Section 6 – Decree of Court; Force and Effect; Private Hearings
Section 6. If the court is satisfied of the identity and relations of the persons, and that the petitioner is of sufficient ability to bring up the child and provide suitable support and education for it, and that the child should be adopted, it shall make a decree, by which, except as regards succession to […]
Section 6a – Certificates of Adoption
Section 6A. The court shall forthwith, following the making of a decree of adoption, issue to the petitioner, or petitioners, a certificate of adoption setting forth all the facts relating to the adopting parent, or parents, as appearing in the statement required to be filed by section six, the name of, and all other facts […]
Section 6b – Adoption Nunc Pro Tunc
Section 6B. In the event that either of the petitioning adopting parents to a petition for adoption, which has been filed with the probate court, should die prior to the entry of a decree of adoption, the probate court may enter a decree within three months following the date of death nunc pro tunc to […]
Section 6c – Agreement for Post-Adoption Contact or Communication
Section 6C. (a) Prior to the entry of an adoption decree, prospective adoptive parents and a birth parent may enter into an agreement for post-adoption contact or communication between or among a minor to be adopted, the prospective adoptive parents and the birth parents. Such agreement may be approved by the court issuing the termination […]
Section 6d – Enforcement of Agreement
Section 6D. A party to a court-approved agreement for post-adoption contact or communication may seek to enforce the agreement by commencing a civil action for specific performance. A court order for specific performance of the terms of a post-adoption contact agreement shall be the sole remedy for breach of an agreement. In such proceedings, parties […]
Section 6e – Decisions of Adoptive Parent on Behalf of Child
Section 6E. Nothing contained in sections 6C and 6D shall be construed to abrogate the right of an adoptive parent to make decisions on behalf of his child.
Section 9 – Succession to Property; Right of Child Adopted in Foreign State
Section 9. A person adopted in another state or country, in accordance with the laws thereof, shall upon proof of such fact be entitled in this commonwealth to the same rights of succession to property by grant, trust settlement, entail, devise, bequest, or by intestacy as he would have had if he had been adopted […]
Section 10 – Second Adoption; Effect
Section 10. If the child has been previously adopted, all the legal consequences of the former decree shall, upon a subsequent adoption, determine, except so far as any interest in property may have vested in the adopted child, and a decree to that effect shall be entered on the records of the court.
Section 11 – Appeals
Section 11. The supreme judicial court may allow a parent, who, upon a petition for adoption, had no notice of the proceedings before the decree and had neither waived notice in accordance with section two nor been the subject of a decree dispensing with need for notice in accordance with section three, to appeal therefrom […]
Section 11a – Adoption Services Offered by Certain Persons or Agencies; Penalty
Section 11A. Any person or entity other than a duly authorized agent or employee of the department of children and families or a child care or placement agency licensed under the provisions of chapter 15D, who causes to be published in the commonwealth an advertisement or notice of children offered or wanted for adoption, or […]