How a landmark 1983 adoption case left a First Nations girl trying to ‘not be brown anymore -cbc

Sep 30, 2025

Leticia Racine’s adoptive mother would eventually place her back into foster care

It’s been four decades but Leticia Racine is still trying to make sense of a battle over her custody that went all the way to the Supreme Court of Canada — and the impact the landmark case has had on her and other Indigenous kids in the years since.

The case cut her off from her biological family, her culture and even her own identity for decades.

“I wasn’t ever told that I was Ojibway and Dakota. Like, that was never a conversation growing up,” Leticia said in an interview for the CBC News podcast See You in Court.

Read More: https://www.cbc.ca/news/indigenous/podcast-first-nations-adoption-1.7645251