I traced my dad’s family history, and

By Dan Goater dan@westdorsetmag.co.uk

When Laraine Cousins began investigating her father’s family history, she had no idea it would lead to her launching a groundbreaking legal case and revealing his suspected link to one of Britain’s most notorious crimes –the Great Train Robbery. In 1969, a 19-year-old Laraine – who grew up in Evershot – learned from her mum that her father, Leonard ‘Peter’ Cousins, was adopted. He was born in Huish Episcopi, Somerset, in 1929 but was adopted by a couple living in Weston-super-Mare. Despite Laraine encouraging her dad to find his birth parents, he refused, and died in 2011 without knowing who they were.

Not content with letting her questions remain unanswered, Laraine began what would become a lengthy legal campaign to access her father’s birth records. Laraine’s family had lived in various locations in Somerset, Dorset and Hampshire and her investigation began by contacting the former Bournemouth Council’s social services adoption team.

After more than a year of cutting through red tape, the team obtained Peter’s adoption records from the courts in Weston-superMare – before telling Laraine she had no legal right to view them.

In response, Laraine lodged a case with the family court in Bristol to access the records after they were moved there.

“I was in court for 30 minutes before the judge said my case was too complex,” Laraine said. “I was told the case would need to go before Sir James Munby, the president of the High Court’s Family Division, when he was on a circuit tour of the courts.

“I was told I would need a barrister, but I was quoted £25-30,000 for the case. I knew people who had taken cases to the High Court and lost a lot of money, so I said: ‘Look, I know it’s ridiculous, but I’m going to represent myself.’

“The barrister I was talking to at the time basically said: ‘Good luck with that’. He said Sir James Munby has a brain the size of a planet and I wouldn’t get anywhere with him.

“I said: ‘I will.’”

When Laraine got to the High Court in July 2014, she said she didn’t know what to write in her formal application.

“I was just staring at a blank piece of paper. I had been told the only way to access my father’s records would be if I could demonstrate exceptional circumstances,” she said.

“I couldn’t really think of anything to say other than: ‘It’s exceptional to me even if it’s not to anyone else.’”

After making her representations, Laraine had to wait until September 2014 to learn she had won her case –setting a legal precedent that she could view a parent’s birth records after their death.

She said: “When I finally got to view those records, among them was a letter my great grandmother by birth, Ivy, had written to my dad basically saying he was loved but, due to circumstances that weren’t fully spelled out, he had to be adopted. The sad thing is dad never saw that letter.”

Laraine’s investigation into her father’s life had one incredibly unexpected side effect – it’s led her to suspect he played a small role in the Great Train Robbery.

Laraine said her father, a working-class man of limited means, became a qualified pilot after someone paid for him to have flying lessons.

During the week of the Great Train Robbery in August 1963, Peter sent Laraine and her mum and siblings to Butlins for a week’s holiday, saying he had to take on a week of