Canada

A B.C. Supreme Court justice says three adults who were left to fend for themselves as teenagers decades ago do not have to pay their estranged mother support.

Shirley Marie Anderson, who is now 74 years old, launched legal action against the children in July 2000 and continued the action in 2008, arguing she could not support herself.

The children "vigorously" opposed the lawsuit, arguing Anderson abandoned them as teenagers and has since remained estranged, adding they just don't have the money to pay.

In his reason for judgment, Justice Bruce Butler says that while Anderson is financially dependent, the adults do not have the ability to support her.

Butler says even if the children would have been able to pay, he wouldn't have made such an order and challenged her "moral claim."

Butler has dismissed the court action and ordered Anderson to pay her children's court costs.