Senior health board managers will appear before the High Court today to explain why troubled children in care were placed in premises run by private companies without the court being informed.
Mr Justice Kelly yesterday described the attitude of the Northern Area Health Board as "bordering, if not actually trespassing", on contempt of court.
The evidence he had heard in recent weeks about the NAHB - one of three boards in the Eastern Regional Health Authority - gave rise to "very considerable question marks" over how it conducted its business.
The judge made the remark after being told a boy aged 13 had been placed in premises operated by Community Children's Centres Ltd. He said there was no indication the premises was ever inspected and the board's involvement in the placement was "cursory".
Although he had made an order last November, continued in December, directing that the boy be detained at the premises, he was never told it was run by a commercial entity, the judge said. Neither was he told the boy had been essentially ejected from there early in February and again early this month. The child was in a "legal limbo" and effectively at large with no one taking responsibility for him.
In the circumstances, the judge said, he would discharge the order placing the child in the private premises. The welfare of the child now rested exclusively with the health board.
