Parental Child Abduction – Lesson 1

ABP World Group Child Recovery Services 

Imagine…

You are in the kitchen cooking dinner while your children are playing in your front yard. When you go outside to call them in, they are gone.

Imagine…

You drop off your child at school before work. When you arrive to pick her up in the afternoon you are told that someone else has already taken her.

Imagine…

You wait for your former spouse to return your son following a schedule weekend visit. When your child isn’t returned, you go to the other parent’s home only to discover that the apartment has been vacated.

The physiological response in each of these situations is the same. Your heart begins to pound and your adrenaline starts to surge through your veins as the realization dawns that your children are gone. In an instant your brain considers possible explanations, but they each defy logic. Your brain already knows what your heart is desperately trying to deny. Your children have been kidnapped.

There are few horrors that can rival the experience of having one’s child kidnapped. Movies and television shows sensationalize child abduction. The nightly news further distorts correct understanding of child abduction by only reporting on the most dramatic of cases, for example, the kidnapping of Elizabeth Smart. There exists, however, a less-glamorous form of child abduction which is perpetrated by the child’s own parent.

Parental Kidnappings

Each year there are more than 350,000 child abductions in America. The vast majority of these kidnappings are perpetrated by one of the child’s parents. The official term for this type of crime is “parental child abduction”, but it is also referred to as a “child kidnapping” or “child snatching”. Regardless of the terminology, the fact that the child is taken by the other parent does not diminish or negate the raw emotional trauma inflicted upon the other parent.

Parental kidnapping is the unlawful abduction of a child by one parent which deprives the other parent of their lawful custody of the child.  In divorce situations, the abductor may be the custodial or the non-custodial parent. This means that even if the abductor is the custodial parent or primary caregiver, if the abduction deprives the other parent of his or her court ordered visitation time then the custodial parent is guilty of parental child abduction.

The US Department of Justice (DOJ), Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention conducted an intensive and thorough research study on child abduction in America. The project is called the National Incidence Studies of Missing, Abducted, Runaway, and Thrownaway Children (NISMART). The section that focused specifically on children abducted by family members is called NISMART-2. This article extensively references the NISMART-2. The original study may be found at: http://ojjdp.ncjrs.org

Defining Parental Child Abduction

“For the purposes of NISMART-2, family abduction was defined as the taking or keeping of a child by a family member in violation of a custody order, a decree, or other legitimate custodial rights, where the taking or keeping involved some element of concealment, flight, or intent to deprive a lawful custodian indefinitely of custodial privileges.”

The NISMART-2 elaborates on the definition above by further defining the following terms:

• Taking: Child was taken by a family member in violation of a custody order or decree or other legitimate custodial right.

• Keeping: Child was not returned or given over by a family member in violation of a custody order or decree or other legitimate custodial right.

• Concealment: Family member attempted to conceal the taking or whereabouts of the child with the intent to prevent return, contact or visitation.

• Flight: Family member transported or had the intent to transport the child from the State for the purpose of making recovery more difficult.

• Intent to deprive indefinitely: Family member indicated intent to prevent contact with the child on an indefinite basis or to affect custodial privileges indefinitely.

Conceptualizing the Problem

Of the 203,900 parental child abduction cases studied, 57% were labeled as “caretaker missing”, meaning that the victimized parent did not know where the child was for at least 1 hour, became alarmed and searched for the missing child. However, the NISMART-2 reveals:

“It is possible for a child to have been unlawfully removed from custody by a family member, but for that child’s whereabouts to be fully known. Thus, a child can be abducted but not necessarily missing.”

In fact, the study found that 43% of the children kidnapped were not thought of as “missing” by the victimized parent because the child’s whereabouts were known to the victim parent.

“Although the family abductions described in this study typically had certain disturbing elements such as attempts to prevent contact or alter custodial arrangements permanently, they did not generally involve the most serious sorts of features associated with the types of family abductions likely to be reported in the news. Actual concealment of the child occurred in a minority of episodes. Use of force, threats to harm the child and flight from the State were uncommon. In contrast to the image created by the word ‘abduction,’ most of the children abducted by a family member were already in the lawful custody of the perpetrator when the episode started. In addition, nearly half of the family abducted children were returned in 1 week or less.”

Even if the child is not considered missing, the abduction is still considered child abuse because of the damage that it inflicts upon the child. The NISMART-1 found that, “family abduction can result in psychological harm to the child” and the NISMART-2 states that “family abductions constitute an important peril in the lives of children it is important to remember that the potential harm to family abducted children exists whether or not they are classified as missing”.

Characteristics of Parental Abductions

Location and Season. 73% of parental abductions took place in the child’s own home or yard, or in the home or yard of a relative or friend. Children were removed from schools or day care centers in only 7% of the cases. In 63% of the cases, the children were already with the abductor in lawful circumstances immediately prior to the abduction.

Police Contact. In 40% of all cases, the aggrieved parent did not contact the police to report the abduction. The study found a number of reasons for this, but the majority of responses indicated that the parent did not believe that the police would intervene in the matter because the child’s whereabouts were known, they were in the care of a legal guardian, and it did not appear that the child was being harmed. The highest percentage of abductions took place during the summer.

Ages. 45% of abductors were in their 30’s. 44% of abducted children were younger than age 6.

Indicators of serious episodes. “The use of threats, physical force, or weapons was relatively uncommon in family abductions.” 17% were moved out of State with the intent to make recovery more difficult. 44% were concealed, at least temporarily, from the victimized parent-+. 76% included attempts to prevent contact. 82% included intent to permanently affect the custodial privileges of the aggrieved parent.

Conclusion

Parental child abduction is the unlawful kidnapping of a child by one parent which deprives the other parent of his or her lawful custodial rights. This kind of child snatching not only victimizes the other parent, but it is also a serious form of child abuse.

When the abducting parent chooses to go underground or flees the state or country, recovery of the child becomes exceptionally difficult – and sometimes impossible. Because of this, if you suspect that your child is at risk of abduction you must act now. There are steps you can take to reduce the risk of abduction, as well as actions designed to make the recovery of your child far more likely.

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Child Abduction Prevention

CHILD ABDUCTION PREVENTION The following information is from The National Center for Missing & Exploited Children and the U.S. Department of Justice, Office of Justice Programs, Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention In light of the high profile abductions of several children, the National Center for Missing & Exploited Children (NCMEC) encourages families not to panic. Instead, parents need to empower themselves with information that can help protect their children. CHILD ABDUCTION: STATISTICS Parental abductions and runaway cases make up the majority of missing children in the United States. In 2002 there were about 797,500 children reported missing, or nearly 2,185 per day. The vast majority of these cases were recovered quickly; however, the parent or guardian was concerned enough to contact law enforcement and they placed the child into the FBI’s National Crime Information Center – a computerized national database of criminal justice information. It is available to Federal, state and local law enforcement and other criminal justice agencies. Each year there are about 3,000 to 5,000 non-family abductions reported to police, most of which are short term sexually-motivated cases. About 200 to 300 of these cases, or 6 percent, make up the most serious cases where the child was murdered, ransomed or taken with the intent to keep. The NCMEC analyzed more than 4200 attempted abductions from February 2005 to March 2010 and found that 38% of attempted abductions occur while a child is walking alone to or from school, riding the school bus or riding a bicycle; 37 % of attempted abductions occur between the hours of 2:00pm through 7:00pm on a weekday; 43% of attempted abductions involve children between the ages of 10 and 14; 72% of attempted abduction victims are female; 68 % of attempted abductions involve the suspect driving a vehicle. Research shows that of the 58,000 non-family abductions each year 63% involved a friend, long-term acquaintaince, neighbor, caretaker, baby sitter or person of authority; only 37% involved a stranger. SAFETY TIPS FOR PARENTS: Be sure to go over the rules with your children about whose homes they can visit when you’re not there and discuss the boundaries of where they can and can’t go in the neighborhood. Always listen to your children and keep the lines of communication open. Teach your children to get out of dangerous or uncomfortable situations right away, and practice role-playing and basic safety skills with them. Teach your children in whose car they may ride. Children should be cautioned never to approach any vehicle, occupied or not, unless accompanied by a parent or trusted adult. Make sure children know their names, address, telephone numbers and how to use the telephone. Choose babysitters with care. Obtain references from family, friends and neighbors. SAFETY TIPS FOR CHILDREN: Always check first with your parents or the person in charge before you go anywhere or do anything. Always take a friend when you play or go somewhere. Don’t be tricked by adults who offer you special treats or gifts or ask you for help. Don’t be afraid to say no and get away from any situation that makes you feel uncomfortable or confused. Trust your feelings. Don’t get into a car or go near a car with someone in it unless you are with your parents or a trusted adult. Never take a ride from someone without checking first with your parents. Never go into a public restroom by yourself. Never go alone to the mall, movies, video arcades or parks. Stay safe when you’re home alone by keeping the door locked. Do not open the door for or talk to anyone who stops by unless the person is a trusted family friend or relative. INTERNATIONAL PARENTAL ABDUCTION In situations where parents have not resolved the issue of child custody, and one of the parents has ties to another country, there is the risk that that parent might take the child with them to a foreign country. Parents who are in this situation can find useful information about international parental abduction in “A Family Resource Guide on International Parental Kidnapping” published by the U.S. Department of Justice, Office of Justice Programs, Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention. For more information please visit www.missingkids.com or call NCMEC’s toll-free hotline at 1-800-843-5678. Published by: ABP World Group International Child Recovery Services Follow our updates on Twitter and Facebook

You Kidnap My Child, And I Get In Trouble?

Divorce

That word hurts.

In the ideal world, a child doesn’t know that word. In today’s world (arguably the exact opposite of ideal), a child not only knows that word but knows many friends with divorced parents, including his own. Actually, my friends and I get excited when we hear about someone’s parents still together. You can literally hear us exclaiming something like, “WOW. How did that happen??” Parents staying together “in good times and in bad” and “in sickness and in health” is a rarity.

According to the enrichment journal on the current divorce rate in America, first marriages fail 50 percent of the time; second marriages fail 60 percent; and third marriages fail 73 percent. Only ten years ago, the U.S. Bureau of Census reported a 40 percent failure of first marriages.

If being apart is more common than staying together, child custody battles are bound to be everywhere.

As a teacher, I’ve seen more than several cases. I would hope for a situation where both parents would walk into a conference and things would go smoothly, as both want the best for their child. And in some circumstances, this would be the case. Excellent. A smooth meeting.

And then the other scene would take place: Mom accuses Dad of hiding things; Dad accuses Mom of lying to the child. If anything went awry, fingers were pointed. My heart always went to the sweet child caught in the middle.

Sorrowfully, this may be the least of child custody complications.

Parental kidnapping occurs more often than reported. According to Lost Children, more than 350,000 family abductions occur in the U.S. each year – that is nearly 1,000 per day!

Recently, an American dad was in the news. Why? His ex-wife took their two children to her home country, Japan. Not on a visit to see family. She fled the United States with the kids.

Need some history on this couple? Here’s the breakdown: Christopher and Noriko were married for 14 years. They lived in Japan for a while but moved back to the United States before the divorce. She agreed during the divorce to remain in the United States. She didn’t. The courts then gave sole custody to Christopher.

What’s a father to do? Forget about it, not deal with it, and never see his children again? Let the mother do whatever she wants? Let her get away with kidnap?

No. He went to be a father. He went to make things right. Easy enough, yeah? No. Japan still recognizes the mother as the sole custodian.

Christopher abducted the children as they were on their way to school.

Pause. I am NOT saying it’s okay to kidnap children – even your own. Children are traumatized enough as it is. However…(nah, I’ll wait for that. Back to our story.)

Christopher ended up getting caught, seconds away from the front gate of the U.S. consulate’s office. Ouch. He’s currently in jail for child abduction in Japan.

Now, where was I? Yes. However…

Shouldn’t certain things be understood between nations, like custody, for example? Different nations have different rules. I understand that some things are different…steal an apple here? Not a big problem. Steal an apple somewhere else? Could be a big problem. But children’s rights? Kidnap? I’m thinking that should be a lot closer to universal. Why isn’t it? Last time I checked, children are humans….and they have rights. So, this case could be argued as a human rights case.

And if divorce rates are rising, shouldn’t our concern for parental kidnapping rise as well?

Source: NeonTommy

Published by: ABP World Group International Child Recovery Service

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Warning of child abduction to sharia law states

Source:The Irish Times, Dublin

FORMER MEP Mary Banotti has called on the Government to monitor the number of reported child abduction cases involving sharia law countries which have not signed international conventions on the issue.

Figures published by the Department of Justice last week showed that a record 141 transnational child abduction cases were dealt with by the authorities last year.

The department said 141 cases involving 183 children were received by the Central Authority for Child Abduction in 2008, an increase of 42 cases on 2007 and the highest annual total since the unit was established in 1991.

However, Ms Banotti, who is president of Irish Centre for Parentally Abducted Children, said it was very difficult to retrieve children who were abducted by one parent to a state that had not signed the Hague conventions on child abduction. Cases involving countries governed by sharia law were particularly difficult to resolve.

“I think there should be a record kept of all children removed to sharia law countries,” she said.

Ms Banotti pointed to a case in which an Irish woman, originally from a north African state, was reunited in January with her four children six years after her husband took them back to their country of origin without her consent. Because the African state had not signed the Hague conventions, the woman had no legal avenue to pursue in order to retrieve her children, who were aged between two and seven when they were taken in 2002.

She was eventually reunited with them in January after her husband was arrested by gardaí on his return to Ireland.

Ms Banotti said the latest child abduction figures corroborated her organisation’s view that the problem remained significant. The centre received reports of seven abductions in the past week.

A major shift in trends in recent years was that, whereas women until recently made up the vast majority of those reporting abduction, today at least half of reports came from men.

While the overwhelming majority of transnational abduction cases investigated here once involved the United States and the UK, recent immigration patterns are reflected in the variety of central and eastern European countries that have appeared on the department’s list in recent years.

In 2008, a total of 33 cases related to states that joined the EU since 2004, including Poland, Latvia, Lithuania, Hungary, the Czech Republic and Romania.

Published by: ABP World Group International Child Recovery Service

Visit our web site at: www.abpworld.com

Interpol – Abducted and missing children

Source: Interpol

INTERPOL maintains a database of missing and abducted children on behalf of the member countries.

The only children appearing on this website are those which the respective law enforcement authorities request INTERPOL to circulate on an international basis.Therefore, out of the important number of children who go missing, only a few hundred appear here.

There can be nothing more distressing for a parent than to not know their child has gone missing. It is INTERPOL’s belief, that all actors of the civil society must join forces to ensure that children do not go missing and, if so, that all efforts are put into finding them.

This is why INTERPOL decided to request the public at large to help law enforcement forces in trying to find those internationally reported missing children and dedicated part of our website to the most crucial cases.

See info about recent events here: Interpol

Published by: ABP World Group International Child Recovery Service

Visit our web site at: www.abpworld.com

500 children a year abducted from UK

New data reveals a stark rise in child kidnapping by estranged parents

By Helen Pidd,guardian.co.uk, Sunday 9 August 2009

Almost 500 children were abducted from the UK and taken abroad illegally last year, according to figures released to the Guardian under the Freedom of Information Act.

There were 336 cases of child abduction reported to authorities in the UK in 2008, an increase of 20% on 2005 figures. These cases involved an estimated 470 children last year. More children were taken illegally to Pakistan than any other country (30 cases in 2008), followed by the USA (23), Ireland (22) and Spain (21). Other abduction hotspots included Australia, France and Egypt.

Abductions usually occur when marriages break down between couples of different nationalities, and the parent who is not awarded custody kidnaps their children. Now is peak abduction season, as children are taken abroad during the school summer holidays and not returned.

Usually, the cases aren’t publicised as they are dealt with in the family courts where reporting restrictions apply to any cases involving the welfare of minors. But they are becoming increasingly common – when the Guardian spent a day in a family court in London recently, eight out of 14 cases heard involved child abduction.

The government has little power to intervene in around 40% of all abduction cases, as they involve children being taken to countries not signed up to the Hague convention, an international treaty which obliges nations to promptly return children wrongfully retained in their jurisdiction. Experts say it is often almost impossible for mothers to get back children taken by their fathers to Islamic countries with sharia law, such as Saudi Arabia, which prioritise male parental rights.

But recently Gordon Brown and the new health secretary, Andy Burnham, have personally intervened in the case of Nadia Fawzi, then a four-year-old British girl taken from Wigan to Libya by her Libyan father.

A month ago, Burnham, the girl’s MP, flew to Tripoli for meetings with the Libyan justice ministry and police force about the case, and Gordon Brown asked the Libyan leader, Colonel Gaddafi, to help return the girl to the UK when the two met for the first time at the G8 summit in Italy.

Nadia was picked up from her home in Wigan by her father, who said they were going to a party. But instead, he drove to Manchester airport, where he was captured on CCTV buying plane tickets to Libya. Nadia hasn’t been home since.

Her British mother, Sarah Taylor, saw her daughter on a few occasions in the months after her abduction, but has had no contact with her since Christmas 2007.

Taylor has spent the last two years doing everything in her power to be reunited with her now six-year-old daughter. Libya is a notoriously difficult country to negotiate with on such matters – it has not signed up to the Hague convention, and so the UK government is limited in the support it can offer.

In November 2007, Taylor took a drastic step. She sold her house, gave up her job and moved to Libya to fight through the local courts for the custody she had already been awarded in the UK courts after her marriage to Nadia’s father broke down.

After a long and difficult battle in the labyrinthine sharia legal system, Taylor won full custody of Nadia in 2008. But her ex-husband refused to comply with the court order, and despite quiet but firm interventions from the Foreign Office and assorted other agencies in the UK and Tripoli, he still has the little girl in his care. Or at least Taylor believes he does – no one is entirely sure where in the Libyan capital father and daughter are currently living.

Burnham told the Guardian he is hopeful that mother and daughter will soon be reunited.

He said: “This awful injustice and crime has now been raised at the highest level and we now expect swift action. This is a story about a young girl taken illegally off the streets of my constituency and I will go to any lengths to right that wrong.”

In 2008, 134 out of the 336 cases of child abduction involved children taken to non-Hague countries, including Bangladesh, Russia, Iraq and Nigeria. These cases are dealt with by the Foreign Office, while Hague cases go through the Ministry of Justice in England and Wales, and the Scottish and Northern Irish court services.

Scotland dealt with nine cases last year involving 12 children. In Northern Ireland last year there were 12 reported instances, involving 20 children taken to the Republic of Ireland, the USA, Israel, Germany, Finland, Poland and France.

The increase in cases is an “inevitable consequence of greater migration”, according to Andy Elvin, chief executive of the charity International Social Services, which helps parents secure the return of their children. “Child abduction is a growing trend as we have an increasing number of families where at least one parent is originally from overseas,” he said.

Denise Carter, director of Reunite, a UK charity specialising in international parental child abduction, said: “The increase in international travel and more and more people travelling on short-term contracts and changing their habitual residence also has an effect.”

Figures from Reunite show that since 1995, the number of children abducted from Britain and taken to another country has risen by 93%.

The government’s figures clearly show the effect of EU enlargement. For example, until Latvia joined the EU in 2004, there had been no reported cases of children being abducted there from the UK in the previous four years. But in 2005, three cases were reported, and there has been at least one new instance every year since.

Similarly, while there were no reported abductions to Poland in 2003, the year before the country’s EU entry, there were 10 in 2006 and 2008. “We expect to see more and more cases from countries like Poland as the years go on and more couples marry, have children and get divorced,” said Elvin.

A Foreign Office spokesperson said: “When there is no international mechanism in place, usually the left-behind parent’s only option [other than trying to come to an agreement with the other parent] is to file a case in the courts of the country where their child has been taken. However, pursuing such a case will often be expensive and there is no guarantee the courts will decide that the child should be returned to the UK.”

Summer is peak abduction season as children are taken abroad during school holidays and not returned.

Published by: ABP World Group International Child Recovery Service

Visit our web site at: www.abpworld.com

Parental Alienation Syndrome (PAS)

From paskids.com

This is the definition of PAS as described by R.A. Gardner who discovered the syndrome and has become an expert in dealing with the issue.

Gardner’s definition of PAS is:

“The parental alienation syndrome (PAS) is a disorder that arises primarily in the context of child-custody disputes. Its primary manifestation is the child’s campaign of denigration against a parent, a campaign that has no justification. It results from the combination of a programming (brainwashing) parent’s indoctrinations and the child’s own contributions to the vilification of the target parent.”

(Excerpted from: Gardner, R.A. (1998). The Parental Alienation Syndrome, Second Edition, Cresskill, NJ: Creative Therapeutics, Inc.)

Basically, this means that through verbal and non verbal thoughts, actions and mannerisms, a child is emotionally abused (brainwashed) into thinking the other parent is the enemy. This ranges from bad mouthing the other parent infront of the children, to withholding visits, to pre-arranging the activities for the children while visiting with the other parent.

Read more about it at www.paskids.com

Published by: ABP World Group International Child Recovery Service

Preventing Abductions

Whenever the evening news brings the story of a kidnapped child or teen, the terrifying prospect of abduction fills the minds of parents across the country. But it’s important to remember that most kids pass through childhood safely.

Read more about it at www.Kidshealth.org

Published by:ABP World Group International Child Recovery Services