Parental Abduction Spain – Walking across borders: Orihuela father’s fight to see his daughter

August 27, 2015

Source: euroweeklynews

“I HAVE always said that I would walk to see my child if I had to. So that is exactly what I intend to do.” 

That’s the determination of one parent to try and gain access to his daughter, and to raise the important awareness about parental child abduction.
Steven Monk-Dalton has now embarked on the walk of a lifetime; from Orihuela to London in a 44-day journey in support of UK charity Reunite International, which helps families affected by child abduction. 

Steven has been planning the Walk Across Borders challenge since February this year and set off from the Orihuela Court on Sunday August 23. His epic 1,082-mile walk will take him north through Spain and France on to the UK, finishing at the Royal Court of Justice, London, in early October where around 30 people will join him in a demonstration.

Already Steven has raised around €1,700 and had support along the start of his journey as Alison Shalaby from Reunite joined him for the first few days of the walk along with volunteer Michelle from the One Day Closer charity shop Steven set up in Villamartin Plaza.

Maurizio Rigamonti flew over from Italy to drive the support car and follow Steven. He had his child returned home to Italy from America via the Hague Convention but is still denied any access to his son. Steven hopes more will join him at the various stages as he plans to walk a marathon a day, and this weekend he should be crossing through and stopping off at La Torre, Landete, Libros, Caude and Monreal del Campo.

Steven is raising money for the charity having been one of the thousands of parents who contacted them for help and advice after his daughter was taken back to the UK by her mother without his consent. It has been five years since he has had any contact with her and she turns 10 this month as Steven is on the walk. He said he had fought for years through the courts and even hired a private detective in the UK to track her down so he could at least know where she was.

Whilst he said the walk was very much about making sure his little girl would one day know she was never forgotten or abandoned by her father, it was about raising awareness for each and every one of the parents and family members who do not get to see a child and how he believed the system had failed them: “I have tried to do everything the right way and under the correct jurisdiction but they let you down, the system is broken. There are failures in the system that allows parental abduction to occur without deterrent or accountability.”

Steven added: “How can ‘parents’ be so cruel as to play God with their children’s lives in this way? It is like a living bereavement.”

For more information on Steven’s cause and follow his challenge or to make a donation, visit his blog at http://walkacrossborders.blogspot.com.es/ or search Walk Across Borders on Facebook.

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There were 64 cases of children being abducted from Ireland last year

September 12 , 2014

Source: thejournal.ie

THE DEPARTMENT OF JUSTICE dealt with 109 new cases of child abduction last year, 45 relating to children entering the country and 64 leaving.

The department acts as the Central Authority for International Child Abduction and its annual report says that, in total, they dealt with 208 new cases last year.

This total also includes cases of  care orders and access applications as well as international child placements.

Including ongoing cases, the authority dealt with a total of 346 cases in 2013.

The abductions related primarily to suspected parental child abductions according to Minister for Justice Frances Fitzgerald.

“Parental child abduction is a growing problem globally reflecting the greater mobility of people around the world and all the consequences of this,” she said today.

Ireland is no different and it is important that we are proactive in working with central authorities in other states in resolving complaints regarding international parental child abductions where they arise.

About half of the cases dealt with last year related to abductions to or from the United Kingdom.

Of the 138 ongoing cases of child abduction, 51 were incoming and 87 were outgoing.

Upon the publication of the report, Fitzgerald said that she hoped many cases could be resolved by families themselves but added that, in most cases, legal remedies are required.

“The resolution of issues around parental child abduction is usually by international law,” she said. “But I would encourage any family to try to resolve their differences before such situations arise and avail of the services available to mediate solutions in the best interest of the children and all those involved.”

Fitzgerald advised families that the Family Mediation Service in the Legal Aid Board can help families reach agreement without having to resort to court.

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International Parental Child Abduction – Child Recovery Services, a necessary evil?

January 23, 2014

“We agree with some of the systems governments have in place to prevent and fight these family disputes, they do work on many different levels and in some cases have great results.

We only exist to help those who have been effected by the failures within the system, mainly due to a conflict in laws or procedures from other governments. These flaws can prevent a parent from any access to their children and even lock them out of pursuing a court case.

Desperate parents turn to us only because they have no where else to turn. We find that it is our responsibility to help those who have no one else to turn to. We do our best in helping these families but we are not miracle workers, sometimes we fail due to difficult circumstances but no one can match the numbers of abducted children that we have achieved to bring home safely during the last 12 years.
«After all my years of experience as Worldwide Medical Director for the worlds largest medical assistance company, I found only ABP World Group capable of providing the unique service of non-violent recovery of an abducted child»
It is very difficult to find a company like ABP World that can provide the experience, honesty, integrity, and assets to actually recover an abducted child safely and at a reasonable cost. I hold ABP World in highest regard and recommend them wholeheartedly. The world is simply a better place because of the work they do. – R. Weston

It is understandable that some concerns are raised about parents using a private security firm, the majority of these parents have no other options left except give up their children and be at risk to never seeing them again. In the last 5 years parental abductions have risen dramaticly, the success of Hague applications is only 3-5%, and the actual success of courts enforcing the Hague applications is less.

The tools that are in place are dated and need to be modernized to ensure a fair return of children to their place of origin so parents can mediate and do whats best for the actual victim, the children.

“It is a great misconception that a child abducted by a parentis a safe child” – Martin Waage, ABP World Group

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Worldwide International Number: +31-208112223

Worldwide 24/7 Emergency Number: +31-208112223

LEPCA -Lawyers in Europe on Parental Child Abduction

January 21 , 2014

Source : LEPCA 

European conference 7-8-9-(10*) May 2014

The International Child Abduction Center in the Netherlands (Center IKO) is organising the first European conference for family lawyers who represent parents in international parental child abduction cases, called LEPCA.

The conference takes place on 8 & 9 May 2014 in the Peace Palace in The Hague, the Netherlands. Here you will find the program.

Register now

Our partner in this project is Mediation bei internationalen Kindschaftskonflikten (MiKK) in Berlin, Germany. Associate Partner organisations are law firms in Belgium, France, Italy, Spain and the United Kingdom, and Non-Governmental Organisations in Bulgaria, Poland and Romania. In addition, Center IKO has established a network of specialised law firms and NGO’s in many countries within the European Union.
The LEPCA Conference addresses on legal professionals who deal with the subject of international parental child abduction cases under the 1980 Hague Abduction Convention, the Brussels II bis Regulation and the 1996 Hague Child Protection Convention.

The objective of the project is to learn from best practices, exchange ideas and create a platform of specialised parental child abduction lawyers within Europe.

About LEPCA 

 

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1-800-847-2315 US Toll free Number
0-808-189-0066 UK Toll Free Number
800-11-618        Norway Toll Free Number

Worldwide International Number: +31-208112223

Worldwide 24/7 Emergency Number: +31-208112223

Parental Child Abduction to Ukraine and Russia

November 5, 2012

Child kidnapping is a crime that happens with frightening regularity. And it often involves the parents. Sometimes a Ukrainian-born mother cannot adapt to her new life abroad and returns to the safety of her native Ukraine, taking along her child without the father’s consent. Or a divorce has gone wrong, and the mother takes the child back to Ukraine despite a court order that allows the father visitation rights.

In any case, domestic child kidnapping is a fairly common event that carries criminal consequences for the offending parent.

As a general rule, the Ukrainian Interpol Bureau, a part of the Ministry of Internal Affairs of Ukraine, should take action based on Interpol notices for missing children and kidnapping parents. This warrant information is also shared with the Ukrainian State Border Control Service.

Unfortunately, there is no national coordinating agency for such searches. The State Execution Service of the Ministry of Justice of Ukraine enforces related court decisions on a case-by-case basis and the Court’s Execution Service involves other relevant agencies, such as local police or children’s services. The entire system is quite bureaucratic and unpredictable, and often precious little gets done in the way of returning the child to the foreign parent.

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Providing assistance in cases of international parental child abductions

August 15, 2012

Source: The Washington Post

More than 1,300 children living in the United States were victims of international parental abductions in 2011 — taken to a foreign country and kept there without one parent’s permission.

As a member of the State Department’s Bureau of Consular Affairs, it is Scott Renner’s job to provide assistance to the parent whose child has been taken away without their consent to either Mexico or Canada.

 

In this role, Renner and his staff help aggrieved parents contact the proper authorities in Mexico or Canada, get legal assistance, locate their children, negotiate voluntary settlements or begin the judicial process for the child’s return so that the issue of custody can be resolved by a court in the U.S. Renner does not make decisions on who should have custody, but steps into the breach to help parents who often have nowhere else to turn.

“We don’t judge their cases. It’s not about who is a better parent,” said Renner. “A judge in Mexico is supposed to decide if the child is to be sent back to the United States, and a judge in the United States will decide which parent should have custody.”

Renner said the cases are often difficult, contentious and emotional. They involve navigating different judicial systems, different legal definitions of custody and many other obstacles.

“We don’t deal with happy families and the cases are often complicated,” said Renner. “It may not always turn out well, but we give them a voice, explain the laws and procedures and help them as best we can.”

About one-third of all reported international parental child abductions from the United States involve Mexico. According to the latest statistics, 1,367 children were reported abducted by parents and taken to foreign countries in 2011, with 465 of those going to Mexico. Mexico has been a focal point for a number of reasons, including strong cultural and social and economic ties with the U.S., many of cross-border relationships, a great deal of immigration back and forth and a very long border.

Renner said some abducted children are never returned, some cases take years to resolve and others are settled relatively quickly. He said improved cooperation with Mexican authorities has helped, with 180 children returned to the United States from Mexico in 2010 and 250 in 2011.

“One of the biggest problems we have is locating the kids. Mexico is a chaotic country,” said Renner. “Kids can be missing for eight to 10 years.”

In one case, Renner said, a child was abducted by a parent in the United States and taken to a town in Mexico that had barricaded itself from the drug traffickers. He said a local judge was “brave enough’ to pursue the matter, negotiated with the child’s grandmother and got an agreement to send the youngster back to the mother in the United States.

Renner became the first chief of a newly-created Mexico and Canada branch in September 2010 shortly after the United States’ relationship with Mexico on parental abductions hit a low point. The State Department had cited Mexico as “not compliant” with the provisions of the Hague Abduction Convention, a treaty designed to return an abducted child promptly to his country of habitual residence.

Colleagues said Renner promoted coordination and collaboration with Mexico, and helped improve a strained relationship, expedite new cases and resolve many of those that had been backlogged.

Beth Payne, director of the State Department’s Office of Children’s Issues, said Renner “worked on the diplomatic level to change way we dealt with Mexican officials on child abduction issues.”

“He traveled to Mexico, worked with different groups, met with government officials, established personal relationships and strong connections, talked about what was in their interest and ours, and got positive solutions to many cases,” said Payne. “He has created the model that we are now following in the rest of the office.”

Renner, a Foreign Service Officer, joined the State Department in 1997 and has had assignments in Nigeria, Chile, Columbia and Poland. This month, he will be promoted from his current job to serve as division chief for Western Hemisphere Outgoing Abductions.

Renner said his job, like many of his other assignments, have given him a chance to “help people solve their problems.”

“I have always been motivated to make a difference on a personal level,” said Renner. “It is really rewarding for me and I am getting paid to do it.”

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Florida Divorce and Custody Disputes that Lead to Parental Abduction: What To Do To Recover Your Child

Source: Jacksonville Divorce Lawyer Blog

In a Florida family law case involving children, such as divorce, paternity, or change of custody, emotions can run rather high.

Unfortunately, stress often surrounds these experiences and the consequences of the stress, if not handled properly, can lead to horrible actions by one parent. A parent who feels their world is caving in may turn to extreme acts, like abducting their child. Florida law has accepted, like most states, the Uniform Child Custody Jurisdiction and Enforcement Act (UCCJEA) which rules that initial child custody determinations should be made by the child’s home state.

A child’s home state is the state in which a child has lived with a parent or guardian for at least six (6) months. It also determines that if a parent, in fact takes a child, the child should be returned to the home state unless an emergency lead to the fleeing (e.g. physical abuse of the parent and/or child by the other parent).
The UCCJEA allows for protection of the parents and the child by providing for legal action to be taken if a parent were to abduct the child. In the United States, there are numbers cases of parent abduction each year and having a protection like the UCCJEA is vital to recovering the children. What it allows is for the nonoffending party to file a petition with the court for an emergency child pick-up. The petition must state the actions of the other parent and give a place where the parent and child are most likely located. Once an order is entered in the home state of the child, like Florida, then the order must be adopted by the state where the child is physically located. Once the order is adopted, it is enforceable against the parent with the child and the parent is required to return the child to the home state. If the offending parent refuses or fails to do so, then the parent may be charged with kidnapping, not to mention the impact that parent’s actions will have on any custody dispute pending in the court.

In Florida, there are many individuals that moved from other countries and as a family law attorney, I often have clients concerned that the other parent will return to his/her country with the child. If a child is taken, without consent of both parents, to a different country, then the Hague Convention on International Kidnapping and Child Custody will have to be employed. The countries that have adopted this action often work diligently at having the child returned to the United States. However, not all countries have adopted the Hague Convention, which can lead to additional jurisdictional issues. A passport for a child requires both parents to consent by signing the application; if this is a concern of yours then you should deny the child getting a passport.
Child abduction is a serious matter and having an understanding for your rights and what actions can be taken to protect you and your child are vital in any type of case. If you have experienced a child custody battle or abduction, then you should speak with a family law attorney in your area for immediate assistance.

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International Parental Child Abduction from the U.S.: Reuniting with your child

Source: divorcelawyerconnecticut

Reuniting with Your Child

Reuniting with your child can be a powerful and emotional event, especially if the reunification takes place after a prolonged period of time. You and your child will no doubt be experiencing a wide range of emotions around this important occasion. Your case officer can provide you advice about reunification, and can help coordinateU.S.and foreign government authorities’ involvement.

 

Reunification Resources

• Reunification Funds – The financial costs of reunification to left-behind parents can be substantial. The Department of Justice’s Office for Victims of Crime (OVC) has established a fund called The Federal Crime Victim Assistance Fund. When no other resources are available, this fund has at times been used to assist left-behind parents with travel costs associated with reunification. The National Center for Missing and Exploited Children administers the OVC funds for left-behind parents. To learn about whether you might qualify for such assistance, contact your case officer.

Reunification Counselors– Many left-behind parents find it helpful to use the services of a reunification counselor to help guide them through the process. The National Center for Missing and Exploited Children maintains a list of reunification counselors. If you think you might benefit from their assistance, ask NCMEC to put you in touch with one of these experts.

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Protecting Kids: Rethinking the Hague Convention

By MIRELA IVERAC, TIME Magazine

In 1980, an international treaty was designed to return children who had been abducted by a parent who moved to another country.

Back then, the people drafting the treaty thought the typical abductor would be a noncustodial father skipping town with the kids, leaving mom with little recourse to try to get her children back. So what happens, three decades later, when research indicates that 68% of the abducting parents in cases under this treaty are mothers — and that many of them are fleeing abusive spouses?

The Convention on the Civil Aspects of International Child Abduction, dubbed the Hague Convention after the place where it was finalized, has been adopted by 82 countries, which are expected to help return abducted children to their habitual residence within six weeks of a parent filing a petition. But Jeffrey Edleson and Taryn Lindhorst, lead researchers on a new study of Hague Convention cases, argue that the treaty is often used against women seeking safety for themselves — and for their children — from violent husbands. “We always thought that child abduction is a bad thing,” says Edleson, a professor of social work at the University of Minnesota. “But in some cases, mothers are taking children to protect them from greater harm.”(Read about countless Chinese children who have been kidnapped and sold to strangers.)

Building on a previous study by Nigel Lowe, a law professor at Britain’s Cardiff University, that found more than two-thirds of alleged abductors in Hague cases filed worldwide were women, Edleson and Lindhorst looked at the more than 300 Hague Convention decisions that were published in U.S. courts between 1993 and 2008. Their new study, which was funded by the National Institute of Justice and will be published next year by Northeastern University Press, analyzed the 47 published U.S. Hague Convention court decisions involving allegations of domestic violence and included interviews with 22 battered mothers who responded to Hague petitions in U.S. courts. The majority of those women had their children ordered to return to another country.

The result in several cases was that the children — and their mothers, who generally accompanied them — faced renewed physical abuse upon their return, researchers found in interviews with the mothers. “Judges want to trust our treaty partners will provide protection for our children and mothers,” says Merle Weiner, a law professor at the University of Oregon and one of the nation’s leading scholars on the Hague Convention. “But sometimes that protection is not real. Sometimes the batterer is so dangerous that only geographical distance can make a difference.”(Read about the abduction of Elizabeth Smart in her own words.)

To raise awareness of the issue, Edleson has organized a Dec. 10 event, timed to coincide with Human Rights Day, in Minneapolis, where actresses will read battered mothers’ testimonies from Hague Convention cases. The readings will be interspersed with conversations between lawyers, legal scholars and social scientists on domestic violence and the Convention, which contains provisions that allow judges to refrain from returning a child if doing so puts him or her at “grave risk” of “physical or psychological harm.” But too often, scholars and lawyers say, judges are not sufficiently steeped in the law to know that they have discretion to accept this as an applicable defense. Additionally, since the treaty’s goal is to have children returned to their habitual residence within six weeks of a parent filing a Hague Convention petition, lawyers may not have enough time to assemble evidence that domestic violence occurred in the other country.

“I don’t think the treaty is wrong,” Edleson says. “It was put in place for the right reasons.” But he and other experts say it’s time to update how the Hague Convention is being implemented, to make it easier for battered mothers to argue that their kids should not be returned to a country where their violent husbands live. The U.S. could also act independently and add a similar provision to the International Child Abduction Remedies Act that Congress passed in 1988. “We’ve only recently realized that the great majority of taking parents are mothers,” Edleson says. “It’s important we make these adjustments so that the Convention fits this new reality.”

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International Child Abduction – Spain

By Velasco Lawyers

It is quite common to hear about separated parents living in different countries where one parent denies the return of a child after a temporary parental visit.

Spain protects parents who have child custody and who are residents in Spain through their national laws, international agreements and bilateral agreements between countries. In particular the Organic Law 9/2002, of the 10 December; The Hague Convention on the Civil Aspects of International Child Abduction signed on the 25th October 1980; The European Council agreement related to judicial decisions for the custody of minors of the 20th May 1980 and the bilateral agreement between Morocco and Spain related to the enforcement of judicial decisions concerning the custody and the return of minors of the 30th May 1995. The latter was deemed a necessity due to the amount of legal cases regarding the return of children abducted by parents during visits to Spain or Morocco.

What is child abduction?
Spanish law is clear about what child abduction is, and it takes these cases extremely seriously:
The removal of a child from their place of residence without the consent of the parent with whom he usually lives or the people or institutions in whose care the child was entrusted.

The retention of a child is a serious breach of an established judicial or administrative decision.
The penalty can be from 2 to 4 years of imprisonment plus the loss of the right to parental authority (patria potestad) for 4 to 10 years.
If the abducting parent informs the other parent or the institution in charge of the child, of their exact location with the promise of immediate return, there will be no charges as long as the period of abduction is less than 24 hours.

International visitation rights
A parent who is a resident in Spain and who receives a request for visitation rights from the other parent in a different country has to legally comply with the request as long as it conforms to the divorce or separation agreement (convenio regulador). The situation can be a terrible dilemma for the parent with custody if they suspect that the other parent will not return the child. In this case a Spanish lawyer experienced in International Family Law should be consulted immediately.

Claiming the child back
For countries outside the international conventions cited above, once the child is abducted it might be difficult to legally force the authorities of the other country to return the child. For countries complying with the treaties above there is a legal route which must be followed to get the child back but the amount of time for the return can vary greatly. The UK, New Zealand and Australia for example will return the child very quickly.

In cases of abduction, time is of the essence. If the child is out of Spain for more than a year, the judge in the visiting country could stop the return process if the other parent can demonstrate that the child has integrated perfectly in their new environment.

Conclusion
If one of the parents suspects abduction it is important to immediately consult a Spanish lawyer, who is experienced in International Family Law, in order to preventively evaluate all options; even more importantly when abduction has already taken place, to be able to explore all possible legal ways for the safe return of the child.

Published by: ABP World Group International Child Recovery Service

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