Way too many women have no code of honor.

From what I read, this was considered international kidnapping under the Hague convention. I could be wrong, but I did think I read that more than once. It is hard enough to reclaim a child kidnapped by a parent in the US, but add a different country and treaty agreements, and the red tape increases to the point of being ridiculous. This man had no legal right to his own child because the kid was in another country and had to fight years through courts to win that right. This isn't a new issue though. Years ago, a movie was made out of a woman's trip into Iran to get her daughters back. Any parent regardless of gender that runs off with a child and deprives the child of the other parent is garbage. Unfortunately the law rarely seems to catch up with them.

Way too many men have no code of honor.

There, had to even that up, since in fact it's even in life.

Thanks, momoffour. This isn't a gender thing. After all, it was the stepfather who kept this boy from his father after the mom died. Where was HIS honor? It's too late to charge her, but he should be punished, no matter how "well-connected" he is.

So glad this case if over. They'll never get those years back though. It's going to be tough for both father and son.

I just spent Christmas morning first with my fiance and the kids, then my ex and the kids, unwarpping presents (I bought all his for the kids too). It's not the most comfortable situation, but I do it for my children, as do plenty of moms and dads.

This isn't just a father-loses-his-kid thing. Many U.S. citizens, male and female, have had their kids taken from them by spouses -- ex or otherwise -- who have taken their kids to other countries of which they were citizens and kept them there. International law is generally useless when it comes to these situations. I'm delighted for Sean Goldman, but his case is atypical. I think about this whenever someone tries to claim that the U.S. is an all-powerful bully. HAH.

Great point, Marion. The kind of math that the Chavez people never do.

To Marion's point that it is unique. My reading indicated that the if the mom was still alive and taking care of the child, the father would have no shot at getting the child.

I just spent Christmas morning first with my fiance and the kids, then my ex and the kids, unwarpping presents (I bought all his for the kids too). It's not the most comfortable situation, but I do it for my children, as do plenty of moms and dads. -- LovelySoul

It is nice to hear of both parents behaving decently. After having to hear about my brother's and his ex's problem today. She is inisting that my brother give up his time with kids and cancel their travel plans for this week because her relatives are making their annual trip to visit then.

obviously, the kid's mother was quite wrong to kidnap the kid and take him to brazil against his father's wishes. but as for the stepfather, i think it likely he was at least trying to act in the kid's best interest - maybe wrong, but people do all sorts of wrong things with good intentions. think about it - the kid was 4 when he left his father. he's now 9. he probably has little or no memory of his real father, who knows what mommy told him about daddy, and his home in brazil with this stepfather is the only home he has any familiarity with. it's not just a case of 'it's my kid, i want him back' - of course you do, and of course his being taken was absolutely wrong, but i wonder what the kid's life will be like now versus if he'd been allowed to stay in a familiar home with familiar family, and if what's RIGHT - returning him to biodad - is really right for the kid.

It will be disruptive for the boy. In essence, he was adopted and now must return to a biological family he doesn't know at all. This started 5 years ago. If the Brazilian family had been reasonable then, in at least letting the father see him, it wouldn't be so hard now.

The mother was alive for most of the battle, so the stepfather may have continued the fight in her memory, as well as thinking it was best for the child. The longer it went on, the more validity that argument had.

I heard the stefather and grandmother wanted to negotiate some sort of visitation/joint custody, but the father shot it down. I can understand why he wouldn't want to do that legally, but I hope he still lets the boy have some contact with them.

momof4,

So tell me, who would you rather work for:

Pope Benedict or Hillary Clinton?

My reading indicated that the if the mom was still alive and taking care of the child, the father would have no shot at getting the child.

Yep. And if it had been a Brazilian father who had taken the kid away from his American mother, and the Brazilian father were still alive, the mom would have no chance of getting custody. I know that gender plays a huge role in custody determination in the U.S., but once you bring another country into play, pretty much every court is going to side with its citizens in terms of determining custody.

obviously, the kid's mother was quite wrong to kidnap the kid and take him to brazil against his father's wishes. but as for the stepfather, i think it likely he was at least trying to act in the kid's best interest - maybe wrong, but people do all sorts of wrong things with good intentions. think about it - the kid was 4 when he left his father. he's now 9. he probably has little or no memory of his real father, who knows what mommy told him about daddy, and his home in brazil with this stepfather is the only home he has any familiarity with.

Yes -- because the stepfather actively participated in what amounted to kidnapping! If the stepfather had wanted to do the right thing, he could have insisted that the father have visitation rights, or refused to marry a woman who was stealing her child from that child's other parent. I'm sorry, but I have *no* sympathy for people who actively engender situations in which children are denied access to a parent and then turn around and argue that the status quo should be preserved in the interests of "stability." If you don't want to destabilize your kid's life, then don't try to keep him or her away from his or her other parent. Yes, there are truly abusive parents out there; if you're dealing with one of them, you have my sympathy. (Sterling, who posts here occasionally, has had to deal with such a case.) But generally you're not talking about that -- just a parent who decides that his or her life would be much easier if he or she didn't have to worry about the person he or she created a baby with back when times were good.

I heard the stefather and grandmother wanted to negotiate some sort of visitation/joint custody, but the father shot it down. I can understand why he wouldn't want to do that legally, but I hope he still lets the boy have some contact with them.

Given that they are raising Sean's half-sibling, I think there is a role for at least the grandmother and the half-sibling to visit Sean. In New Jersey. With police posted on guard at every entrance and exit. And a GPS tracking chip attached to each item of Sean's clothing. Etc. If the stepfather and the grandmother had shown a commitment from the beginning to allowing Sean to have a real relationship with his dad, I might feel differently -- but they've proven that they can't be trusted.

On a slightly different note: I am not, shall we say, a fan of Barack Obama and the current Congress, but I want to give them props for their handling of this situation. I have a problem with countries that aid and abet in the kidnapping of U.S. kids getting favored treatment in treaties. I know that you can't destroy an otherwise good relationship with a country over custody issues, but I think, say, delaying a trade bill, as NJ Sen. Lautenberg did with Brazil earlier this month, is a legit strategy. This wasn't just a Democratic thing -- New Jersey's Republican reps also got involved -- but getting the Secretary of State and the President involved was a major gesture, and one that may pay dividends down the road in other situations.

Not my issue to worry about (though the Elian thing pissed me off)

> once you bring another country into
> play, pretty much every court is
> going to side with its citizens

People have the idea that Brazilian courts and Libyan courts and Madagascan courts are somehow as clean as those of the US on some ethically harmonic level.

This is not likely. It's a daydream, one that drifts into the nightmare of the United Nations. ('Hey, let's get the leaders of all the nations together, and then we can do this and that....')

> delaying a trade bill, as NJ Sen. Lautenberg
> did with Brazil earlier this month, is
> a legit strategy.

Just as it will be next time, when they use that technique on us... And importers of Brazilian widgets will be phoning their congressman: 'It's a damn shame that little Enrique can't spend Christmas with his Daddy in Curitiba, but why is this my fucking problem? I got fifty thousand units going out next week, and they need their goddamn sub-assemblies....'

This type of crime/child abuse will continue as long as it is tacitly condoned by the courts both overseas and here in the U.S.

I worked with a woman whose ex-husband kidnapped their young son. After several years in hiding here in Ohio, he was found. The child was returned to his mother and the father charged.

This mother spent years wondering if her son was alive or dead. She spent time and money trying to locate her son. The boy was deprived a mother and told who knows what by the father as to what happened to his mother.

To add insult to injury the father's sentence was a couple of years of PROBATION. So this scum sucking pig's punishment was having to call a probation officer every so often and tell him he was being a good fellow?

Probation is not a punishment. It is not a deterrent. It is a minor inconvenience. As long as major crimes incur minor sanctions the low lives of the world will feel free to engage in any repulsive activity without fear of consequence.

A friend of mine had a rather bizarre reverse of this happen to him. His ex-wife sent their (teenage) kids to visit from England to the US, and then called him, saying "keep them, I don't want them".

Luckily he was in a position to accept them happily, got all the paperwork done and and they've thrived here. But I can only imagine the kind of message that sends the kids.

marion - i didn't mean that the kid SHOULD have been left with the stepfather. only that he may have not had entirely bad intentions and that it still sucks to be the kid.

"momof4,

So tell me, who would you rather work for:

Pope Benedict or Hillary Clinton?"

Neither. What brought this up?

momof4,

You did.

Who is more likely to live a code of honor, Pope Benedict or Hillary?

Try answering the question this time.

> Who is more likely to live a
> code of honor, Pope Benedict
> or Hillary?

Neither, and that wasn't the question you asked.

> Try answering the question this time.

Your question is an obtuse cluck. The best clucks are deft. And perfectly timed. That was neither.

Also, on Christmas Day I was thinking about how I was still pissed off about this.

Fuckers.

Crid,

Oh contrare.

... and Hillary is a lap dog for barry Hussein.

Neither of them feel that way; this is the Sun-Tzu thing of keeping your enemies closer.

Now, it's safe to assume that Hillary's moment had passed when she lost to Obama last year. She'd already been on the national scene for almost twenty years, often in hideous disgrace. It was probably now (then 2008) or never.

But Obama knows better than to play it safe for 2012, and she was sending signals that he damn well shouldn't: The outfit she wore for her concession speech was identical to the one depicted on the nutcracker, right down to the pearls.

His solution was brilliant: Make her SecState. It kneecaps her pesky, growing Democratic authority in the Senate, and nobody ever distinguishes their resume at Foggy Bottom.

I'll never understand why she fell for it.

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