An Ohio attorney submits a letter to the editor in regard to a case where her client won a hollow victory in an international parental child abduction case.

A US Court apparently awarded her client custody of his children.

Unfortunately, the mother of the children has them with her in Japan. And Japan won’t honor the US judgment and return the children.

The attorney’s message is, in a nutshell, an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure.

If minor American children don’t have passports, the very best prevention of international parental child abduction is to block their issuance.

This can be accomplished by either parent registering in the US Department of State’s Children’s Passport Issuance Alert Program.

Remember though that some children may have dual citizenship by virtue of one parent’s foreign citizenship. If so, the foreign parent may be able to obtain a foreign passport for the children, sometimes without the American parent’s knowledge or consent.

Once a passport has been issued to a child, there is no way to ensure that that child cannot travel abroad.

Many common carriers do require written consent of both parents to each trip abroad, but this is not a legal requirement.

Once a family court case is filed, a court may issue an order to secure children’s passports and prohibit foreign travel, but it doesn’t happen automatically.

Read more in this Dayton [OH] Daily News piece: Parents can take preventive steps to prevent abductions.

About to stand trial for beheading his wife, Husband wins permission to try to show that he was a victim of domestic abuse by Wife.

Husband reportedly has a forensic psychiatrist and a psychologist prepared to testify that he suffers from “battered spouse syndrome”.

And e-mails that supposedly corroborate his claim.

Husband maintains that Wife threatened to kill him, regularly kicked and struck him, threatened to set fire to their house, and threatened to abscond to Pakistan with the couple’s children.

On the other hand, the prosecution intends to offer proof that Wife was a victim of domestic violence by Husband.

Wife had reportedly called the police on Husband numerous times over the years, but never pressed charges. Their divorce was pending at the time of her murder two years ago.

The criminal case has been dragging for two years due to Husband’s changes of attorneys and other experts in the case and, now, changes in defense legal strategy and newly disclosed evidence.

Before his arrest, Husband ran a cable TV station with programming catering to a Muslim audience.

Read more in this Buffalo News article: ‘Battered spouse’ defense allowed in beheading trial.

Father is court-ordered to pay child support.

The amount of Father’s child support obligation is unknown.

But Father pays his child support.

Father allegedly raises funds to pay his child support by buying over 5,000 cold pills and then re-selling them. Father makes nearly four hundred “shopping trips” to pharmacies.

The buyers reportedly buy the pills from Father to use them in the process of producing “meth”, an illegal drug. Father allegedly knows this.

Father enters a plea bargain with federal law enforcement authorities under which Father pleads guilty to possession of narcotics.

At sentencing, Father faces between nine and eleven years’ incarceration in a federal facility.

It is unknown whether Father has a conventional job by virtue of which he could have paid his child support.

Read more in this St. Louis Post Dispatch article: Arnold man admits selling cold pills to pay child support and this KDSK TV 5 news article: Arnold man sells cold pills to pay bills and child support.

One state’s child welfare agency removes children from their parents’ homes, due to perceived abandonment, abuse or neglect, at a pace equal to two times the national average.

A whopping fifty thousand of that state’s three million residents are listed in a child abuse registry … although not convicted of – or even charged with – any crime.

These residents make the list because a single child welfare investigator (with a supervisor’s rubber stamp) concludes that it is more likely than not, however slightly, that they abused a child.

As a result, the listed residents face loss of employment and loss of child custody.

They do have a right of appeal … to the same child welfare agency.

The state under consideration? Midwestern Iowa.

But forty-five other states’ laws and procedures are not all that different from Iowa’s in regard to “qualifying” for listing in such child abuse registries.

The federal government reports that many states list residents on abuse registries with appallingly little evidence. Many abusers aren’t even informed that they have been placed on the list. Those who press appeals, often aren’t ever advised of the outcome.

Iowa’s Supreme Court reviewed the state’s system recently and reportedly found it lacking in constitutional safeguards. Now the state legislature is working on reforms.

But what about the other forty-five states doing things similarly?

Read more in this Washington [DC] Times editorial: Abusing due process.

Bio Mother of one year old Baby is just sixteen. Bio Mother has two adult Sisters.

Bio Mother and Baby live with Bio Mother’s mother, but Sisters worry over boyfriends Bio Mother is involved with.

Bio Mother’s boyfriend reportedly has made threats of violence against one of the Sisters. Bio Mother allegedly leaves Baby in the care of her teenaged friends overnight.

But child welfare agency investigates Bio Mother – twice – and investigation finds no evidence of abuse or neglect of Baby.

Bio Mother leaves Baby with Younger Sister for two weeks to go on vacation.

When Bio Mother returns, Younger Sister doesn’t give Baby back.

Bio Mother files criminal complaint for kidnapping.

Older Sister, a nurse, files a legal case in family court to obtain guardianship of Baby. Older Sister makes numerous serious allegations in her case against Bio Mother.

Family court judge grants Older Sister temporary guardianship of Baby on an expedited (if not emergency) basis.

Bio Mother is not given an opportunity to respond to the allegations before the family court judge rules.

Two months later, Older Sister admits in court that she has no hard evidence to back up any of her allegations.

Hearings continue.

Read more in this Des Moines Register article: Sisters tussle over tot’s guardianship.

When either spouse starts a business or practice during a marriage, that business is marital property.

If one spouse earns his or her living working in that business or practice, that is the source of the couple’s income.

A Wisconsin dentist-Husband and his Wife were married for twenty years. During the marriage, Husband started his dental practice and Wife stayed home.

The practice is valued at $1 million and Husband is ordered to pay alimony of $16,000 per month.

Husband appeals the trial court’s rulings, asserting that a significant portion of the practice’s value represents goodwill and that that portion is nonmarital and should not be divided between the spouses but retained by Husband.

Husband also asserts that the alimony award double-dips into the cash flow encapsulated into the valuation of the practice.

On appeal, Wisconsin’s intermediate appellate court upheld the trial court’s rulings, finding that marketable goodwill is subject to equitable distribution between spouses.

The appellate court felt that Husband had not fully developed this argument and was not persuasive on this point.

Florida case law applies different terminology (“personal goodwill” versus “enterprise goodwill”) and engages in a different analysis of the facts. This would likely lead to a somewhat different result in a similar case to the one reported.

Read more in this Wisconsin Law Journal article: Commentary: Salable professional goodwill as divisible property.

International child abduction is not a new problem, but it is a growing problem.

A comprehensive, if somewhat dated list of steps a parent may take if their child is abducted is excerpted and cited below.

• Request revocation of the other parent’s passport
• Request revocation or suspension of the other parent’s green card.
• Request assistance from INTERPOL.
• Follow / trace the money that the other parent is using.
• File in a US court for custody and return of your child
• File in the foreign court for custody and return of your child
• and much more.

Read much more in this disjointed San Francisco All Voices news article: How do mainstream media cover international child custody disputes? because there is still some good information there.

Father and five month old Son are staying with relatives in Florida.

Father falls asleep with Son lying on a queen-sized bed.

When Father awakens, Son is face-down at the edge of the bed, stuck against a dresser.

Son isn’t breathing.

Father administers CPR but is unable to revive Son.

Father yells for help and Aunt calls 911.

Paramedics are also unable to revive Son.

Father is very distraught and police Baker Act him (that is, take him into protective custody for psychiatric evaluation).

Medical examiners call Son’s death a homicide due to presence of extensive injuries, including broken ribs, ruptured bowel and internal bleeding.

Police eventually arrest Father for first degree murder and aggravated child abuse.

At his trial, Father maintains that Son’s ribs were broken in a fall weeks before Son’s death. Father reasons that the other injuries resulted from his failed CPR efforts.

Jury acquits Father on both murder and child abuse charges.

Read more in this Tampa Tribune article: Hillsborough jury acquits father in son’s death.

Husband and Wife divorce. Husband is ordered to pay child support for Daughter.

Husband stops paying child support in the fall of 2009. Husband alleges that he was unable to work due to illness, but produces no corroboration.

Law enforcement authorities set out to attach some of Husband’s property to auction it off to reduce Husband’s child support arrearages.

And the authorities do in fact seize … four beehives on Husband’s property. Worth less than one fifth of the amount of Husband’s arrearages.

Read more in this Russian News and Information Agency RIA Novosti article: Bees seized.

Out of India …

Wife files for divorce from Husband in twenty year marriage.

Wife asks the Indian divorce court to award her alimony and spousal support.

Wife alleges that she converted to the Hindu religion prior to their marriage, and that she and Husband had a religious wedding ceremony in accordance with the Hindu religion.

Under Indian divorce law governing marriages between spouses of the Hindu faith, a wife may seek alimony – but apparently not so between spouses of other faiths.

Despite the length of this couple’s marriage, however, the Indian high court denies Wife’s request for alimony, finding that Wife has not proved that she did in fact convert to Hindu prior to the marriage and that the marriage may therefore not have been valid from its inception.

The Indian court appears to rationalize, in essence, that too many Indians insincerely convert from one religion to another, not for spiritual motivations, but to manipulate the law to their own legal advantage in family court, or otherwise.

With regard to the particular case before it, the appellate court apparently finds that Wife duplicitously spent twenty years of her life in a sham and/or fraudulent marriage, scheming all along to capitalize on the alimony law available to Indian Hindus, in the event the couple ever divorced.

While this case is from India, spouses should be aware that alimony laws in the United States are being reviewed, challenged and, in some cases, updated to reflect changes in the times.

Read more in this Times of India article: HC refuses alimony to ‘converted’ woman.