When David Goldman’s wife, Bruna, and their 4-year-old son, Sean, boarded a plane at Newark Liberty International Airport in June 2004, Mr. Goldman was planning to join them a week later in Rio de Janeiro. Several days later, Ms. Goldman called and said she wanted a divorce. She was staying in Brazil, her native country, and so was the boy, she announced.
With that call, the Goldman family was sent into a high-profile international abduction and custody case that continues in American and Brazilian courts and has now reached the highest levels of the Obama administration.
As the legal battle unfolded, Ms. Goldman was granted a divorce in Brazil and married her lawyer, João Paulo Lins e Silva, a son of a family lawyer in Rio. In August 2008, with the case pending in Supreme Federal Court, she died during the birth of the couple’s daughter.
Days later, Mr. Goldman flew to Brazil to take custody of his son, but a Family Court judge granted guardianship and custody of Sean to Mr. Lins e Silva, to “fully guarantee” Sean’s “personal and emotional development.” The court also denied Mr. Goldman’s request to visit his son.
The case has become a sore point in the relationship between the United States and Brazil and may be on the agenda when Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton and Celso Amorim, the Brazilian foreign minister, meet in advance of a scheduled meeting next month between President Obama and the Brazilian president, Luis Inácio Lula da Silva, former and current State Department officials said.
Full Article and Source:
Court Battle Over a Child Strains Ties in 2 Nations
See also:
BringSeanHome.org
With that call, the Goldman family was sent into a high-profile international abduction and custody case that continues in American and Brazilian courts and has now reached the highest levels of the Obama administration.
As the legal battle unfolded, Ms. Goldman was granted a divorce in Brazil and married her lawyer, João Paulo Lins e Silva, a son of a family lawyer in Rio. In August 2008, with the case pending in Supreme Federal Court, she died during the birth of the couple’s daughter.
Days later, Mr. Goldman flew to Brazil to take custody of his son, but a Family Court judge granted guardianship and custody of Sean to Mr. Lins e Silva, to “fully guarantee” Sean’s “personal and emotional development.” The court also denied Mr. Goldman’s request to visit his son.
The case has become a sore point in the relationship between the United States and Brazil and may be on the agenda when Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton and Celso Amorim, the Brazilian foreign minister, meet in advance of a scheduled meeting next month between President Obama and the Brazilian president, Luis Inácio Lula da Silva, former and current State Department officials said.
Full Article and Source:
Court Battle Over a Child Strains Ties in 2 Nations
See also:
BringSeanHome.org
2 comments:
These inter-country kidnaps have to be bad for the children. And are almost impossible to resolve.
Why won't a simple DNA test resolve this problem? Who is the father?
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