A father who abducted his three-year-old daughter has been ordered to return her to her mother’s home country.

The mother and father were from different countries. They met in 2017, married in 2019 and moved to the mother’s country as a family in 2020. The mother worked and the father was the homemaker.

In 2022 they planned to move to England, where the father had been offered a good job and they had signed a tenancy on a flat.

However, the relationship deteriorated before the move. The mother alleged that the father was emotionally abusive and controlling. Taking the child with her, she left the family home, filed for divorce and obtained assistance from her country’s social services.

The father was given supervised contact with the child but disappeared with her and fled the country, eventually arriving in England.

Meanwhile, the court in the mother’s country granted her custody pending a hearing to make further determinations.

She applied for the summary return of the child to her home country under the Hague Convention on the Civil Aspects of International Child Abduction 1980 art.12.

The father submitted that, although his removal of the child was wrongful, a summary return should be refused because it would subject the child to a grave risk of physical or psychological harm, or other intolerability.

He submitted that he was the primary carer, and a sudden separation would seriously affect the child, that the mother’s care of the child had been remiss on occasions, and that the mother was aggressive towards him and had exposed the child to such aggression.

The High Court found in favour of the mother.

It held that returning the child to her mother’s care and the mother’s home country, involving only virtual contact with the father, would not expose the child to a grave risk of physical or psychological harm or place her in an intolerable situation.

A sudden and prolonged separation from the father would be distressing and confusing for the child but the situation did not meet the level of seriousness required for a defence under the Convention.

Although the father had been the child’s primary carer on weekdays while the mother worked, they had cared for the child together after work, on weekends and on holidays. The mother had cared for the child alone many times before.

The father’s allegations concerning the mother’s ability to care for the child were not of such a nature or of sufficient detail to constitute a grave risk. The mother had looked after the child for extended periods without her coming to any harm.

The arguments between the parties where the mother had shown aggression towards the father took place when they were living together, and things were very fraught. That was unlikely to recur now they were separated.

It followed that the court was required to order the child’s summary return under the Convention.

Case citations: N (Abduction), Re Also known as: A Mother v A Father Family Division [2022] EWHC 3146 (Fam) Judge Judd J

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