I need legal advice about international custody!!! Please help!!

self | Rutabega

[Rodney King]

Because all we can do with such limited info is to take her word for it. Of course, you are correct that it could be just that she is selfish and is the real problem here, but we would hav eno way of knowing htat.

[crystalk]

No idiot here.

I took it for granted her daughter was Swedish from the context of her letter. If her daughter was born in the USA my comments would have been different.

PS Where WAS the daughter born?

[another cricket]

All right, here it goes. First: document everything! Keep a journal, videotape, and audiotape, whatever. You will need something to show that your husband is emotionally distant and detached from the children if you are to have any hope of getting custody.

While you are doing this you please consider trying to find a good counselor. Living in another country can be very tough. Culture shock is very real and can put enormous pressure on an already shaky marriage. Who knows maybe you can work it out. Kids need both Dad and Mom and having parents on two separate continents is rough on them.

If he is phyically abusive then, of course, all bets are off.

A. Cricket

[Bikers4Bush]

You could be right and then again you may not be. She asked for advice and it's getting thrown out there.

Who are you to scold her and act so holier than thou?

[unsycophant]

Maybe a better idea would be to contact your family and ask THEIR advice...

A political forum probably isn't the best place to solicit legal information, or even ideas about 'what to do'. In fact, you may end up more confused than you were before you started this thread.

You're in a position to help yourself more than anyone else is. In lieu of that, turn to your family-they probably have more personal interest in your helping to resolve your situation than anonymous people on the Internet.

[Architect]

True. We don't. But the most severe complaint she comes up with is that her husband is "unkind". Doesn't sound to me like the marriage is irrecoverable to me, even it the charge has any truth. It does seem to me that conservatives should be trying to find ways to resolve this instead of condemning yet another child to fatherlessness.

I would also say that, if she is determined to break up her family, she could at least have the decency to stay in Sweden where Dad and daughter can be together.

[Architect]

Who are you to scold her and act so holier than thou?

Who are you to abet the destruction of a marriage? I have no doubt whatever that if a man asked the same thing, FReepers would be all over him for it - and rightly so.

[Tuscaloosa Goldfinch]

If I'm not mistaken, the daughter has DUAL citizenship. She's a Swedish citizen AND a U.S. citizen.

[crystalk]

OK nitpickers, of course when her daughter grows up and reaches 18, she could try to move to the USA and claim citizenship there based upon her mother's nationality regardless of her own place of birth.

I meant, of course, that the daughter HAS NO CLAIM TO US NATIONALITY NOW, as a minor, unless she was born in the USA...Sweden is her only and presumptive home, and only it could issue the daughter a passport/travel document...and it would be the only legit forum with regard to the daughter and her custody, and in that nation's courts the husband would surely prevail.

[be131]

PS Where WAS the daughter born?

It doesn't matter. Any child whose mother is a U.S. citizen is entitled to citizenship.

[truthkeeper]

If you have a brain in your head you will NOT file for divorce and custody in Sweden. Come for an extended visit here - with your children, of course - and then do it. (This is NOT kidnapping, BTW.)

BTDT, and wish I had split to Michigan to file - with my kids - when I had the chance, instead of screwing around with the California courts. They granted joint legal custody to a my ex, a complete lunatic. I suspect those Swedish courts might be just as generous.

You are getting good advice on this thread. I suggest you take it.

[frodolives]

Having practiced family law for 17 years, I'm sorry to say that the most honest and most practical advice will be found in post 11. What did your son's father do when you took your son- and his- to a foreign country? Whatever visitation and contact you arranged with Ex #1 and your son is the schedule you should have with your daughter. Like, six weeks each summer. It's not impossible to be a parent even if you live in a foreign country and see your child infrequently. You would not be a "bad mother" if you choose to let your daughter grow up in her native country.

[Architect]

This is NOT kidnapping, BTW

Only in the twisted mind of someone who is willing to do it and the courts which abet her.

[frodolives]

BTW, it most certainly is kidnapping. And, more importantly, it's NOT good for the kids.

[Bikers4Bush]

Having been through a bad one myself I'd dare say I'm in a better position to understand her plight than you.

Unless of course you're such a hypocrite that you'd object to someone doing what you have done yourself.

[truthkeeper]

Not unless she's in violation of a restraining order preventing her from traveling abroad with her children. It doesn't sound like that's the situation here.

[DoctorMichael]

FYI: This is the second time this type of question has come up on this Board alone.

Your predicament is more comon than you think. 60 Minutes actually did a segment on US parents having NO rights when it comes to kids of an American parent who are taken overseas by the foreign spouse.

I have a friend who associated with the following organization. Maybe they will be able to provide more info/counseling.

http://www.findthekids.org/sections.html

Good Luck!

[crystalk]

Thank you so much frodo, I was beginning to think I was the only one on this thread thinking with my head instead of some lower part of the anatomy.

Those bozos who tell her to kidnap this daughter to the USA are advising her to commit a crime under the laws of Sweden, which would also be a crime under the laws of the USA, let me tell YOU!

Look how many Arab fathers have flown off to the Mideast with their sons by American women, they are certainly breaking the law and committing a crime, and so would this woman be committing a crime if she did it.

But of course the Mideast countries shelter the runaway abducting dads, but IMO the good ole USA might send her right back to Volvoland to stand trial on kidnap charges!