This section identifies gaps in the Federal Government’s current responses to international parental kidnapping cases, i.e., cases involving the international wrongful removal or retention of a child. Recommendations are made to close the gaps and improve the governmentwide handling of these difficult cases. Many of the recommendations have resource implications.
GAP 1: Establish a more informative and coordinated Federal response to international parental kidnapping
Many different Federal agencies are potentially involved in international child abduction situations. Interagency coordination occurs, but there is no established framework for assuring accurate tracking of case activity by all concerned agencies or for assisting those officials in assuring that all appropriate measures are being taken by all appropriate agencies in any given case.
There also is no central point of contact for information and guidance for parents, their advocates, other assisting organizations, or for State and local law enforcement, all of whom turn to the Federal Government for help in international abduction cases. Much more could be done to provide information to these interested parties about assistance that may be available and how to obtain it, and to facilitate coordination and communication among relevant agencies. In addition, there are significant gaps in services provided, for example, in the area of counseling and support to left-behind parents and to families and children even at the end of the ordeal.
Recommendations
1.1 Identify/designate a point of contact (POC) for left-behind parents, their advocates, interested organizations, and law enforcement in international child abduction cases. The POC for law enforcement may be different than the POC for parents and their advocates. The role of the POC(s) shall be to provide information about assistance that may be available from the Federal Government and other governmental and private sources to address the civil and criminal aspects of international parental kidnapping and to explain how to obtain appropriate assistance. The POC(s) shall serve as a liaison between these offices and interested parties to facilitate communication and promote interagency collaboration to resolve specific cases.
1.2 A comprehensive case tracking system could foster collaboration and coordination among agencies and improve the Federal responses to and services for children, parents, law enforcement agencies, and other organizations involved in international child abduction cases.
1.3 Task a group of management information systems specialists from all appropriate Federal agencies and any relevant nongovernmental organizations, as necessary, to review existing systems used for gathering, updating, analyzing, and disseminating both case-specific and aggregate information on international abduction cases and to explore development of a comprehensive case tracking system, as well as a system—responsive to gap 2—that integrates statistics and information from all relevant agencies.
1.4 Establish a working group of the Policy Group, comprising representatives from Federal agencies, the POC(s), and relevant contractors—for example, the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children—chaired by the Office of Children’s Issues (which is also the U.S. Central Authority) to meet quarterly, or more often as needed. This group will review and foster resolution of difficult international parental abduction cases, both Hague and non-Hague, including cases identified by the POC; explore systemic problems with the implementation of the Hague Convention; and promote interagency coordination in the resolution of cases.
1.5 Support the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children in its role as a missing children’s clearinghouse in international child abduction cases. The clearinghouse would serve as a repository for information, research, literature, and so forth, relating to international child abduction cases; and ensure that this information is accessible to parents, law enforcement officials, prosecutors, lawyers, judges, and other children’s advocacy organizations (via the Internet and other means) consistent with applicable privacy laws. (See recommendation 9.6.)
GAP 2: Develop a comprehensive statistical database on international parental kidnapping cases
There is no one comprehensive integrated process for gathering and analyzing data and information on international child abduction cases. Addressing this problem requires that all agencies should assure the timely and complete entry of appropriate information in the abduction cases they handle. The problem of integrating data from various sources must also be addressed. For example, although the Department of State’s Office of Children’s Issues has taken steps to improve its data collection and analysis, other offices and agencies, each working with its respective database system, may use different criteria to categorize cases, actions, and results. As a consequence, there is no comprehensive, integrated statistical database that can be used to describe reliably the incidence of abduction cases, agency actions with respect to those cases, results and timeliness of results, and the use and efficacy of the Convention and other legal remedies.
If a comprehensive statistical database could be developed, it could serve a variety of objectives, including: (1) more accurately identifying the resource needs of responding Federal agencies; (2) assessing the record of various countries in returning abducted children; (3) identifying problem areas and best practices; (4) evaluating the efficacy of the Hague Convention both as a whole and also with respect to the performance of particular countries; (5) seeking to improve mechanisms for returning children under the Hague Convention and otherwise by sharing data selectively with other countries; (6) advising parents, their advocates, and courts of information (including country-specific information) that may be useful in formulating appropriate court orders and taking other actions to deter abductions; and (7) providing more accurate and useful information to policymakers, the Congress, and the public about the problem of international abductions.
There is a strong case, then, for the benefits of a comprehensive statistical base. However, the technical complexity and resource requirements entailed in developing such a capability need first to be explored.
Recommendations
2.1 Task management information systems specialists to explore development of a comprehensive system, as described in 1.3 above. If such a system is feasible, then:
GAP 3: Expand diplomatic efforts to resolve international parental kidnapping cases and educate the public about them
Diplomatic efforts can be an important part of addressing the problem of international parental abduction, both in seeking—on multilateral and bilateral bases—to make treaty and nontreaty responses more effective generally and in seeking to resolve difficulties in particular cases involving the location of, return of, and access to abducted children. However, many parents lack an understanding of what the Federal Government can and cannot do to facilitate resolution of international parental child abduction cases. More can be done to provide such information.
More could also be done to systematize and intensify contacts with foreign governments on bilateral and multilateral bases to improve international responses to parental child abductions. This is particularly true with respect to countries that have joined the Hague Convention, as discussed in connection with gap 4. With non-Hague countries, the need is perhaps greater and the task is much more difficult, because no framework of international law governs the matter; instead, each non-Hague country applies its own law to its own nationals and others within its own territory. Nonetheless, this is an area in which all governments should recognize the necessity of transnational legal cooperation in the best interests of the child. The United States should intensively explore possible legal and diplomatic tools that could better address this situation. Similarly, as discussed in connection with gap 5, the problem of access is particularly difficult; although the Hague Convention has a provision on rights of access, this has not been developed, either in the text or in practice, into an effective legal regime.
Recommendations
3.1 Educate parents, attorneys, and other interested parties on:
3.2 Invite foreign diplomatic personnel from embassies to participate in informal discussions to overcome barriers that impede resolution of international abduction cases, including special problems that arise in cases involving dual nationals.
3.3 Articulate U.S. policy regarding diplomatic initiatives in international parental kidnapping cases and the ways and means by which the State Department may communicate with foreign governments on behalf of a left-behind parent seeking return of an abducted child. Include a description of problems and barriers to recovery that have arisen in past cases and describe how they can be overcome. Disseminate this information to left-behind parents, their advocates, and other interested parties.
3.4 Consult left-behind parents on how to improve service, using survey research tools and the family support network (an OJJDP-funded program, known as Project Hope, which trains parents to provide crisis assistance and support to left-behind parents in the United States whose children are victims of international abduction).
GAP 4: Improve implementation of the Hague Convention
The Hague Convention on the Civil Aspects of International Child Abduction provided for the first time an international treaty mechanism for parents to seek the return of abducted and wrongfully retained children and to facilitate access to children located in another country. However, there are systemic problems with how the Convention is implemented in a number of countries, including impediments to locating children, delays in processing of cases, nonenforcement of court orders, lack of access to children, and the imposition of conditions on return orders (undertakings). Efforts must continue to improve the Convention’s effectiveness. Enhancing the operation of the Convention worldwide is of great interest to the United States because more children are abducted to and from the United States than any other Convention country.
Recommendations
4.1 Ensure that the issue of international child abduction and the need selectively to increase the number of signatories to the Convention are on the official agenda of relevant bilateral and multilateral meetings attended by appropriate non-Hague countries.
4.2 Raise and examine delays in proceedings, quality of legal representation, and compliance with the provisions of the Convention with central authorities of Hague party countries.
4.3 Address issues, such as noncompliance, failure to enforce return and access orders, procedural delays, inability to locate children, and other problems that impede successful operation of the Convention, in bilateral discussions and at the next meeting of Hague Convention party countries at The Hague.
4.4 Make a concerted effort to expand access to legal services in the United States and abroad for all left-behind parents in Hague and non-Hague cases by:
4.5 Work to increase the frequency of meetings of party countries in The Hague to review operation of the Convention.
GAP 5: Seek solutions to problems of parental access at an international level
Although not entirely satisfactory, there are somewhat predictable law and practice regarding international child abduction. However, law and practice regarding efforts of parents to visit their children abroad are much less well-developed. The Hague Convention is vague on how access rights (referred to in the United States as visitation rights) are to be effectively exercised internationally, and the Convention does not include return of the child as a remedy for breach of access rights. There are recognized shortcomings of the Hague Convention that should be addressed. Thus, in Hague and non-Hague countries, a left-behind parent’s ability to visit a child may be largely dependent on the laws and customs of the country in which the child is located, which may unfairly disfavor left-behind parents. Moreover, without a clear international legal framework to address access problems, government agencies and private attorneys—both here and abroad—are less able to assist parents in obtaining access.
Two possible avenues to improve the situation regarding access may be to press, on a multilateral basis, for better implementation of Hague Convention provisions, which may provide relief regarding access, and to consider the efficacy of the 1996 Hague Convention on Jurisdiction, Applicable Law, Recognition, Enforcement, and Cooperation in Respect of Parental Responsibility and Measures for the Protection of Children (Hague Convention for the Protection of Children) as a means of better addressing the access problem. Other solutions should also be explored.
Unmerited denial of access, whether in the context of an abduction or not, is a serious problem which, to date, has not been satisfactorily addressed on an international level.
5.1 Ensure that the issue of access rights is taken up at the next quadrennial meeting of Hague Convention party countries at The Hague.
5.2 Accelerate consideration of the 1996 Hague Convention for the Protection of Children as a possible means of enforcing access rights in party countries.
5.3 Investigate ways to improve international access to children in Hague and non-Hague countries.
5.4 Explore arrangements with countries not party to the Hague Convention to ensure that the left-behind parent may enjoy access to his or her child and that the child has access also to his or her second parent.
GAP 6: Foster more widespread and effective use of NCIC and INTERPOL to stop abductions in progress and to locate abducted children and abductors
When a left-behind parent reports an abduction in progress to U.S. law enforcement authorities, those authorities must immediately attempt both to locate the abductor and child and to halt the abduction. U.S. law requires entering information on the child at once into the missing person database of the National Crime Information Center (NCIC). NCIC is a U.S. nationwide computerized police information system. The FBI administers NCIC on behalf of more than 80,000 U.S. criminal justice agencies at all levels of government. If it has obtained a warrant for the abductor, a law enforcement agency handling an abduction case can enter a record on the abductor in the NCIC wanted person database, as well.
There are, however, certain limitations regarding the use of the NCIC system. First, the system is useful only if law enforcement officers have the training to know when and how to make the best use of it. Not only are there questions about whether officers have been adequately informed about making all appropriate NCIC entries in international abduction cases, but there seem to be instances in which entries are removed prematurely when a missing child is located overseas—but not yet recovered—and subsequent opportunities to identify the child’s (or abductor’s) movements are lost.
When an international abduction from the United States is underway, U.S. law enforcement must rapidly notify and request assistance from appropriate foreign law enforcement authorities. In addition to calling the FBI field office, U.S. Federal, State, and local law enforcement can alert foreign authorities 24 hours per day, 7 days per week, every day of the year, by contacting the INTERPOL–U.S. National Central Bureau (USNCB).
If an abductor and child have entered one or another foreign country and their location is unknown, U.S. law enforcement can use INTERPOL’s powerful notice system to search for them internationally. Red (fugitive), yellow (missing persons, including an abducted child), and blue (trace and locate) notices provide all INTERPOL member countries with a given person’s case and identification information and ask any country locating the person to notify the requesting country immediately so that it may request extradition, facilitate a request for the child’s return under the Hague Convention, or take other action as appropriate. U.S. law enforcement can apply for INTERPOL notices through the USNCB. However, many U.S. law enforcement personnel are unaware of the various types of assistance available through INTERPOL.
6.1 Explore the feasibility of a policy change for NCIC that would require maintaining NCIC records concerning a child missing in a foreign country until the child is recovered or until the issue of the child’s return has been resolved.
6.2 Train U.S. Federal, State, and local law enforcement in using NCIC and INTERPOL more effectively in cases of children abducted from the United States.
GAP 7: Strengthen passport issuance and revocation practices and institute specialized training for border inspectors to aid in deterring and intercepting crossborder parental abductions
Parents who believe their child may be at risk of international abduction look to local and Federal authorities for help in preventing, detecting, and intercepting an abduction. Travelers departing the United States do not encounter exit controls. (Occasionally Federal Inspection Service (FIS) personnel may perform outbound merchandise inspections.) Airlines, not the U.S. Government, may require a passenger to show a valid passport when he or she boards a plane. Even in cases where there may be an opportunity to prevent or delay the departure of a child and/or parent in a suspected abduction, FIS personnel at the border may not be adequately trained to respond to abductions.
Preventing the issuance of a passport to a child may deter some abductions. A parent with a valid custody order may put a hold on the issuance of a U.S. passport to his or her child(ren) by contacting the Department of State. The State Department Office of Passport Services may deny or revoke a U.S. passport of an abducting parent who is the subject of a Federal warrant. However, neither of these measures is widely known to parents or to all law enforcement authorities. It is clear that there needs to be wider training and information materials available to parents and law enforcement.
Because many abducted children are dual nationals, they may also hold a valid passport of the other country. If they don’t have one, they may apply for one. There may be no barriers to the issuance of these passports. In fact, the foreign countries’ embassies and consulates may be required to issue a passport on demand by one of their nationals. At present there is no requirement for the Passport Office to notify a foreign government when it denies a passport for a dual national child. Nor is there is a formal mechanism to inform foreign governments about lookouts placed in the system for U.S. passport applications for these children.
7.1 Provide a joint training program for Federal Inspection Services personnel at U.S. borders and ports of entry to increase awareness about international child abduction.
7.2 Review policies governing the issuance and denial of U.S. passports.
7.3 Explore ways to increase awareness among Federal, State, and local officials of procedures for and the effect of revoking U.S. passports when a parent (or other person) is criminally charged with child abduction.
GAP 8: Provide education, training, and other assistance
International parental child abduction is a complex and difficult issue. For attorneys, judges, and officials at all levels of government who deal with family law and custody matters, the prospect or fact of an international abduction will generally present issues of law, fact, and practice as to which they have little or no experience or training. For parents—often under extreme stress—the picture is even more daunting. Although information, experience, and assistance are available, they are not easily accessible, nor has there been a systematic, coordinated effort to educate and assist parents and others involved about remedies and resources in international child abduction cases.
8.1 With extensive coordination with other Federal agencies, the Missing and Exploited Children’s Program shall develop a formal, comprehensive education, training, and technical assistance program for parents; Federal, State, and local law enforcement officials and prosecutors; State clearinghouses; judges; attorneys; and other agencies and organizations involved in civil and criminal international abduction cases. This effort shall be linked to training on international parental kidnapping provided by other agencies and organizations. (See 8.2.1, below.)
8.2 Identify current training and technical assistance resources. Design, develop, and conduct training; provide technical assistance; and disseminate publications and other products to fill needs and gaps in service delivery. Provide training to State and Federal law enforcement and prosecutors on the investigation and prosecution of parental kidnapping, focusing on actions to be taken immediately in cases of suspected international parental kidnapping. Provide training to agency personnel who deal with left-behind parents to ensure they have the necessary sensitivity and expertise to respond effectively in international abduction cases and are conversant with the rights and services due to Federal crime victims. Train judges and attorneys on the Hague Convention, other intercountry agreements concerning children, problems related to dual nationality, obstacles to recovery, the relationship between domestic violence and parental kidnapping, the impact of abduction on children, and prevention. (See 8.3, below.)
| 8.2.1 | Each Federal agency involved in the civil or criminal aspects of international child abduction shall ensure that there is detailed guidance on appropriate responses in these cases and that training on international parental kidnapping is routinely included in continuing education programs for agency personnel involved in these cases. |
8.3 Focus attention on preventing abductions. Develop a media campaign to educate parents, the public, and organizations and agencies involved in these cases. Increase public awareness of the Hague Convention. Highlight problems created by dual nationality. Create and disseminate prevention information (e.g., fact sheets and official letters) to educate judges and parents on issues related to dual nationality and safeguards that can be included in custody orders to deter abductions.
8.4 Develop a mentoring approach to encourage lawyers, prosecutors, and law enforcement officials who have experience with international abduction cases to share their experiences and expertise with similarly situated parties.
GAP 9: Expand the availability of resources to assist left-behind parents
At the international level, securing the return of abducted children, and in the criminal context, the return of abductors, can entail significant costs—costs that may be beyond the resources of parents or, when a criminal case is involved, of local law enforcement officials. Indeed, lack of funds may be a significant obstacle to recovering abducted children from another country. Left-behind parents may lack the means to travel abroad, to retain a lawyer and pay other legal costs, to engage translators and interpreters, to undertake an international search for the child, to obtain counseling, or even to transport the child home. State and local prosecutors may forego criminal charges in international parental kidnapping cases because of the costs involved in seeking international extradition of fugitive abducting parents, including translating legal documents and paying to transport the abductor and escort officers back to the United States. Also, State missing children clearinghouses may have insufficient resources to effectively assist left-behind parents and local law enforcement in abduction cases.
9.1 Explore the availability of financial resources, such as victim assistance funds from the Office for Victims of Crime, to defray some of the expenses incurred by left-behind parents in international parental kidnapping cases.
9.2 Consider legislation to make Federal funds available in fiscal year 2000 and thereafter to defray the cost of extradition in cases involving State offenses. (The administration supported such legislation in 1998.)
9.3 Encourage States to review the sufficiency of funding and staffing of State missing children clearinghouses and to consider how these entities can best help parents of abducted children.
9.4 Encourage States to add parental kidnapping to the list of offenses for which State victims of crime compensation is available.
9.5 Support the establishment of a mediation program to help resolve wrongful removal and retention cases and to foster voluntary return of children from Hague countries.
9.6 Through the clearinghouses or other appropriate mechanism, promote the development and expansion of support services for parents, including counseling and mentor support networks. (See recommendations 1.5, 3.4, and 8.4.)
1. Further review additional means to interdict abductors before they abduct children from this country.
2. Further review ways to provide meaningful assistance to left-behind parents.
| 2.1 | Consider whether to encourage States to enact the Uniform Child Custody Jurisdiction and Enforcement Act (UCCJEA), including its provisions that authorize State prosecutors (or other designated public officials) to locate and obtain the return of a child in an incoming Hague Convention case. |
3. Explore the legal and policy issues involved in authorizing Federal or State law enforcement authorities to place a child, listed on NCIC as missing, into protective custody when the facts known to the law enforcement official encountering the child do not support the arrest of the accompanying adult.
4. Identify specific laws and policies that may encourage abductors or impede resolution of abduction cases, e.g. military regulations.
5. Elaborate NCMEC’s role in international paren-tal kidnapping cases. (See recommendation 1.5.)
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