1. Colombia’s courts do not normally
recognize U.S. custody orders. The U.S. State Department has declared that,
“While Colombian courts can recognize or enforce U.S. custody orders, they
generally refuse to do so. In a Colombian court, Colombian law takes
precedence over U.S. law. A Colombian court order granting custody to one
parent will prevail over an order issued by a U.S. court.” Nor
is there is any extradition from Colombia for international parental child
custody.
2. Colombia is noncompliant with the Hague
Abduction Convention. Its courts treat Hague cases as if they are custody
cases, which is a serious and fundamental violation of the terms of the treaty.
Its courts act slowly and inefficiently, conducting lengthy home studies during
which time the abducted children become settled in the country, thereby opening
the door to an ultimate finding that the children should not be returned to the
United States. Its appeal procedures delay matters further. Colombian courts
open their doors in Hague cases to the entire custody issue(s) rather than
limiting their inquiries to the strict provisions of the Convention. Not only
is this practice in direct violation of the terms of the treaty but it also
causes enormous expense, great delays and is most unfair to the left-behind
parent in the United States.
3. These opinions are based on my own
experiences with child abduction cases in Colombia over the past several years.
My opinions are supported further by the official opinions of the U.S. State
Department, which in my opinion are highly authoritative and reliable, albeit
most conservative and diplomatic, and are relied on by courts throughout the
United States and in other countries and by international family lawyers
throughout the world.
4. Colombia’s violations of the Hague
Convention have caused the United States Government to label Colombia
repeatedly as noncompliant and, most recently, to make a formal diplomatic
protest against Colombia.
5. In one report, the U.S. Government
complained that, “Misunderstanding of the nature and purpose of the Convention
in Colombia has led to faulty decisions in Colombian courts. Representatives
from the Colombian Central Authority have stated that the Convention exists
primarily to protect a child’s best interests, rather than to permit return of
a child for a custody determination (and best interests analysis) in the courts
of his or her habitual residence." They also have stated their belief that the
Convention’s jurisdictional focus is outweighed by Colombian law and the UN
Convention on Rights of the Child.
6. The U.S. Government has repeatedly
complained of heavy delays in handling abduction cases in Colombia. This is
consistent with the findings of the World Bank Group that on the average
commercial contract cases take an astonishing 1288 days (3½ years) to be
resolved in Colombia.
7. In May 2015 the U.S. State Department
made a formal determination, , that Colombia is a country “Demonstrating
Patterns of Noncompliance” with the Convention, because the Colombian Central
Authority “regularly fails to fulfill its responsibilities pursuant to the
Convention” and “The judicial or administrative branch … fails to regularly
implement and comply with the provisions of the Convention.”
8. Accordingly, at that time the United
States Government through the U.S. Embassy in Bogota, Colombia delivered a
formal diplomatic complaint – a “demarche” – to Colombia protesting Colombia’s
noncompliance with the terms of the Convention.
9. Based on such factors, the Superior
Court of New Jersey ruled in 2014 -- in a case in which I provided expert
testimony as to international child abduction and Colombia -- that the child’s
Colombian mother should not be allowed to take the parties’ child to Colombia
because the risk of her retaining the child in Colombia outweighed the benefit
of international travel.