Proceedings Under the Hague Child Abduction Convention: 2020

• Author: Robert G. Spector
• Pages: 325-339

325

Proceedings Under the Hague Child

Abduction Convention: 2020

ROBERT G. SPECTOR*

Introduction

Most U.S. international family law litigation involves the Hague

Convention on the Civil Aspects of International Child Abduction

(Abduction Convention)1 and its implementing legislation, the International

Child Abduction Remedies Act (ICARA).2 U.S. federal and state courts

have concurrent jurisdiction to resolve a request for the return of a child

under the Abduction Convention.3

The Abduction Convention operates to promptly return children to their

habitual residence. To obtain an order returning a child, the petitioner must

prove that the child was wrongfully removed from, or retained outside

of, the child’s “habitual residence” and that the petitioner had “a right[]

of custody,” which he or she was “actually exercis[ing]” (or would have

exercised but for the abduction), under the law of the child’s habitual

residence.4

1. Hague Convention on the Civil Aspects of International Child Abduction, Oct. 25, 1980,

T.I.A.S. No. 11670, 1343 U.N.T.S. 89 [hereinafter Abduction Convention].

2. International Child Abduction Remedies Act (ICARA), 22 U.S.C. §§ 9001–11.

3. Id. § 9003(a).

4. Abduction Convention arts. 3, 12. As is often noted, the law of the Abduction Convention

is relatively straightforward, but the facts can be complicated. See, e.g., Quintero v. De Loera

Barba, No. 5:19-148, 2019 WL 1386556, at *3 (W.D. Tex. Mar. 27, 2019), appeal dismissed

pursuant to appellant’s motion, No. 19-50275, 2019 WL 4673234 (5th Cir. Aug. 15, 2019).

* Robert G. Spector is the Glenn R. Watson Chair and Centennial Professor of Law Emeritus

at the University of Oklahoma Law Center.

Published in Family Law Quarterly, Volume 54, Number 4, 2021. © 2021 American Bar Association. Reproduced with permission. All rights reserved. This information or any portion thereof may

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