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Child abduction
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
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Child abduction is the abduction or kidnapping of a child (or baby) by an older person.
Several distinct forms of child abduction exist:
- A stranger removes a child for criminal or mischievous purposes.
- A stranger removes a child (usually a baby) to bring up as that person's own child.
- A parent removes or retains a child from the other parent's care (often in the course of or after divorce proceedings).
While cases have been reported from antiquity, this phenomenon has recently taken on greater awareness as a result of movies and television series (example: Without a Trace) depictions of the premise of people who remove children from strangers to bring up as their own often after the death of their own child.
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Perhaps the most feared (although not the most common) kind of abduction is removal by a stranger. The stereotypical version of stranger abduction is the classic form of "kidnapping," exemplified by the Lindbergh kidnapping, in which the child is detained, transported some distance, held for ransom or with intent to keep the child permanently. These instances are, however, rare.[1]
A very small number of abductions result from (typically) women who kidnap babies (or other young children) to bring up as their own. These women are often unable to have children of their own and seek to satisfy their unmet psychological need by abducting a child rather than by adopting. The crime is often premeditated, with the woman often simulating pregnancy to reduce suspicion when a baby suddenly appears in the household.
An example of child abduction is the case of Montana Barbaro, stolen in Melbourne, Australia on Saturday 7 August 2004. A male attacker knocked the mother to the ground, and a female removed the baby. They fled in a car. Montana was recovered some 40 hours later, unharmed. Similar cases include the abductions of Alex Griffiths, in 1990, and Abbie Humphries, in 1994. Both were infants snatched from their maternity ward, shortly after birth, by women intending to raise them as their own children.[citation needed]
By far the most common kind of child abduction is parental child abduction and often occurs when the parents separate or begin divorce proceedings. A parent may remove or retain the child from the other seeking to gain an advantage in expected or pending child-custody proceedings or because that parent fears losing the child in those expected or pending child-custody proceedings; a parent may refuse to return a child at the end of an access visit or may flee with the child to prevent an access visit. Parental child abductions may be within the same city, within the state region or within the same country, or may be international. Studies performed for the U.S. Department of Justice's Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention reported that in 1999, 53% percent of family abducted children were gone less than one week, and 21% were gone one month or more, NISMART National Family Abduction Report, October 2002
Depending on the laws of the state and country in which the parental abduction occurs, this may or may not constitute a criminal offense. For example, removal of a child from the UK for a period of 28 days or more without the permission of the other parent (or person with parental responsibility), is a criminal offense. In many states of the United States, if there is no formal custody order, and the parents are not living together, the removal of a child by one parent is not an offense.
Many US States have criminalized interstate child abduction and the National Conference of Commissioners on Uniform State Laws (NCCUSL) has undertaken a project to draft a uniform state law dealing with parental abduction. [1]
Serious problems can arise when parental abduction results in moving a child, with a parent, across an international border. The laws of the countries are different, and a foreign child custody order may not be recognized. The United States added specific language to American passports in the mid-1990's concerning international parental abduction.
The Hague Convention on the Child Abduction is an international treaty and legal mechanism to recover children abducted to another country by one parent or family member. The United States ratified this treaty in 1988.
There are reports that abduction of children to be used or sold as slaves is common in parts of Africa.
The Lord's Resistance Army, a rebel paramilitary group operating mainly in northern Uganda, is notorious for its abductions of children for use as child soldiers or sex slaves. According to the Sudan Tribune, as of 2005, more than 20,000 children have been kidnapped by the LRA.[2]
- ^ A study commissioned by the US Department of Justice, Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention found that there were only approximately 115 stereotypical stranger abductions in 1999. NISMART National Non-Family Abduction Report October 2002