United States Ninth Circuit

The district court's denial of a mother's petition under the Hague Convention on the Civil Aspects of International Child Abduction for the return of her children to Mexico, is affirmed, where: 1) the parents had used a "shuttle custody" arrangement in which the children had split their time between Mexico and the US; 2) the Convention did not attach because the parents shared a settled intention to abandon Mexico and adopt the US as the children's habitual residence; and 3) the father also could have prevailed on the basis that he and the mother shared a settled intention to abandon Mexico as the children's sole habitual residence, that there was an actual change in geography, and that an appreciable period of time had passed, and therefore the children were habitually resident in the US when the father retained them.

Appellate Information

• Decided 11/15/2013
• Published 11/15/2013

Judges

• NOONAN

Court

• United States Ninth Circuit

Counsel