THE SUPREME Court has ruled that a young girl was unlawfully brought from Latvia to Ireland by her mother against her father’s wishes and must be returned for the Latvian courts to decide issues of custody and access.
The three-judge court also upheld a High Court finding it was inappropriate to hear the views of the five-year-old child on the matter. Given the child’s age, the High Court’s general, although not inflexible, view is that it is inappropriate to hear a child under the age of six.
The case arose after the girl was brought to Ireland by her mother from Latvia in March 2009. The child’s father lives in Latvia, he and the mother were unmarried but were living together in Latvia in 2004 when the child was born.
They exercised joint custody of her until 2007 when the mother moved to Ireland, leaving the child with her father but returning from time to time to see her daughter. In June 2008, the mother returned to Latvia and brought the child to Ireland for three months, allegedly without the father’s knowledge or consent.
She returned the child to the father in September 2008. In January 2009, the mother began custody proceedings in Latvia while the father also sought custody.
In late March 2009, the father learned the mother had returned to Ireland with the child. He denied the mother’s claims he had agreed verbally that she could have custody and could bring the child here and took court proceedings here.
The mother claimed he was bringing those proceedings to punish her for not sending more money home for child support, that he was an alcoholic and had only allowed her to see the child in return for sexual favours from the mother. The father denied all those claims.
The issue before the Irish courts was whether the habitual residence of the child was Latvia and if so, whether she should be returned to the courts there.
On March 16th last, the High Court found the child’s habitual place of residence was Latvia and her removal was wrong within the meaning of the Hague Convention on International Child Abduction. It ordered the child to be returned to Latvia for issues of custody and access to be decided.
The mother appealed that decision in person to the Supreme Court and also urged the court to hear her child’s views.
Dismissing the appeal, Mrs Justice Susan Denham affirmed the High Court findings on all the facts of the case including that the parents exercised joint custody, the father was the child’s chief carer in her early years and the child was habitually resident in Latvia prior to her removal.
She also upheld findings that the child was removed without the father’s consent and would not be at “grave risk” if returned to her father’s custody.
Mrs Justice Denham noted the father had offered to make undertakings, including to vacate his apartment and allow the mother and child to live there until the issues of access and custody were determined. She said the case was listed before the Latvian courts next month.
