Our Notable Cases
Parental Child Abduction Case
Molshree Sharma (“Molly”) and Jonathan Standeford have worked with individuals from all over the world and across the United States to secure the requisite orders from the Cook County Circuit Court on international child abduction cases. In the case outlined below you will see that they received an allocation judgment of parental responsibilities in favor of their client, the left-behind parent. Additionally, they aided in the return of the minor child to the habitual residence of Cook County, Illinois, and ultimately received a judgment in favor of their client for nearly $400,000.00 of attorneys’ fees and costs spent litigating this case.
Molly and Jonathan have experience representing clients whose cases involve countries that have signed the Hague Convention on the Civil Aspects of Child Abduction (“Hague Convention”), and Non-Hague Convention signatory countries. The approach, strategy and process are varied depending on which country(ies) are involved and whether they are Hague Convention compliant or not. For example, India which is a non-Hague signatory country, has become a prime destination for parental child abduction as the laws in place provide the abducting parent with various avenues to delay litigation, harass the left-behind parent, and needlessly prevent the return of a minor child to the habitual residence. Many times, when an abduction of a child involves India, it spawns years of endless litigation in India. Which results in little or no hope of meaningful contact between the child and the left-behind parent, and even less so that the child might one day return. This results in harm not only to the child, but both parents as well. For example, the left-behind parent has few options and little or no access to the child. On the other side, if a parent is in an abusive marriage, they have limited options and could be embroiled in litigation without being able to seek a defense of grave risk of harm, therefore must live with the instability of not being able to return to the United States.
Jonathan and Molly represented the father in the case outlined below where the father was without remedy to seek the return of the minor child to the habitual residence and home state of Illinois.
Our client and his wife were married in 2011. They lived in Chicago, Illinois for nearly all of their marriage and their minor child exclusively resided in Chicago until 2016. years. Prior to the mother’s wrongful abduction of the minor child, the parties jointly raised the child, vacationed together, and resided in the same home. Similar to many other international child abductions, there were nearly no signs that the other party was intending to remove the child without consent. Such as was the case for our client.
In late 2016, the minor child was on a family trip to India when the mother, and without notice or consent, absconded with the child with the intent to wrongfully abduct and retain the child in India. Immediately thereafter, the left-behind parent contacted Molly Sharma who assisted in getting orders from the Cook County Circuit Court demanding the return of the minor child from India, holding the abducting parent in indirect civil contempt, and awarding sole parenting time and decision making to our client (which proved imperative in securing the return of the child).
In 2022, Molly and Jonathan secured the necessary order for the left-behind parent to obtain a passport (the minor child’s passport was expired and in the possession of the mother, therefore rendering the minor child out of status for immigration purposes). After securing the passport, our client courageously returned to India and after 2 years was able to make his passage across the Nepal border to Kathmandu, where the U.S. Embassy assisted in his protection from the mother who ultimately appeared in Nepal and assaulted U.S. Embassy staff and the left-behind father. After more than a month of being in Nepal, the Nepali Supreme Court denied the abducting mother’s petition for habeas corpus and ruled that the father could return with the child to the United States because that was the only Court to have issued a custody determination judgment and have jurisdiction over the minor child. Had Molly and Jonathan not secured the Cook County Circuit Court orders and Judgments, the minor child may still be in India to this day and remain a victim of international child abduction.
In mid-2024, our client returned to the United States from Nepal, and for the first time in nearly 8 years, the child was home. Since the child’s return to the United States, the abducting mother has sought to have in-person parenting time, which was determined to create and unreasonable risk of re-abduction. Given this risk, our client maintains all in-person parenting time and all decision-making authority for the child.
Ultimately, our client received a positive outcome, but not without costs – both emotionally and monetarily. The circumstances and pace of this case resulted in years of missed time with his child. Additionally, our client spent a vast sum of money as a result of this international child abduction perpetuated by the mother. Throughout litigation, Molly and Jonathan sought reimbursement for funds needlessly spent to return the child to the habitual residence and home state. As a result of the abduction and after a multiday hearing, the Cook County Circuit Court entered a judgment in favor of the left-behind father for nearly $400,000.00 in fees.
Arnoux Sharma Standeford, LLC stands by parents who find themselves in untenable and devastating situations and help navigate a meaningful resolution.
Parental Child Abduction Case #2
The primary focus of the Hague Convention on the Civil Aspects of International Child Abduction is to determine jurisdiction, and when appropriate, return a minor child to the habitual residence for any necessary child custody determinations before the proper court.
Jonathan Standeford and Molshree (Molly) Sharma appeared pro hoc vice before the Middle District of North Carolina Federal Court in December 2024, and successfully obtained a preliminary injunction in our client’s favor in a proceeding involving a minor child who was wrongfully abducted from Veracruz, Mexico to North Carolina by her mother. This proceeding is for the return of the minor child to the habitual residence of Veracruz, Mexico under the Hague Convention on the Civil Aspects of International Child Abduction and the International Child Abduction Remedies Act.
Our client, the left-behind father, resides in Veracruz, Mexico and was married to the mother of their four-year old child. All parties are citizens of Mexico, with our client being a dual citizen of the United States. The parties, along with the child, resided in Mexico for the entirety of their marriage until June 2023, when the mother under false pretenses abducted the minor child from their home. Following months of efforts to locate the child and the mother, the minor child was located being wrongfully retained in the jurisdiction of the Middle District of North Carolina.
Jonathan and Molly successfully petitioned and secured a preliminary injunction against the mother who had wrongfully abducted the minor child to prevent her from removing the child from the jurisdiction. In order to secure the preliminary injunction, Jonathan and Molly were required to argue a likelihood of success on the merits of the case showing the minor child was wrongfully removed from the habitual residence, and that if the court did not restrain the mother, it was likely she would again abscond with the child beyond the jurisdiction of the court and she then would conceal the child further impairing the father-child relationship.
Additionally, our client was awarded access to the minor child who he had only limited contact with for over a year as a result of the abduction.
Jonathan and Molly will proceed to trial in January 2025, seeking the return of the minor child to the care and custody of our client in Veracruz, Mexico. Jonathan and Molly have assisted in reuniting multiple left-behind parents with their children and continue to be a valuable factor in litigation not only in Illinois, but in this case in North Carolina.
Jonathan and Molly echo the quote made in the Abbot v. Abbot decision that “[s]ome child psychologists believe that the trauma children suffer from these abductions is one of the worst forms of child abuse.” Abbot v. Abbot, 542 F.3d 1081. Jonathan and Molly remain in contact with various families who have suffered as a result of international child abduction to provide as much effort and attention as possible to assist through such a difficult trauma.