Case Update (23 Sept 2025): USA v. Gaulsh; motion to dismiss criminal kidnapping charges and quash arrest warranted granted

This is the case of a Danish citizen. He met a woman and they had a child, who was born in 2011. The couple separated and the New York State Family Court entered a parenting plan in 2014. In 2018, the court, because of the Mother’s unstable housing, gave the Father, the Defendant here, sole custody. After a few years, the court increased the Mother’s visits with the child to included overnights. In late 2020, when the Mother was to have overnight visits with the child, the Father did not show up to drop off the child, and it was learned that the day before, he had flown with the child to Denmark. The court issued an order “suspending” his custody rights and awarding temporary custody to the Mother. It issued a writ of habeas corpus to immediately release the child to the Mother’s custody. Several months later, the U.S. government filed charges against the Father under the International Parental Kidnapping Crime Act, ad the Mother pursued the child’s return using the Abduction Convention. The Danish courts ordered the child’s return. Shortly after the return was ordered, the Serbian government arrested the Father as he traveled into Serbia with the child. The child was returned to the USA, the Father was incarcerated waiting for an extradition determination, and ultimately he was released to his home country of Denmark. No indictment has ever been filed, and the Father seeks to dismiss the case against him, and quash the arrest warrant.

The U.S. District Court for the SDNY first looked at whether the fugitive disentitlement doctrine applies, precluding the motion to dismiss. In other words, the USA argued that the doctrine means the court cannot consider the motion to dismiss on the merits. Under this doctrine, a court may decline to consider a Defendant’s claims if they are deemed a fugitive from justice. To determine the doctrine’s application, the court first must consider whether the Defendant is considered a “fugitive”, and, second, whether to exercise its discretion to disentitle the “fugitive” from a judicial determination of their claims. First, the court concluded that Defendant was not a “fugitive” - international parental kidnapping is only a crime that can occur outside the USA. It cannot occur in the USA. Further, the Defendant here did not conceal himself, and simply remained in his home country. Second, the equities weigh in Defendant’s favor. Disentitling Defendant, here, would not substantially advance the enforceability of any decision rendered against him. Defendant, here, did not exhibit disrespect for the laws of the USA, but instead simply remained in his home country. Further, the government is not prejudiced by the Defendant’s absence - it has shown little urgency to prosecute the case, and Defendant has been in Denmark for 3 years without indictment or extradition. The motion to dismiss can proceed.

As for the Defendant’s motion to dismiss, of the three arguments made by the Defendant, the court focused on one key argument first (which it found dispositive, negating the need to address any other arguments) - the right to a speedy trial under the Sixth Amendment. Weighing the evidence, and the four year delay in proceeding with the case, the court found that all factors weighed in favor of dismissing the case.

Compare this case to Paris v. Brown, decided in the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit, where a Father in France was precluded from pursuing a request to return his children to France using the Hague Abduction Convention because of the fugitive disentitlement doctrine. The 9th Circuit reversed the dismissal of his Abduction Convention case, and remanded to adjudicate it on the merits.