Case Update (24 Oct 2023): Nisbet v. Spirit Rose Bridger; children had no habitual residence at time of removal
Petitioner Father and Respondent Mother are parents to 2 children. Their first child was born in February 2018 in Jersey, while the family was residing with Petitioner’s parents. The second child was born in February 2020 in Scotland. After the first child’s birth, on or around August 2019, while in Jersey, Petitioner stabbed his mother in the neck. She died. He was arrested, and plead guilty to manslaughter on the basis of diminished responsibility. He is presently serving an indefinite term in a secure psychiatric facility. During the children’s lives, they lived in Scotland and in Jersey. At times, they were in a refuge, then a halfway house. At times, they were with Petitioner’s family in Jersey or at Petitioner’s apartment in Scotland. When COVID-19 broke, Respondent, who had expressed a desire to move to Oregon with the children, could not get a passport or CRBA for the youngest child because the U.S. consulate closed. It was finally, on June 17, 2022, that Respondent departed Scotland for the U.S. with the children, having sent several boxes of possessions to Oregon first. Prior to their departure, the children were in nursery school in Scotland, but the Respondent stated that they had no family or friends. The oldest has a Jersey passport, the youngest a Scottish passport. Both children are U.S. citizens.
Petitioner Father sought the children’s return to Scotland. The court concluded that the children, on June 17, 2022, actually had no habitual residence, saying, “[t]he children had no family or friends in Scotland and no meaningful relationship with their father. Petitioner has never lived with [the youngest child] and met her in person only three times. Petitioner lived with [oldest child] for a total of a year, on and off, and for a substantial amount of that time, he was bedridden from his second suicide attempt. And Respondent was in the U.K. on an expiring visa. Petitioner himself has not lived in Scotland for several years [being in an institution in Jersey].” Further, Respondent had made it clear that she intended to move to Oregon during the relationship. Citing to the Third Circuit, the court said, “where [parental] conflict is contemporaneous with the birth of a child, no habitual residence may ever come into existence.” Finally, the Respondent had described a significant amount of coercive acts by the Petitioner, and the court found that this supported its finding that the children had no habitual residence.
On this alone, the court denied the petition.
The court also found that returning the children alone to Scotland while the Petitioner is confined is “facially an intolerable situation” and so the court also looked ahead into the future when the Petitioner might be released, and found that returning the children would expose them to a grave risk of harm. In addition to a variety of acts described by the Respondent, it appeared that the “Petitioner has deliberately made it more difficult for his caretakers to properly treat him” by giving conflicting information to them and refusing treatment. The court order gives a nice summary of the different circuit’s existing jurisprudence in finding spousal domestic violence to be a grave risk. It concluded that Petitioner’s behavior extended to other members of his family. The court also referenced the cascading effect of removing the children from their support network in Oregon and returning them to Scotland as contributing to the risk of harm.
The Petitioner proposed the ameliorative measures of having the children returned to the care of a live-in nanny or one of his friends, but the court found these unworkable, and would require the court to “meddle with long-term arrangements abroad”.
