15-1936 Adamis v. Lampropoulou 

### UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS FOR THE SECOND CIRCUIT 

## SUMMARY ORDER

RULINGS BY SUMMARY ORDER DO NOT HAVE PRECEDENTIAL EFFECT. CITATION TO A SUMMARY ORDER FILED ON OR AFTER JA NUARY 1, 2007, IS PE RMITTED AND IS GOVERNE D BY FEDERAL RULE OF APPELLATE PROCEDURE 32.1 AND THIS COURT = S LOCAL RULE 32.1.1. WHEN CITING A SUMMARY ORDER IN A DOCUMENT FILED WITH THIS COURT, A PARTY MUST CITE EITHER THE FEDERAL APPENDIX OR AN ELECTRONIC DATABASE (W ITH THE NOTATION A SUMMARY ORDER @ ). A PARTY CITING TO A SUMMARY ORDER MUST SERVE A COPY OF IT ON ANY PARTY NOT REPRESENTED BY COUNSEL. At a stated term of the United States Court of Appeals for the Seco nd Circuit, held at 1 the Thurgood Marshall United Stat es Courthouse, 40 Foley Sq uare, in the City of New 2 York, on the 24 th day of August, two thousand sixteen. 3 4 PRESENT: 5 GERARD E. LYNCH, 6 SUSAN L. CARNEY, 7 Circuit Judges , 8 ALVIN K. HELLERSTEIN,  9 District Judge. 10

___________________ __________________ 11 12 NIKOLAOS ADAMIS, 13 14 Petitioner-Appellant , 15 16 v. 15-1936 17 18 FOTINI LAMPROPOULOU, AKA FOTINY 19 LAMBROPOULOS, 20 21 Respondent-Appellee

. 22 23

___________________ __________________ 24 25

 Judge Alvin K. Hellerstein, of the United States District Court for the Southern District of New York, sitting by designation.2 FOR PETITIONER-APPELLANT: Nikolaos Adamis, pro se, Porto Rafti, Greece. 1 2 FOR RESPONDENT-APPELLEE: Fotini Lampropoulou, pro se, Douglaston, NY. 3 4 Appeal from a judgment of the United States District Court for the Eastern District 5 of New York (Pamela K. Chen, J .). 6 UPON DUE CONSIDERATION, IT IS HEREBY ORDERED, ADJUDGED, 7 AND DECREED that the judgment of the district court is AFFIRMED

. 8 Appellant Nikolaos Adamis, proceeding pr o se, appeals from the district court’s 9 judgment denying his petition pur suant to the Hague Conventio n on the Civil Aspects of 10 International Child Abduction, Oct. 25, 1980, 1343 U.N.T.S. 89 (“the Hague 11 Convention”), as implemented by the Interna tional Child Abduction Remedies Act, 22 12 U.S.C. §§ 9001 et seq ., for return of his son, D.A., to Greece following his removal to the 13 United States by D.A.’s mother, appellee Fotini Lampropoulou. Following a bench trial, 14
the district court found that Adamis had co nsented to the removal of D.A. from Greece, 15 which meant that the move was not “w rongful” under the Hague Convention. 1 On appeal, 16 we construe Adamis’s pro se submissions as challenging the district court’s factual 17 findings. We assume the parties’ familiarity with the underlying fa cts, the procedural 18 history of the case, and the issues on appeal. 19 “In cases arising under the [Hague] C onvention, a district court’s factual 20

1 The district court also found that D.A. was of sufficient age and matu rity for the court to take his views into account and did not want to be returned to Greece. Because we conclude that the district court did not comm it clear error in finding that Adamis consented to D.A.’s removal, we do not a ddress that finding on appeal.3 determinations are reviewed for clear error. However, the district court’s application of 1 the Convention to the facts it ha s found, like the interpretation of the Convention, is subject 2 to de novo review.” See Gitter v. Gitter , 396 F.3d 124, 129 (2d Cir. 2005) (alterations and 3 internal quotation marks omitted). When a fi nding is based on a cred ibility determination, 4 “particularly strong deference should be granted to the findi ng in light of the factfinder’s 5 unique ability to assess the witness.” Ortega v. Duncan , 333 F.3d 102, 107 (2d Cir. 2003) 6 (internal quotation marks omitted). 7 The Hague Convention was adopted “to pr otect children internationally from the 8 harmful effects of their wrongful removal or re tention and to establish procedures to ensure 9 their prompt return to the State of their habitu al residence, as well as to secure protection 10 for rights of access.” Ermini v. Vittori , 758 F.3d 153, 160 (2d Ci r. 2014), quoting Hague 11 Convention, Preamble. The C onvention seeks to prevent the wrongful removal of a child 12 to a jurisdiction more favorable to custody, and “is not designed to adjudicate custody 13
claims.” Id. The Convention thus “does not estab lish substantive standards for resolving 14 the merits of any underlying custody dispute[,] . . . [and its] focus is simply upon whether a 15 child should be returned to [h is] country of habitual reside nce for custody proceedings.” 16 Mota v. Castillo , 692 F.3d 108, 112 (2d Cir. 2012). Under Article 13 of the Hague 17 Convention, a court is not bound to order a child’s re turn if the respondent esta blishes that 18 the petitioner had “consented to or subsequently ac quiesced in” the removal of the child. 19 Hague Convention, art. 13(a). 204 The district court’s finding that Adamis consented to D.A.’s removal was based 1 largely on the court’s assessment of re corded conversations between D.A. and 2 Lampropoulou. Adamis, who was represented below, consented through counsel to the 3 admissibility of those recordings at trial and stipulated as to their authenticity. For the 4 first time on appeal, Adamis argues that the ta pes were doctored. That argument, and any 5 argument that the recordings should not have been admitted because they were made in 6 violation of Greek law, has been waived. See Krieger v. Gold Bond Bldg. Prods. , 863 7 F.2d 1091, 1096 (2d Cir. 1988) (argument as to inadmissibility of ev idence to which party 8 did not object at trial is d eemed waived on appeal). 9 The district court’s finding that Adamis consented to D.A.’s removal was not 10 clearly erroneous. The district court relie d on the testimony of La mpropoulou, D.A., and 11 D.A.’s stepsister, Toula. Their statements were corroborated by a recorded conversation 12 that occurred approximately ten days before Lampropoulou moved with D.A. to the United 13 States. The conversation confirms that Lamp ropoulou could live in th e United States with 14 D.A., and could “come and go” to Gree ce with D.A. Crediting Lampropoulou’s 15 testimony, the district court found that ther e were no further conversations between the 16 couple about the move until af ter Lampropoulou had already a rrived in the United States, 17 and that Adamis’s explanation for the recording – that he had consente d only to a short trip 18 to New York – was not credible. We defer to those credibility findings which, particularly 19 in conjunction with the r ecorded conversations, are not clearly erroneous. 205 We note that the determination that D. A.’s removal from Greece was not wrongful 1 under the Hague Convention establishes only th at he will not be ordered returned to 2 Greece. Our decision does not have any bearing on the merits of any future custody case, 3 nor does it affect the “existing allocation of custody rights.” Abbott v. Abbott , 560 U.S. 1, 4 20 (2010). 5 We have considered all of Appellant’s remaining arguments and find them to be 6 without merit. Accordingly, we AFFIRM the judgment of the district court. 7
FOR THE COURT: 8 Catherine O = Hagan Wolfe, Clerk 9 10 11