Local police checkmated the man and returned him and the girl to King County. The father, who did not have custody, pleaded guilty to illegally taking his daughter from 1987 to 1991. He served a year in jail and then disappeared. His daughter was reunited with her mother in Seattle. In many police departments, parental custody cases require a unique, and sometimes awkward mix of civil custody issues and criminal law to resolve.
King County is considered a pioneer in the field and a comprehensive model.
The Child Find unit is a small yet very cohesive program. Lowrance's organizations continue to heighten awareness about such cases nationwide and wants King County's program copied elsewhere. The Police Foundation, a law enforcement think tank based in Washington, D.C., the American Prosecutors Research Institute in Alexandria, Va., and the University of California trauma center asked Barnard to help advise people doing a study of the criminal justice system's response to parental abductions. Last month The U.S. Justice Department asked Barnard to write an investigative guide book. When a child is found, police, prosecutors, private therapists, the state Attorney General's Office, State Child Protective Service workers, judges react as a team to help children and their families cope with the emotional damage caused by the abduction.