Opinion ID: 199909
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: Referral of Sexual Abuse/Grave Risk Determination to Swedish Courts

Text: 61 McLarey argues the district court punted on its Hague Convention obligations by not deciding the issue of sexual abuse, the basis for her grave risk claim. McLarey also says that the only reason that the children were not properly evaluated in Sweden prior to their wrongful removal was that Danaipour did not give his permission for or cooperate in any such evaluation. Danaipour denies that he stymied the Swedish investigations, but the record supports McLarey's argument on this point. 62 Under the text of the Convention, the question for a U.S. court confronted with an Article 13(b) defense is whether there is a grave risk that the [child's] return would expose the child to physical or psychological harm or otherwise place the child in an intolerable situation. Hague Convention, art. 13(b), T.I.A.S. No. 11,670, at 8. It is clear that a court in the abducted-to nation has jurisdiction to decide the merits of an abduction claim, but not the merits of the underlying custody dispute. Friedrich, 78 F.3d at 1063; see also 42 U.S.C. § 11601(b)(4) (1994); Hague Convention, art. 19, T.I.A.S. No. 11,670, at 9. The Convention assigns the duty of the grave risk determination to the country to which the child has been removed. It is not a derogation of the authority of the habitual residence country for the receiving U.S. courts to adjudicate the grave risk question. Rather, it is their obligation to do so under the Convention and its enabling legislation. Generally speaking, where a party makes a substantial allegation that, if true, would justify application of the Article 13(b) exception, the court should make the necessary predicate findings. Cf. Whallon, 230 F.3d at 460 (1st Cir.2000) (upholding district court's findings that father had not verbally abused daughter and that any psychological harm resulting from abuse of mother in that case did not rise to level required by 13(b)). 63 Implicit in the district court's decision is a determination that, even if the evaluation requested by McLarey led to a finding that sexual abuse had occurred, McLarey would not be able to meet her burden of showing grave risk upon return. The court found that [i]n these circumstances, McLarey has not proven by clear and convincing evidence that [either of the children] will be exposed to a grave risk of physical or psychological harm, or otherwise be placed in an intolerable situation, if returned on the conditions the court is ordering. 13 Danaipour, 183 F.Supp.2d at 325 (emphasis added). The district court did not make a decision on whether Danaipour had sexually abused the children, or take the steps to obtain the evidence it thought necessary to make a reliable finding. 64 We think there are several errors in the district court's approach. It is one thing to evaluate whether to return a child once the grave risk occasioned by sexual abuse has been shown. It is another to say, as the district court did, that the child could be returned before it knew whether there was sexual abuse, despite credible evidence that there had been sexual abuse. Secondly, even on its own terms, the court order is based on improper assumptions. As discussed below, the imposition of many of those conditions was erroneous, as was the court's finding that the Swedish courts would undertake a forensic evaluation. It was based on these errors that the court declined to order the forensic evaluation that it found would be necessary to determine in a medically reliable manner whether either child was sexually abused in any way. Id. at 317. The court declined to gather the very information that it found was necessary to make a determination on the key issue. In this case, the trial judge should have made a determination on the underlying question, whether sexual abuse occurred. 14 65 The district court's approach here cuts the inquiry short, in a way that is inconsistent with Hague Convention obligations and United States policy on the Convention, as expressed in the Department of State analysis of grave risk. Hague International Child Abduction Convention: Text and Legal Analysis, 51 Fed.Reg. at 10,510. The trial judge should have taken the steps available to him to determine if sexual abuse occurred; only once he had made such a finding could he ask the right questions about whether the children could be returned to the locale of the abuse, where the abuser still resided and where the district court could not guarantee the outcome of future determinations regarding the safety of the children. Similarly, if the evaluation exonerated Danaipour, or even if it was inconclusive, that would also be relevant information to deciding the level of risk, if any, that the girls would face if returned.