Bollinger County man faces charge of parental kidnapping

~ The boy's parents never sought a court-directed custody decision.

The Bollinger County prosecutor won a round and lost a round in his attempt to make parental kidnapping charges stick against a man accused of denying his former girlfriend access to their son.

Associate Circuit Judge Scott Thomsen dismissed one count against Joey B. Howard, 27, of northwest Bollinger County, but sent the other to circuit court for trial.

The felony charges stemmed from Howard allegedly denying Michelle Raith, 23, of Fredericktown, Mo., contact with their 5-year-old son between May and the end of September.

There were no court orders establishing custody arrangements for the boy at the time. Since then, Howard filed a civil case seeking custody and has a temporary order granting him primary care of the child, defense attorney Allen Moss said.

The civil case will have no bearing on the outcome of the criminal case, prosecutor Stephen Gray said. "The fact that he files later, after he is arrested, and gets some kind of custody arrangement after the fact does not negate the four-month period where she was denied contact," Gray said.

Howard is scheduled for arraignment in front of Circuit Judge William Syler on Dec. 2.

One count was dismissed after a preliminary hearing that lasted about two hours, Moss said. A court-ordered custody arrangement isn't an "absolute defense," Moss said, but the facts of the civil case were presented Wednesday and should be a factor in the criminal trial.

"The state punishes someone for withholding custody without good cause," Moss said. "We have always maintained that he had good cause."

The original charge against Howard was filed the day after the boy's fifth birthday. The second charge, which was dismissed, was filed a day later when Howard continued to prevent Raith from seeing the child.

"We felt each day was an additional offense," Gray said.

At trial, the defense will argue that Raith wasn't really denied access to her son, Moss said. A birthday party was arranged at a neutral location, he said. Raith was invited but did not attend.

To convince a jury Howard is guilty, Moss said, Gray will have to convince them that the boy should be with his mother.

The birthday party invitation isn't the same as returning the boy to his mother, Gray said.

"Even if he let her talk with him by phone or get occasional fleeting glimpses of him, that is not enough to avoid this section" of the law, he said.

Howard and Raith never married, and neither sought a court-directed custody or child-support decision.

Unmarried parents should take the case as a lesson, Gray said. "It is a safer course to have it all set in a schedule by the court."

rkeller@semissourian.com

335-6611, extension 126