CUSTODY LAWS NOW TOUGHER; STILL, THE VIOLATIONS RARELY GO TO TRIAL

Laws against parental kidnapping have become tougher over the years. But a county prosecutor says most of the time, violators of child custody arrangements are never brought to trial.

Parents can be charged with kidnapping their children if they don't have custody and refuse to return them to the parent who does.

Cape County Prosecuting Attorney Morley Swingle said the crime is being reported more often then ever in the county. In most cases, the children are returned to the custodial parent, and police often have to intervene.

But Swingle explained that once the child is returned to the custodial parent, more often than not, charges are dropped.

"Many of these cases end up being cases we dismiss after all the emotions have calmed down," Swingle said. "Once the child is returned, suddenly the victim is happy. You end up with a witness who's not particularly cooperative anymore."

There are reasons a custodial parent may not want to press charges against an ex-spouse who refuses to follow court-set custody guidelines, he said.

"If the person is put in jail, there goes their job, and in some cases, the child support," Swingle said. "The intention of the law is to get the child back to the proper custodial parent quickly, and I think it does that."

Laws passed in the late 1980s allow police to physically take a child away from the parent who does not have custody and return the child to the parent who does. In 1982, the law was changed to allow the FBI to get involved in parental kidnapping cases.

Sometimes, this means police are moderators in tense and dangerous domestic battles.

"It's very emotional," said Cape Girardeau Police Sgt. Carl Kinnison. "People can get very angry and frustrated. It's one of those situations where emotions explode."

Just last week in Cape Girardeau, Kinnison said, a woman refused to return her child to her ex-husband when her scheduled visitation was over. After the man called police, the woman barricaded herself and her child in her home and refused to allow police to enter. A search warrant had to be obtained, and police spent about two hours trying to convince the woman to turn the child over, he said.

In many cases, police are summoned to intervene when parental kidnapping has been threatened but hasn't occurred.

"The threat of it is more common than the actual occurrence," Kinnison said. "But it does happen."

Swingle said the most common form of parental kidnapping is interference of custody or not following custody arrangements.

Parents can be charged with child abduction even before a final custody agreement has been reached. If parents take children to another state to avoid returning them to the parent who has custody, the crime is a felony.

"The whole purpose of these laws is to have the people go to court and have the court control the child's custody," Swingle said.

"That's why the criminal justice system is involved in this. Otherwise, the parent (who has custody) would have to go to court and fight for the rights they already have. This way, police can intervene immediately."

Swingle said parents usually flee to a relative or friend's house. The friend or relative could possibly be charged with assisting in parental kidnapping or assisting in child abduction.

"A lot of the time, these people will lie to police and say they don't know where the child is," he said. "They don't realize the seriousness of what they're doing."

Swingle said the laws protecting the rights of custodial parents work, even though they don't always result in charges or a trial. They often result in the child being returned to the proper parent.

"I think they're accomplishing what they're meant to accomplish," he said. "Being able to return the child to the parent immediately gives peace of mind to the victim whose child has been snatched."