Two parents engaged in a divorce and custody matter in Colorado. In the proceeding, the father sought to travel to the UAE with their children. The father and children have Jordanian and U.S. passports, and father has relatives in Dubai, where the family regularly traveled during the marriage. The mother expressed concern that the father would not return with the children if permitted to travel there. One of the evaluators testified that there is “at least a reasonable risk” that father would not return. But, the court ultimately concluded that it didn’t share those concerns. The court permitted annual travel by the father with the children to the UAE, with some restrictions. The court required the father to post a bond of $50,000 and to surrender the children’s U.S. and Jordanian passports to a neutral third party who would release them before travel. The father appealed, arguing that the court’s imposition of these two “abduction prevention measures” was based solely on the finding that the UAE was not a Contracting State to the Hague Abduction Convention, and that the court should have considered all the factors in the Uniform Child Abduction Prevention Act, which is enacted by Colorado. The father argued that the trial court’s failure to consider all the factors in UCAPA constituted reversible error. The appellate court agreed, stating, “We agree with these other jurisdictions and decline to adopt a bright-line rule or singular test permitting the imposition of abduction prevention measures simply because a parent intends to travel with a child to a country that is not a signatory of the Hague Convention.” Quoting a NJ case, the court also said, “It also warned that to focus solely on the conflict between the parent’s native country’s laws, policies, religion, or values and our own would border on “xenophobia, a long word with a long and sinister past.”

The Uniform Child Abduction Prevention Act was adopted by the Uniform Law Commission in 2006. It provides a laundry list of red flags for courts to consider in exercising their discretion in implementing potential abduction prevention measures. Colorado enacted this uniform law in 2007. As of this post, there are 15 enactments, and 2 states that are introducing it this year already. To learn more about UPCAPA, you can view this webinar by the New York State Bar Association.