On September 19, 2022, the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Missouri ordered the parties’ minor child returned to her habitual residence of Japan. The child’s father filed his return petition in the court on April 12, 2022. The court found that the child’s mother removed the child from Japan, without the father’s knowledge or consent, on October 15, 2021. The parents had been moving towards a separation and divorce for the better part of 2021, so, the father had hidden the minor child’s expired passports in Japan. The court noted that “[o]n October 15, 2021, Respondent spoke with her parents, who were in the United States. Her parents informed her that they had been in touch with their Congresswoman, Ann Wagner. Representative Wagner’s office provided instructions for how Respondent might obtain an emergency passport for L.T. so that they could leave Japan. Following that conversation, Respondent went to the family’s storage locker to search for L.T.’s U.S. passport after dropping L.T. at school. When she found the passport, Respondent immediately reported to L.T.’s school, retrieved L.T., and took a taxi to the U.S. Embassy. Once at the Embassy, Respondent told the diplomat she met with that she feared for her life and for her child’s safety. She obtained an emergency passport and was directed to go immediately to the airport.”

Respondent mother argues three points against returning the minor child: that Japan was not the child’s habitual residence primarily because she “only remained in Japan due to coercion by Petitioner[,]” that returning the child would expose her to a grave risk of harm, and that Petitioner father had consented or otherwise acquiesced to the child’s relocation to Missouri because “Petitioner did not make any effort to secure the return of the child until 180 days had passed after the removal and until over 150 days after Respondent filed divorce proceedings.”

The Court ultimately concluded that Japan was the child’s habitual residence, that there was no grave risk under the legal standard, and there was no consent and/or acquiescence on the part of Petitioner father. The Court ordered the child returned “at Respondent’s expense at a reasonable date and time mutually agreed upon by the parties.”