Domestic Violence and Parental Child Abduction

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This book focuses on the protection of abducting mothers who have been subject to return proceedings under the 1980 Hague Abduction Convention and the Brussels IIa Regulation, in circumstances where the child abduction has been motivated by acts of domestic violence from the left-behind father. The utility of Regulation 606/2013 on mutual recognition of protection measures in civil matters and Directive 2011/99/EU on the European Protection Order, and how protection measures can be used to protect abducting mothers, are examined within this context. Both instruments allow cross-border circulation of protection measures but, so far, have not attracted much attention in practice. This book aims to fill that gap.

Domestic Violence and Parental Child Abduction is the culmination of the POAM (Protection of Abducting Mothers in Return Proceedings) project, a collaborative research project conducted between 2019 and 2021. It presents and analyses the findings of the project and brings together contributions by the project partners, as well as by other renowned experts. The book also presents a Best Practice Guide developed for the application of Regulation 606/2013 and Directive 2011/99/EU in child abduction cases committed against the background of domestic violence.

The book offers a unique perspective on the problem of international parental child abductions committed against the background of domestic violence. Given its practical focus, it will appeal not only to an academic audience but also to judges, legal practitioners and other professionals working in the area of parental child abduction.

With a foreword by Thalia Kruger (University of Antwerp) and contributions by Anatol Dutta (Ludwig Maximilian University of Munich), Marilyn Freeman (University of Westminster), Jan von Hein (University of Freiburg), Costanza Honorati (University of MilanoBicocca), Onyója Momoh (University of Aberdeen), Marin Mrčela (Supreme Court of the Republic of Croatia), Johanna Niemi (University of Helsinki), Laura-Maria Poikela (University of Turku), Nicola Taylor (University of Otago), Tatjana Tertsch (Ludwig Maximilian University of Munich), Katarina Trimmings (University of Aberdeen), Michael Wilderspin (Former Legal Adviser to the European Commission) and Mirela Župan (Josip Juraj Strossmayer University of Osijek).

KATARINA TRIMMINGS is a Senior Lecturer in Law at the University of Aberdeen, and the Director of the Aberdeen Centre for Private International Law. She has written extensively on cross-border parental child abduction, and published a monograph titled Child Abduction within the European Union (Hart Publishing, 2013), and is one of the authors of the 15th edition of Cheshire’s Private International Law (Oxford University Press, 2017). She led the EU-funded project ‘Protection of Abducting Mothers in Return Proceedings: Intersection between Domestic Violence and Parental Child Abduction’ (POAM, 2019-2021).

ANATOL DUTTA holds a Chair of Private Law, Private International Law and Comparative Law at the Ludwig Maximilian University of Munich. Previously, he was Fellow at the Max Planck Institute for Comparative and International Private Law in Hamburg (2003-2014) and was Professor at the University of Regensburg (2014-2017). Anatol Dutta is a member of the editorial board of Zeitschrift für das gesamte Familienrecht (FamRZ), a leading family law journal for practitioners and academics in Germany and is a member of the German Council of Private International Law. He has a special interest in family and succession law, from a private international law as well as a comparative and interdisciplinary perspective.

COSTANZA HONORATI is a Full Professor of European Union Law at the Milano-Bicocca University, School of Law where she also holds the Chair of EU Private International Law. She has been Co-ordinator of the PhD Program in European Union Law since 2017 and was the Head of the PhD School between 2009 and 2013. She is currently Chair of the EU Commission’s Working Group on a Guide to the Maintenance Regulation and was previously a member of the Expert Group assisting the Commission on the Recast of the Brussels IIa Regulation (2015). She has been a Visiting Scholar and Visiting Professor at several institutions). She is a member of the Editorial Board of Rivista di diritto internazionale privato e processuale and the Special Editor for private international law of European Papers.

MIRELA ŽUPAN is a Full Professor at the University of Osijek, Faculty of Law, and Head of the PhD Programme in Law. Her main professional interests include private international law of family and contractual matters, as well as the impacts of ICT on law and the protection of the vulnerable (children, adults, companion animals). She was awarded the Max-Planck Society Doctoral and Postdoctoral Grant from the Max Planck Institute for Comparative and International Private Law in Hamburg. As a member of several research groups, she has organised and participated in conferences, seminars and workshops, and has published a number of books, chapters and papers. She has acted as a member of the Expert Group assisting the Commission on the Recast of the Brussels IIa Regulation and was nominated as a national reporter for European Commission studies.