Child abduction or child theft is the unauthorized removal of a

minor Minor may refer to: * Minor (law), a person under the age of certain legal activities. ** A person who has not reached the age of majority * Academic minor, a secondary field of study in undergraduate education Music theory *Minor chord ** Bar ...

(a child under the age of

legal adulthood The age of majority is the threshold of legal adulthood as recognized or declared in law. It is the moment when minors cease to be considered such and assume legal control over their persons, actions, and decisions, thus terminating the control ...

) from the custody of the child's natural parents or legally appointed guardians. The term ''child abduction'' includes two legal and social categories which differ by their perpetrating contexts: abduction by members of the child's family or abduction by strangers: *

Parental child abduction Parental child abduction is the hiding, taking, or keeping hold of a child by their parent while defying the rights of the child's other parent or another member of the family. This type of abduction occurs when the parents separate or begin d ...

is the unauthorized custody of a child by a family relative (usually one or both parents) without parental agreement and contrary to family law ruling, which may have removed the child from the care, access and contact of the other parent and family side. Occurring around parental

separation Separation may refer to: Films * ''Separation'' (1967 film), a British feature film written by and starring Jane Arden and directed by Jack Bond * ''La Séparation'', 1994 French film * ''A Separation'', 2011 Iranian film * ''Separation'' (20 ...

divorce Divorce (also known as dissolution of marriage) is the process of terminating a marriage or marital union. Divorce usually entails the canceling or reorganizing of the legal duties and responsibilities of marriage, thus dissolving the ...

, such parental or familial child abduction may include

parental alienation Parental alienation is a theorized process through which a child becomes estranged from one parent as the result of the psychological manipulation of another parent. The child's estrangement may manifest itself as fear, disrespect or hostility tow ...

, a form of child abuse seeking to disconnect a child from targeted parent and denigrated side of

family Family (from la, familia) is a group of people related either by consanguinity (by recognized birth) or affinity (by marriage or other relationship). The purpose of the family is to maintain the well-being of its members and of society. Idea ...

. This is, by far, the most common form of child abduction. * Abduction or kidnapping by strangers (by people unknown to the child and outside the child's family) is rare. Some of the reasons why a stranger might kidnap an unknown child include: **

extortion Extortion is the practice of obtaining benefit through coercion. In most jurisdictions it is likely to constitute a criminal offence; the bulk of this article deals with such cases. Robbery is the simplest and most common form of extortion, ...

to elicit a

ransom Ransom is the practice of holding a prisoner or item to extort money or property to secure their release, or the sum of money involved in such a practice. When ransom means "payment", the word comes via Old French ''rançon'' from Latin ''re ...

from the parents for the child's return ** illegal adoption, a stranger steals a child with the intent to rear the child as their own or to sell to a prospective adoptive parent **

human trafficking Human trafficking is the trade of humans for the purpose of forced labour, sexual slavery, or commercial sexual exploitation for the trafficker or others. This may encompass providing a spouse in the context of forced marriage, or the extr ...

, stealing a child with the intent to exploit the child themselves or through trade to someone who will abuse the child through

slavery Slavery and enslavement are both the state and the condition of being a slave—someone forbidden to quit one's service for an enslaver, and who is treated by the enslaver as property. Slavery typically involves slaves being made to perf ...

forced labor Forced labour, or unfree labour, is any work relation, especially in modern or early modern history, in which people are employed against their will with the threat of destitution, detention, violence including death, or other forms of e ...

, or

sexual abuse Sexual abuse or sex abuse, also referred to as molestation, is abusive sexual behavior by one person upon another. It is often perpetrated using force or by taking advantage of another. Molestation often refers to an instance of sexual assa ...

. **

child murder Pedicide, child murder, child manslaughter, or child homicide is the homicide of an individual who is a minor. Punishment by jurisdiction United States In 2008, there were 1,494 child homicides in the United States. Of those killed, 1,035 ...

Parental child abduction

By far the most common kind of child abduction is parental child abduction (200,000 in 2010 alone). It often occurs when the parents separate or begin

proceedings. A parent may remove or retain the child from the other seeking to gain an advantage in expected or pending child-custody proceedings or because that parent fears losing the child in those expected or pending child-custody proceedings; a parent may refuse to return a child at the end of an

access Access may refer to: Companies and organizations * ACCESS (Australia), an Australian youth network * Access (credit card), a former credit card in the United Kingdom * Access Co., a Japanese software company * Access Healthcare, an Indian BPO ...

visit or may flee with the child to prevent an access visit or fear of domestic violence and abuse. Parental child abductions may result in the child be kept within the same city, within the state or region, within the same country, or sometimes may result in the child being taken to a different country. Most parental abductions are resolved fairly quickly. Studies performed for the U.S. Department of Justice's

Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention The Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention (OJJDP) is an office of the United States Department of Justice The United States Department of Justice (DOJ), also known as the Justice Department, is a United States federal executive ...

reported that in 1999, 53% percent of family abducted children were gone less than one week, and 21% were gone one month or more. Parental abduction has been characterized as

child abuse Child abuse (also called child endangerment or child maltreatment) is physical, sexual, and/or psychological maltreatment or neglect of a child or children, especially by a parent or a caregiver. Child abuse may include any act or failure to ...

, when seen from the perspective of the kidnapped child.

International child abduction

International child abduction occurs when a parent, relative or acquaintance of a child leaves the country with the child or children in violation of a custody decree or visitation order. Another related situation is retention where children are taken on an alleged vacation to a foreign country and are not returned. While the number of cases which is over 600,000 a year consists of international child abduction is small in comparison to domestic cases, they are often the most difficult to resolve due to the involvement of conflicting international jurisdictions. Two-thirds of international parental abduction cases involve mothers who often allege domestic violence. Even when there is a treaty agreement for the return of a child, the court may be reluctant to return the child if the return could result in the permanent separation of the child from their primary caregiver. This could occur if the abducting parent faced criminal prosecution or deportation by returning to the child's home country. The

Hague Convention on the Civil Aspects of International Child Abduction The Hague Convention on the Civil Aspects of International Child Abduction or Hague Abduction Convention is a multilateral treaty that provides an expeditious method to return a child internationally abducted by a parent from one member countr ...

is an international human rights treaty and legal mechanism to recover children abducted to another country. The Hague Convention does not provide relief in many cases, resulting in some parents hiring private parties to recover their children. Covert recovery was first made public when Don Feeney, a former Delta Commando, responded to a desperate mother's plea to locate and recover her daughter from Jordan in the 1980s. Feeney successfully located and returned the child. A movie and book about Feeney's exploits lead to other desperate parents seeking him out for recovery services. By 2007, both the United States, European authorities, and NGO's had begun serious interest in the use of mediation as a means by which some international child abduction cases may be resolved. The primary focus was on Hague Cases. Development of mediation in Hague cases, suitable for such an approach, had been tested and reported by REUNITE, a London Based NGO which provides support in international child abduction cases, as successful. Their reported success lead to the first international training for cross-border mediation in 2008, sponsored by NCMEC. Held at the

University of Miami School of Law The University of Miami School of Law (Miami Law or UM Law) is the law school of the University of Miami, a private research university in Coral Gables, Florida. Founded in 1926, the University of Miami School of Law is the oldest law school in ...

, Lawyers, Judges, and certified mediators interested in international child abduction cases, attended. International child abduction is not new. A case of international child abduction has been documented aboard the Titanic. However, the incidence of international child abduction continues to increase due to the ease of international travel, increase in bi-cultural marriages and a high divorce rate.

Abductions by strangers

The stereotypical version of kidnapping by a stranger is the classic form of "

kidnapping In criminal law, kidnapping is the unlawful confinement of a person against their will, often including transportation/ asportation. The asportation and abduction element is typically but not necessarily conducted by means of force or fear: the ...

," exemplified by the

Lindbergh kidnapping On March 1, 1932, Charles Augustus Lindbergh Jr. (born June 22, 1930), the 20-month-old son of aviators Charles Lindbergh and Anne Morrow Lindbergh, was abducted from his crib in the upper floor of the Lindberghs' home, Highfields, in East Amw ...

, in which the child is detained, transported some distance, held for ransom or with intent to keep the child permanently. These instances are rare.

Child abduction for ransom: United States

The earliest nationally publicised kidnapping of a child by a stranger for the purpose of extracting a ransom payment from the parents was the Pool case of 1819, which took place in Baltimore, Maryland. Margaret Pool, 20-months-old, was kidnapped on May 20 by Nancy Gamble (19-years-old) and secreted with the assistance of Marie Thomas. On May 22, the parents, James and Mary Pool, placed an ad in the ''Baltimore Patriot'' newspaper offering a $20 reward for Mary's return. When the child was recovered on May 23—through the efforts of members of the community who conducted a search—it was revealed that the child had been badly whipped by Gamble and bore bloody wounds. Both Gamble and Thomas were tried for the crime of kidnapping and found guilty. The motive for the crime was demonstrated to be financial. She had kidnapped the child with the intention of waiting for a reward to be offered, then would return the child and collect the money. This is a technique favored by many ransom child kidnappers before the use of written ransom demands became the favored method. Nancy Gamble's crime and subsequent trial were reported in detail in ''Baltimore Patriot'' (June 26, 1819). The June 26 article, as well as others on the case that had appeared in the ''Patriot'', were reprinted in newspapers in other states including: Connecticut, Maryland, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, New Jersey, New York, Pennsylvania, Vermont, Virginia and Washington D.C.

Children abducted for slavery

In 1597,

Elizabeth I of England Elizabeth I (7 September 153324 March 1603) was Queen of England and Ireland from 17 November 1558 until her death in 1603. Elizabeth was the last of the five House of Tudor monarchs and is sometimes referred to as the "Virgin Queen". Eli ...

licensed the abduction of children for use as chapel choristers and theatre performers. There are reports that abduction of children to be used or sold as slaves is common in parts of Africa. The

Lord's Resistance Army The Lord's Resistance Army (LRA), also known as the Lord's Resistance Movement, is a rebel group and heterodox Christian group which operates in northern Uganda, South Sudan, the Central African Republic, and the Democratic Republic of the Co ...

, a rebel paramilitary group operating mainly in northern

Uganda }), is a landlocked country in East Africa. The country is bordered to the east by Kenya, to the north by South Sudan, to the west by the Democratic Republic of the Congo, to the south-west by Rwanda, and to the south by Tanzania. The south ...

, is notorious for its abductions of children for use as

child soldier Children (defined by the Convention on the Rights of the Child as people under the age of 18) have been recruited for participation in military operations and campaigns throughout history and in many cultures. Children in the military, inclu ...

s or

sex slave Sexual slavery and sexual exploitation is an attachment of any ownership right over one or more people with the intent of coercing or otherwise forcing them to engage in sexual activities. This includes forced labor, reducing a person to a s ...

s. According to the

Sudan Tribune The ''Sudan Tribune'' is an electronic news portal on Sudan and South Sudan and neighbouring countries including news coverage, analyses and commentary, official reports and press releases from various organizations, and maps. It is based in ...

, , more than 30,000 children have been kidnapped by the LRA and their leader, Joseph Kony.

By stranger to raise

A very small number of abductions result from women who kidnap babies (or other young children) to bring up as their own. These women are often unable to have children of their own, or have

miscarried Miscarriage, also known in medical terms as a spontaneous abortion and pregnancy loss, is the death of an embryo or fetus before it is able to survive independently. Miscarriage before 6 weeks of gestation is defined by ESHRE as biochemical l ...

, and choose to abduct a child rather than

adopting Adoption is a process whereby a person assumes the parenting of another, usually a child, from that person's biological or legal parent or parents. Legal adoptions permanently transfer all rights and responsibilities, along with filiation, fro ...

. The crime is often premeditated, with the woman often simulating pregnancy to reduce suspicion when a baby suddenly appears in the household. Historically, a few states have practiced child abduction for

indoctrination Indoctrination is the process of inculcating a person with ideas, attitudes, cognitive strategies or professional methodologies (see doctrine). Humans are a social animal species inescapably shaped by cultural context, and thus some degree ...

, as a form of punishment for political opponents, or for profit. Notable cases include the kidnapping of children by Nazi Germany for Germanization,

Gitta Sereny Gitta Sereny, CBE (13 March 192114 June 2012) was an Austrian-British biographer, historian, and investigative journalist who came to be known for her interviews and profiles of infamous figures, including Mary Bell, who was convicted in 196 ...

"Stolen Children"
rpt. in '' Jewish Virtual Library'' (

American-Israeli Cooperative Enterprise , native_name_lang = , image = , caption = , population = 110,000–150,000 , popplace = New York metropolitan area, Los Angeles metropolitan area, Miami metropolitan area, and other large metropolitan are ...

). Accessed September 15, 2008. (Reprinted by permission of the author from ''Talk'' ovember 1999) the

lost children of Francoism The lost children of Francoism (; ; ) were the children abducted from Republican parents, who were either in jail or had been assassinated by Nationalist troops, during the Spanish Civil War and Francoist Spain. The kidnapped children were someti ...

, during which an estimated 300,000 children were abducted from their parents, and the about 500 "Children of the Disappeared (Desaparecidos)" who were adopted by the military in the

Argentine Dirty War The Dirty War ( es, Guerra sucia) is the name used by the military junta or civic-military dictatorship of Argentina ( es, dictadura cívico-militar de Argentina, links=no) for the period of state terrorism in Argentina from 1974 to 1983 as ...

. In Australia the '

Stolen Generation The Stolen Generations (also known as Stolen Children) were the children of Australian Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander descent who were removed from their families by the Australian federal and state government agencies and church miss ...

' is the term given to native Aboriginal children who were forcibly abducted or whose mothers gave consent under duress or misleading information so the government could assimilate the black population into the white majority. In Canada, with the

Sixties Scoop The Sixties Scoop was a period in which a series of policies were enacted in Canada that enabled child welfare authorities to take, or "scoop up," Indigenous children from their families and communities for placement in foster homes, from which ...

, indigenous children were systematically removed from their families and culture to be fostered and adopted by white families. Some other abductions have been to make children available by

child-selling Child-selling is the practice of selling children, usually by parents, legal guardians, or subsequent custodians, including adoption agencies, orphanages and Mother and Baby Homes. Where the subsequent relationship with the child is essentially ...

for adoption by other people, without adopting parents necessarily being aware of how children were actually made available for adoption.

Abduction before birth

Neonatal infant abduction and prenatal fetal abduction are the earliest ages of child abduction, when ''child'' is expansively defined as a viable baby before birth (usually a few months before the typical time for birth) through the age of majority (the age at which a young person is legally recognized as an adult). In addition, embryo theft and even

oocyte An oocyte (, ), oöcyte, or ovocyte is a female gametocyte or germ cell involved in reproduction. In other words, it is an immature ovum, or egg cell. An oocyte is produced in a female fetus in the ovary during female gametogenesis. The femal ...

misappropriation in reproductive medical settings have been legalistically construed as child abduction.

Global Missing Children's Network

Launched in 1998 as a

joint venture A joint venture (JV) is a business entity created by two or more parties, generally characterized by shared ownership, shared returns and risks, and shared governance. Companies typically pursue joint ventures for one of four reasons: to acce ...

of the

International Centre for Missing & Exploited Children The International Centre for Missing & Exploited Children (ICMEC), headquartered in Alexandria, Virginia, with a regional presence in Brazil, Singapore, and Australia, is a private 501(c)(3) non-governmental, nonprofit global organization. It ...

(ICMEC) and NCMEC, the Global Missing Children's Network (GMCN) is a network of countries that connect, share

best practices A best practice is a method or technique that has been generally accepted as superior to other known alternatives because it often produces results that are superior to those achieved by other means or because it has become a standard way of doing ...

, and disseminate information and images of missing children to improve the effectiveness of missing children investigations. The Network has 22 member countries: Albania, Argentina, Australia, Belarus, Belgium, Brazil, Canada, Germany, Greece, Ireland, Italy, Mexico, the Netherlands, New Zealand, Poland, Romania, Russia, Serbia, South Africa, South Korea, Spain, the United Kingdom, and the US. Each country can access a customizable website platform, and can enter missing children information into a centralized, multilingual database that has photos of and information about missing children, which can be viewed and distributed to assist in location and recovery efforts. GMCN staff train new countries joining the Network, and provide an annual member conference sponsored by Motorola Solutions Foundation at which best practices, current issues, trends, policies, procedures, and possible solutions are discussed. The parents of

Madeleine McCann Madeleine Beth McCann (born 12 May 2003) is a British missing person who disappeared from her bed in a holiday apartment in Praia da Luz, Portugal, on the evening of 3 May 2007, at the age of 3. ''The Daily Telegraph'' described the disappeara ...

, a three-year-old girl who disappeared from her bed in a hotel in Portugal in 2007, approached ICMEC to help them publicize her case. ICMEC's YouTube channel, "Don'tYouForgetAboutMe," which lets people post videos, images, and information about their missing children, was launched that year as a part of these efforts, and had 2,200 members. ICMEC reviews the postings to ensure that any child in a posted video is in fact missing, that authorities are aware that the child is missing, and that the images are not inappropriate.

Laws

International

Japanese Child Abduction Rally to Restore Sanity

France

Since February 2006, France has adopted a nationwide alert system, Alerte Enlèvement, which broadcasts (via radio, television, street signs and airport and train stations screens) crucial information when an abduction of a minor takes place. The French Penal Code describes the fact of "without order of a constituted authority and except as ordered by law, to stop, to remove, to detain or to kidnap a person" punishable by twenty years of imprisonment. If the victim is mutilated or permanently disabled as a result of the kidnapping, the offense is punishable by thirty years of imprisonment and by life imprisonment when it is preceded or accompanied by torture or "barbaric acts".

United Kingdom

See the

Child Abduction Act 1984 The Child Abduction Act 1984 (c 37) is an Act of the Parliament of the United Kingdom. It creates offences that replace, in England and Wales, the offence of child stealing under section 56 of the Offences against the Person Act 1861. Part I ...

, the Child Abduction and Custody Act 1985 and the

Child Abduction (Northern Ireland) Order 1985 Child abduction or child theft is the unauthorized removal of a minor (a child under the age of legal adulthood) from the custody of the child's natural parents or legally appointed guardians. The term ''child abduction'' includes two lega ...

United States

The United States has a variety of related laws at the state and municipal levels. The US developed the

AMBER Alert An Amber Alert (alternatively styled AMBER alert) or a child abduction emergency alert (SAME code: CAE) is a message distributed by a child abduction alert system to ask the public for help in finding abducted children. The system originated in ...

system, which broadcasts cases of suspected kidnapping when the child is believed to be in a motor vehicle and the vehicle licence plate is known. Some laws, such as the

Adam Walsh Child Protection and Safety Act The Adam Walsh Child Protection and Safety Act is a federal statute that was signed into law by U.S. President George W. Bush on July 27, 2006. The Walsh Act organizes sex offenders into three tiers according to the crime committed, and m ...

, aim to prevent stranger abductions through public sex offender registeries which include an offender's address.

References

External links

ABP World Group child recovery BLOG

Associationfortherecoveryofchildren.org

BBC News Report: West Africa's child slave trade (6 August, 1999)

The PK Papers: Index of Parental Kidnapping Historical Texts

The Japan Children's Rights Network (Information Regarding Abductions to Japan)

The Pool ransom kidnapping, 1819

The Holt parental kidnapping case, 1760

The Tuthell parental child abduction, 1810

Child abduction in Germany, German Federal Office of Statistics 1995 – 2012

German CPS echo Nazi Germany

Crimes Against Children Spotlight. Parental Kidnapping: Using Social Media to Assist in Apprehending Suspects and Recovering Victims

FBI The Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) is the domestic intelligence and security service of the United States and its principal federal law enforcement agency. Operating under the jurisdiction of the United States Department of Justice, t ...

International Expertise Center ChildAbduction
{{DEFAULTSORT:Child Abduction Crimes Abuse Domestic violence

Abduction Abduction may refer to: Media Film and television * "Abduction" (''The Outer Limits''), a 2001 television episode * " Abduction" (''Death Note'') a Japanese animation television series * " Abductions" (''Totally Spies!''), a 2002 episode of an ...