KIDNAPPING BY AIR

Greymouth Evening Star, 30 August 1929, Page 9

KIDNAPPING BY AIR

FATHER AND HIS SON. A father, who kidnapped his own son and carried him off to France by aeroplane was committed to prison by Mr Justice Batesson in the’Divorce Court, in London recently. Application was made ,to the Court by Mrs Francis Evelyn Adami, of- Sinclair Mansions, Shepherd’s Bush. Mrs Adami, said her counsel, Mr Bucknill, had filed a petition for divorce, and while the suit was pending obtained an order for the custody of the child. From time to time, said Mr Bucknill, Mrs Adami allowed her husband to see the child, and on one of these occasions, on June 22, when they were at Westcliff, he abducted the boy and flew with him in an aeroplane to France.

He then wrote to his wife from France, counsel, continued, telling her that if she would drop her proceedings, she might see the child again. Mrs Adami followed, her husband to France, and brought the child back to England. Mr Bucknill said that beside the order giving custody of the child to the wife, there was an injunction against Mr Adami, because he had threatened to take the child away. Mr Adami had signed an affidavit giving the Court an undertaking that, pending the suit, he would not take the child out of the jurisdiction.

Mrs Adami, in an affidavit, said that' on the evening of the day when the child disappeared her husband telephoned her from somewhere in France, telling her that he had chartered an aeroplane and flown with the boy to France, and that she would never see him again unless she abandoned the proceedings. He gave her two hours to make her choice. In a letter to her he wrote: —“Ronald is my son, and I have as much right to him as you, but I do not want to deprive you of him, unless you try to do wrong. My duty to . Ronald is to let hjm have his mother, but his father comes first.”

Mr P. B. Morle, for Mr Adami, said Mr Adami was a French citizen, and was not brought up under the shadow of English justice, and had not learned a due regard for English Courts. He acted in the mistaken belief that he was acting in the best interests of the child; He now desired to offer a sincere apology. The .judge issued a writ of attachment.