NZ Herald
  • Home
  • Latest news
  • Herald NOW
  • Video
  • New Zealand
  • Sport
  • World
  • Business
  • Entertainment
  • Podcasts
  • Quizzes
  • Opinion
  • Lifestyle
  • Travel
  • Viva
  • Weather

Subscriptions

  • Herald Premium
  • Viva Premium
  • The Listener
  • BusinessDesk

Sections

  • Latest news
  • New Zealand
    • All New Zealand
    • Crime
    • Politics
    • Education
    • Open Justice
    • Scam Update
  • Herald NOW
  • On The Up
  • World
    • All World
    • Australia
    • Asia
    • UK
    • United States
    • Middle East
    • Europe
    • Pacific
  • Business
    • All Business
    • MarketsSharesCurrencyCommoditiesStock TakesCrypto
    • Markets with Madison
    • Media Insider
    • Business analysis
    • Personal financeKiwiSaverInterest ratesTaxInvestment
    • EconomyInflationGDPOfficial cash rateEmployment
    • Small business
    • Business reportsMood of the BoardroomProject AucklandSustainable business and financeCapital markets reportAgribusiness reportInfrastructure reportDynamic business
    • Deloitte Top 200 Awards
    • CompaniesAged CareAgribusinessAirlinesBanking and financeConstructionEnergyFreight and logisticsHealthcareManufacturingMedia and MarketingRetailTelecommunicationsTourism
  • Opinion
    • All Opinion
    • Analysis
    • Editorials
    • Business analysis
    • Premium opinion
    • Letters to the editor
  • Politics
  • Sport
    • All Sport
    • OlympicsParalympics
    • RugbySuper RugbyNPCAll BlacksBlack FernsRugby sevensSchool rugby
    • CricketBlack CapsWhite Ferns
    • Racing
    • NetballSilver Ferns
    • LeagueWarriorsNRL
    • FootballWellington PhoenixAuckland FCAll WhitesFootball FernsEnglish Premier League
    • GolfNZ Open
    • MotorsportFormula 1
    • Boxing
    • UFC
    • BasketballNBABreakersTall BlacksTall Ferns
    • Tennis
    • Cycling
    • Athletics
    • SailingAmerica's CupSailGP
    • Rowing
  • Lifestyle
    • All Lifestyle
    • Viva - Food, fashion & beauty
    • Society Insider
    • Royals
    • Sex & relationships
    • Food & drinkRecipesRecipe collectionsRestaurant reviewsRestaurant bookings
    • Health & wellbeing
    • Fashion & beauty
    • Pets & animals
    • The Selection - Shop the trendsShop fashionShop beautyShop entertainmentShop giftsShop home & living
    • Milford's Investing Place
  • Entertainment
    • All Entertainment
    • TV
    • MoviesMovie reviews
    • MusicMusic reviews
    • BooksBook reviews
    • Culture
    • ReviewsBook reviewsMovie reviewsMusic reviewsRestaurant reviews
  • Travel
    • All Travel
    • News
    • New ZealandNorthlandAucklandWellingtonCanterburyOtago / QueenstownNelson-TasmanBest NZ beaches
    • International travelAustraliaPacific IslandsEuropeUKUSAAfricaAsia
    • Rail holidays
    • Cruise holidays
    • Ski holidays
    • Luxury travel
    • Adventure travel
  • Kāhu Māori news
  • Environment
    • All Environment
    • Our Green Future
  • Talanoa Pacific news
  • Property
    • All Property
    • Property Insider
    • Interest rates tracker
    • Residential property listings
    • Commercial property listings
  • Health
  • Technology
    • All Technology
    • AI
    • Social media
  • Rural
    • All Rural
    • Dairy farming
    • Sheep & beef farming
    • Horticulture
    • Animal health
    • Rural business
    • Rural life
    • Rural technology
    • Opinion
    • Audio & podcasts
  • Weather forecasts
    • All Weather forecasts
    • Kaitaia
    • Whangārei
    • Dargaville
    • Auckland
    • Thames
    • Tauranga
    • Hamilton
    • Whakatāne
    • Rotorua
    • Tokoroa
    • Te Kuiti
    • Taumaranui
    • Taupō
    • Gisborne
    • New Plymouth
    • Napier
    • Hastings
    • Dannevirke
    • Whanganui
    • Palmerston North
    • Levin
    • Paraparaumu
    • Masterton
    • Wellington
    • Motueka
    • Nelson
    • Blenheim
    • Westport
    • Reefton
    • Kaikōura
    • Greymouth
    • Hokitika
    • Christchurch
    • Ashburton
    • Timaru
    • Wānaka
    • Oamaru
    • Queenstown
    • Dunedin
    • Gore
    • Invercargill
  • Meet the journalists
  • Promotions & competitions
  • OneRoof property listings
  • Driven car news

Puzzles & Quizzes

  • Puzzles
    • All Puzzles
    • Sudoku
    • Code Cracker
    • Crosswords
    • Cryptic crossword
    • Wordsearch
  • Quizzes
    • All Quizzes
    • Morning quiz
    • Afternoon quiz
    • Sports quiz

Regions

  • Northland
    • All Northland
    • Far North
    • Kaitaia
    • Kerikeri
    • Kaikohe
    • Bay of Islands
    • Whangarei
    • Dargaville
    • Kaipara
    • Mangawhai
  • Auckland
  • Waikato
    • All Waikato
    • Hamilton
    • Coromandel & Hauraki
    • Matamata & Piako
    • Cambridge
    • Te Awamutu
    • Tokoroa & South Waikato
    • Taupō & Tūrangi
  • Bay of Plenty
    • All Bay of Plenty
    • Katikati
    • Tauranga
    • Mount Maunganui
    • Pāpāmoa
    • Te Puke
    • Whakatāne
  • Rotorua
  • Hawke's Bay
    • All Hawke's Bay
    • Napier
    • Hastings
    • Havelock North
    • Central Hawke's Bay
    • Wairoa
  • Taranaki
    • All Taranaki
    • Stratford
    • New Plymouth
    • Hāwera
  • Manawatū - Whanganui
    • All Manawatū - Whanganui
    • Whanganui
    • Palmerston North
    • Manawatū
    • Tararua
    • Horowhenua
  • Wellington
    • All Wellington
    • Kapiti
    • Wairarapa
    • Upper Hutt
    • Lower Hutt
  • Nelson & Tasman
    • All Nelson & Tasman
    • Motueka
    • Nelson
    • Tasman
  • Marlborough
  • West Coast
  • Canterbury
    • All Canterbury
    • Kaikōura
    • Christchurch
    • Ashburton
    • Timaru
  • Otago
    • All Otago
    • Oamaru
    • Dunedin
    • Balclutha
    • Alexandra
    • Queenstown
    • Wanaka
  • Southland
    • All Southland
    • Invercargill
    • Gore
    • Stewart Island
  • Gisborne

Media

  • Video
    • All Video
    • NZ news video
    • Herald NOW
    • Business news video
    • Politics news video
    • Sport video
    • World news video
    • Lifestyle video
    • Entertainment video
    • Travel video
    • Markets with Madison
    • Kea Kids news
  • Podcasts
    • All Podcasts
    • The Front Page
    • On the Tiles
    • Ask me Anything
    • The Little Things
  • Cartoons
  • Photo galleries
  • Today's Paper - E-editions
  • Photo sales
  • Classifieds

NZME Network

  • Advertise with NZME
  • OneRoof
  • Driven Car Guide
  • BusinessDesk
  • Newstalk ZB
  • Sunlive
  • ZM
  • The Hits
  • Coast
  • Radio Hauraki
  • The Alternative Commentary Collective
  • Gold
  • Flava
  • iHeart Radio
  • Hokonui
  • Radio Wanaka
  • iHeartCountry New Zealand
  • Restaurant Hub
  • NZME Events

SubscribeSign In
Advertisement
Advertise with NZME.
Home / New Zealand

International tug of love: Father takes boy from NZ after three-year legal battle

Nikki Preston
By Nikki Preston
NZ Herald·
28 Jun, 2020 09:51 PM4 mins to read

Subscribe to listen

Access to Herald Premium articles require a Premium subscription. Subscribe now to listen.
Already a subscriber?  Sign in here

Listening to articles is free for open-access content—explore other articles or learn more about text-to-speech.
‌
Save

    Share this article

    Reminder, this is a Premium article and requires a subscription to read.

The parents involved in a three-year legal battle over whose country their son should live in say the family court system is broken.

The parents involved in a three-year legal battle over whose country their son should live in say the family court system is broken.

A father involved in a lengthy legal battle with his ex-wife has finally been granted permission to take his son home after a three-year fight.

Hours after getting the go-ahead from a judge to leave New Zealand during the Covid-19 pandemic, the father and son were on the plane and have just finished isolating in the father's birth country.

But the boy's Kiwi mother says she is distraught she wasn't even able to hug her son goodbye and believes the court system failed the young boy by not allowing him to foster a relationship with both parents.

The parents cannot be named, along with other identifying factors, to protect their son's privacy.

In November, the Family Court granted the father custody of the boy and permission to return with his son to his country of residence, and the boy's birth country, instead of granting custody to the mother to raise him in New Zealand.

Advertisement
Advertise with NZME.

The judge found that under the mother's care the boy would lose any relationship with his father and be "further harmed by exposure to the mother's continued anxiety and distress", court documents show.

READ MORE:
• Premium - Father desperate to take son home has lost faith in NZ's court system
• Father in global custody battle faces another hearing before he can take son home
• Family's frantic search for missing Tauranga man Julian Varley
• Father saves 4-year-old son from enormous scrub python in Airlie Beach

But before they left, the mother appealed against the decision - only abandoning it days before her appeal was to be heard.

Advertisement
Advertise with NZME.

She then raised safety concerns with the court about the boy travelling overseas because of Covid-19, preventing the pair from leaving New Zealand before another hearing.

Earlier this month, Judge Timothy Druce heard those concerns and accepted medical advice that the health risk to the boy was on par to him getting bitten by a shark or a volcanic eruption in New Zealand. He granted the father permission to leave with the son as soon as possible.

The ruling marked the end of a three-year legal battle that started when the mother breached a court joint parenting order in 2017 and failed to return the boy back to his birth country during a visit to New Zealand.

The father told the Herald he was relieved to be able to finally resume his life again after being in limbo for almost three years.

He had previously expressed frustration with the New Zealand Family Court's slow process and what he saw as its refusal to stand by a court joint parenting order agreed by the parents and lodged in three countries including New Zealand.

But the mother, who agreed to speak to the Herald for the first time this week, said she was heartbroken at their swift departure. She does not know when she will next see her son and worries for both his physical and mental wellbeing in the countries he is going to.

She also questioned why it was okay for the boy to be "ripped out" of the country he had lived in for three years, removed from his school and friends without even being allowed to say goodbye to his mum.

The mother said she believed the Family Court system was broken and had not looked after the best interests of her child.

Advertisement
Advertise with NZME.

"How is it okay for a child to be removed from New Zealand during Covid when every warning by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs says don't travel? How is that okay - how does that give the judge the right to say, 'Off you go?'"

She described the whole court process as toxic and claimed that while the November judgment raised concerns the boy would lose any relationship with his father if she had custody, the ruling meant he would instead lose his relationship with her.

The boy speaks to his mother two times a week as agreed in the court order. She claimed he was not in a good place last time they spoke. "He's breaking down."

However, the father said the boy was happy and excited to be returning to his birth country. They had been waiting to leave since the father was granted custody in November.

While the father had also been frustrated by the New Zealand court system, a positive was all the friends he had made and support they had given him both emotionally and financially because he was unable to work while on a visitor's visa, he said.

He was also grateful to his legal team who stuck with him over the three years and hoped the case would set a precedent for other parents in non-Hague convention countries or trying to travel during the coronavirus pandemic.

Save

    Share this article

    Reminder, this is a Premium article and requires a subscription to read.

Latest from New Zealand

WellingtonUpdated

'Amazing woman': Kiwi killed by elephant remembered as adventurous traveller

04 Jul 06:53 AM
New Zealand

Royal NZ Air Force establishes first dedicated space unit

04 Jul 06:24 AM
New Zealand

The nearly fatal gas exposure case that rocked Greymouth

04 Jul 06:03 AM

There’s more to Hawai‘i than beaches and buffets – here’s how to see it differently

sponsored
Advertisement
Advertise with NZME.

Latest from New Zealand

'Amazing woman': Kiwi killed by elephant remembered as adventurous traveller

'Amazing woman': Kiwi killed by elephant remembered as adventurous traveller

04 Jul 06:53 AM

Alison Jean Taylor died with her sister in an elephant attack in Zambia this week.

Royal NZ Air Force establishes first dedicated space unit

Royal NZ Air Force establishes first dedicated space unit

04 Jul 06:24 AM
The nearly fatal gas exposure case that rocked Greymouth

The nearly fatal gas exposure case that rocked Greymouth

04 Jul 06:03 AM
'It's all safe mum': Murder accused allegedly took $85k hidden in mother's dressing gown

'It's all safe mum': Murder accused allegedly took $85k hidden in mother's dressing gown

04 Jul 06:00 AM
From early mornings to easy living
sponsored

From early mornings to easy living

NZ Herald
  • About NZ Herald
  • Meet the journalists
  • Newsletters
  • Classifieds
  • Help & support
  • Contact us
  • House rules
  • Privacy Policy
  • Terms of use
  • Competition terms & conditions
  • Our use of AI
Subscriber Services
  • NZ Herald e-editions
  • Daily puzzles & quizzes
  • Manage your digital subscription
  • Manage your print subscription
  • Subscribe to the NZ Herald newspaper
  • Subscribe to Herald Premium
  • Gift a subscription
  • Subscriber FAQs
  • Subscription terms & conditions
  • Promotions and subscriber benefits
NZME Network
  • The New Zealand Herald
  • The Northland Age
  • The Northern Advocate
  • Waikato Herald
  • Bay of Plenty Times
  • Rotorua Daily Post
  • Hawke's Bay Today
  • Whanganui Chronicle
  • Viva
  • NZ Listener
  • Newstalk ZB
  • BusinessDesk
  • OneRoof
  • Driven Car Guide
  • iHeart Radio
  • Restaurant Hub
NZME
  • About NZME
  • NZME careers
  • Advertise with NZME
  • Digital self-service advertising
  • Book your classified ad
  • Photo sales
  • NZME Events
  • © Copyright 2025 NZME Publishing Limited
TOP