A prior edition of this Divorce Law Column (NYLJ, 8/16/2022, “Prompt Return” Under the Hague Convention On International Child Abduction: The Long and Winding Road of ‘Golan v. Saada’) focused on the U.S. Supreme Court’s decision in Golan v. Saada, 596 U.S. ___, 142 S. Ct. 1880 (2022), where “Justice Sonia M. Sotomayor, writing for an undivided court, in interpreting the Hague Convention on the Civil Aspects of International Child Abduction as implemented by the International Child Abduction Remedies Act (ICARA) 22 U.S.C. Section 9001 et seq, held that a court which finds the return of a child to its country of habitual residence would expose that child to ‘grave risk of harm’ is not then required to examine all possible ‘ameliorative measures’ prior to denying a parent’s petition for return of that child to a foreign nation.” The Supreme Court remanded the matter directly to the district court (and not to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit) to exercise its discretion and to apply the “proper legal standard.” Following that remand, on Aug. 31, 2022, U.S. District Court Judge Ann M. Donnelly of the Eastern District of New York issued her decision and order, which provides lawyers with the opportunity to review the end result of the case’s protracted proceedings, something that is not always available in those state courts where lower court decisions are not regularly reported and published.

(As an unfortunate and tragic footnote, one and a half months after the decision on remand, the petitioner, 32-year-old Narkis Golan, was found dead in her Brooklyn, New York apartment on the evening of Oct. 18, 2022, and her death was under investigation according to the office of the chief medical examiner for New York City. See “Family Questions Death of Domestic Violence Victim Whose Case Made It to Supreme Court Following Yearslong Custody Battle,” by Julianne McShane, 10/26/2022, https://www.nbcnews.com/news/crime-courts/supporters-vow-continue-fight-deceased-domestic-violence-victim-whose-rcna53966).

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