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Father meets son after five-year custody battle
Source: Agencies |
December 26, 2009, Saturday
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A FATHER and son played with toys and puzzles and rested on a quiet nine-hour flight from Brazil to Florida, a peaceful conclusion after a tumultuous reunion that brought a five-year custody battle spanning two continents to an end.
David Goldman and nine-year-old Sean Goldman landed in Orlando on a jet chartered by NBC on Thursday. Later they were driven away in a caravan of three sport utility vehicles, heading to an unknown destination.
They did not speak with reporters at the airport, but NBC broadcast an interview with the father and footage from the flight.
"My little boy is five feet away, sound asleep, peaceful," Goldman, of New Jersey, told the network. "We're on our way. My heart is just melting. I love him."
Earlier on Thursday, when the father and son were reunited in Rio de Janeiro, the youngster was forced to squeeze though a jostling throng of reporters and photographers.
The reunion ended an epic battle that pitted Sean's father against the boy's Brazilian stepfather, who had cared for Sean since his mother died last year. The dispute strained relations between the two countries and reached the highest level of government.
Soon after he fought his way through the crowd, a smiling Sean Goldman was back in his father's arms, talking about basketball and how much snow there was back in New Jersey.
"It is now time for our new beginning, the rebirth of our family at such a special time of the year," David Goldman wrote in a letter read to reporters after his departure.
Sean had lived in Brazil since Goldman's ex-wife, Bruna Bianchi, brought him to her native country for what was supposed to be a two-week vacation in 2004. She stayed, divorced Goldman and remarried, and Goldman began legal efforts to get Sean back.
After Bianchi died last year in childbirth, her husband, Paulo Lins e Silva, a prominent divorce attorney, continued the legal fight and won temporary custody.
"Today, the abduction has ended," said US Representative Chris Smith, a New Jersey Republican who was with Sean's father in Brazil and supported him. The boy's maternal grandmother, Silvana Bianchi, however, said: "My heart is empty and broken because our love is missing. To take the boy on Christmas Day is a heinous crime."
Wearing a gold Brazil Olympic T-shirt, a tearful Sean was walked a block to the American consulate, surrounded by his stepfather, family and their lawyer.
David Goldman and nine-year-old Sean Goldman landed in Orlando on a jet chartered by NBC on Thursday. Later they were driven away in a caravan of three sport utility vehicles, heading to an unknown destination.
They did not speak with reporters at the airport, but NBC broadcast an interview with the father and footage from the flight.
"My little boy is five feet away, sound asleep, peaceful," Goldman, of New Jersey, told the network. "We're on our way. My heart is just melting. I love him."
Earlier on Thursday, when the father and son were reunited in Rio de Janeiro, the youngster was forced to squeeze though a jostling throng of reporters and photographers.
The reunion ended an epic battle that pitted Sean's father against the boy's Brazilian stepfather, who had cared for Sean since his mother died last year. The dispute strained relations between the two countries and reached the highest level of government.
Soon after he fought his way through the crowd, a smiling Sean Goldman was back in his father's arms, talking about basketball and how much snow there was back in New Jersey.
"It is now time for our new beginning, the rebirth of our family at such a special time of the year," David Goldman wrote in a letter read to reporters after his departure.
Sean had lived in Brazil since Goldman's ex-wife, Bruna Bianchi, brought him to her native country for what was supposed to be a two-week vacation in 2004. She stayed, divorced Goldman and remarried, and Goldman began legal efforts to get Sean back.
After Bianchi died last year in childbirth, her husband, Paulo Lins e Silva, a prominent divorce attorney, continued the legal fight and won temporary custody.
"Today, the abduction has ended," said US Representative Chris Smith, a New Jersey Republican who was with Sean's father in Brazil and supported him. The boy's maternal grandmother, Silvana Bianchi, however, said: "My heart is empty and broken because our love is missing. To take the boy on Christmas Day is a heinous crime."
Wearing a gold Brazil Olympic T-shirt, a tearful Sean was walked a block to the American consulate, surrounded by his stepfather, family and their lawyer.
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