Strollerderby : Brazil

Breaking News: Brazilian Custody Case Suspended

SunnyChanel — Wed, 03 Jun 2009 06:54:00 GMT

The saga continues. The man who was to be reunited with his son after years of waiting and litigation will have to, sadly, wait longer. David Goldman was to regain custody of his nine-year-old son on Wednesday – a judgment issued by a Federal judge. But a Brazilian supreme court has suspended the court order due to an emergency request filed a small political party. They made the claim that the whole scenario had turned into a political matter. Due to this injunction, the Brazilian court must now go convene for a full trial - which could take days or even months. (For a synopsis of the saga check out Brett’s post here.)

According to the AP:

“The Progressive Party argued that the boy should not be returned to the United States in such an "abrupt manner." It said he should stay in Brazil because he has been living in the country for five years and would be stripped of his current family environment of "happiness, love and comprehension," the supreme court statement said.

The party also said the boy could suffer psychological damage because of the order to immediately put him in the care of his biological father, and that the outcome of the case reflected an interest in "prioritizing international relations over the fundamental rights of a Brazilian native" boy, the supreme court statement said."

I can’t imagine being in Goldman’s shoes. Being so close to getting your son back and yet delayed once again. What would you do if you were in his shoes?

Source

Breaking News - New Jersey Dad Wins Brazilian Custody Case

Brett Singer — Tue, 02 Jun 2009 12:37:00 GMT

This is a strange story but the ending appears to be a happy one.

The details, from CNN:

- Sean's parents divorced and mom moved him to Brazil in 2004

- Mom died in childbirth in 2008, leaving Sean with stepfather

- Sean Goldman, 8, to be turned over to U.S. Consulate on Wednesday

Hilary Clinton even referred to the case yesterday, which is unusual. But so is the story itself.

If you want to get depressed before you get happy, read this letter that Sean's father, David Goldman, wrote at BringSeanHome.org. There's even ('natch) a Facebook group, with over 40,000 members. One more from the "get angry before you get happy" file: Sean's stepdad's lawyer compared the decision to allow Sean to return to the United States with being sent to a "Nazi concentration camp," according to a post in that Facebook group.

David Goldman is supposed to arrive in Rio de Janeiro this morning to pick up his son. Something tells me he won't be all that interested in sight-seeing.

Source: CNN

UPDATE: President Obama Issues Statement About Dr. George Tiller

Babble Talk Radio Live - Friday May 29 - Listen Here

Some Good News in Cross-Continental Custody Battle

JeanneSager — Tue, 10 Feb 2009 13:32:00 GMT

Remember David Goldman, the Jersey dad whose wife up and moved to Brazil, cutting him off without a chance to see their four-year-old son? The story got us all ferklempt, not to mention righteously indignant on Dad's behalf when it came to light on the Today Show last fall.

Put down your pitchforks parents! Four years after his wife took off, divorced him, remarried and died, Goldman finally got to see his son this week.

It's a two tissue box tale if there ever was one. Goldman bid son Sean and wife Bruna goodbye at Newark International Airport in June 2004. He thought they were simply going to visit Bruna's family in her native Brazil, and they'd be home in due time.

Then he got word from Bruna that she wasn't coming back. Oh, and by the way, she wanted a divorce. Court battles ensued, but Goldman couldn't get past the Brazilian roadblocks, and his wife had remarried a "well-connected" Brazilian attorney who was helping her every step of the way. Then came word that Bruna had died during childbirth in August 2008. David Goldman thought he finally had a chance at his son; only to hear that the attorney was filing for a name change to take Goldman's off of Sean's birth certificate.

When the story became public, politicians from the U.S. stepped in to help. New Jersey Congressman U.S. Rep. Christopher Smith, traveled to Brazil this week with Goldman, securing visitation for father and son while he put pressure on the Brazilian government, warning them that they are violating the Hague Convention, an international adoption treaty.

It's not over yet, but can you imagine having been the fly on the wall for that meeting between father and son? We'd be talking a three-tissue-box story then.

Now Goldman's supporters are looking for letters to be sent to Congressmen who will help co-sponsor a bill - along with Smith - to call for Brazil to conform under the Hague Convention rules and send Sean (and American citizen) home with his father to the states. Get a look at the bill and a list of congressmen here.

Image: Bring Sean Home.org

Dad Battles for Return of Son Taken to Brazil

SunnyChanel — Wed, 24 Sep 2008 23:02:00 GMT

This morning I was reading my morning papers, drinking coffee and watching the morning news (while also wrestling with my 2-year old…yeah, I’m a mean multi-tasker) when my heartstrings were tugged by the tale of David Goldman and his battle for his son on the Today Show.

In a nutshell, the story goes a little something like this, four years ago, his wife and his 4-year old son embarked on a 2-week vacation to Brazil where David’s wife and mother of his child Sean was from. Once they landed, she called David and told him she wasn’t coming back, ever. He attempted to obtain a custody heading, which according to the Hague Treaties, his son would have to return to the states to attend. But the Brazilian courts were late in responding and in turn the New Jersey courts ruled that too much time had past and that Sean should just stay with his mom in Brazil.

His wife remarried, to a “well-connected” Brazilian lawyer and last month she died in childbirth. Naturally, David assumed that since his wife deceased, that he would then get his son back. But it turns out the new husband had filed a petition to have David’s name struck from Sean’s birth certificate and replaced with his own. Which would, as David said “exclude me from ever even being my son’s father…So far, the Brazilian judicial system is letting him do this.” The boy is a US citizen and the question is how could a man that has no blood relation to him, claim sole guardian when his real father is ready, willing and able to raise his own son. To find out more about David’s plight you can check out the site here.

(source and photo from MSNBC)

Diaper Saves Falling Baby's Life

Madeline Holler — Thu, 28 Aug 2008 21:21:00 GMT

Oh, disposable diapers. So bad for the world. But so good for falling babies?

An 18-month-old boy in Sao Paulo, Brazil, toppled out of his family's third-floor apartment window and began the 30-foot descent to what should have been the end of his short life.

But! (Butt?)

The disposable diaper he was wearing snagged on a spike that was embedded into a wall of the concrete apartment building. Little Caua Felipe Massaneiro dangled there for a moment. The diaper's velcro tabs slowly released and he fell the final bit to the ground. The snag on the spike -- which, had he hit just a bit differently could have killed him before the rest of the fall -- slowed his fall significantly, thereby lessening the impact as he hit the ground.

He was taken to the hospital where his is in stable condition and being treated for minor fractures.

According to Caua's dad, the toddler crawled onto a couch that was positioned under the open window, something he's never done before. Police are investigating whether parental negligence is at fault.

Terrifying, to say the least. Hopefully the parents were also wearing diapers because surely they crapped their pants when this happened. I know I would have.

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Documents Show Missing Florida Girl’s Mother Didn’t Want Child

Photo: Babyminestore.com

Best of FameCrawler: Week of May 9th

Whit Honea — Fri, 09 May 2008 20:00:00 GMT

Hello, Harlow!

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Nicole Kidman: DUMPED

Elisabeth Hasselbeck's Post Baby Bikini Bod!

Secrets of How Celebrity Moms Lost Their Baby Weight

Britney Finally Gets Her Boys

Oh My God That Britney's Shameless: Oops, She Did It AGAIN?

Pregnant Posh! Beckham Baby on the Way!

Sarah Jessica Parker's Pregnancy News!

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Slumming It - Literally

Amy S.F. Lutz — Tue, 11 Mar 2008 17:32:00 GMT

I'm much more better off - financially speaking - than my parents were when I was growing up. So my number one fear, for my own kids, has always been that they'll grow up spoiled brats, with no appreciation for everything they are lucky enough to enjoy.

Maybe taking them on one of the growing number of organized slum tours - now available through the most tragically, poverty-stricken areas of India, Brazil, Mexico and South Africa - would open their eyes.

Welcome to "poorism" - as its critics call it - where, for a small fee (Indian tours go for 300 rupees, or about $7.50) tourists get intimate with open sewars, exposed electrical wires and beggars. For souvenirs, they get to snap photos of children digging through garbage dumps.

If you're thinking, ick, you're not alone. Many tourism professionals believe these excursions amount to little more than exploitation, a new way to give Westerners a smug sense of how great their lives are.

To be fair, it seems the intentions of the tour operators are less mercenary than that. Some hope to change general perception of these neighborhoods by showcasing work by local artists and inviting tourists to participate in festivals and other rituals. Others stress the economic benefits the tours bring to the slums, by hiring locals as guides and allowing craftspeople to sell handiwork to tourists. One Mexican tour requires participants to help make sandwiches and fill water bottles for the needy they visit. It's all an attempt to humanize a problem that, whether we go and check it out in person or not, won't go away.

Still, I can't see how my children would identify with a group of people they need to be taken by a tour guide to see, like animals on a safari. It's a tough question: how do you teach children to be grateful and generous, without feeling superior?

Britain's Oldest Mum Still Old, Still a Mum

Madeline Holler — Fri, 02 Nov 2007 12:33:00 GMT

A British newspaper reports that the woman who became the country’s oldest to give birth struggled to hold her now 18-month-old son. See! At 63, she’s too old to properly raise and care for a young child. She’s struggling under his weight! Oh. Like other mothers of squirmy toddlers. Fine.

Still, since grandma-aged moms are breeding like rabbits anymore, it’s worth revisiting the sordid details of this U.K. pioneer.

Patricia Rushbrook, a child psychiatrist, gave birth to her son JJ last summer to become the oldest mother in her country. She conceived the boy after an IVF procedure in Russia, where there is no upper age limit for fertility patients.

She has three grown children, whom she raised with her deceased first husband. JJ is a first child for his father.

Come on. When is something bad going to happen so we can go back to criticizing old people who have babies? Well, there’s always the 67-year-old lady in Spain who cashed out her retirement and used the funds to conceive twins. Surely that’s a disaster that will prove a point. Right?

Japanese Spinster, 60, Skips Cats, Gets Pregnant Instead

Madeline Holler — Fri, 05 Oct 2007 16:06:00 GMT

Another old lady is showing the world that pregnancy and childbirth aren't just a young woman's game. If all goes well, a 60-year-old Japanese woman will give birth next year for the first time in her long life.

She will become that country's oldest single mom, leaving her fellow citizens to debate which is worse -- aged- or single-motherhood. While single moms aren't unheard of in Japan, it is rare for a woman to seek motherhood without a partner on purpose in the highly conformist society.

The rest of the details of this latest senior citizen's conception and pregnancy are the usual: woman whose contemporaries are grandmothers wants a baby; comes to the U.S. (or South Africa or Brazil) where fertility technology is less regulated; is implanted with one or more embryos; goes home and creates a frenzy; discomfort and outrage ensue until someone brings up Tony Randall.

The side of me that likes to be consistent applauds this mom and wishes her the best. The side of me that likes to see old biddies flip an oppressive generation in a somewhat oppressive culture the middle finger would like to raise a cup of non-alcoholic sake and toast the metaphorical balls on this woman. Kanpai! Call me if you need a sitter!

Japan doesn't have an age limit on women who want technological assistance in becoming pregnant, but the laws forbid single women from undergoing procedures. In 2001, a 60-year-old married Japanese woman gave birth after U.S. doctors implanted an embryo from a donated egg and her husband's sperm.

But all this leads me to wonder just how many of the AARP set are priming their uteruses and trying to get pregnant. I’m assuming chances are not so good the older you get. So, these few that we hear about – the 66-year-old record holder from Romania, that 62-year-old New Jersey woman, the 51-year-old surrogate of her grandchildren – they’re the exceptions right? That means there must be a whole bunch of others out there trying this very minute.

I wonder what my mom is doing right now.

Ouch! 3rd Heaviest Baby Ever Born in China

Karen Murphy — Sun, 04 Mar 2007 20:37:00 GMT

Ginormo-baby was born in China this week, weighing 13.75 pounds, and is thought to be the heaviest baby born in China since the Communist takeover in 1949, and is the 3rd heaviest baby born anywhere in recent history. My, oh my. And I thought it was hard birthing my tiny-by-comparison 6-something pounders. Ouch! Typically such heavy babies can be due to excessive prenatal weight gain in the mother or diabetes, and although the former athlete and new mom is built like a linebacker at 264 pounds, there's no family history of diabetes.

So you're asking yourself about now, well if this is the 3rd-heaviest baby born in recent history, what about #2 and especially what about #1? The most recent heaviest baby was born in Brazil in January 2005, weighing 7.6kg., which is 16.72 pounds. And the #1 heaviest baby, according to the Guinness Book of World Records, was born in Italy in 1955, and weighed 10.2kg. That's 22.44 pounds.

Everybody, all together now: "OUCH!"

Rio Medics Forget Pregnant Woman in Ambulance

Sarah, Goon Squad Sarah — Mon, 19 Feb 2007 13:02:00 GMT

Remind me never to call 911 in Brazil. EMT's picked up a woman who was 8 months pregnant and forgot to drop her off at the hospital. Instead, they took the ambulance straight into the shop. I have no idea how something like this happens. What do you think was going through this poor woman's mind? If you call an ambulance it's usually a pretty big deal. In this case Maria Adelaide Azevedo was having problems with high blood pressure and her doctor told her to go straight to the hospital.

Azvedo's gynecologist was outraged. He wondered how long she would have been stuck in the ambulance at the mechanic if she had passed out. I'm wondering the same thing.