What can I do if my child is kidnapped?

Question: How can my son get the St. Louis police to initiate the parental kidnapping prevention act? They keep telling him that it is a civil matter and they can't get involved unless the ex admits she moved (out of state) intentionally to deny him access. He has joint legal custody and ex moved without his consent and no court modification. We had to hire an investigator to find her after 8 weeks of waiting for some type of contact from her. Son has thought he had an attorney, but attorney has yet to return his call after 3 weeks of messages. Apparently if you don't have a lot of money it is hard to get a good attorney to help. Any suggestions of what he can do or if there is an attorney willing to help him with contempt paperwork.

Answer: The Parental Kidnapping Prevention Act is indeed a civil (federal) law, and it only applies if someone moves with a child to another state in violation of a valid court order. It is designed to prevent a party from establishing jurisdiction over custody matters in another state by improperly taking the child to that state. It can be raised in a custody action in another state as a means of depriving that state of subhect matter jurisdiction over the case. Its' name notwithstanding, the PKPA is not a criminal statute, really has little to do with kidnapping, and would definitely not furnish any basis for the St. Louis Police to do anything. There are other laws you could invoke, possibly including general kidnapping statutes, but not the PKPA.

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