Stranger Than Fiction: How A Father Recovered His Abducted Son

In the past few years, over 5,000 international child abduction cases have been brought to court. Though the word “abduction” seems to go hand-in-hand with “stranger,” it is very often a parent who brings the child to another country without informing the second parent, resulting in a fight for custody.

To raise awareness about this issue as well as share his personal experience, David Goldman wrote A Father's Love: One Man's Unrelenting Battle to Bring His Abducted Son Home. The memoir details Goldman’s struggle to bring his son, Sean, home, after his wife brought him to Brazil and announced neither she nor Sean would be returning home.

What Goldman thought was a two-week-long vacation in Brazil for his son and wife turned into a nightmare that spanned over five years and included battles with the Brazilian court system, his ex-wife, Bruna, and her parents.

Speaking in front of an audience at  in Ridgewood before signing copies of his memoir, Goldman explained how he fought and won in what came to be an excruciatingly long and frustrating legal battle. Many audience members followed Goldman’s struggle in the media after seeing him and Sean appear on the “Today Show” and an episode of “Dateline,” and hoped and prayed for Sean's safe return.

“Truth is stranger than fiction,” Goldman said, encapsulating his experience. “The book is about my unconditional love for my son, and the battle for overcoming the unimaginable.”

Though there is a treaty called the K.3 Convention, which ensures the return of an abducted child to the place or he she lived prior to their abduction, the battle to bring Sean home wasn’t easy. While the Brazilian Court system recognized keeping Sean in Brazil was in violation of the K.3 Convention treaty, as well as U.S. and New Jersey law, judiciaries said returning Sean to the U.S. would uproot his life and cause him even more harm, delaying his return nearly another full year.

Bruna and her parents also fought to keep Sean in Brazil, claiming Goldman had given them permission to travel there, and even drove them to the airport to depart for Brazil.

"Yeah, I gave permission," Goldman said. “Permission for a two-week long vacation, not to permanently stay with my son and keep him from me, forever.”

The nightmare didn't end until "the wheels were up," Goldman said of his and Sean's plane ride back to the U.S.

Luckily, Goldman's story has a happy ending. Yet he knows others are less fortunate. Out of 5,000 international child abduction cases in the last few years, maybe 1,200 have been returned, prompting him to help create the Bring Sean Home Foundation.

“One thing I always say is, I can’t accept this gift of Sean and I being reunited without trying to give back,” Goldman said.

Supporters would be happy to know that Sean is doing very well at home, is receiving good grades at school and has a good group of friends, Goldman said.

“He starts camp on Monday, and he can’t wait,” Goldman said.  “He can be a boy again.”