Jeffrey Lee Chafin v. Lynne Hales Chafin

Notable Items:

Petitioner: Jeffrey Lee Chafin
Respondent: Lynne Hales Chafin
Venue: Supreme Court of the United States
Opinion of the Court: Chafin-Chafin (2012)

Issue(s) Before the Court:

After a child has been returned to their country of habitual residence, pursuant to an order of a United States court in compliance with the Hague Convention on the Civil Aspects of Child Abduction, is any appeal of the order moot.

Petitioner's Claim(s):

The child's country of habitual residence is the United States and seeks reversal of the District Court determination that the child's country of habitual residence is the United Kingdom.
Even if the child's country of habitual residence is the United Kingdom, the child should not have been returned because the Convention's defenses to return apply.
Plaintiff seeks custody and wants to pursue that relief in the United States.
Plaintiff wants the orders that he pay the respondant $94,000 vacated.

Respondent's Claim(s):

The child's country of habitual residence is the United Kingdom.
Respondant is pursuing right of custody for herself in Scotland.
Respondant asserts that the money is rightfully owed. Respondant argues that the case is moot because the District Court lack the authority to issue the re-return order either under the Convention or pursuant to its inherent equitable powers.

Holding(s) and Disposition:

Held: No. The The courts below therefore continue to have jurisdiction to adjudicate the merits of the parties' respective claims.
Disposition: The judgement of the United States Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit is vacated, and the case is remanded for further proceedings consistent with this opinion.

Material Facts:

In 1988, the United States ratified the Hague Convention on the Civil Aspects of Child Abduction (the Convention) and passed the International Child Abduction Remedies Act (ICARA).
Petitioner, a citizen of the United States, while stationed in Germany with the US Army [2006], married respondant, a citizen of the United Kingdom.
Their daughter, E.C. (the child), was born the following year [2007].
In 2007, plaintiff was deployed to Afghanistan. Respondant took the child to Scotland.
Later plaintiff was transferred to Alabama and in February 2010, respondant and the child joined the plaintiff in Alabama.
Soon thereafter, plaintiff filed for divorce and child custody. [Divorce was finalized and the plaintiff was awarded custody.]
Towards the end of that year, respondant was arrested for domestic violence, thereby alerting US Citizenship and Immigration Services that the respondant had overstayed her visa.
Respondant was deported in February 2011. The child remained in the care of the plaintiff for several months.

Procedural History:

May 2011, respondant initiated this case in US District Court for the Northern District of Alabama seeking a court order under the Convention and ICARA to return the child to Scotland.
Bench trial in October 11 and 12, 2011, decided in favor of the respondant, concluding that the child's country of habitual residence was Scotland and granting the petition for return.
Plaintiff immediately moved for a stay pending appeal. Court denied the motion.
Within hours, respondant and the child left the United States, headed for Scotland.
December 2011, respondant initiated custom proceedings in Scotland.
The Scottish court soon granted her interim custody and a preliminary injunction, prohibiting Mr. Chafin from removing E. C. from Scotland.
February 2012, the Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit dismissed the plaintiff's appeal as moot and remanded to the district court with instructions to dismiss the suit as moot and to vacate its order. [WHAT ORDER?]
Upon remand the district court did so and ordered the plaintiff to pay the respondant over $94,000 in court costs, attorney's fees, and travel expenses.
Meanwhile the Alabama state court had dismissed the child custody proceeding initiated by the plaintiff for lack of jurisdiction.
Writ of certiorari granted.

Rationale

Roberts Majority Opinion (??)

This dispute is still very much alive.
US Courts continue to have personal jurisdiction over respondant and may command her to take action even outside the United States [what basis for personal jurisdiction? jurisdiction did not terminate upon conclusion of suit? Or does jurisdiction continue as long as appeals or court orders are outstanding?]
Enforcement of the order may be uncertain ... but such uncertainty does not typically render cases moot.
... not moot because the defendants might "re-enter this country on their own" and encounter the consequences of our ruling....
So too, here.
The courts below therefore continue to have jurisdiction to adjudicate the merits of the parties' respective claims.
The judgement of the United States Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit is vacated, and the case is remanded for further proceedings consistent with this opinion.
A full description of the rationale is available below

Ginsburg Concurrance (Breyer, Scalia)

As the Court’s opinion explains, the Eleventh Circuit erred in holding that the child’s removal to Scotland rendered further adjudication in the U. S. meaningless.
Reversal of the District Court’s return order, I agree, could provide Mr. Chafin with meaningful relief.
This case highlights the need for both speed and certainty in Convention decisionmaking.
Lynne Chafin filed her petition for a return order in May 2011. E. C. was then four years old. E. C. is now six and uncertainty still lingers about the proper forum for adjudication of her parents’ custody dispute.
Protraction so marked is hardly consonant with the Convention’s objectives. On remand, the Court rightly instructs, the Court of Appeals should decide the case “as expeditiously as possible,” ante, at 13.
For future cases, rulemakers and legislators might pay sustained attention to the means by which the United States can best serve the Convention’s aims: “to secure the prompt return of children wrongfully removed to or retained in” this Nation; and “to ensure that rights of custody ... under the law of one Contracting State are effectively respected in the other Contracting States.” Art. 1, Treaty Doc., at 7.

Majority Full Argument

Article III restricts the power of federal courts to "Cases" and "Controveries"
... actual injury traceable to the defendant and likely to be redressed by favorable judicial decision.
... cannot decide questions that cannot affect the rights of litigants in the case before them ...
... case-or-controversey requirement subsists through all stages of federal judicial proceedings, trial and appellate ...
This dispute is still very much alive.
Respondant argues that the case is moot because the District Court lack the authority to issue the re-return order either under the Convention or pursuant to its inherent equitable powers.
That argument ... confuses mootness with the merits ...
Plaintiff's claim for re-return ... cannot be dismissed as so implausible that it is insufficient to preserve jurisdiction, ... prospects of success are therefore not pertinent to the mootness inquiry.
Defendant asserts ... a re-return order, that relief would be ineffectual because Scotland would simply ignore it ....
[Even so] the case would not be moot.
US Courts continue to have personal jurisdiction over respondant and may command her to take action even outside the United States [what basis for personal jurisdiction? jurisdiction did not terminate upon conclusion of suit? Or does jurisdiction continue as long as appeals or court orders are outstanding?]
Enforcement of the order may be uncertain ... but such uncertainty does not typically render cases moot.
... not moot because the defendants might "re-enter this country on their own" and encounter the consequences of our ruling....
So too, here.
[Roberts reviews theoretical consequences of deciding that the case is moot upon return of the child. Routine granting of stays, increased number of appeals, flight from jurisdiction, ....]
The courts below therefore continue to have jurisdiction to adjudicate the merits of the parties' respective claims.
The judgement of the United States Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit is vacated, and the case is remanded for further proceedings consistent with this opinion.
The core of the rationale is available above