A MESSY custody battle between a Singaporean woman and her Chinese-American ex-husband has wound its way from the US to Singapore.
After her marriage broke down, Jane (not her real name) fled to Singapore with her 9-year-old twins.
She went into hiding, checking into a cheap hotel and not daring to call her family here for the first few days for fear of being discovered.
Within days of their disappearance, her ex-husband put out posters on the Internet. Now the posters have also popped up here outside Jane’s family home and their business address.
Jane cannot be identified under the law to protect her children.
When couples of different nationalities are caught in a custody battle and one party flees with the children, what often follows is an international round of hide-and-seek.
After a series of ugly court fights, the couple began their custody battle for the twins in the US in September 2006.
On 31 Aug, while the custody hearing was still in the courts, Jane took the twins and used their Singapore passports to fly back to Singapore.
The 44-year-old mother later filed a police report in Singapore, claiming that she brought the twins here to protect them.
On 3 Sep, a court order filed in Los Angeles, California, stated that the father has full custody of the twins.
Jane said she had applied for Singapore passports for the twins in the US when her marriage started breaking down.
She said the boys also have American passports which are with her ex-husband’s lawyers.
Jane said: “The boys didn’t have a clue. I had picked them up from my ex-partner’s home, and we later went to a friend’s house for dinner.
“Only on the way to the airport did I tell them we were going to Singapore.”
She said the boys were excited and helped her with the luggage at the airport..
Having been away from Singapore since 2004, the twins missed their cousins and relatives here.
Jane was worried whether her sons would be on an alert list and be prevented from leaving the US by the immigration authorities.
But everything proceeded smoothly.
She said: “I felt very confident when nobody questioned us. After all, I am a Singaporean and my sons were born here. We have the right to travel on our Singapore passports.”
After they landed in Singapore, Jane did not make any attempt to contact any of her four sisters here for fear that her ex-husband would track her down through them.
She also always made sure she was not being tailed.
Jane claimed that her ex-husband was a determined man who would go to great lengths to hunt them down.
Jane checked into a hotel on Balestier Road.
For the next two days, they ate local food which they missed while in the US.
She said: “We ate a lot of chicken rice and fishball noodles. The twins were hooked on teh c (tea with evaporated milk).”
When she was certain that nobody was on their trail, she decided to call her oldest sister on their third day back in Singapore.
Said the sister, 49: “I told her not to lie when she said she was here with the boys.
“But I knew she wouldn’t leave the US without the boys. In the end, I was happy but I couldn’t tell anyone.”
The sister was relieved because earlier that day, she had received an e-mail from the father telling her that the trio had gone missing.
She added that they thought of the “worst things” or that her sister had “done something stupid to herself”.
Later that day, she met her younger sibling and offered her a place to stay.
The older woman said: “The love hotel she stayed in was no place for children.”
Internet posters
But the boys were thrown into the limelight about a week after arriving in Singapore when their pictures appeared on the Internet.
The posters said the boys had been missing since 4 Sep and were “believed to be illegally abducted to Singapore”.
On 11 Sep, posters of the twins were placed on the windscreens of cars belonging to neighbours of Jane’s family here.
A bigger poster appeared at a Thomson Road bus stop near the family’s place of business on 15 Sep.
The media here reported on the missing twins after it was mentioned that they had been seen at the family’s shop.
Jane’s family members claimed they noticed two strangers spying on their home in north Singapore.
After confronting them, the family learnt they were private investigators. On 16 Sep, Jane made a police report.
She said: “We had to take precautions because the boys’ identity had been exposed. People can recognise them.
“I’m worried they will be snatched from me.”
At the family’s shop, the twins, who spoke with an American accent, seemed oblivious to the drama surrounding them.
They seemed more interested in fighting over who had the higher score in a computer game they were playing.
Said one of them: “It’s so much fun to be in Singapore. My uncle taught us how to catch fish in the drain. Next week we’re going to the beach.”
The other twin who is older, added: “We’re now famous. We were on TV. But I didn’t understand what was said (because it was in Mandarin).”
MARRIAGE SOURS
MAR 1999: Jane begins dating the Chinese-American after being introduced by a friend.
NOV 1999: The couple marry in Los Angeles, California, and later return to Singapore.
2000: The twins are born in Singapore.
JUL 2004: The family moves to the US.
SEP 2006: The marriage sours. Jane decides to leave the family home. They share custody of the children.
MAY 2009: The marriage ends.
JUL 2009: Jane applies for Singapore passports for the twins in the US.
AUG 2009: Jane and the twins fly to Singapore.
This article was first published in The New Paper
Heads must roll in the MFA.
THINK + behave differently from Locals.. I have lived overseas 40 yrs...I should know... My children's thinking + aspirations are so different from Locals.. Be WARNED.. experience living overseas BEFORE you get involved Life may NOT be up to your expectations !!!