Dad Arrested For Picking Up His Own Kids In Japan

An American dad who travelled to Japan in search of the two kids abducted by his Japanese ex-wife is now sitting in a foreign jail. His crime? He picked up his own kids, then took off for the US consulate.

The father, Christopher Savoie, was granted full custody of his two kids by a court in Tennessee, but that’s a ruling the Japanese government has ignored.

So Savoie’s current wife, Amy, told CBS News he went to see his children. He picked six-year-old Rebecca and eight-year-old Isaac up as they walked to school with their mother (his ex-wife), then headed for the consulate, where he was blocked by Japanese police.

The story has shades of the Sean Goldman case — another international custody case. Sean was kidnapped by his Brazilian mother, who is now dead, and his New Jersey dad is fighting to get him back. But though Brazilian authorities have ignored the New Jersey rulings giving David Goldman custody of his son, essentially treating David as a criminal, they’ve never gone so far as to arrest him for his attempts to see his own child.

That’s where Japanese officials apparently thing Savoie was in the wrong — in making contact with his kids. As a parent, I can’t say I’d do anything different.

Do you think Savoie should have picked the kids up or just flown into town and exhausted legal channels?

Image: CNN