GUELPH, Ont. – Roberto Martinez sat in a courtroom in this southern Ontario city Thursday, nodding slowly, as a judge granted him full custody of his infant son.
It was a somewhat hollow, though quite important, victory.
Though Martinez has legal custody of 10-month-old Jadon Alexander Yanez Parada, the boy is believed to be thousands of kilometres away with his mother in Chile.
Martinez, 35, will work with officials from the provincial Ministry of Community and Social Services in an effort to have Chilean authorities try to locate and seize Jadon under The Hague Convention on Child Abduction and have the boy returned to Canada.
James Pietrangelo, Martinez’s lawyer, said Justice Jane Caspers’ order will be sent along with other documents to the Canadian Embassy in Chile.
“It’s mostly now a case of waiting for the Chilean authorities to see if they’ll comply with it,” Pietrangelo said.
But while Chile is one of 80 “contracting states” that has ratified The Hague Convention, the lawyer said the South American nation has in the past been slow to offer assistance to officials of other countries making application under the convention.
For Martinez, shifting the focus to Chile presents a new series of legal hoops he must jump through to be reunited with the son he hasn’t seen since late January.
“I miss him and I want him back,” Martinez said.
Martinez said he met Jadon’s mother, Roxana Eliana Yanez Parada, in 2006 and the couple lived together at Martinez’s apartment in nearby Cambridge for most of that year.
After about six months, Martinez said the relationship began to fall apart and the couple argued frequently. He said police were called to the apartment twice, by Yanez Parada. Neither visit resulted in charges, he said.
In the fall of 2006 Yanez Parada became pregnant, and in December she moved back into her parents’ Guelph home, Martinez said.
Jadon was born June 5, 2007.
Martinez said he and Yanez Parada, 37, remained in touch after their split and he attended appointments with her gynecologist. But eventually, he alleges, he was squeezed out by Yanez Parada to the point he began calling Guelph and Cambridge hospitals on a regular basis to find out whether she had given birth.
Documents filed by Yanez Parada with the Family Court allege Martinez had issues with substance use and was physically abusive toward her. Martinez concedes he has used marijuana in the past but strenuously denies his former partner’s abuse allegations.
“I didn’t do any of those things,” he said, suggesting Yanez Parada’s claims are designed to shut him out of Jadon’s life.
Pietrangelo said the Family Court case began as a simple attempt for Martinez to get visitation rights after he consented to Yanez Parada having full custody. Visitation rights were granted, but Martinez, a project co-ordinator with the City of Kitchener, filed a motion alleging Yanez Parada was in contempt of the court-ordered access.
And then the woman stopped attending court appearances.
Martinez said he last saw Jadon during a regular access visit Jan. 26.
A week later, on Feb. 2, Yanez Parada did not show up for a similar appointment. Pietrangelo told court Thursday that is the date he has confirmed Jadon and his mother entered Chile.
The judge also agreed with a request by Pietrangelo to rule Jadon’s removal from Canada was “wrongful.”
Meanwhile, the RCMP has listed Jadon on its national missing children database.
