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Summary
The Brazilian family of 9-year-old Sean Goldman returned the boy to his American father on Thursday at the US Consulate in Rio de Janeiro, ending a legal saga that strained ties between the two countries.David Goldman arrived early at the consulate building in a black van escorted by police as he prepared to meet his son after a five-year-custody dispute.Sean, who was wearing a Brazilian volleyball jersey, was brought to the consulate by his stepfather Joao Paulo Lins e Silva, his Brazilian grandmother, Silvana Bianchi and his family's lawyer, Sergio Tostes. Brazil's top judge ruled late on Tuesday that Goldman should be reunited with his son, backing a decision made last week by a federal court.Sean's Brazilian family said on Wednesday that it would not appeal the ruling and would hand over Sean to the US consulate by Thursday morning, which would allow father and son to be reunited for Christmas. The legal battle over Sean Goldman sparked tensions between the United States and Brazil, and reached a crescendo with a threat in Washington to hold up the approval of billions of dollars of trade benefits to the South American nation. In response to the Supreme Court ruling, the US Senate promptly passed a trade bill late on Tuesday to extend several billion dollars worth of duty-free benefits on some Brazilian exports that New Jersey Senator Frank Lautenberg had blocked in protest over the Goldman case. Goldman has been fighting to bring his son home since 2004 when Bruna Bianchi, his then-wife and Sean's mother, brought the boy to her native Brazil and then divorced Goldman. She died last year.Bianchi's family and her second husband have fought to keep Sean in Brazil, saying he has settled in the country and does not want to go back to the United States. Goldman and the US government say Sean's case is clearly one of international child abduction under the Hague Convention on child protection that both countries signed.
