A distraught Swedish mother has flown to Utah in search of her 3-year-old daughter, who was snatched from Sweden in November and brought here by the child's father.
Karin Sofia Ohlander, 26, says her ex-husband, Mark Andrew Larson, 28, took the child Nov. 29 during a scheduled visitation in Sweden.Larson called Ohlander two days later. "He said, `I'm in the United States.' He said Julia was fine. I said, `Where are you?' and he just hung up. That's all the communication I've had with him since Julia disappeared," Ohlander said an interview Wednesday.
Ohlander arrived in Orem Jan. 21, carrying a Swedish warrant ordering the return of her child, and tried to see Larson. But he had fled. Larson's father, Everett G. Larson, Provo, acknowledged that his son has the child. His son is on vacation with his new wife and Julia, the elder Larson said.
En route to the United States after an encouraging telephone call from her attorney, Lloyd C. Eldredge, Ohlander had a good feeling that she'd see her daughter again. But the reality - and the uncertainties - of the situation have are apparent.
"You're kind of constantly being thrown between hope and despair," she said. "Some days things look really hopeful. Then you kind of fall down again. The United States is a big country, and people just disappear."
Ohlander's attorney filed a petition for the child's return in U.S. District Court Wednesday afternoon. U.S. District Judge Bruce Jenkins promptly issued a warrant authorizing federal marshals to look for Julia and return her temporarily to her mother. Jenkins scheduled a hearing next week on the matter of the child's custody.
Under an international agreement, the country where a child resides can order the return of that child. The United States and Sweden are two of 16 countries that acknowledge the Hague Convention rules prohibiting international child kidnapping.
Ohlander and Larson met in 1986 while Larson was serving a mission in Sweden for The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.
"He baptized me," Ohlander said.
They were married in October 1989 in the LDS Jordan River Temple and settled in Utah. Julia was born in August 1990. The couple's marriage began to crumble and the two separated a few months later, according to divorce records filed in Sandviken, 125 miles north of Stockholm.
Ohlander went back to Sweden, taking Julia with her.
The couple obtained a Swedish divorce in December 1992. A Swedish district court granted Ohlander full custody of Julia but allowed Mark Larson to visit his daughter in Sweden four weeks each year.
The elder Larson said he can't speak for his son but does have an opinion on the matter. "I'm fully supportive of my son in this situation. I think he is legally and morally in the right on this thing," Everett Larson said.
Ohlander's fear that Larson would kidnap Julia figured prominently in the couple's divorce proceedings. "I kind of suspected Mark would do this. He always said that if we got a divorce, he would not let me have Julia."
Ohlander's attorney repeatedly told the judge that Larson had threatened to snatch the child and take her back to the United States, according to Swedish court records.
Larson's lawyer called that claim a "complete fabrication." Larson would never do that, his attorney assured the judge.
Larson has a right to rear his daughter, his father said. Julia was born under the LDS Church's marriage covenant, and therefore Mark Larson and Sofia Ohlander should share in her upbringing, he said.
"It is my opinion and testimony that Mark is a law-abiding, moral man who is exercising his patriarchal stewardship in complete righteousness," Everett Larson said.
"Mark is contesting the legal operations that took place in Sweden as contrary to international law and Swedish law," he said.
Asked why his son isn't in town to make his arguments in court, Everett Larson said, "That will be occurring presently." He said he expects Mark Larson to return from vacation in about two weeks.
But federal marshals won't wait that long. They left federal court Wednesday armed with a warrant that authorizes them to search any place they believe Julia might be, said Eldredge, Ohlander's attorney.
The marshals planned to visit Everett Larson first and find out where Mark Larson went, Eldredge said. Everett Larson told the Deseret News Wednesday evening that he had heard from his son.
"He and his new wife have been poring themselves over Julia, helping her to be comfortable in their environment," Everett Larson said.
But Ohlander worries about her daughter.
"He's torn her away from an environment she feels safe in," she said. "He doesn't know her routines. She doesn't speak English."