Show & Tell vs. Hide & Seek: Navigating Family Law in Australia and Russia

So at this point, Susan, I guess it's important just to highlight the fact that it's very important to engage with other international family lawyers.

Yes, I think even as you were speaking, Elena, I was thinking that that getting the right advice for parents who are looking at leaving Russia or leaving Australia to go to Russia right at the outset is very important.

And I can tell you about a case that I have.

I saw a lady on six different occasions, a Russian lady living in Australia over a two-year period and And she would come and see me each time and say she'd separated from her husband.

We would work on a plan to file an application in the family court in Australia for her to relocate back to Russia because she had no family in Australia.

And then she would reconcile with the husband.

And this happened on six separate occasions over this two-year period.

I then didn't hear from her and I just assumed she was then happily married.

And recently she reached out to me to tell me that she had actually persuaded her husband to allow her to travel to Russia for a holiday with the children.

But once she arrived in Russia and that holiday period passed, she just didn't return.

And she continues living in Russia with the children.

The husband has been successful and in engaging the Hague Convention to have orders to bring the children back.

But she has taken steps to not comply and she's refused to come back.

But she has applied for a property settlement because she would like to have some assets or some money from the sale of a house and other assets they have in Australia.

And the court in Australia has imposed certain orders for her to only be able to prosecute essentially that application if she complies with the court's orders about returning the children.

I've only recently reconnected with her and I've been looking at that, but it just goes to show getting advice early is important.

That's an example of someone who took advice from me, understood that the process was going to be two or three years because her husband wouldn't agree for her to relocate the children to Russia, and then took the law into her own hands.

And now she's facing a situation where she's in Russia with her children, living with her mother, who doesn't seem to have significant means to support her.

But she may have... gone about it so poorly that she might do herself out of what would have been a very good property settlement had she taken the appropriate steps here.

Because I did think she had good merit to achieve a relocation of the children, but she was impatient and very concerned about the delay because she wanted to move more quickly.

So I think engaging with an experienced family lawyer in your country regardless of what country you're in, right at the beginning and getting the advice is very important.