HOUSTON - An international businessman and his wife have
learned their fate for international parental kidnapping, announced U.S.
Attorney Ryan K. Patrick and Special Agent in Charge Perrye K. Turner of the
FBI. A federal jury deliberated for more than two days following a 10-day trial
before convicting Carlos Otavio Guimaraes, 68, and Jemima Guimaraes, 66.
Today, U.S. District Judge Alfred Bennett heard arguments
from both the prosecution and defense teams. The government requested the court
impose a term of imprisonment advised by the sentencing guidelines or slightly
higher, while the defense asked for a non-custodial sentence. Ultimately, the
court imposed a three-month sentence for Carlos Guimaraes, while Jemima was
ordered to serve one month. Both will also be ordered to serve one year of
supervised release following their terms of imprisonment during which time they
will be required to remain in the United States. The court continued its order
that both their U.S. and Brazilian passports remain surrendered and they cannot
obtain new ones. The court also ordered the defendants may not have any contact
with their fugitive co-defendant daughter, but placed no prohibition on
communicating with their grandson.
Each was also ordered to pay a $75,000 fine. Restitution
will be determined at a later date, but could be in excess of $400,000.
At the hearing, the judge also heard from the victim – the
child’s father – who gave impassioned testimony about how this has impacted him
and how much he misses his son. He stated that he has been “emotionally
crippled by this experience. What my family and I have endured at the hands of
these defendants has been so painful that I cannot imaging inflicting it on
another human soul. How do you take away a parent’s right to have their child
in their life?” He further noted that he has been consumed by grief. “My boy
was just gone,” he said. “For years, I have begged and begged and begged them
to bring my boy back, but they refused.”
The father also told the court the court that each trip to
Brazil to see his son for even a short time cost him close to $20,000 and that,
for years, he had been working an enormous amount of hours - averaging 100 a
week - just to finance his fight to try to get his son back.
He also noted that what these defendants did was devoid of
any concern for the child’s well-being, that the decision was motivated by
greed, power, control and fear – fear not of him, but that he would get in the
way of them taking the child for themselves. “They sought to enforce their own
brand of vigilante justice,” he said, adding that the couple had undermined
orders, lied to the court and succeeded in obtaining full custody of the child,
noting they had stripped him of his parental rights, “making a mockery of the
United States judicial system.”
At trial, the jury heard that the child’s grandparents
helped illegally retain the child in Brazil away from his father in Houston.
The mother and minor child traveled to Brazil to attend a family event in July
2013, but were supposed to return to Houston no later than July 20, 2013. The
child was never returned to the United States.
The jury also heard how the child’s mother allegedly
orchestrated a plan to travel to Brazil for her brother’s wedding via an agreed
travel agreement as part of the pending divorce. While in Brazil, she went to a
Brazilian state court and obtained custody of the minor. From that moment
forward, the father of the child was limited in his ability to visit with his
son. The visits he did have were supervised by a guard hired by the child’s
mother. Currently, despite a Harris County divorce ruling in 2015 favorable to
the father, his ability to maintain a relationship with his son has been
incredibly difficult. The child no longer speaks English, and the father had to
learn Portuguese to navigate the Brazilian legal system and communicate with
his son.
The child’s father testified and told the jury that all he
ever wanted was for his son to return to Houston so he could be a constant
presence in his life.
Evidence was also presented which included the fact that the
grandparents support their daughter by providing housing and employment as well
as attorney fees. Additionally, when the father would visit Brazil, Jemima was
present for most of the exchanges of the child. Video evidence showed both
Carlos, Jemima, the hired guard and their Brazilian attorney at one of the
exchanges.
The defense attempted to convince the jury that the
Brazilian court rulings should be respected despite the fact they disregard the
father’s position. The rulings found the United States was not the place to
raise a child in the “egotistical profile of the American family.”
The defense provided an expert on the Hague Convention to
testify, but that expert was unable to give even one example of a child that
has been returned from Brazil when the abducting parent was alive and domiciled
in Brazil. Further, the expert acknowledge the U.S. State Department has found
Brazil to be non-compliant with the provisions of the Hague Convention on the
Civil Aspects of International Child Abduction since 2005.
The defendants claimed the mother was fleeing from domestic
violence, but the jury rejected that defense. The jury ultimately found Carlos
and Jemima Guimaraes aided and abetted their daughter in the international
parental kidnapping of their grandson.
They were permitted to remain on bond and voluntarily
surrender to a U.S. Bureau of Prisons facility to be determined in the near
future.
The child’s mother - Marcelle Guimaraes, 40 - is also
charged but remains a fugitive in Brazil. She is presumed innocent unless and
until convicted through due process of law.
The FBI conducted the investigation. Assistant U.S.
Attorneys Sherri L. Zack and Kimberly Ann Leo are prosecuting the case.
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