Jack Schoenmakers
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Jack Schoenmakers is a member of Gimbrere Legal and has a practice in the field of national and international Family Law.
He is specialized in the field of divorce, child & custody, parental relocation & abduction and Hague convention cases.
Jack is a member of the Dutch International Child Abduction Lawyers Association (DIAL) and Lepca, Lawyers in Europe on Parental Child Abduction. He is also a member of ABAL (Across Borders Alliance Ltd ).
Relevant experiences and positions
Jack has been handling child abduction cases on a daily basis for many years and he litigates international child abduction cases before the District Court and the Court of Appeal with great regularity. He has a large national and international network of colleagues and agencies, such as Mercator, who he works with in these cases.
Some personal questions
When did you first handle a child abduction case?
My first child abduction case was 25 years ago.
Why is it interesting for you as a lawyer to work on these cases?
The best part is that clients entrust their most previous possession, their children, to you to achieve the best positive result.
Which cases are you most concerned with?
Non-Hague Convention cases in which the treaty still applies in the Netherlands.
Which child abduction case will you never forget?
I have now been handling cases involving international child abduction for almost 25 years. The case that always stays with me is the first case I handled in 1999. At that time, in proceedings, the trailing parent was represented by the Ministry of Justice. I was then the lawyer of the Dutch mother who had come to the Netherlands from the United States with three young children. The father believed that there was child abduction. The court ruled that the three young children had to return to New York.
At that time, filing an appeal had no suspensive effect. I then appealed on the woman’s behalf and the woman then went into hiding with the children. The woman was helped in the background by family, friends as well as a well-known journalist and television program. The case also received a lot of publicity in the media. I then won the case on appeal. The main reason was that I could prove through witnesses that the American father had agreed to the permanent residence of the children in the Netherlands. Because my client was in hiding during the appeal, communication was very difficult and the client was wanted by the police and judicial authorities.
Ultimately, this case led to my interest in international child abduction cases. To this day, I handle such cases on a daily basis and each case is yet another challenge. What I learned from my first abduction case is that every case offers possibilities and opportunities. Of course, consultation and mediation should be the initial starting point. In many cases, this does not lead to agreement and litigation must take place. In short, in every case thorough investigation of all facts and circumstances should follow. In particular, communication between parties through WhatsApp, Facebook and email can provide a lot of information to, for example, certain defenses. I have been able to conclude many cases positively with that.
How do you ensure good cooperation with the parent in a child abduction case?
My starting point : It takes two to tango.
