Marisa Cullen
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My name is Marisa Cullen. I practice exclusively in Scots Law and have specialised in Scottish Family Law for the past 15 years. While I undertake and provide advice on all aspects of Scots Family Law, my particular speciality is International Family Law and within that category I am known for my expertise in International Parental Child Abduction. Children tend to be at the heart of many of my cases and keeping children at the forefront of my advice is very important to me.
Relevant experiences and positions
I am a Partner in Family Law Matters Scotland LLP. I practice exclusively in the field of Scots Family Law and the majority of my practice deals with either Intra-UK or International Family and Child Law matters. I have, for over 15 years now, been instructed regularly by the Scottish Central Authority to act for parents seeking the return of their children under the 1980 Hague Convention. I also defend parties in 1980 Hague Convention cases, deal with Non-Hague Cases and deal with Scottish relocation cases.
I am one of the few members of CALA (Child Abduction Lawyers Association) having been offered a place in that organisation after being supported by two English child abduction lawyer referees. I regularly write articles, blogs and commentary in the Scottish Legal Arena. I am the guest editor of Thomson Reuters Practical Law’s International Parental Child Abduction section. I write annual International Child Abduction Summaries for Greens, a Scottish Legal Publication. I am a member of the Law Society of Scotland’s Family and Child Law Sub-committee where I use my expertise to assist mainly in the field of international family law. I regularly liaise with colleagues in England and internationally when dealing with my international family law caseload.
Some personal questions
What is your advice to parents who are thinking about relocating with a child?
I think it is very important when considering a relocation how the child’s life would be better relocating than not. While that of course may include financial reasons, I think it is important that parents consider the child’s other parent of course but also their wider family members; their friends; their schooling; their social integration and their stability. Writing a checklist of pros and cons of relocating with the child in mind. Researching what the child’s new life would be like in the country that they are going to, in terms of accommodation, schooling, language, culture and social integration. If possible, prior discussion with the other parent about the possibility of relocation, having already thought about how that would work in terms of their relationship, contact, holidays with the child.
Why is it interesting as a lawyer to work on these cases?
International parental child abduction cases can be highly emotive and stressful for the families involved. Having said that, they have always been the cases that most interest me in the sphere of family law because they can often be life changing for the families, and particularly the children involved. They often involve getting to know very quickly, other countries legal systems and co-operation with foreign lawyers is always essential. Getting it right for children in international parental child abduction cases can be very difficult but if we get it right then it can be life changing for the child involved.
What is your advice to parents dealing with International Child Abduction?
This will obviously depend on which parent you are acting for, whether it is the parent who has abducted the child or the parent seeking the return of the child. However, in both cases, unless there is any particular safety risk to the child involved, I would advise parents to allow both parents regular communication with the child, no matter what country that they are living in. For a child to be removed from their country and often from the parent that they are used to seeing, is often a traumatic experience for them. More often than not, I find it extremely frustrating when the parent who has taken the child will not allow any communication even by video or through messages with the parent that has been left behind. While there may be cogent reasons for the parent to have abducted the child in the first place, if the child has been used to communication with the other parent, to suddenly go through a traumatic experience of moving country and then having to continue the trauma by not having any communication with the other parent, I think is not in any way child focussed.
When did you first handle a Child Abduction case?
I started dealing with child abduction cases around 15 years ago. They were a very new area of law to me and there were (and still are) very few family lawyers in Scotland who deal with this area as we are a very small jurisdiction. We stick quite rigidly in Scotland to the 6 week process under the 1980 Hague Convention. It was new to me to essentially prepare an evidential hearing, albeit usually in written form, in a matter of a number of weeks for such an important decision that the Court has to make as to whether to return a child to the country of their habitual residence or not. It was an eye-opening experience to deal with other countries’ laws, to deal with clients who usually lived in a foreign country, some spoke English and some did not but it was rewarding when I felt that the right outcomes were made for the children.
Do you think your Country is dealing well with criminal cases concerning child abduction?
In relation to parental child abduction, Scotland only criminalises parents who abduct children from Scotland if they are in breach of a Court Order. This is unlike the position in England where the English criminal law states that an offence of child abduction is committed if the parent does not have the consent of the other parent before removing the child from England. There is currently a consultation going on with the Scottish Government as to whether they are going to amend the legislation to be more in line with the English criminal law on this topic. It is immensely frustrating for me when I speak with my English child abduction lawyer colleagues, who are able to contact the Police if they have a client who telephones them and says that their child is about to be abducted and that can often be dealt with in a criminal context. It is very difficult to get emergency orders from the Scottish Court in a very short timescale that would prevent a child being abducted from Scotland, if that abduction was imminent. As the Police will not become involved in Scotland if it is not in breach of a Court Order there are very few cases where I can use the Police to assist clients who are facing having their children immediately abducted from Scotland.