There is no timetable for custody trials in Taiwan, but the court may speed up custody proceedings for a three-year-old girl named Emily because of media attention and other circumstances, legal experts said yesterday.
"In Emily's custody suit, the judges will send social workers to visit Emily's father and mother to see how well they can take care of a little child, and they will offer their opinions to the judges," Taipei District Court spokesman Liu Shou-sung (
"The judges also would summon the girl's mother and father, listen to them make their case for taking care of their daughter, and the judges will then make a decision," Liu added.
PHOTO: CHANG CHIA-MING, TAIPEI TIMES
He said he did not know how long the hearing would take.
Taipei lawyer Wang Tzu-wen (王子文) told the Taipei Times that the Taipei District Court may speed up the hearing, because Emily's future is better resolved early, and because the transnational suit has been making headlines.
The suit could be finished in a month, Wang added.
Meanwhile, Liou Hsing-yuan (
The statement said that the New York Family Court had judged Nadia Juan (
Children's Bureau Director Huang Pi-hsia (
Juan on Tuesday had filed a provisional disposition asking the court to award her temporary custody of Emily during the trial.
She argued that because Sartin is a US citizen, he may have to leave the country, as his visa would not allow him to stay in Taipei for long.
The Taipei District Court has not yet ruled on the application.
However, the court approved a provisional disposition on Tuesday that prevents Emily from leaving the country during the custody trial.
Liu said "the judges made their decision quickly because it was an emergency case."
"The suit would make no difference if Emily had already left Taiwan," Liu added.
Juan, the former New York correspondent for the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT)-run newspaper Central Daily News.
Sartin, a 55-year-old New Yorker, had won custody of Emily in the US, and attempted to leave Taiwan with his daughter last week, but was stopped as he did not have her Taiwanese passport when passing the immigration point.
(Editor's note: There have been discrepancies in the spelling of the American father's first name, with government officials and local media offering a variety of spellings. As the signature on the statement issued by the father's lawyer yesterday is signed "Cary Sartin," the Taipei Times is henceforth using this spelling.)
also see story:
Editorial: A plague on all their houses
Starlux Airlines, Taiwan’s newest international carrier, has announced it would apply to join the Oneworld global airline alliance before the end of next year. In an investor conference on Monday, Starlux Airlines chief executive officer Glenn Chai (翟健華) said joining the alliance would help it access Taiwan. Chai said that if accepted, Starlux would work with other airlines in the alliance on flight schedules, passenger transits and frequent flyer programs. The Oneworld alliance has 13 members, including American Airlines, British Airways, Cathay Pacific and Qantas, and serves more than 900 destinations in 170 territories. Joining Oneworld would also help boost
A new tropical storm formed late yesterday near Guam and is to approach closest to Taiwan on Thursday, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said. Tropical Storm Pulasan became the 14th named storm of the year at 9:25pm yesterday, the agency said. As of 8am today, it was near Guam traveling northwest at 21kph, it said. The storm’s structure is relatively loose and conditions for strengthening are limited, WeatherRisk analyst Wu Sheng-yu (吳聖宇) said on Facebook. Its path is likely to be similar to Typhoon Bebinca, which passed north of Taiwan over Japan’s Ryukyu Islands and made landfall in Shanghai this morning, he said. However, it
Taiwan's Gold Apollo Co (金阿波羅通信) said today that the pagers used in detonations in Lebanon the day before were not made by it, but by a company called BAC which has a license to use its brand. At least nine people were killed and nearly 3,000 wounded when pagers used by Hezbollah members detonated simultaneously across Lebanon yesterday. Images of destroyed pagers analyzed by Reuters showed a format and stickers on the back that were consistent with pagers made by Gold Apollo. A senior Lebanese security source told Reuters that Hezbollah had ordered 5,000 pagers from Taiwan-based Gold Apollo. "The product was not
COLD FACTS: ‘Snow skin’ mooncakes, made with a glutinous rice skin and kept at a low temperature, have relatively few calories compared with other mooncakes Traditional mooncakes are a typical treat for many Taiwanese in the lead-up to the Mid-Autumn Festival, but a Taipei-based dietitian has urged people not to eat more than one per day and not to have them every day due to their high fat and calorie content. As mooncakes contain a lot of oil and sugar, they can have negative health effects on older people and those with diabetes, said Lai Yu-han (賴俞含), a dietitian at Taipei Hospital of the Ministry of Health and Welfare. “The maximum you can have is one mooncake a day, and do not eat them every day,” Lai
RSS