Pressure mounts on state in homeschool case

Pressure is mounting on a state-run social services agency in Sweden to return to his parents a 10-year-old boy who was taken into custody because he was being homeschooled, after the European Court of Human Rights ruled such separations can cause harm to children.

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Homeschooling Parents Get New Hope in Custody Dispute

A recent European Court of Human Rights ruling is putting more pressure on Sweden to return a 10-year-old boy to his rightful home after the government abducted him from his parents nearly three years ago for being homeschooled.

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ADF/HSLDA File Second Application to Strasbourg on Behalf of Johansson Family

The Alliance Defense Fund, the Home School Legal Defense Association and local Swedish counsel have filed a second application on behalf of Annie and Christer Johansson to the European Court of Human Rights in Strasbourg. Nearly two years ago, as the Johansson’s and their seven year old son Domenic were on a plane ready to move to India to engage in missionary work with orphanages, Swedish police boarded their plane and took young Domenic into foster care simply for being home educated. Since that time, the family has not been allowed to use the lawyer or legal defense of their own choosing within Sweden despite no objective reason for Swedish court’s to reject this most basic of requests.

Christer, whom was arrested and imprisoned for several weeks among serious criminals without ever seeing a judge simply for taking Domenic home for one day without permission (he called the police the following day to let them know he was at his parents’ home with his son), was also forced to use a state appointed lawyer in his criminal proceedings despite having the financial resources to appoint his own lawyer. The claim filed by ADF and HSLDA makes clear that in a democratic society, it is unacceptable for Sweden to force legal counsel onto a family without any objective cause to do so and to reject a defendant’s right to use the lawyer of their own choosing. For more information on this case and other ADF cases, please visit: http://www.alliancedefensefund.org.

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EUROPEAN COURT OF HUMAN RIGHTS

General Overview

On June 26th, 2009, Domenic Johansson, a seven year-old boy (born on September 9, 2001) who is a dual citizen of Sweden and India, was seated in a commercial airliner awaiting departure of a flight to India. Without a court order or any kind of preliminary notification, Swedish authorities boarded the plane and removed Domenic from the custody of his parents, Christer Johansson (a Swedish citizen) and Annie Johansson (an Indian citizen). The sole purpose of the removal of Domenic was to prevent his parents from moving with him to India.
At the time of the removal, the sole issue that motivated the actions of the Swedish government was the fact that Domenic was being homeschooled. No other information concerning minor medical issues (which have arisen since the boy was unlawfully removed from his parents) was known to any Swedish authority at the time he was peremptorily removed from his parents.
Swedish officials removed this boy from an international flight solely to prevent his parents from moving to another nation and from educating him in a manner that is lawful in India, in Sweden, and in a majority of nations.

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ADF, HSLDA file suit with European Court of Human Rights

“Parents have the right and authority to make decisions regarding their children’s education without government interference,” said ADF Legal Counsel Roger Kiska, who is based in Europe. “A government trying to create a cookie-cutter child in its own image should not be allowed to violate this basic and fundamental human right. The refusal of Swedish authorities to respect that right has left us no choice but to take this case to the European Court of Human Rights.”

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Battle Continues Over Home-schooled Child Seized by Swedish Government

On Friday, the Alliance Defense Fund and the Home School Legal Defense Association attorneys filed an application with the European Court of Human Rights asking it to hear the case of a seven-year-old boy seized by Swedish authorities because his parents home-school.

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