Wife took two children to Argentina for a three-week vacation and never returned
By Sophia Voravong
Journal and Courier
LAFAYETTE, Ind. (AP) — Christian Gallo refused to listen to the people who told him to stop fighting — that too much time had passed since June 2008, when his then-wife took their three children to Argentina for a three-week vacation and never returned.
The Lafayette man held onto their toys and drawings that adorned a wall in his south-end home. Even a “goodbye” on a sticky note that his oldest, Sofia Gallo-Hyland, now 12 years old, scrawled before leaving that summer remained clinging to Gallo’s bathroom mirror as encouragement.
“I had people always saying, ‘What if it doesn’t happen?’ That wasn’t an option for me,” he told the Journal & Courier. “In my mind, I knew the possibility was really, really low. But the moment that I start doubting myself, I knew I would not succeed.”
Gallo’s 4-1/2-year fight has come to a happy end. The children — Sofia, Joaquin Maria Gallo-Hyland, now 10 years old, and Christian Maria Gallo-Hyland, now 8 years old — returned to Lafayette in mid-December.
The children did not want to directly comment to the Journal & Courier, but instead asked their father. They’ve been re-enrolled at Lafayette Catholic schools.
“They are very happy to be here, already making friends and enjoying their schools,” Gallo said. “Sofia has more trouble adjusting since she jumped from elementary school to the middle of high school, but she is adjusting fast and catching up fast with her friends from school she had not seen in four years.”
Meanwhile, an arrest warrant remains active for Gallo’s ex-wife, Sandra Moira Hyland, said Detective Joe Clyde of the Lafayette Police Department. She is charged in Tippecanoe Superior Court 1 with three counts of violating a child custody order, all Class D felonies, punishable by six months to three years incarceration.
Hyland is believed to still be in Argentina, Clyde said. Her information is listed with the International Criminal Police Organization, or Interpol, and other agencies to help increase the chances of arresting her.
“We do want to bring her back here,” Clyde said.
Gallo, a native of Argentina, and Hyland, an American citizen who was raised in Argentina, were married in Argentina in 1999. They moved to the United States — and Lafayette — in January 2003.
Tippecanoe Superior Court 2 Judge Thomas Busch granted Gallo full custody of his children after he filed for divorce in August 2008. Gallo was naturalized as a U.S. citizen in December 2008.
Their international custody dispute is an example of what the Office of Children’s Issues of the U.S. Department of State refers to as international parental child abduction.
The state department received 1,135 requests for assistance in international parental abduction cases during its 2009 fiscal year, nearly double the 642 requests in 2006, according to its 2010 compliance report.
Further, the National Center for Missing & Exploited Children estimates that, at any given time, there are 11,000 to 12,000 children who have been taken from the United States to another country.
In the divorce proceeding, Hyland’s Tippecanoe County-based attorney alleged that Gallo was sometimes violent toward Hyland and the children. Gallo denies those accusations.
Hyland, via email, has previously declined to comment on the case. But she sent documents to the J&C from a parallel case in a Buenos Aires court, which centered on whether Busch’s custody order was enforceable.
