Every day, children in the United States are wrongfully removed from the United States or retained outside of the United States in violation of parental rights. In 1993, Congress passed the International Parental Kidnapping Crime Act (“IPKCA”), which created a federal international kidnapping offense, codified at Title 18, United States Code, Section 1204. Section 1204 makes it a federal crime for a parent or other individual to remove or attempt to remove a child from the United States or retain a child outside the United States with intent to obstruct another person’s custodial rights. For example, consider that a married couple had a son together in the United States. During a martial dispute, the father moves with his son to another country in order to keep him away from the mother with no intent of return. In this situation, the father has committed the federal crime of international parental kidnapping. Convicted offenders of this crime can face up to three years of imprisonment.