| Christopher Yavelow thought the new age movement was harmless until January 4, 1999 when his wife Monique Fasel abducted his children from the family home into a Wicca witch coven in the Netherlands. The girls, native-born American citizens aged 13 and 11, are both devout Christians. Yavelow is American. Fasel is Swiss.
Yavelow, the award-winning composer and author, had discovered Fasel, a confirmed pedophile, molesting one of his daughters two days earlier on Saturday and informed her that he was taking the children to the Child Protection Agency on Monday. Since then, his life and the lives of his children have been a nightmare. |
 photo: August 11, 1999 (click to enlarge) |
What happened to this marriage of almost 20 years? In 1997, Moniques mother died. Shortly thereafter Monique Fasel became involved with three New Age organizations*. These organizations are considered cults by many. As early as 1997, Yavelow began to suspect that his wife might be molesting their daughter. Yavelow sought help for his wife's problem and to protect his children. Fasel's "private life" kept herself away from the house an average of 55 hours a week. Yavelow was self-employed and was able to work at home and care for the kids. He was the primary caregiver from 1993 to 1999. His role as custodial parent increased as Fasels diminished. One of Yavelow's daughters admitted to Claire Boers Stoll (registered psycho-therapist in Amsterdam) that Fasel had molested her.
Finding help for his wife and daughters proved difficult in the Netherlands where the family was living. In 1999, The Netherlands was chastised by the United Nations for a deplorable history of child abuse. Remarkably, while Yavelow attempted to make sense of how his wife could have committed such atrocities upon their daughter, he by chance uncovered a province-wide conspiracy to protect child molesters which he reported to authorities.
When he turned to the Dutch Child Protection Agency for help Yavelow discovered they were even more corrupt than the Dutch legal system. He found that there were not dozens but hundreds of lawsuits against the agency, as well as regular protest marches, in which parents demanded "protect our families from the Child Protection Agency."
Yavelow and his children fought with the Dutch legal system from January through July, 1999, at four hearings. Through video testimony and letters to the judge, his children unceasingly asserted their wishes to be returned home to Yavelow. The courts refused to consider their testimony even though Dutch laws specify that children over 12 must be heard. Yavelow was forced to complain to the Palace of Justice in the Hague in order to persuade the local courts to uphold their own laws which specify equal shared custody and 50-50 access for both parents.
Nonetheless, when his older daughter wrote a letter pleading that the judge listen to her horror stories of incest by her mother and Yavelow submitted reports from registered psychologists confirming those accusations, the judge retaliated by cutting their 50% access down to every other Saturday. He did this, he said, because Yavelow had attempted to deliver his daughter's letter to him at the hearing. Most Dutch lawyers have confirmed Yavelow's suspicions that the judge was also "punishing" Yavelow for reporting the Haarlem court to the Palace of Justice. (It is a little-known fact that the Netherlands legal system is such that many of the judges are also practicing lawyers and some are even members of parliament. It is even possible to be a parliament member, lawyer, and judge simultaneously.)
The Child Protection Agency representative testified that delivering a letter to a judge at the request of a child was a far greater form of child abuse than mother-daughter incest. The judge proclaimed "we have to cut the knot between the children and one of the parents, and I have decided to cut knot between them and you!" So much for justice in a socialist country,
The new "knot-cutting" access-arrangements were to begin on September 1, 1999. At that point, according to Dutch law, Yavelow and Fasel had joint custody of the children. They had not had a custody hearing nor had the word "custody" been mentioned in any of their previous four hearings, all of which had been solely devoted to temporary access schedules in the ongoing joint custody situation.
Christopher and his children consulted with 4 US lawyers and 3 Dutch lawyers. Having determined that there were no legal reasons to stay in the Netherlands, they decided it was time to come home to the United States. The children had dreams of attending American schools (Fasel had placed them in an Anthroposophic cult school), attending American churches (Fasel refuses to allow them to attend the American church in Holland of which they are a member, instead forcing them into an endless progression of New Age rituals), having American friends (Fasel forbids this and, in fact, she altered official Dutch records to state that the children are not American and did not move to Holland from the United States), and speaking English, their native language.
The Yavelow family arrived in the United States on September 1, 1999 and slowly made their way to the Pacific Northwest where they had pre-arranged housing and schooling as well as their normal after-school activities: music, drama, horse-riding, and so forth. They had shipped some of their most precious belongings ahead. The children were ecstatic and repeatedly stated that being home in America was "a dream come true!"
Within hours of their arrival, they informed Monique of their plans to have a custody hearing as soon as they arrived at their destination. They invited her to the hearing and assured her that this was to maximize the children's contact with both parents, something that the Dutch courts were obviously against.
On September 9, 1999, before Christopher and his children arrived at their desination, Fasel appeared in Maryland with a Hague Convention request demanding the return of the children unless "one of the few exceptions is to be applied." The exceptions are articles 13b and 20.
Article 13b of the Hague Convention states; "there is a grave risk that his or her return would expose the child to physical or psychological harm or otherwise place the child in an intolerable situation." Article 20 states "The return of the child under the provision of Article 12 may be refused if this would not be permitted by the fundamental principles of the requested State relating to the protection of human rights and fundamental freedoms."
Yavelow and his children were well-prepared to exercise their rights to those exceptions, however, they were never allowed to do so. They were never given the hearing promised to them by articles 7F and 10 of the Hague Convention. In fact, they didn't discover that the Hague Convention was involved until October 30 after Yavelow had been jailed and his children had been kidnapped by Fasel back to the Netherlands.
In support of the Hague request, a bogus and completely unauthorized English translation of the Dutch temporary access arrangements order was submitted. Neither that document, nor the Hague Convention request stated that either Yavelow or Fasel had custody because both parents had joint custody. Further, the next to the last paragraph of Fasel's Hague Convention request made it clear that custody had not been determined yet. Nonetheless, Maryland's Baltimore County Circuit Judge John 0. Hennegan was duped into believing that the temporary access arrangement, which has no legal force even in the Netherlands, was a custody order which he "domesticated" it into a Maryland Custody Order giving custody to Fasel.
Maryland had and has no jurisdiction over the case: No one in the family is a resident of Maryland. Neither Fasel nor the children have never been a resident of Maryland although Yavelow was once a resident 32 years ago. Note that there was no attempt on behalf of the courts to authenticate any of the documents submitted by Fasel. Subsequently, Yavelow, with a five-minute call to the Dutch embassy, was able to ascertain that the documents submitted by Fasel were bogus and could not be used in a legal process according to the Dutch consul in Washington, DC.
As if that weren't enough, all this took place without informing Yavelow or his children of the hearing. This, in spite of the fact that Fasel and her lawyers had the family under photographic surveillance by private detectives and knew where they were at all times from the moment she arrived in the United States. Had they been informed of the hearing, Yavelow would have submitted copies of the Dutch law as well a clear article 13b and article 20 defense to their charges. He was carrying those documents with him at all times.
Fasel was able to build a devestating house of cards upon the bogus custody order. First, it allowed Fasel to obtain parental child abduction warrants for Yavelow's arrest and the return of the children.
Using the warrants to bolster her credibility, Fasel listed Yavelow with Interpol, the NCIC, and the Center for Missing Children (the NCMEC), who fabricated a story about Yavelow being armed, and she convinced major newspapers such as the Baltimore Sun to devote extensive and inflammatory coverage to her lies and fabrications. Eventually, the Sun would average 70% falsehoods in their articles. She appeared repeatedly on the three major television networks, and, apparently under the advice of the NCMEC, she conspired to use 6-year old videos of the children in order to make it appear that Yavelow had kidnapped two preschool children.
Continuing her path of deception she persuaded Maryland Deputy State's Attorney Howard Merker to agree to "pay to extradite Yavelow to Maryland if he is found out of state." Next she talked the FBI into issuing a federal warrant and placing Yavelow on their "Ten Most Wanted" list, erroneously stating that the children were "victims" when in fact they were traveling with their father voluntarily, happier than they had ever been in their lives.
By then the Yavelow family was driving across the United States and had no idea that any of this had taken place. When they reached Minnesota, a chance call to Yavelow's mother made them aware that something was up and they decided to go to Alabama because that state has legislation designed to prevent schemes by foreigners such as the one perpetrated by Fasel. Yavelow assumed (incorrectly) that the Dutch courts might have given Fasel a custody order and Alabama does not recognize foreign custody orders.
Yavelow and his children settled in Fairhope, Alabama, and met with realtors to find a house. They joined a church. The children squealed with delight, "We finally have a zipcode!" He took the children to register for school. After the school tour his older daughter said "this is what I've always dreamed of, to go to an American high school... with lockers and everything. Its like a dream come true." However, the dream was short-lived. The next morning they noticed an article placed in the Mobile Register by Fasel. They decided to go to a friend's house in Houston, Texas, and try to find a lawyer.
In Houston, Yavelow spent the first three weeks of October frantically searching for a lawyer in Maryland as a $1,000 phone bill for calls to Maryland clearly reveals. His efforts met with little success. Eventually, he was able to keep Maryland authorities apprised of his efforts via regular email communication with Maryland State Prosecutor Andrew White, Deputy States Attorney Howard Merker, and Maryland FBI Agent Michael Charikofsky. Yavelow informed them of his Hague Convention exceptions but none of them ever informed him of the basis for the charges against him.
On October 21, 1999, at least a half dozen FBI agents surrounded the house where Christopher and his daughters were staying and brutally arrested him in front of his children who attempted to shield him pleading, " Please don't take our father away. He has not kidnapped us. We are here of our own free will! We want to be in America. We are American citizens! " According to the Hague Convention, children of their age must be listened to and their wishes honored. Yavelow's children were denied this fundamental right.
Yavelow was jailed in Harris County Jail and his children were handed over to Fasel who promptly abducted them to the Netherlands, herself violating the same sentence in Judge Hennegans court order that had led to the warrants being issued for Yavelow in the first place (she had been ordered to turn over all passports and appear for a hearing). Yavelow had expressed concernsthat she would flee with the children to the arresting officers and also to Deputy State's Attorney Howard Merker, and Maryland FBI Agent Michael Charikofsky. FBI Agent Michael Charikofsky had stated in writing that the children would NOT be returned to Fasel until there had been a hearing.
With the help of U.S. government agencies the National Center for Missing Children and the FBI, Fasel is now free to continue her sexual "experiments" with Yavelow's daughters. Now, his daughters are being "de-programmed" by an anti-Christian organization, having their Dutch paperwork altered to indicate that they are not American citizens, have never been to America, and did not come from America (Fasel was caught doing this once before), and being further indoctrinated into the new-age cult rituals of Anthroposophy, Luong Minh Dang, and Wicca.
Yavelow's only crime: trying to fulfill his daughters' dreams of returning to their home country, the United States, so that they could attend normal American schools and churches, have American friends and speak English.
Fasel learned a good deal from her American experience. She learned how advantageous it is to have a hearing in which the other parties are not present to speak up for themselves. Thus, in the middle of October, prior to kidnapping Yavelow's children, she had a hearing in the Netherlands. Again Yavelow was not notified nor invited to attend the hearing, neither were the children. This notwithstanding the fact that everyone involved on both sides of the ocean was in daily email contact with Yavelow at the time.
The children are old enough that according to Netherlands law, their testimony is required to be considered. It is mandatory in the case of Celina who is over 12. The girls had written seven letters to the judge, demanding to be heard, expressing their desire to live with their father at his house, or if that could not be arranged, that at the very least they be allowed to live with their father half the time which is what the Dutch law officially proscribes in custody cases. The Dutch judge dismissed their letters with the ridiculous remark, "these do not relate to the requested arrangement concerning parental access" (presumeably, "requested arrangement" in this pronouncement refers to Fasel's request that Yavelow be stripped of all parental rights).
On November 2, 1999, the decision from the October "exparte" hearing was made. The Dutch courts gave Fasel full custody of Celina and Stephanie. Fasel requested that Yavelow lose all his rights of parental access to the children and the court granted that request, essential ordering that Yavelow was no longer the the father of his children.
She was also provisionally awarded his house, his office, and all his possessions including about $250,000 worth of computers and computer music equipment and all his music, his writings, books, master recordings of his works, his curricula, and paintings by his parents who are both artists.
Although Yavelow had provided the court with statements from Fasel's secret Swiss accounts (which he discovered after she left and which are of suspicious origin) the courts awarded Fasel 100% of Yavelow's income, citing, as justification for this, a savings account that had been depleted for legal expenses a year ago.
No one seems to notice that if Fasel only received custody in November, how could she possibly have had it at the beginning of September when she came over to the United States waving Dutch documents that she claimed were custody papers -- documents and translations that were never authenticated and have still not been authenticated.
Fasel accomplished more destruction along the way: Through legal fees she has bankrupted Yavelow and his 82-year-old mother. By lying to his best friends from childhood and working with a California-based anti-Christian group she has turned many of Yavelow's closest friends and relatives against him and his children. She lied on nationwide TV and to the newspapers in an attempt to ruin his career (Yavelow is a composer, author, and multimedia producer whose works have received national and international awards in all three fields).
The scenario played out just as in the article, "America's Stolen Children" (Readers' Digest Ñ September 1999), with the FBI unwittingly facilitating the kidnapping of Yavelow's American children by the foreign parent (Fasel) as Readers' Digest claims has happened 13,000 times in the past. Coincidentally, there were two congressional committees examining this very problem during October (links to the congressional testimony can be found at http://www.yavelow.com/children.html#Senate).
On November 4, 1999, more than a week after his release on $25,000 bail from Harris County jail in Houston, Texas, Christopher Yavelow was finally shown the charges and warrants against him. At his arrest and during his more than six days in jail he was never notified of the charges against him although at every opportunity he had asked every official he encountered.
Fasel continues to harass Yavelow. With practically daily emails during the last week of November and first week of December, Fasel threatened to sell Yavelow's house at "60% of market value" so that he would realize no profit from the equity. Technically, the equity should go to Yavelow.
She worked around the clock during the Fall and Winter to try to have Yavelow jailed for a year but without success. Deputy States Attorney Howard Merker has campaigned on television and in the newspapers to "change the laws so that Yavelow will serve more time" and this, without ever meeting Yavelow or his children or asking them what their own wishes were.
From a wider perspective it is important to note that the United States facilitated Fasel's violation of the international Hague Convention Treaty by allowing her to return to the Netherlands without having a hearing. Yavelow and his children were traveling with well-researched article 13b and article 20 Hague Convention defenses that they planned to present at the required hearing. Fasel had arrived with a Hague Convention request for return of the children. A hearing was required.
Additionally, by stripping Yavelow of his parental rights against the wishes of his children, among other things, the Netherlands is in serious violation of articles 8, 9, 10, 11, 13, 14, 15, 16, 18, and 19 of the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child. Both the United States and the Netherlands are party to this treaty.
In summary, Yavelow had committed no crime in the Netherlands and he was completely within his rights to move himself and his American children back to the country of their birth and citizenship. His wife obtained a U.S. custody order by deceiving the U.S. legal system with bogus documents and used that U.S. custody order to unleash the entire law enforcement community of the United States upon him and his children. Now, thanks to the FBI, Fasel has been able to kidnap Yavelow's children back to the Netherlands.
At no time was Yavelow ever notified of the charges against him. Only at the very end of this ordeal was he even aware that law enforcement agents were chasing him. At no time was he ever provided the opportunity to defend himself, speak to a judge, or even examine the charges against him. Further, he was never notified of the basis for any charges, orders, or warrants against him. At no time was Yavelow afforded any right to file an exception to the Hague Convention documents or even to have his gauranteed Hague Convention hearing. At all junctures Yavelow and his children were denied their rights of due process.
Celina and Stephanie Yavelow are native-born American citizens who have spent more than half their lives in America. They desperately want to return to their own country. They are being held incommunicado in the Netherlands against their will where they continue to be abused by Monique Fasel and the other members of the three cults to which she belongs.