Chapter 2

Jack’s flight landed at Reagan National on Tuesday morning. Washington, DC, was ablaze with autumn color. Crisp air and cloudless

blue skies greeted him as he stepped out of the taxi. It was the kind of October day that made south Floridians—stuck in heat

and humidity until Halloween—wonder if life really was better north of the Mason-Dixon. Jack would reserve judgment until

January. He entered the chrome-and-glass office building and was in the office of Myra Weiss before noon.

Myra was a partner at one of Washington’s elite law firms, just a stone’s throw from the White House. Her corner office on

the twelfth floor offered what Big Law referred to as a “power vista,” which Jack admired from a tufted leather armchair.

Myra seemed immune to it, seated with her back to a floor-to-ceiling window that showcased Lafayette Square, the familiar

Pennsylvania Avenue view of the White House, and, in the distance, the Washington Monument.

Myra was about ten years older than Jack, closer in age to him than to his father, but Jack had always thought of her as part

of her former boss’s generation. According to her bio on the American Bar Association website, she’d made it her mission as

chair of the ABA’s International Section to ensure that women sued in the United States under the Hague Convention had proper

legal representation. Her firm handled as many as it could. For the rest, she recruited talented lawyers from all over the

country to take cases on a pro bono basis.

“Do you have any experience with cases under the Hague Convention?” asked Myra.

“Not specifically. But I’ve had tons of trials with transnational implications, mostly under the Foreign Corrupt Practices

Act.”

“You’ll take a mandatory training class,” she said. “I look for highly skilled trial lawyers, not walking encyclopedias. You do at least know what the Hague Convention is , right?”

“A multilateral treaty,” said Jack. “Something like a hundred signatory countries.”

“Most important for our purposes, the convention governs court proceedings in which a parent alleges that his child was abducted

by the other parent and removed from the usual country of residence.”

“You say his child. I assume it works both ways. The mother or the father can sue under the Hague Convention if their spouse abducts the

child.”

“True. But my interest in these cases is narrower. All too often, the ‘kidnapper’ is a woman—a wife and mother fleeing an

abusive husband. The Hague Convention provides a legal basis for the father to bring suit in the United States and secure

the child’s return to him in his home country.”

“I presume it also provides some protection for the abused mother and her child,” said Jack.

“Yes. Some protection. These cases are very difficult for a mother to win.”

“How so?”

“The Hague Convention strongly disfavors kidnapping under any circumstances. Even proof that the mother was the victim of

domestic abuse is not enough for her to win. She must prove that returning the child to the father under the Hague Convention

would place the child —not the mother—in grave danger of ‘physical or psychological harm.’”

“Sounds like a pretty nebulous standard,” said Jack.

“You’ll learn all about it in your training. For now, let’s focus more specifically on the case that was filed in Miami. John Doe v. Jane Doe .”

“I presume John Doe is the father.”

“Yes. Farid Bazzi. He is Iranian and lives in Tehran. The mother is also Iranian but has lived in Miami with their daughter,

Yasmin, for almost a year.”

“That explains the Miami connection. But I’m still confused how this lawsuit is even in a US court. My understanding is that

Iran is not a signatory to the Hague Convention.”

“That’s correct.”

“So technically there is no legal basis for Farid to seek the return of the child to Iran.”

“It’s not that cut-and-dried.”

“The law rarely is,” said Jack.

“That goes double for international law. The Bazzi family moved to the UK when Yasmin was a newborn and stayed there until

she was four. Yasmin lived less than a year in Iran before her mother took her to the United States. The UK is a signatory

to the convention.”

“But Farid wants the child returned to Iran, not the UK, right?”

“Of course he does,” said Myra. “But Farid’s lawyer pulled a clever legal move. Under the convention, a child can be returned

only to his or her ‘habitual place of residence.’ Farid’s lawyer is arguing that Yasmin’s ‘habitual place of residence’ is

the UK, where the family lived for most of her life.”

“That’s pure legal gamesmanship,” said Jack. “The minute Yasmin sets foot in the UK, Farid will take her to Iran. Yasmin and

her mother will never see each other again.”

“You’re a quick study, Jack. That’s exactly the problem.”

His father’s words echoed in Jack’s mind: The stakes are higher than in any criminal case . Jack’s friends at the Freedom Institute might take issue. The case of Doe v. Doe wasn’t life-or-death. But Jack took his father’s meaning. Jack had never known his biological mother; she’d died in childbirth.

Jack understood better than anyone that, for six-year-old Yasmin and her mother, the stakes could not be higher.

“Tell me more about Yasmin’s mother,” said Jack. “My father described her as a ‘political hot potato.’”

“I see this as a humanitarian issue, not a political one.”

“That makes the case even more interesting to me.”

“Ultimately, it’s up to Ava to decide whether she wants you to be her lawyer.”

“Ava is her name?”

“She goes by the name Ava Bazzi,” said Myra.

“Goes by? You mean she’s using an alias?”

Myra drew a deep breath, as if there were so much more to the story. “Two years ago, Tehran’s morality police arrested Ava Bazzi for taking part in a hijab protest. She was taken to an Iranian jail. That’s the last anyone has seen of her.”

“I remember hearing about the protests in the news.”

“Ava did get news coverage at the time, but so did others. Over five hundred demonstrators were killed or disappeared. Amnesty

International was very vocal about it. All those stories lost traction when the mainstream media turned to bigger international

issues after Russia invaded Ukraine.”

“And now, out of the blue, Ava Bazzi reappears in Miami as a respondent in a lawsuit filed under the Hague Convention?”

“Or does she? Most rational minds—governments excluded—believe Ava Bazzi died in custody at the hands of the morality police.”

“So you’re saying this is not the real Ava Bazzi? That this case is not about keeping a mother and her child together?”

“That’s the threshold question. The Iranian government says Ava abandoned her husband and fled to the West with her daughter.”

Jack finished Myra’s point for her. “So, if the Iranian government is right, and this is, in fact, Ava Bazzi, the stakes could

not be higher.”

“Absolutely.”

“But if you’re right—the real Ava Bazzi is dead, and someone else abducted Yasmin—then what?”

“Then we have a potential international crisis that threatens to undermine the legitimacy of the Hague Convention and all

the good work this organization does for abused mothers in desperate need of help all over the world—which both Harry and

I entrust to you.”

“I get the picture,” said Jack.

“Either way, it should be a very interesting first meeting with your new client.”

Jack looked past her, gazing through the window toward the White House. “Interesting, to say the least.”