The criminal investigation division of the Jeju Provincial Police Agency is seen in this photo taken on Sept. 8.YONHAP
JEJU — An Australian-born 4-year-old girl caught in her parents’ custody dispute has been found dead with her father in a car on Jeju Island, after her mother repeatedly asked police to find her and keep her safe.
The two were found in a rental car at about 6:08 p.m. Monday in the parking lot of an oreum, one of Jeju’s small volcanic cones, in Pyoseon-myeon, Seogwipo, the Jeju Special Self-Governing Provincial Police Agency and the island’s fire authorities said Wednesday. No note was found. Police are investigating how the two died.
The father was a Korean national, and the mother is a Korean Australian with Australian citizenship. Their daughter was born in Australia in 2022.
“There did not appear to be any specific signs of danger, and we offer our condolences that such a tragedy happened while we were continuing to monitor the situation,” a police official said.
“We had a statement from a person involved that nothing seemed unusual at a recent sports day at the day care center, and it was difficult to find any particular warning signs during the eight in-person checks we carried out with the Seogwipo city government and others since November of last year.”
In a briefing, the police explained that the father brought his daughter to Korea at the end of October of last year, while he and his wife were going through divorce proceedings in Australia. The two stayed in Seoul before moving to Seogwipo, Jeju.
On March 30, the mother won a case at the Seoul Family Court under The Hague Convention on the Civil Aspects of International Child Abduction and was granted permission to have the ruling enforced. The convention allows a parent to ask a court to return a child under 16 who has been wrongfully taken or kept abroad in breach of custody rights. The child is to be sent back to the country where they lived, in this case Australia.
The Seogwipo Police Station's building in Jeju IslandYONHAP
The mother traveled from Australia to bring her daughter home but was unable to see her because the parents had each reported the other to police for child abuse in November of last year. The mother also accused the father of abducting the girl by taking her to Korea without regard for her wishes.
A neighbor filed a separate report of suspected child abuse against the father on March 22. The Seogwipo Police Station and the city government conducted two on-site investigations and referred the cases to prosecutors. Prosecutors declined to indict the father, finding no grounds for the abduction and abuse allegations the mother had raised.
On April 13, the mother filed a missing persons report with the Seongdong Police Station in eastern Seoul and asked police to help enforce the custody ruling. Officers checked on the girl by video call that day and told the mother she was safe. The next day, the father brought the girl to a police box in Hamdeok, Jeju City, where officers confirmed her well-being in person.
On Oct. 2, the father told the girl’s day care center that she would stop attending because they were moving to the United States. When the mother found out, she asked an Australian court for emergency measures, and the court canceled the girl’s passport on Oct. 3.
She also told the Jeju police agency she was worried about the father’s behavior and asked officers to locate her daughter and ensure her safety. She says she asked police to separate the girl from the father, who she said had depression linked to post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) from an accident, but that the request was turned down.
The father had suffered from PTSD after a traffic accident involving a truck in Australia.
If you or someone you know is feeling emotionally distressed or struggling with thoughts of suicide, LifeLine Korea can be contacted at 1588-9191 or the Crisis Counseling Center at 1577-0199. The Seoul Global Center offers English-language counseling, contact 02-2075-4180 (+1) to arrange a session. Other international helplines can be found at www.befrienders.org.
This article was originally written in Korean and translated by a bilingual reporter with the help of generative AI tools. It was then edited by a native English-speaking editor. All AI-assisted translations are reviewed and refined by our newsroom.
