Parental Kidnapping Prevention Act

The Parental Kidnapping Prevention Act of 1980 (PKPA), 28 U.S.C. § 1738A, was enacted about the same time that states were adopting the Uniform Child Custody Jurisdiction Act (UCCJA). The PKPA was enacted for substantially the same reason as the UCCJA—to discourage child snatching and forum shopping and encourage some finality in child custody decisions.

Because the PKPA is a federal statute, it takes precedence over the UCCJA whenever the two conflict. It does not preempt the area of child cus­tody jurisdiction, however. The Uniform Child Custody Jurisdiction and Enforcement Act (UCCJEA) controls questions that the PKPA does not cover or clearly resolve.

The PKPA deals primarily with the application of the full-faith-and-credit clause to custody decrees. It comes into question only when there already is a custody decree, and one of the parties is trying either to enforce it or to modify it in another state. However, since this is often likely to occur, albeit less often under the UCCJEA than under the UCCJA, the PKPA should be taken into account at the time the original decree is sought.

The PKPA requires that a state enforce the custody decree of a sister state unless (1) the rendering court did not have jurisdiction (28 U.S.C. § 1738A(c); (2) the decree was entered without reasonable notice and an opportunity to be heard (28 U.S.C. § 1738A(c)); or (3) the decree was entered while a proceeding was pending before another court that had juris­diction (28 U.S.C. § 1738A(g)).

The PKPA prohibits a court from modifying a custody decree unless it has jurisdiction and the court of the other state no longer has continuing jurisdiction or has declined to exercise it (28 U.S.C. § 1738A(f)).

Whenever the PKPA calls for a determination that a court has or had jurisdiction, this means that the court must have had jurisdiction under both its own laws and the PKPA jurisdiction provisions (28 U.S.C. § 1738A(c)).

Source: VIRGINIA POVERTY LAW CENTER, VIRGINIA POVERTY LAW MANUAL at DR-58 (2002).

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