•Judge Ngenye Macharia said it will be a waste of the court’s time for the Mazzoncinis to have the custody wars fought in High Court.
•Mazzoncini’s lawyer Austin Ayuo confirmed that the baby is okay and in good health.
Image: VICTOR IMBOTO
The American couple whose adopted child was taken away by the police has been asked to take the custody battle to the children’s court.
Justice Ngenye Macharia told Matthew and Daisy Mazzoncini that the case’s jurisdiction is the children’s court.
Macharia said she does not have the details of the case and asked that the matter be heard by the court handling custody issues and the application file closed.
“Move to the children’s court; it will then determine who should be the custodian of the child,” Macharia said.
The judge made the decision after Mazzoncini’s lawyer Austin Ayuo confirmed that the baby is okay and in good health after being rescued by the Director of Criminal Investigations.
The court also granted Ayuo seven days to file a supplementary affidavit replying to the responding affidavit by the respondents to the applications made.
The lawyer had applied to have the baby’s whereabouts disclosed and to be produced in court after the DCI denied any involvement his abduction.
The child was said to have been taken away by a Mr Baraza of the DCI.
Last week on Tuesday, the court ordered Mazzoncini’s attorney to visit the child but not to reveal his location to the couple.
Macharia gave the order after the police admitted that they took the child from the Mazzoncinis on April 5, 2019.
Police had at first denied abducting the child and even offered to help find him. But in an affidavit, they said they had rescued him.
In the affidavit filed by DCI’s Bernard Baraza, police said the child is not epileptic, neither does he have seizures or convulsions as claimed by the parents.
They say they stopped administering Epilim, a drug used to treat epilepsy to the child and started him on a drug for treating adenoid hypertrophy – a nasal condition.
“I am aware that the minor was rescued by the security agencies on April 5, 2019, and recorded at Spring Valley police station and handed over to the Child Welfare Society of Kenya,” Baraza said.
The case will be mentioned on July 9, 2019, after both parties have filed their responses before the court.
(Edited by O. Owino)