http://www.northjersey.com/arts_entertainment/124333989_A_father_s_long__fierce_fight_to_get_his_son_back_.htmlWednesday, June 22, 2011 Last updated: Wednesday June 22, 2011, 5:18 PM
BY VIRGINIA ROHAN
STAFF WRITER
The Record
Print | E-mail When David Goldman talks about his 11-year-old son Sean, he sounds like the average proud father.
"He had his first playoff game yesterday and he went three for three. He even got a hit off one of the best pitchers in the league, and he was very instrumental in … keeping the team in the game," says Goldman, a lifelong Monmouth County resident who has a charter fishing business. "And he caught a 38-pound striped bass a couple of days ago on my afternoon charter."
This father-son tale is actually anything but typical, though. Normalcy was something Goldman had to fiercely fight for — a story he tells in his new book, "A Father's Love: One Man's Unrelenting Battle to Bring His Abducted Son Home."
IF YOU GO
WHO: David Goldman.
WHAT: Signing his book "A Father's Love."
WHEN: 7 p.m. Thursday.
WHERE: Bookends, 211 E. Ridgewood Ave., Ridgewood; 201-445-0726 or book-ends.com.
HOW MUCH: Free with purchase of the book at Bookends ($26.95).
On June 16, 2004, Goldman's wife Bruna took off from Newark Liberty International Airport with then 4-year-old Sean on a two-week trip to her native Brazil.
Half a decade passed before Goldman saw his son again.
"We lost 5 1/2 years that we can never get back," he says. "No matter how great things are now, I missed his first tooth falling out, I missed five birthdays, I missed holidays. We missed them."
In Goldman's telling, he'd had a "storybook romance" with Sean's mother, whom he'd met in 1997 in Milan, where she was studying for her master's degree in fashion design and he was working as a model.
Goldman had stumbled into that career during a summer break from college, while lifeguarding at 10th Avenue in Belmar. Asked to be in some beach shots for a catalog, he wound up posing with Kathy Ireland.
Goldman's modeling work took him to Japan and Europe. In Milan, he and Bruna Bianchi Carneiro Ribeiro, a neighbor in his apartment building, fell in love. They married in 1999, and Sean was born the following year. They bought a house in Tinton Falls. Bruna's parents, Ray and Silvana Ribeiro, even bought a condo in Sea Bright.
Goldman thought they were one big happy family — until June 20, 2004, when Bruna called from Brazil to say, "Our love affair is over. I've decided to stay in Brazil. I'm keeping Sean here with me." (Her American friends would later say Bruna's only hint of complaint was that the couple were not rich.)
Thus began a long period of dark days for a shocked Goldman. His attorneys — in the U.S. and Brazil — decided to file for help under the Hague Convention, a treaty, signed by more than 80 countries, that agrees upon principles and actions to remedy international parental child abduction.
On Aug. 22, 2008, Bruna, who had secured a Brazilian divorce and remarried, died in Brazil — which Goldman discovered two weeks later. She bled to death after giving birth to a healthy daughter. Bruna's parents, along with her second husband, a member of a rich and powerful family, took up the fight to keep Sean in Brazil, tying Goldman up in one legal challenge after another.
"You just have to be patient and let the truth speak with love and patience and understanding," he says. "And in my case, there were enough other people to get angry for me."
Among those who championed Goldman's cause was U.S. Rep. Chris Smith (R-Gloucester County). Later in the fight, Sen. Frank Lautenberg offered crucial help, as did Bernie Aronson, former assistant secretary of state for Inter-American Affairs. With his help, the case even got the attention of Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and President Obama.
Media coverage was also instrumental in turning things around.
On Christmas Eve 2009, Goldman finally left Brazil with Sean.
The Ribeiros continued to challenge the Hague Convention decision, both in Brazil and New Jersey. On Feb. 17, 2011, the Superior Court of New Jersey dismissed the Ribeiros' case.
Sean is thriving, his dad says. "He loves the sea. He loves anything outdoors. He lived a very sedentary lifestyle [in Brazil] , but really, he loves being a kid and he loves being able to do what kids do," says Goldman. "Little people shouldn't have such big problems. The problem that he should have is, 'Gee, Dad, I don't know if I want chocolate or strawberry.' 'Can I stay up later?' 'Can I watch this one more show?' 'Do I have to do this reading now?' Those are the things that are normal for a kid his age, and that's exactly where he is. And it's so great."
E-mail: rohan@northjersey.com
