The High Court considered whether five siblings should be returned to England after their parents gave sharply conflicting accounts of whether their move to Kenya had been temporary or permanent in TK v SD [2026] EWHC 2220 (Fam).
A mother applied for the return to England of her five sons, aged between four and fifteen, who had been living in Kenya since July 2025. She maintained that the family had travelled there for a holiday and that the father had subsequently wrongfully retained the children; the father contended that the move had always been intended to be permanent.
The court found that the father had subjected the mother to serious and ongoing coercive and controlling behaviour, including cancelling her passport, attempting to renounce her British citizenship and restricting access to her email account. His conduct amounted to a form of “stranding” or transnational abandonment.
Nevertheless, the court concluded that by mid-August 2025 the children had become habitually resident in Kenya. They had not therefore been wrongfully retained there. The English court consequently had no jurisdiction under either the 1996 Hague Convention or the inherent jurisdiction, and the mother’s application was dismissed.
Mavis Amonoo-Acquah, led by Michael Gration KC, was instructed by Bindmans LLP and acted for the respondent father.
