I just read this interesting article on a guy who is paid by people to abduct their children back from people who don't have the legal right to either have custody or take care of their children across countries. It's not morally acceptable by any means, and there's no way to arrest him for what he does.
Personally, I think that it's OK to pay someone to kidnap your child back. Provided you have custodial rights and all that. But I do think that violating the law like this in whatever country is probably not the best course of action.

It might not be the "best" action, but in many cases, it's the only action as the authorities in some countries simply refuse to acknowledge that the children have been taken illegally as it were.

There was a film some years ago...one of those crappy "made for TV" / "FIlm at 11" deals that featured this type of thing. Law enforcement were powerless to retrieve the child legally, so the legal guardian/mother hired a guy to cross the border with Canada, break into the kidnapper/non-legal guardian/father (who was incidentally some sort of mob guy - low rank) and take the kid back to its mother...
EDIT : Or am I confusing that with a MacGuyver episode?? :blink:
damned if I can recall the name of the film now, but as things are repeated heavily here, it may be on again soon :P

There is a UN treaty on Child Kidnapping that mostly covers that, and which MOST decent countries are signed up to. I know it came into play in a dispute between a British woman and her Pakistani husband, and both courts honored the treaty and each other's judgements.
That said, there are a few countries that aren't signed up. Japan being one of them. (Currently 75 plus cases of such kidnapping in japan, of US citizens alone). Though the new government has given very slight hints that they might sign up.

(Currently 75 plus cases of such kidnapping in japan, of US citizens alone)
I wonder how many of the cases are down to foreigners marrying simply for a Spousal visa then, when they finally want to go home, realising that they don't even know their wife and thus didn't know that she'd never want to leave Japan?
I specifically say wife, as men pretty much have no legal right when it comes to children here, especially when they are foreigners.

Personally, I applaud this kind of action. If your children are stolen from you, you should have the right to steal them back! I think it's also smart to hire someone else to do it, because if I had a child and someone kidnapped him, if I went to the house myself, I would probably do more than take the kid back. And that extra could send me to jail.

I think the legal system fails in most respects. It was meant to replace vengeance, but in practice, it has become just another exclusionary service only available to the rich.
I say do what you have to do to protect your life, your family, your rights, and your belongings.
Like I often say, in a capitalist society you vote with your dollars, your mouth, and your fists. Use each wisely.

Well said.

Sounds fun, when are they hiring for more?

I wholeheartedly agree with the second half of your post but the "replacing vengeance" thing is a dangerous ethical misunderstanding. The penal system is not in place to pay criminals back, but to make sure that they never repeat their actions.
As a side effect of legal penalization, some victims might feel avenged. But vengeance should never be any part of the reason for a legal system. Otherwise the whole world goes blind.

If I am allowed the glory of looting something on the way, I'm in...I'm pretty good with a rifle if I do say so myself.

Well, that was the reason the legal system was introduced, to institutionalize and replace vengeance. It's the whole reason there *is* a criminal code, so that payment for misdeeds could be lifted from the tribal level, and from the alleyways, and into a court. I am not saying justice should BE about vengance, I am say that's what it was designed to replace.

OK I see what you meant. Syntactical misunderstanding.

Bit of a serious article, probably of interest to no-one here... but i was reading it in another tab at the same time as browsing this thread, so what the heck:
http://search.japantimes.co.jp/cgi-bin/fl20091020zg.html