When your child is abducted: One woman's nightmare

A miracle
The three weeks that followed were surreal. The first time Jennifer took Ian out for a walk, Ed followed them. Once, she went to the village centre and managed to call the Canadian Consulate to let them know she was safe. As the days passed, Jennifer continued to play the docile wife, serving Ed food and even promising they could perhaps try to have another child. “I took all the blame and said and did all the right things.”

Then, a miracle. Ed told her he would give her another chance and she and Ian could live together in Canada again. He booked a flight home for her and Ian; she assumed he would follow a week later, after he finished up some work in the company he was running in Korea.

On Nov. 9, 21 days after she had arrived in Korea, Jennifer was taking Ian back home. As the two of them boarded the plane, Jennifer was short of breath and weak. She was terrified the whole plan would backfire. Ed called out for Ian to come back and give him another hug. “Watching them together, I knew this would be the last time he’d ever see Ian,” she says.

Back home
Twenty-four hours later, Ed called Jennifer at her parents’ place, demanding to know why the phone at their apartment wasn’t working. Jennifer could now tell him the truth: she was going to live with her parents, and he would have to go to court to win visiting rights if he wanted to see his son.

Enraged, Ed screamed that he would kill her and burn down her parents’ house. Jennifer called the police, who put out an alert at the airport to detain Ed if he entered the country. They also gave Jennifer a personal alarm device that she could set off if Ed got near her.

In the days that followed, Jennifer never let Ian out of her sight. She arranged for intensive trauma therapy for herself and her son over a period of several months. A journal entry from that time captures the sense of fear that pervaded her life.

“Sometimes I wake in the middle of the night, frozen in fear. I can hear my son’s rhythmic breathing and thank God he’s beside me. Then I hear a creaking floorboard and my eyes flash to the door handle. The part of my conscious brain that knows he is still in Korea is squashed by the other part of me that is scared to death that he is here in the house with his hand on the door, ready to enter the bedroom and scoop away my son. I jump up and lock the bedroom door, then dive back into bed, wondering how long I’ll be awake tonight.”

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