KERALITE WANTED IN USA FOR ABDUCTION IS ARRESTED IN ANJUNA

PANJIM: The Anjuna police on Saturday arrested Ranjit Varghese, who works in a shop in Anjuna, after the American consulate sought his arrest and extradition to the US to face trial, following an order from an American court.

Varghese, an Indian citizen, is wanted in a case related to abducting his seven-year-old son from his ex-American girlfriend. The American woman, Marcela Oleson, a US citizen, has won the case of the custody of the child in a US court. Oleson had obtained an order from the JMFC, which held that in view of the order of the Maryland court granting custody of the minor child to the mother, the Anjuna police should assist the mother to get custody of the child.

However, Varghese managed to hide the child before the police could find him, police said. However, by late evening the police traced the child. "The mother is extremely distraught. From October she has been hunting for her child in South India, till she learnt that Varghese was with the child in Goa. She came to Goa and tried to take the custody of her son, but was threatened. We have now got an order from the JMFC asking the Anjuna police to assist the mother to get custody of the child. But the father has managed to hide the child," said Oleson's counsel Jose Peter D'Souza.

The consulate general of USA in a letter to the Goa police on December 16, requested the provisional arrest of Ranjit Varghese under Section 41 (g) (placing under arrest on suspicion) of CrPC. On Saturday, Varghese was arrested under the section because a red corner notice was issued against him by interpol, said police. "We are in the process of handing over the child to the mother," said DySP Sammy Tavares.

The letter from assistant regional security officer of the American consulate in Mumbai, Viktor Karabin, had stated,"The US department of Justice, the US National Central Bureau for Interpol has transmitted Red Notice to the Interpol General Secretariat for dissemination requesting the location and provisional arrest of Varghese for offences including passport fraud. The US Embassy will be requesting the extradition of Varghese to the US under the Extradition Treaty."

The consulate also requested the police to hand over the custody of the child to the mother on Varghese's arrest so that the child can return to his residence in the US with his mother.

Varghese, originally from Kerala, had arrived in India from the US in August 2010 with his US-citizen son, Tomas. This despite the fact that the child's mother, Marcela Oleson, a US citizen, was granted sole legal custody of the child by a US court. An arrest warrant was issued against Varghese on October 28, 2010, by the US district court of Maryland for international parental abduction, false claim to US citizenship and making false statement in application for his son's US passport. The court has passed an order to "locate and arrest the accused with a view to extradition" and the action has to be immediately informed to the Interpol in Washington.

Sources said that the couple lived together from 1997 to 2003, but they were never married. In June 2003 the couple split and Tomas was born in July 2003 in Washington DC. In January 2009, a Maryland court granted custody of the child to the mother, while Varghese was given visitation. The court also passed an order stating that neither of the parent could remove the child from US without the other's consent.

Varghese fraudulently obtained a US passport for his son by falsely representing himself as a US citizen in the application, Oleson's counsel said. He also attached to the application a forged statement of consent from Oleson, which was falsely notarised indicating that Oleson's consent signature was true when it was in fact forged. After obtaining the passport, he abducted his son and fled to Germany on August 12, 2010. From Germany, he later arrived in Goa. (TNN)