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Exmo. Sr. President of the Superior Council of the Judiciary

Subject: Criminal complaint filed by Exma. Sra. Judge Sónia Sousa Bartolo in relation to Case No. 2023/GAVPM/3898

INTRODUCTION

I hereby most respectfully set out and request the following:

I am a participant in a complaint filed with the Higher Council of the Judiciary against Her Honour Judge Sónia Sousa Bártolo, of the Cascais Family and Minors Court – Judge 1, concerning facts which, in my view, may amount to a breach of functional and ethical duties in the exercise of judicial office, a matter whose disciplinary assessment falls within the competence of this Council.

The purpose of this communication is to inform you of a subsequent development related to the case in question: following the disciplinary complaint submitted, Her Honour Judge Sónia Sousa Bártolo filed a criminal complaint against me, of which I became aware on 17 June 2026, and which is currently under consideration by the Public Prosecutor’s Office.

I consider it important that this new element be assessed in the overall context of the facts previously communicated to this Council, not as any anticipation of a conclusion as to the nature or merits of the said criminal complaint, but as an integral part of the evolution of a case that raises particularly sensitive issues concerning judicial conduct, the assessment of the evidence produced, and the impact of the decisions taken on a child’s life.

All documentation relating to the case, including the elements supporting the issues previously raised, is publicly available in order to allow an independent analysis of the facts and to contribute to reflection on transparency, the reasoning of judicial decisions, and trust in the administration of justice in international child-retention proceedings.

The case in question involves proceedings under the 1980 Hague Convention on the Civil Aspects of International Child Abduction, in which questions were raised regarding the consistency between the evidence produced at the hearing and the reasoning set out in the judicial decision delivered.

The complaint previously submitted to the Higher Council of the Judiciary was precisely intended to request an assessment of facts that I consider relevant to evaluating compliance with the functional duties inherent in the exercise of the judiciary.

I consider it essential that, in light of new developments and the nature of the issues raised, a full, independent, and properly reasoned assessment of the facts communicated be ensured.

The truth about a child’s life history and experiences is an essential element in the exercise of healthy and informed parenting. In proceedings involving minors, the way in which courts assess the facts, evaluate the evidence, and reason their decisions has a direct and lasting impact on the lives of children and their families.

This situation must also be viewed in the current European context, in which there has been growing public debate about the functioning of justice systems, the transparency of judicial decisions, and the way institutions ensure the protection of children’s rights and interests in complex family situations.

In several European countries, movements of public contestation and debate have emerged regarding the way certain judicial proceedings involving minors are conducted, reflecting a growing concern within civil society about the need to ensure that decisions with a profound impact on children’s lives are taken with particular rigour, proper reasoning, and institutional accountability.

In this context, the transparent and reasoned assessment of concrete situations takes on heightened importance for preserving citizens’ trust in justice. The response of institutions to alleged failings or doubts raised in proceedings of this nature is decisive in demonstrating that existing oversight mechanisms operate independently, seriously, and effectively.

Thus, more than an individual dispute between procedural parties, it is understood that the examination of this specific case may help strengthen public confidence in the ability of judicial institutions to recognise, analyse, and correct possible failings when these are properly demonstrated.

This communication is also being made available to the media, as there is deemed to be a public interest in the transparent follow-up of matters related to the administration of justice, without prejudice to the exclusive competence of judicial and disciplinary authorities to assess the facts and draw the relevant conclusions.

Accordingly, it is requested that this communication be added to the existing materials relating to the complaint submitted and that the facts now communicated be considered in the overall assessment of the case, pending a clear, reasoned response consistent with the institutional responsibility of this Council.

The first complaint concerning the conduct of Her Honour Judge Sónia Sousa Bartolo in this case was submitted by me to the Higher Council of the Judiciary in 2023, precisely with the aim of preventing the child from being subjected to the mistreatment to which he/she ultimately fell victim at the hands of the Cascais Court. I would remind this Council that we are dealing with what, to the best of my knowledge, is the longest case in the history of the application of the 1980 Hague Convention, and there is no known instance in any of the 103 signatory States of comparable disregard for the principles of urgency and procedural diligence that should guide this type of proceeding. HCCH. Over these three years, the Higher Council of the Judiciary has not carried out any effective assessment of the issue that was brought before it, choosing, in practice, not to act in the face of conduct by judges that left a child exposed to mistreatment, instead of ensuring, with absolute priority, that child’s protection. Although the matter is now also before the criminal courts, a prompt, clear, and responsible response from the Higher Council of the Judiciary is expected. There are thousands of children whose lives today depend on the way cases like this are handled and on the example this Council chooses to set.

Essential facts omitted from the judgment

Without prejudice to all that has already been set out in the disciplinary complaint submitted, it is necessary to highlight three essential points which illustrate, very clearly, how the judgment rendered omitted facts that were decisive for classifying the retention as unlawful, in breach of the duties of rigour, impartiality and reasoning that bind every judicial magistrate.

  1. Unlawful retention and later confession of the absence of consent
    • The mother unlawfully retained the child in Portugal, while for about two years of proceedings maintaining that she had done so with the father’s consent. 31.01.2023, 07.03.2023 ou 12.04.2023.
    • In a recorded hearing, two years later, the mother herself expressly confessed that she had never had the father’s consent, that consent being the element which, in legal terms, distinguishes a lawful removal or retention from an unlawful one under the 1980 Hague Convention, whose purpose is to secure the immediate return of children unlawfully removed or retained. (audio) or (audio)
    • The judgment omits this confession entirely, erasing the factual element that objectively defeats the thesis of lawful retention and should have led to a finding of unlawfulness.
  2. Prolonged denial of the child’s shared life in two countries
    • For two years of proceedings, the mother systematically denied the existence of any agreement providing for the child’s life to be divided between the two countries, building her procedural position on the alleged non-existence of such an arrangement. Audiência de 03.08.2023
    • Nevertheless, the recorded hearing was opened by an intervention from Exma. Sra. Judge asking whether the plan was to “implement the agreement that divided the child’s life” between the two countries, revealing that the court had full knowledge of the existence of that agreement from the outset. (audio), (audio), (audio), (audio), (audio)
    • The judge never confronted the mother, in open court, with the lie maintained for two years, nor did she incorporate that essential fact into the reasoning of the judgment, thereby omitting a decisive element for assessing the mother’s procedural good faith and for qualifying the child’s retention.
  3. Return request under the Hague Convention and instructions from the Central Authority
    • Before the conciliation hearing of 31.01.2023, both parents had informed the court of the existence of a return request under the 1980 Hague Convention. 30.01.2023 e 31.01.2023
    • On 11.04.2023, the Portuguese Central Authority instructed the court to suspend the proceedings concerning the regulation of parental responsibilities while the return request remained pending, in line with the logic of the Convention, which prioritises immediate return and prevents the procedural consolidation of unlawful retentions.
    • The judgment omits the information provided by both parents and ignores the instruction from the Central Authority, placing the “relevant” beginning of the case in June 2023, as if nothing had occurred before that date and as if there had been no return request and no instruction from the Portuguese Central Authority to suspend the proceedings. This artificial reconstruction of the procedural chronology allows, in practice, the unlawfulness of the retention to be set aside.

Incapacity or lack of honesty

The facts set out above place the father before an uncomfortable alternative: either it must be accepted that the decision in question resulted from a serious inability on the part of Exma. Sra. Judge to properly understand and assess the evidence produced, or it must be concluded that there was a deliberate distortion of the relevant facts. By bringing a criminal complaint against the parent, the judge herself opened the door for the criminal court now to scrutinise this course of events and determine whether this was mere incapacity or a lack of functional honesty.

If the Public Prosecutor’s Office were to dismiss the criminal complaint, Her Honour Judge Sónia Sousa Bartolo is requested to join the proceedings as an assisting party and not to let the accusation she chose to bring be dropped. If the allegation is serious, then it must be pursued to the end. The said criminal complaint cannot serve as a defensive diversionary tactic, as the truth of the facts is essential for the child to grow up with an accurate understanding of their life history, and not one shaped by a judicial narrative that is incompatible with the documentary, chronological, and recorded evidence already contained in the case file.

The judicial system cannot serve as a shield for potentially fraudulent conduct by magistrates, nor can it turn parents into defendants merely because they seek to preserve the truth about their children’s lives. Justice is only worthy of the name when it is transparent, accountable, and does not protect, by omission or by complicity, those who turn proceedings into instruments of concealment. It is essential that these issues be clarified without reserve, because public confidence in justice depends on it.

These three elements — the confession of the absence of consent, the implicit recognition of an agreement for the child’s life to be shared between two countries, and the disregard of the parents’ communications and the Central Authority’s instruction concerning the return request — are critical facts of the case, fully documented, which clearly establish the unlawfulness of the retention, yet were omitted by Exma. Sra. Judge from the judgment so as to support, against the evidence produced, the thesis that the retention was lawful. The disciplinary complaint already filed contains numerous other examples of the same pattern of conduct, supported by documentary evidence and official recordings.

Request to the CSM

In light of the above, I express the following expectation:

This case is, in my view, a paradigmatic example of unacceptable management of a proceeding involving a child, which is why a clear, reasoned and transparent response from this Council is expected, one that helps reinforce citizens’ trust in justice, without creating the impression of corporatist protection of magistrates at the expense of children’s rights.

Accordingly,

Yours faithfully,

Luxembourg, 07 July 2026

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