Disciplinary Complaint against Judge Sónia Sousa Bártolo | Hague Convention | Portugal

Versions internationales / International versions

Version française Version française de la plainte contre la Juge Sónia Sousa Bártolo auprès du Conseil Supérieur de la Magistrature.

English version English version of the complaint against Judge Sónia Sousa Bártolo to the Superior Council of the Judiciary

To His Excellency the President of the High Council for the Judiciary

Subject: Disciplinary complaint against Her Excellency Judge Sónia Sousa Bártolo

INTRODUCTION

Following the complaints submitted to Your Excellencies on 11.11.2023 and reiterated on 22.04.2024, I hereby set out facts of extreme gravity which occurred in the context of proceedings governed by the 1980 Hague Convention on the Civil Aspects of International Child Abduction, and formally lodge a complaint against Her Excellency Judge Sónia Sousa Bártolo.

The conduct described in this complaint does not constitute mere errors of judgment, but reveals systematic and deliberate conduct in breach of the duties of impartiality, independence, objectivity, diligence and promptness laid down in articles 6(c) and 7(c) of the Statute of Judicial Magistrates, distorting the regime of the Hague Convention and irreversibly sacrificing the best interests of the child and the rights of the requesting parent.

In the previous complaints it had already been reported that the rules of the Hague Convention were being blatantly ignored and that the Cascais Court intended, through the deliberate prolongation of the proceedings, to create an artificial integration of the minor unlawfully retained in Portugal, to the detriment of her habitual residence in Luxembourg. Those complaints sought to prevent a two‑year‑old child and her father from being subjected to prolonged instability and abuse arising from lengthy proceedings that are not in conformity with the legal regime of the Hague Convention.

None of them obtained an effective response, allowing Judge Sónia Sousa Bártolo to continue conducting the case in a manifestly biased manner, instrumentalising the passage of time until achieving a result contrary to the purposes of the Convention: the retention of the child in the State of unlawful retention. It is universally recognised that the time factor irreversibly determines the outcome in Hague proceedings, defeating the purpose of immediate return.

Throughout the entire proceedings, the Portuguese Central Authority was regularly contacted by the father and by the Luxembourg authorities in order to ensure that the time limits and the Hague Convention were respected. The response was always the same: the conduct of the proceedings depends exclusively on the Judge, in a clear sign of the failure of the control mechanisms which should ensure the swift implementation of the Convention.

More than 23 months (that is, 99 weeks) after the return request was sent to the Portuguese Central Authority, the Cascais Court delivered its decision, which, instead of correcting the irregularities, used various strategies to distort and conceal its disregard for international law and for the Hague Convention itself.

This decision was appealed to the Lisbon Court of Appeal, with an express request for the re‑examination of evidence. The Court of Appeal upheld the decision without reconsidering the evidence, thus protecting the system instead of restoring legality.

I am firmly convinced that the Court of Appeal was fully aware of the inexplicable exceeding of the six‑week time limit laid down in the Hague Convention and of the violation of the European Convention on Human Rights by the Court of First Instance. The Lisbon Court of Appeal was also undoubtedly aware that a decision which recognised the unlawfulness of the retention but did not order the return of the child to Luxembourg due to the time spent in Portugal (which is a direct consequence of the indiscriminate handling of the return application by the Cascais court) would entail the liability of the Portuguese State.

The Public Prosecutor’s Office, an independent body and guardian of the best interests of the child, acknowledged the unlawful retention and argued for the immediate application of the Convention. The Public Prosecutor’s Office examined the evidence, attended the same hearings, submitted pleadings and lodged an appeal with arguments contrary to those of the first instance, considering the decision biased. This was not a matter of a legal difference of opinion, as the Public Prosecutor’s Office states on p. 20 of its appeal : “This appeal does not arise from a divergence of opinion regarding a legal issue between the court a quo and the Public Prosecutor, but rather from the fact that we are faced with a judgment which has serious weaknesses, vulnerabilities and nullities which not only fail to safeguard the best interests of the child, but actually prejudice them.”

I repeatedly alerted the competent authorities: the Portuguese Central Authority stated that it could do nothing, the Ombudsman referred the matter to the High Council for the Judiciary, the High Council for the Judiciary recommended waiting, and the Luxembourg authorities sent repeated official communications which received no reply, even going so far as to say to the Portuguese authorities that Portugal "has not the slightest respect for the Hague Convention".

All the documents supporting this submission are accessible in a public repository, Pela Justica, available to everyone, with anonymisation and removal of data and personal accounts, in compliance with GDPR rules. Each link in this submission points to the exact location where the information is to be found, in order to facilitate the reader’s task and enable them to understand the issue in a matter of seconds.

In view of the above, a brief factual summary follows, demonstrating that the decision does not result from an impartial assessment of the evidence, but from procedural conduct aimed at obtaining a predetermined outcome and benefiting one of the parties responsible for the unlawful retention of the minor. In this summary I refrain from qualifying what appear to be manipulations, lies and crimes allegedly committed by Judge Sónia Sousa Bártolo, matters which will be discussed before the criminal courts. I leave to the High Council for the Judiciary only the elements of a disciplinary nature.

DELIBERATE OMISSION OF A DECISION ON AN URGENT INTERIM MEASURE

The Statute of Judicial Magistrates classifies in its article 83‑H as serious offences acts carried out with intent or gross negligence which reveal a serious disregard for the fulfilment of functional duties, namely unjustified, repeated or manifestly negligent non‑compliance with the schedules established for public acts, as well as with the time limits established for acts incumbent upon the judge, in particular when six months have elapsed since the end of the time limit for the performance of the act.

Now, on 29.06.2023 the Public Prosecutor’s Office filed an interim measure seeking the immediate return of the minor to Luxembourg, attaching the official document sent by the Luxembourg authorities on 24.01.2023 (received by the Portuguese Central Authority on 25.01.2023) expressly requesting the return of the minor under the Hague Convention.assets

Before the conciliation hearing, the parents had already notified the court by means of the applications of 30.01.2023 and 31.01.2023, informing it of the existence of the return application, information that was further reinforced by the Portuguese Central Authority itself which, on 11.04.2023, requested Judge Sónia Sousa Bártolo to stay the parental responsibility proceedings on account of the pending return request arising from unlawful retention. All these elements were deliberately disregarded and omitted by the Judge from her decision, so as to ensure that the interim measure would remain unanswered for 17 months (77 weeks) — an omission that is legally inadmissible in fast‑track urgent proceedings.

Judge Sónia Sousa Bártolo’s conduct blatantly violated the regime of the Hague Convention, which imposes on the judge an absolute duty of the utmost expedition, failing which the ratio of the Convention is emptied of content. National case‑law is unanimous: Lisbon Court of Appeal of Évora, case no. 879/24.0T8STB‑A.E1: “The court to which a request for the return of a child is submitted under the 1980 Hague Convention, as in the present case, must accelerate the processing of the request, using the most expeditious procedure provided for in national legislation, in order to ensure the immediate return of the child to the country of his or her habitual residence, as set out in article 11(3) of the Regulation.” Throughout this submission the High Council for the Judiciary will see how Judge Sónia Sousa Bártolo has shown that, in her court, there is no case‑law that applies when it contradicts the outcome she seeks.

Let us assess the conduct of all other judges who deal with return proceedings in cases of abducted or unlawfully retained children in the 103 Contracting States to the Hague Convention. From a review of the periodic global statistical studies published by the HCCH, it is easy to conclude how disastrously Judge Sónia Sousa Bártolo managed this case. From 2008 to the present day, the longest case on record lasted 750 days, including all appeals up to the final instance. When we compare the official global data with the concrete case, we see that the Cascais Court took two years in first instance alone and fell just 57 days short of that worldwide maximum.

The official data of the Hague Convention show that over the last 20 years there has never been a judge with such a lack of restraint in any of the 103 Contracting States to the Convention, and that no judge has ever handled a case as Judge Sónia Sousa Bártolo did. This is currently the longest case on record in the official database of the Hague Convention, and this list includes countries and continents which do not have the resources available to the Judge. The breach of the duties of diligence to which Judge Sónia Sousa Bártolo is bound is indisputable.

In other words, whereas the Hague Convention provides in its article 11 that the judicial or administrative authorities of any Contracting State are to act expeditiously in proceedings for the return of children, expressly setting a six‑week time limit for doing so, the Cascais Court did everything in its power to ensure that judgment would only be delivered after two years.

Despite the multiple warnings, Judge Sónia Sousa Bártolo chose to treat the return application as a set of proceedings for the regulation of parental responsibilities, thereby ensuring the integration of the child and the procedural outcome she sought.

Obviously, when the Cascais Court delivered its judgment, two years (98 weeks) after the Portuguese Central Authority had received the request for the return of the minor, no decision other than to keep the child in Portugal was realistically possible. As will be explained below, by reference to the documents in the case file and the recordings of the hearings, Judge Sónia Sousa Bártolo chose to conceal her poor management of the proceedings, arriving at an outcome which can hardly be reconciled with all that was filed in the case or with what the parents stated in recorded hearings.

It is also clear that a decision taken two years after unlawful retention can never be clear and transparent, as every judicial decision must be. No court would say, two years later, that the retention was unlawful but that the child will not return because of its poor management of the proceedings. In such a situation, it is easier to falsify the facts and manipulate the proceedings in order to justify a lawfulness that does not exist. The use of dilatory expedients reveals the implicit recognition of the unlawfulness, while seeking to create ex post justifications over time.

The clarity and transparency of the administration of justice are essential elements for ensuring citizens’ trust in the judicial system. The way in which Judge Sónia Sousa Bártolo dealt with the information, manipulated and concealed facts in the case file which would have led to the discovery of the truth, raises serious doubts as to the confidence that citizens can have in justice. The High Council for the Judiciary will see that this was not a mere oversight regarding a factual element, but a premeditated strategy aimed at obtaining a procedural result which benefited the mother to the detriment of the child and the father.

Note that the Public Prosecutor’s Office, after hearing the mother on 12.04.2023 and gathering all the evidence enclosed with the initial petition, lodged an interim measure including irrefutable evidence of unlawful retention. All the items of evidence in the interim measure were discussed during several recorded hearings, but were concealed by Judge Sónia Sousa Bártolo in the judgment maintenance of the child’s enrolment in the Luxembourg nursery throughout 2022 (audio) and (audio); a medical appointment scheduled in Luxembourg for November 2022; emails exchanged by the parents with the Luxembourg nursery (March, July, September 2022) arranging the child’s various returns to the nursery (audio); confirmed enrolment in pre‑school for the 2023/24 school year; an email from the child’s paediatrician (relating to an August 2022 appointment) confirming a life shared between the two countries, filed in the case in order to contest the mother’s argument that there was no agreement for a life divided between the two countries, but rather a definitive relocation of the child to Portugal (audio).

All these items, present in the initial petition and the subject of various discussions in recorded hearings, were omitted from the judgment in order to justify the desired procedural outcome. From the outset, the Judge has shown that she intended to satisfy the mother’s claims to the detriment of the child and her father. Already at the conciliation hearing, after refusing to suspend the divorce and custody proceedings when informed that there was a return application, she instructed the father to cancel the child’s nursery place, thereby indicating that she would do everything in her power to prevent the child’s return to her country of origin.

GROSS FALSIFICATION OF THE PROCEDURAL TIMELINE – “MAGIC TRICK” (according to the Public Prosecutor’s Office)

Judge Sónia Sousa Bártolo committed a serious manipulation of the procedural timeline by stating in the judgment that “the proceedings only began on 29.06.2023” (the date on which she received the case file at the Cascais Court), deliberately concealing that: (i) 25.01.2023: the Portuguese Central Authority OFFICIALLY RECEIVED the Luxembourg return application (document in the case file); (ii) on 30.01.2023 the father NOTIFIED THE COURT of the existence of the Hague application; (iii) on 11.04.2023: the Portuguese Central Authority REQUESTED THE SUSPENSTION of the proceedings.

In the present case, the return application was received by the Portuguese Central Authority on 25.01.2023, and according to all national and international case‑law, that is the moment which defines the commencement of the judicial proceedings. The case‑law, disregarded by Judge Sónia Sousa Bártolo throughout the proceedings, states, for example, in the judgment of 27‑06‑2024 in case no. 2695/23.8T8PTM.E1 that “The 1980 Hague Convention on the Civil Aspects of International Child Abduction, in force in our legal order since 1 December 1983, provides in article 12 that ‘where a child has been wrongfully removed or retained in terms of article 3 and, at the date of the commencement of the proceedings before the judicial or administrative authority of the Contracting State where the child is, a period of less than one year has elapsed from the date of the wrongful removal or retention (…)’.”

This falsification allowed the Judge to create the legal fiction of a “consolidated interim regime”, alleging that the child was already “integrated” in Portugal when in fact the Hague application pre‑dated that situation by five months. And this was done without Judge Sónia Sousa Bártolo at any time stating that she had been informed by the parents of the return application before the conciliation hearing, manipulating the information as if she had no knowledge of it.

If an interim measure is by nature urgent and requires a judicial decision (granting or dismissal), Judge Sónia Sousa Bártolo left the interim measure unanswered for 17 months (that is, 77 weeks). The interim measure should have been examined, the documents it contained should have been considered and the procedural dates should have been taken into account. It is very difficult to believe that the document which lies at the heart of the entire case was not examined by the Judge; we are left with no other conclusion than that there was intentional manipulation of information by Judge Sónia Sousa Bártolo.

The omission of a decision on an interim measure is legally inadmissible. This was a case of reinforced urgency (abduction and unlawful retention of a minor) where the Hague Convention imposes a reinforced duty to decide and the judge is bound to the utmost expedition; delays are incompatible with the regime. The Judge chose, despite the multiple warnings, to ignore the issue and later manipulated the elements in the interim measure at her own discretion.

Disregarding the interim measure and all the information in the case file, the judgment, in a creative manner, places the beginning of the proceedings at 29.06.2023 so as not to address the issues raised by the Public Prosecutor’s Office, disregarding all national and European case‑law and distorting the timeline in order to create the illusion that the father had lodged the return application on false pretences. National case‑law, never applied by Judge Sónia Sousa Bártolo in her court, states, for example, in the summary of the judgment of the Coimbra Court of Appeal in case 786/09.7T2OBR‑A.C1: “3 – Under article 11 of that Convention and article 11(3) of Council Regulation (EC) No 2201/2003 of 27 November 2003, the court must adopt urgent procedures with a view to the return of the child; 7 – This reinforces the principle that the court must order the immediate return of the child, limiting to what is strictly necessary the exceptions provided for in subparagraph b) of article 13 of the said Convention; the principle is that the child must always return if his or her protection is assured in the Member State of origin.”

If all the documentation confirmed the point in time when the return application was lodged, the mother herself also confirmed on multiple occasions, during several recorded hearings, that the return application was made in January 2023 (audio). The Public Prosecutor’s Office criticises the way in which Judge Sónia Sousa Bártolo manipulated the data in order to fabricate an artificial timeline, addressing this issue on p. 67 of its appeal, stating: “Note that the father made the return application to the Central Authority in Luxembourg within the legal time‑limit (on 24.01.2023), even before the conference for the regulation of parental responsibilities in Portugal (and this taking place in the circumstances referred to above), never accepting the jurisdiction of the Portuguese courts and also bringing proceedings for the regulation of the exercise of parental responsibilities in Luxembourg (on 13.10.2022). Moreover, the time‑limits laid down in the Hague Convention cannot be artificially denied and disregarded, as if they did not have to be respected, on the grounds that proceedings for the regulation of parental responsibilities were brought in Portugal. Accepting this would be to find the magic formula for always disregarding the one‑year time‑limit laid down in the Convention: the offending parent would remove the child from the country, prevent the other parent’s access to the child and such access would only be granted after the regulation of parental responsibilities in the retaining country, taking place before the end of the one‑year period, in order to shorten the Convention’s time‑limit.”

In practice, that was precisely the magic formula found by Judge Sónia Sousa Bártolo, when she stated in her judgment that the return application, presented to her in June 2023, did not have to be subject to the rules of international law, but rather to her interim regime, thus achieving the result she had sought from the outset. Once again, the Public Prosecutor’s Office addresses this issue on p. 67 of its appeal, stating: “Moreover, the interim decision in the context of the regulation of the exercise of parental responsibilities cannot justify the refusal to return the child under the Convention, although the grounds for that decision on custody rights may be taken into account in the decision on the return of the child. Thus, even though this Court has declared itself internationally competent in matters of the regulation of parental responsibilities and has there fixed the child’s residence with the mother, having established contact arrangements and allowing the child to travel from one country to the other, it does not automatically follow from this that there was no wrongful removal.”

The magic formula found by Judge Sónia Sousa Bártolo made it possible not to answer a single question raised by the Public Prosecutor’s Office in the interim measure. With an “abracadabra” trick, it was pretended that the evidence submitted by the Public Prosecutor’s Office did not exist and, as such, nothing that had been discussed over two years of judicial proceedings was addressed.

Was Judge Sónia Sousa Bártolo merely careless when, in August 2023, she prepared the case and failed to notice the alleged false pretences, or did she seek first to integrate the child so that the alleged false pretences she later relied on would prevent a higher court from overturning the decision?

The Judge’s strategy was clear: by “reinventing” the beginning of the proceedings as 29.06.2023 (five months after the Hague application), she created the illusion of a “stable interim regime”, preventing the application of the Hague Convention (immediate return) and favouring parental regulation proceedings (which fell within the jurisdiction of the Luxembourg courts).

SYSTEMATIC DISREGARD OF TECHNICAL EXPERT EVIDENCE

Having ignored the information on the return application communicated to the court on 30.01.2023, the Judge improperly initiated proceedings for the regulation of parental responsibilities, ordering an expert assessment by the NIJ — which observed the child on two afternoons and concluded in the report of 30.03.2023 that this was a healthy child and that both parents had good parenting capacities.

On 03.08.2023, already in possession of the expert report, the Judge opened the hearing by explicitly stating that “And I am aware that either of the parents has the parental skills to have the … child … with them, therefore, this is not at issue here”, thereby acknowledging the absence of any basis for regulating parental authority — a statement which required the immediate application of the Hague Convention (it should be recalled that a merits assessment has no place in proceedings concerning the abduction/unlawful retention of a child). However, disregarding the expert report she herself had ordered, she adhered uncritically to the implausible allegation by the mother that a child under 3 years of age was suffering from “anorexia nervosa” (a condition typical of adolescents), a dilatory strategy aimed solely at gaining time in the face of the interim measure brought by the Public Prosecutor’s Office.

On 28.09.2023 the child’s doctor formally confirmed the falsity of the allegation of anorexia, but this element — like the entire body of technical evidence — was completely disregarded. Nevertheless, on 12.10.2023 the Judge accepted the mother’s position that the expert assessment was “important”, choosing to manage the proceedings as a standard regulation case, determining their outcome by the erosion of time rather than by the technical evidence available. This selective credibility contradicts the duty to give precedence to technical evidence over subjective allegations, in the absence of any reasoning to justify such a stance. Judge Sónia Sousa Bártolo disregarded all the technical opinions contained in the file, validating exclusively the mother’s undocumented accounts.

The Judge then disregarded the first expert assessments already carried out by the NIJ and ordered a new set of expert reports from the NIJ and the INML. The issue did not concern the quality of the report made available to the court, since the Judge did not call into question the work of the NIJ experts, and it was the very same experts who carried out the second assessment. It can be inferred that the sole purpose was to play with the passage of time and to artificially integrate the child in Portugal, using expedients which made it possible to circumvent the law and validate the unlawful situation.

The court was informed that this was a decision that was not in accordance with national case‑law, as stated in the judgment of the Porto Court of Appeal (judgment 1298/21.6T8MCN.P1), which considers such expert reports to be incompatible with the six‑week urgency requirement. The case‑law, which has no value in Judge Sónia Sousa Bártolo’s court, states: “Moreover, the present proceedings are of an urgent nature (see, for example, article 11 of the Convention – which provides that ‘the judicial or administrative authorities of Contracting States shall act expeditiously in proceedings for the return of children’, and in paragraph 2 that the proceedings should, as a general rule, culminate in a decision ‘within six weeks from the date of commencement of the proceedings’), which is hardly compatible with the carrying out of forensic medical examinations by the National Institute of Legal Medicine (which, as forensic practice has shown, take several months to be prepared), and this urgency has been, precisely, one of the reasons invoked to reject means of proof which are not a condition for the delivery of the decision, even in cases of refusal of the return.”

The scarcity of case‑law precisely shows that recourse to specialised INML expert reports in Hague Convention proceedings is problematic. When the only known judgment (Porto Court of Appeal, 1298/21.6T8MCN.P1) rejects them for being incompatible with the Convention, there was no legitimate room to order expert opinions (bearing in mind that the Cascais Court already had an opinion). The decision was not merely a technical error, but a deliberate violation of clear case‑law and of the international rule of urgency.

The father submitted several applications, for example on 11.08.2023, 28.09.2023, and 17.11.2023, warning of the incompatibility of the expert assessments with the ongoing proceedings and of the court’s complicity with the mother’s conduct, but never received any response, giving the impression that the breach of the urgency rule was deliberate.

The expert opinions were only ordered on 02.04.2024, that is, more than eight months (32 weeks) after the hearing of 03.08.2023, and were completed only one year after that hearing — serving, in practice, to achieve an artificial integration of the child. The Judge is untruthful when she states in her judgment that “On 10 May 2024, in view of the failure to send the results of the expert assessments which had been ordered so long before, the following order was made…”, making use of ambiguity and failing to provide specific dates in order to create the illusion that delays were the responsibility of third parties. The Judge manipulated the entire chronology to suit her own convenience, forgetting that the NIJ report was transparent and indicated that the expert assessments were only requested on 02.04.2024.

When completed, the expert reports of the NIJ and the INML answered all the questions put by the court in respect of the child, the father and the mother, confirming the absence of any relevant issues and that both parents had parenting capacities. I recall once again that there can be no question of the merits in a return application under the Hague Convention.

A year and a half after the allegation of anorexia that gave rise to the expert assessments, the mother eventually acknowledged, in a recorded hearing (audio), that this allegation had been an error, making this mea culpa after Judge Sónia Sousa Bártolo had granted her the benefit of excessive procedural length.

This conduct also reveals manifest partiality and a breach of articles 6(c) and 7(c) of the Statute of Judicial Magistrates, by instrumentalising false allegations to consolidate unlawful retention and to frustrate the regime of celerity of the Hague Convention.

CONFESSION BY THE MOTHER, JUDICIAL COMPLICITY IN THE LIE AND POSSIBLE CRIMINAL OFFENCES BY JUDGE SÓNIA SOUSA BÁRTOLO

On 20.02.2022, the mother travelled to Lisbon with the child and enrolled her in a Portuguese nursery on 25.02.2022. On 25.08.2022, precisely on the day that six months had passed since the child’s enrolment in the Portuguese nursery, the mother, while on holiday with the extended family, surreptitiously initiated divorce and custody proceedings (audio). In the initial petition of 24.08.2022, filed while she was on holiday at her in‑laws’ home, she asserted that “At present the Applicant and the Respondent have no relationship other than that arising from the exercise of parental responsibilities”, later changing her entire narrative in recorded hearings (audio). On 24.08.2022, she also alleged that the child’s change of residence had been definitive and had been carried out with the father’s consent, stating that “With the Applicant and with the Respondent’s authorisation, the couple’s daughter also returned, and since 20 February 2022 she has been residing in Portugal and since 24 February 2022 attending nursery school in Lisbon, ‘Os Pirralhos do Marquês’.” This information, present in the case file and discussed at various recorded hearings, was concealed and manipulated by Judge Sónia Sousa Bártolo.

Throughout a judicial process which became increasingly prolonged, the mother lodged multiple applications in which she consistently denied the existence of any unlawful retention of the child, repeatedly asserting that the change of residence to Portugal had been definitive and had taken place with the father’s consent. On 31.01.2023 she stated: “The Respondent claims that the Applicant is unlawfully retaining the child in Portugal. However, the Respondent authorised, agreed to and knew that in February 2021 the child was coming with the mother to live in their country of origin – Portugal”, repeatedly asserting that the father had changed his mind regarding the consent he had given. On 07.03.2023 she claimed: “The father always knew where the … child … was living, he maintained contact with his daughter, both by video call and by visiting her from time to time. However, and to the mother’s great astonishment, even speaking with his daughter, knowing where she is and agreeing to her return to Portugal, the father decided to file a complaint for child abduction. The father wanted to go back on his word, withdrawing the consent he had given.” On 12.04.2023 she also stated that “In view of the above, the Applicant considers that there is no unlawful retention of the … child …, under article 3 of the Hague Convention, especially as the father consented to her residence in Portugal, always maintained contact with his daughter and even enrolled her in a Portuguese school – Colégio São João de Brito, as already appears in the present proceedings.” In the same application she also requested the Judge to “inform the Portuguese Central Authority that there is no unlawful retention of the child”, and the Judge later concealed all the previous applications in order to place the start of the proceedings on 29.06.2023. This version was also refuted in several recorded hearings (audio), and Judge Sónia Sousa Bártolo, interested in a particular procedural outcome, concealed all these elements from her judgment.

The father alleged that the child’s life was divided between the two countries, as a result of a regulation agreement reached by the parents. The mother maintained the thesis that the child had moved definitively to Portugal with the father’s consent. Judge Sónia Sousa Bártolo discussed at the hearing of 03.08.2023 with the parents the existence of an agreement which would divide the child’s life between the two countries, explaining that consent is the essential element for changing a child’s residence. On p. 45 of the transcript of the 03.08.2023 hearing there is a discussion between the Judge and the mother in which it is said: “Judge No. One of you is certainly not telling the whole truth. The mother’s version is: I agreed with the father, I came to live in Portugal and I brought the … child … with me. The father’s version is: the mother was coming to live in Portugal, the daughter could come here for some periods, but the idea was never for the daughter to come and live in Portugal, and she always had to … maintain contact … with the father. Mother Madam, Madam Judge, I find all this very strange. Judge: Therefore, if there was no agreement … Mother: There was no agreement … Judge: If there was no agreement, if there is no agreement, children cannot simply leave their countries like that. Mother: No, and just as there is no agreement, and why all this situation of the father even talking about the nursery is strange to me, because, as you know, Madam, there is an enrolment procedure in a Portuguese school for the 2023‑2024 school year …”.

Since the mother consistently denied the existence of any agreement dividing the child’s life between the two countries, and the Judge had stated at the 03.08.2023 hearing that “these are matters that are proven by documentary evidence”, the father filed, together with his application of 11.08.2023, the signed version of the agreement reached between the parents. As with all the evidence filed by the father in the case, this agreement was not subject to any challenge or comment by the mother.

Judge Sónia Sousa Bártolo, who apparently had doubts as to who was lying, was put straight: “Judge No. One of you is certainly not telling the whole truth. The mother’s version is: I agreed with the father, I came to live in Portugal and I brought the child with me. The father’s version is: the mother was coming to live in Portugal, the daughter could come here for some periods, but the idea was never for the daughter to come and live in Portugal, and she always had to … maintain contact … with the father.” Surprisingly, Judge Sónia Sousa Bártolo forgot all the discussions she had with the parents at the 03.08.2023 hearing and omitted all the elements documented in the file.

Contrary to what the mother had always claimed, and to all the documentation in the file and the parents’ statements in recorded hearings, it became clear that there was in fact a formal agreement (audio) drawn up by the mother and accepted by the father, to divide the child’s life (audio) between Luxembourg (habitual residence) and Portugal (audio). The High Council for the Judiciary should note that none of these elements appears in the judgment, and that all the compromising explanations given by the mother, which did not align with the desired procedural outcome, were omitted.

As the mother explained in recorded hearings, the father would not have allowed the child to leave for Portugal without an agreement (audio) guaranteeing her residence in Luxembourg, a sine qua non condition for the father (audio), who did not want his daughter to change her residence to Portugal, but wanted the mother to remain as present as possible in her daughter’s life. Again, all these elements were manipulated and concealed from the judgment.

At the hearing of 14.11.2024, two years after the unlawful retention, the mother presented yet another version of the facts, justifying the retention with different arguments. What was initially not a retention, but a change of residence with the father’s consent, thus became a justified retention, without the Judge raising any questions about the change in narrative. At the beginning of the 14.11.2024 hearing with the mother, there is even the absurd situation in which Judge Sónia Sousa Bártolo forgets all the mother’s previous statements (audio) and opens the hearing by asking whether the aim was to implement the agreement which the mother had always denied existed.

This version, maintained for two years without any evidential support and denied in several recorded hearings (audio), received cons\tant backing from the court, with Judge Sónia Sousa Bártolo conducting the hearings in such a way as to bolster the lies, as will be seen below. Once again, all these versions, which proved contradictory, were connivingly supported by Judge Sónia Sousa Bártolo and concealed from her judgment.

In other words, for TWO YEARS the mother maintained a fraudulent narrative: “Definitive change of residence to Portugal WITH THE FATHER’S CONSENT.” The 03.08.2023 hearing marks a dramatic turning point (hearing transcript): Judge Sónia Sousa Bártolo explicitly acknowledges: “Judge: No. One of you is certainly not telling the whole truth. The mother’s version is: I agreed with the father, I came to live in Portugal and I brought the … child … with me. The father’s version is: the mother was coming to live in Portugal, the daughter could come here for some periods, but the idea was never for the daughter to come and live in Portugal, and she always had to … maintain contact … with the father. Mother: Madam, Madam Judge, I find all this very strange. Judge: Therefore, if there was no agreement … Mother: There was no agreement … Judge: If there was no agreement, if there is no agreement, children cannot simply leave their countries like that. Mother: ‘There was no agreement’.”

In other words, the Judge publicly states that consent is the essential element for changing a child’s residence, thereby validating the father’s thesis that the absence of consent constitutes unlawful retention. We know, however, that Judge Sónia Sousa Bártolo later distorted this principle in order to safeguard the interests of one of the parties.

The High Council for the Judiciary should appreciate the gravity of Judge Sónia Sousa Bártolo’s actions: the mother acknowledges before the Judge, during the hearing, that there was no agreement, but rather a definitive consent; after two years of lying, it was the Judge’s legal duty immediately to confront the mother with the contradictions in her multiple prior applications and to apply the Hague Convention (in the absence of an agreement, the return is immediate).

What happened was that the Judge never confronted the mother with her lies and conducted the hearings in such a way as to sustain those same lies, acting as an accomplice to procedural fraud: (i) she pursued parental regulation proceedings (when she lacked jurisdiction under the Hague Convention); (ii) she concealed the confession in the final judgment; (iii) she conveyed the idea of a “clear agreement” in order to favour the mother.

However, Judge Sónia Sousa Bártolo’s conduct goes even further. A few minutes later, we have the absurd situation in which it is the Judge who asks leading questions, already including a justification for the child’s abduction/unlawful retention (audio). The High Council for the Judiciary should note that it is the Judge, who never asked the mother why she had denied the existence of the agreement for two years, who gives the mother the argument of having been coerced (audio) into signing an agreement which the mother had always denied existed, requiring only that the mother answer “yes” for the question to be settled. Judge Sónia Sousa Bártolo truly appeared to want the child to remain with the mother and there are strong indications that she was willing to do whatever was necessary to achieve this. The High Council for the Judiciary has already seen the mother’s statements at the hearing of 03.08.202303.08.2023, where she said: “Mother: No, and just as there is no agreement, and why all this situation of the father even talking about the nursery is strange to me, because, as you know, Madam, there is an enrolment procedure in a Portuguese school for the 2023‑2024 school year …”, and will understand that it is possible that, in the mother’s mind, the idea took root that Judge Sónia Sousa Bártolo was the ideal partner for the commission of the criminal offences of child abduction and unlawful retention.

On 14.11.2023, two years after the start of the judicial proceedings, the mother confirmed for the first time that she had retained the child in Portugal, inventing yet another series of lies. The High Council for the Judiciary already knows that the mother said at the hearing of 03.08.2023 that the change of residence had been definitive, had taken place with the father’s consent and that there had been no agreement. Judge Sónia Sousa Bártolo, showing full complicity with the mother’s lies (audio), accepted the new versions without asking for any clarification. Everything was documented in the file and the hearings were recorded, but even so there was no restraint. As happened throughout the proceedings, the mother was always given the opportunity to adapt her narrative to the needs of the moment. At that hearing, the Judge agreed to the change in narrative, allowing the mother to convey the message that she had already explained at the 03.08.2023 hearing the reasons which led her to prevent the child’s return, fully aware that none of what was being said corresponded to the version given by the mother on 03.08.2023. At that hearing the mother stated that there had been no unlawful retention, as the change had taken place with the father’s consent and in the absence of any agreement between the parents.

According to the new version, presented on 14.11.2024, the mother prevented the child’s return to Luxembourg, as defined in the agreement reached with the father, because the father was not familiar with the child’s routines and also due to her own personal discomfort. This new version, which replaced the initial narrative, was received by the Judge with complete sympathy.

Although throughout the proceedings Judge Sónia Sousa Bártolo showed herself to be complicit in the mother’s conduct, the Public Prosecutor’s Office did not fail to do its job. In confrontation with the Public Prosecutor’s Office, the mother exposed her contradictions, having confirmed (audio) that she retained the child in Portugal (audio) and having confessed (audio) that she never obtained the father’s consent (audio) to do so (audio). All these elements, present in multiple applications and in several recorded hearings, were concealed from the judgment in order to produce a decision manifestly contrary to the facts in the case file. This criticism is made by the Public Prosecutor’s Office when it states in its appeal that “With all due respect, we cannot agree with the court a quo, which held that the child came to live in Portugal by agreement, or with the father’s consent, since the evidence produced shows that there was an agreement of wills between both parents to establish alternating residence (two weeks in Portugal and one in Luxembourg), a situation which was subsequently rendered impossible by the mother.”

This complicity transforms Judge Sónia Sousa Bártolo from an arbiter into an ally of the party who lied systematically over two years of judicial proceedings. The Public Prosecutor’s Office confirms this partiality in its appeal when it states that “On the basis of the documentary evidence in the case, the court selected the facts according to its own conviction and the decision it intended to reach, in a partial and not very objective manner, disregarding facts that were relevant for a proper decision in the case.”

I draw the High Council for the Judiciary’s attention to the absurd situation where one of the parties confesses to unlawful retention and it is the Judge who conceals the confession in order to justify the outcome she intended ab initio.

DELIBERATE ALTERATION OF THE SUBJECT‑MATTER OF THE PROCEEDINGS

I clarify for the High Council for the Judiciary the rules of the Hague Convention in proceedings relating to child abduction and unlawful retention. In such proceedings, the only element to be considered is whether the abduction or retention is lawful or unlawful, and this is the only question the court must answer. The aim is thus to safeguard the child and protect him or her from the violence associated with abduction/unlawful retention. As I will explain below, Judge Sónia Sousa Bártolo chose not to address this issue, in order to proceed with the regulation of parental authority she intended to carry out.

Proof of the unlawfulness of the removal or retention of a child under the Hague Convention rests on two essential conditions: (1) that there has been a breach of a right of custody attributed to a person or body under the law of the State in which the child was habitually resident immediately before the removal or retention, and (2) that that right was being effectively exercised at the time of the removal or retention, or would have been so exercised but for the removal or retention. The party requesting the child’s return must prove unlawfulness, and must show that the removal or retention took place without consent or in breach of that right of custody, such unlawfulness being an essential requirement for the application of the Convention and for an order for the child’s immediate return.

Thus, it is sufficient that there has been a breach of the custody right conferred by law in the State of the child’s habitual residence, and that this breach has occurred without the consent of the holder of that right, for the child’s removal or retention to be considered unlawful under the Hague Convention.

When the Central Authority receives a return application, the judicial or administrative authorities of the Contracting States shall act expeditiously in proceedings for the return of children (article 11). I recall in this regard that Portugal has already been condemned by the European Court of Human Rights. The European Court of Human Rights has always attached importance to the factor of “time” in its assessment of compliance with article 11 of the European Convention on Human Rights. Emphasising the need to deal urgently with child abduction cases, the Court has repeatedly held that the “passage of time” may have irreparable consequences for the relationship between the child and the parent who does not live with him or her. The requirement of speed is the cornerstone of the Convention.

It follows, first, from the first paragraph of this provision that the judge of the requested State is obliged to act urgently. This obligation covers two aspects: first, the use of urgent procedures and, as far as possible, prioritisation of return applications. Second, paragraph 2 of article 11 provides for a non‑binding six‑week time‑limit from the commencement of proceedings. Any delay beyond this period may give rise to a request for an explanation to the court of the requested State.

This provision draws the judge’s attention above all to the decisive nature of the factor of time in such situations. Indeed, the more time passes, the greater the risk that the child will adapt to his or her new environment. The principle of immediate return would thus lose its logic in so far as it would again uproot the child, which would no longer necessarily be in his or her best interests.

This obligation to act urgently is explained by the fact that the judge of the State of abduction does not rule on the substantive issues, namely the arrangements for exercising custody, parental authority and residence, but merely verifies whether the conditions are met for ordering the child’s return. All case‑law supports this approach, as is expressed, for example, in the judgment of 12‑10‑2023 (Case no. 1210/23.8T8FAR‑A.E1): “Furthermore, as regards the issue of the regulation of the exercise of parental responsibilities, it is in the child’s best interests that this should be carried out by the court having jurisdiction at his or her habitual place of residence (Netherlands), and the child should return there for that purpose, since no facts have been established which indicate a serious risk for the child on his or her return, or that returning there would place the child in an intolerable situation, within the meaning of article 13 of the 1980 Hague Convention”, adding that “It should be noted that it is not possible here to comment on which of the parents is better able to safeguard the child, as that discussion can and should only take place in the context of the appropriate proceedings for the regulation of parental responsibilities.”

Judge Sónia Sousa Bártolo therefore received an application for the return of a child on 25.01.2023 and only delivered her judgment on 19.12.2024 (99 weeks after the Portuguese Central Authority had received the return request under the Hague Convention). The Judge intentionally transformed the proceedings into parental authority regulation proceedings in order to benefit the mother, to the detriment of the child and the father.

Judge Sónia Sousa Bártolo officially altered the subject‑matter of the proceedings, changing them from an application for the return of an unlawfully retained child — as recognised by all those involved, including the Judge herself (audio), in various hearings — into proceedings for the regulation of parental responsibilities, two years after the formal request made by the Luxembourg authorities. The judgment completely ignores the return application and focuses exclusively on the regulation of parental authority, exceeding the cognitive limits of the proceedings, as denounced by the Public Prosecutor’s Office on p. 46 of its appeal, where it states that “In the present case, the application is not for the determination of the child’s residence, but this is the outcome of the judgment, which, with all due respect, exceeded its cognitive powers, extrapolating the subject‑matter of the proceedings.”

As is more than evident, Judge Sónia Sousa Bártolo, who has already regulated parental authority, will not deny what she has already stated in her judgment. In a theatrical performance, she will continue to feed instability in the child’s life and will use taxpayers’ resources to justify the charade whose outcome is already described in her judgment.

The alteration of the subject‑matter of the proceedings was one of the main criticisms made by the Public Prosecutor’s Office throughout its appeal, among multiple examples, notably when it states on p. 45 of its appeal that “The court a quo, by deciding as it did, has already taken a definitive stance on the outcome of the ongoing proceedings for the regulation of parental responsibilities, thereby emptying them of their subject‑matter — since it will be this very court that will judge and decide on the child’s residence (Portugal vs Luxembourg).”, and again on p. 46 of the appeal: “The judgment … takes a position favourable to the mother’s interests and empties of substance the other proceedings that are pending and joined, failing to address the legal issues raised therein, namely those relating to the child’s removal and/or retention by the mother.”

This subversion of the subject‑matter of the proceedings breaches national law and the regime of the Hague Convention, which precludes the court of the State of retention from having jurisdiction to decide the merits of custody, limiting its role to ordering immediate return (article 12 of the Hague Convention; article 11 of the Brussels II‑bis Regulation). The court of the State of retention has no jurisdiction to regulate parental responsibilities when a return application under the Hague Convention is pending; such a decision exceeds its cognitive powers.

In Hague Convention proceedings, a duration of two years is unprecedented and incompatible with the Convention’s regime, with Judge Sónia Sousa Bártolo having set a “new world record” for failure to observe the requirement of speed. This was only possible because the Judge occupied herself with managing parental authority.

SUMMARY OF JUDGE SÓNIA SOUSA BÁRTOLO’S MANIFEST PARTIALITY

The examples set out above demonstrate an unacceptable structural partiality, characterised by the systematic concealment of evidence (the Luxembourg request and the parents’ applications, as well as those of the Central Authority), procedural manipulation (alteration of the subject‑matter, failure to respond to an interim measure for 17 months), disregard for technical expert opinions (NIJ and the child’s doctors) and the staging of hearings in order to create the illusion of procedural normality.

In Hague proceedings, for which the legal time‑limit for a decision is six weeks, hearings were only resumed on 23.10.2024 — 62 weeks after the first hearing and 91 weeks after the return application was received by the Portuguese Central Authority — thus consolidating the artificial integration of the child and preventing reversal by the higher courts. This is not an isolated error or a “lack of skill” on the part of Judge Sónia Sousa Bártolo, but conscious and documented manipulation since the initial hearings of 2023 (divorce/custody), with the stated aim of keeping the child in Portugal with the mother, regardless of the legal regime laid down by the Hague Convention.

The Public Prosecutor’s Office confirms Judge Sónia Sousa Bártolo’s partiality when it states on p. 9 of its appeal that “On the basis of the documentary evidence in the case, the court selected the facts according to its own conviction and the decision it intended to reach, in a partial and not very objective manner, disregarding facts that were relevant for a proper decision in the case.” This conduct was not sporadic but rather a generalised fraudulent pattern, sufficiently documented in the case file and in recorded hearings. A full review of the case by the High Council for the Judiciary is imperative in light of the matters already reported and will reveal multiple additional converging elements.

MANIPULATION OF THE SCHOOLING ISSUE TO FORCE ARTIFICIAL INTEGRATION

If issues relating to parenting capacities have no place in a child return application, where only the lawfulness of the abduction or retention is assessed, there is even less room for discussion of the child’s schooling. Nevertheless, keen to keep the child with the mother in Portugal, the court chose to manage the child’s schooling over two years, even though the time‑limit set by the Hague Convention for a decision is six weeks.

The six‑week time‑limit laid down in the Hague Convention is precisely intended to prevent the artificial integration of the child. Observing the strategy adopted by the Cascais Court, which intended, through parental regulation proceedings, to integrate the child artificially in Portugal by failing to respond to the urgent return application brought by the Luxembourg authorities, the father coordinated measures with those authorities in order to maintain the child’s connection with her country of habitual residence.

During the 2023‑2024 school year, the child attended two schools, with institutional support (social, educational and medical) in Luxembourg — and not by the father’s decision alone. This matter was documented in the file on 14.03.2024 and was discussed in recorded hearings (audio), but was distorted and omitted from the Judge’s judgment. However, it was the father whom the Judge held responsible for a decision taken jointly by both parents, further illustrating the asymmetry of her reactions. The Public Prosecutor’s Office examined the same evidence and attended the same hearings, describing, once again, on p. 33 of its appeal a scenario very different from that of the Judge, stating: “It was in the parents’ plan for the child to attend two nurseries, one in Portugal and another in Luxembourg; the father accepted and even chose Colégio São João de Brito (March 2022) for his daughter to attend, just as the mother was aware of the school in Luxembourg and the date on which the child would start her integration, and she never objected to it, indeed she agreed with the Portuguese nursery on the child’s absences for Luxembourg.”

The judgment omits the institutional support and characterises the dual schooling as an isolated and irresponsible act by the father, belittling the Luxembourg institutions and the logic of the Convention. The description of the schooling issue in Judge Sónia Sousa Bártolo’s judgment boils down to the Judge’s displeasure at the measures the father and the Luxembourg authorities put in place to prevent the manipulation carried out by the court with a view to integrating the child. To avoid integration, and 52 weeks after the unlawful retention, the child resumed attendance at the Luxembourg school, without the judgment mentioning at any time that the Hague Convention sets a six‑week time‑limit for a decision.

Judge Sónia Sousa Bártolo states in her judgment that “On 10 May the following order was made … The regime established in the regulation of parental responsibilities, even if a provisional regime, is to be strictly complied with. Neither parent may schedule holidays outside the child’s school holidays. As to the possibility of the child attending a school in Luxembourg when she goes there with the father, this is contrary to all pedagogical practice and prejudices the child’s development. Furthermore, the father was informed during the hearing that he should not do so.” However, the description of the order concerning the child’s schooling is inaccurate, as repeatedly happens in the Judge’s judgment. On 28.09.2023, in the week in which the 2023‑2024 school year began, the court was informed that the child would begin attending the two schools, and the parents submitted multiple applications throughout the school year, discussing attendance at the Luxembourg school. Nevertheless, the Judge’s only order on the matter was made on 10 May 2024, that is, four weeks before the end of that school year. As the High Council for the Judiciary will have understood, procedural timing is not Judge Sónia Sousa Bártolo’s strong point.

Note Does the High Council for the Judiciary believe that a child unlawfully retained in Portugal can, after two years in the State of retention, return to the State of origin if the outcome of the proceedings determines that the retention was unlawful? Believing such a premise implies defending the thesis that a child who has already gone through the trauma of forced uprooting will more easily face a second identical situation, and that it is therefore unproblematic to send the child back to the State of origin. Judge Sónia Sousa Bártolo intended that the child remain in Portugal and decided to condition the entire proceedings by the passage of time, manipulating, distorting and concealing information in order to achieve the outcome she sought.

FACTUAL MANIPULATION AND SEXIST BIAS IN THE REASONING

The Judge has already determined parental regulation in the Hague Convention proceedings, announcing the outcome she sought. As confirmed by the Public Prosecutor’s Office on p. 46 of its appeal: “In the present proceedings, the application is not for the determination of the child’s residence, but this is the outcome of the judgment, which, with all due respect, exceeded its cognitive powers, extrapolating the subject‑matter of the proceedings.”

When the Judge maintains in her judgment the thesis that the mother cared for the child alone and that the father is “What is certain is that the father is also learning how to care”, she does not explain at any point where this idea comes from; it is a statement with no evidential basis whatsoever. The High Council for the Judiciary should note that the expert reports ordered by the Judge stated that: “Although the Respondent indicates differences between his and the Applicant’s parenting styles, this team does not consider that those differences are so extreme as to mean that one of the parties does not have the parental competences to ensure the safety and well‑being of the child; on the contrary, we consider that these differences are complementary. For example, the father states that he is somewhat more concerned with issues related to his daughter’s future (education, financial situation, etc.), while the mother demonstrates greater capacity to express affection and care. Based on the information gathered, we consider that both parents appear to show parental competences, as well as concern for their daughter’s well‑being.” This archaic formulation (“the father is learning to care”, implying that “the mother already knows”) has no place in 2025, breaches the principle of gender neutrality enshrined in the Constitution and reflected in all case‑law. Judge Sónia Sousa Bártolo adheres to all the mother’s theses, whereas the medical reports and expert evidence in the court file say precisely the opposite and both schools refute Judge Sónia Sousa Bártolo’s version, who once again gave exclusive credibility to the mother. Even if this description corresponded to reality, which it does not, Judge Sónia Sousa Bártolo must understand that parental inexperience does not legitimise the abduction and unlawful retention of a child.

At the hearing of 03.08.2023, having analysed the NIJ’s expert report, the Judge stated on p. 3 of the transcript that: “Judge: And I am aware that either of the parents has parental competences to have the… child… with them, therefore, this is not at issue here.” She then drastically changed her position in the judgment, without there being a single clinical, school or expert document raising any doubts as to the father’s parenting capacities. If all the documentation confirmed the father’s parenting capacities, this justification given by Judge Sónia Sousa Bártolo, in contradiction with her initial statements and with all the medical, school and expert reports, appears to be nothing more than another fabrication of her own, associated with her eagerness to keep the child in Portugal, in disregard of the applicable legal rules.

If the expert opinions pointed to competences on the part of both parents, they actually described the complementarity of those competences. The Judge, with the partiality she demonstrated throughout the case, concealed all this information.

The father’s parental capacities were discussed in several recorded hearings, including discussion of the fact that between September 2023 and July 2024 the child spent half of the school year in Luxembourg, with the mother confirming that it was the father who provided all care to the child (audio). The mother even explained in that recorded hearing >what she meant by the issue of care provided to the child, stating that a father capable of caring for the child would not subject her to being in two countries, in two schools and under dual medical follow‑up (audio). The judgment, reflecting the partiality shown by Judge Sónia Sousa Bártolo throughout the case, appears to defend the thesis that a father capable of caring for a child is one >who silently and lightly accepts all the atrocities and unlawful acts committed against his daughter. The High Council for the Judiciary will see how examples of the procedural manipulation carried out by Judge Sónia Sousa Bártolo continue to multiply, clearly demonstrating her partiality.

Judge Sónia Sousa Bártolo states, in fact 25 of her judgment, that “After the child’s birth, the mother took maternity leave until she moved to Portugal”, which is completely false. The mother was never alone at home with the child between the day of the child’s birth (31.08.2020) and the day she left for Portugal (20.02.2022). Although it is true that during that COVID period it was common for everyone (including the father) to work from home, it is inaccurate to say that the mother was at home on maternity leave to care for the child (which the mother never claimed) and that the father was not. If we assume that teleworking should be considered proof of a parent’s presence with his or her child, once again this proof is only applied to the mother and not to the father.

The “one‑year‑and‑six‑month maternity leave” described by Judge Sónia Sousa Bártolo is another fact she has invented. There is no country which has 550‑day maternity leave; this absurd idea is contradicted by fact 26 of her judgment, which states that “When the mother moved to Portugal, she had to reimburse the Luxembourg State the amount of EUR 8,000.00, because she had not finished taking her parental leave and had left the country.” Although it is possible that, naively, Judge Sónia Sousa Bártolo believes that Luxembourg maternity leave lasts until children reach adulthood, it was explained in recorded hearings that the mother worked at 80% (i.e. 32 hours per week) from the end of maternity leave (which lasted 8 weeks after the child’s birth) until her departure for Portugal on 20.02.2022 (audio). The mother, who invented many facts over two years of judicial proceedings, never ventured to the ridiculous extreme of alleging that she had been on maternity leave between the child’s birth and the end of February 2022, as she knows that maternity leave is limited to a maximum of 20 weeks in Luxembourg (“Quand l’accouchement a lieu avant la date présumée, les jours de congé prénatal non pris sont ajoutés au congé postnatal, sans que la durée totale du congé de maternité ne puisse excéder 20 semaines au total.”).

These examples reveal obvious contradictions and are particularly telling. They should be read in conjunction with the many passages in the judgment in which we find phrases that illustrate (using underlining and numerous exclamation marks) Judge Sónia Sousa Bártolo’s blatant lack of objectivity. Note that we find descriptions such as “the father is also learning how to care” or “… the Luxembourg social services … what is certain is that, at present, there is no way those services can make up for the absence the mother would represent in the child’s life”, or, failing to understand that these proceedings were not parental authority regulation, she states: “In fact, had the parents managed to obtain approval of the agreement they had signed, we would now be dealing solely with an incident of non‑compliance!”, or when she explains that, one year after the Portuguese authorities had received the return application, the father disregarded the interim agreement and enrolled the child in a Luxembourg school, stating that “even when he turns to the court and the court sets an interim regime for him (with which he even agreed, note!), it counts for nothing, since this father does only what he wants regarding his daughter’s life.” These descriptions, directed only at the father, are always made without any supporting evidence, and even offend common sense. The same type of value judgment is never expressed in relation to the mother, and this is certainly not by chance.

The tone was always hostile towards the father and deferential towards the mother — > a disparity that is incompatible with equality of arms. It is enough to listen to the first five minutes of the hearing with the father and the first five minutes of the hearing with the mother to understand the unequal treatment of the parties.

Judge Sónia Sousa Bártolo expresses in her judgment various value judgments concerning the “natural role” of parents, without any expert support, thereby breaching the duty of objective reasoning. Her descriptions include sexist prejudices and family decisions that amount to objective partiality and breach gender equality. This judgment is handed down by a Judge who works in a country where both parents may be male. Are such children destined for adoption? The judgment provides no reasoning for any of these prejudices and flatly contradicts the expert opinions and schools, which refute the mother’s narrative, while the Judge adheres uncritically to the mother’s theses.

ABUSIVE INVOCATION OF THE EXCEPTION UNDER ARTICLE 13(B) OF THE HAGUE CONVENTION

Having refused the return on the ground of “absence of unlawfulness”, the Judge subsidiarily invokes the exception under article 13(b) (grave physical/psychological risk), revealing her strategy of shielding the decision from any appeal. National case‑law precludes this possibility, as stated in the Lisbon Court of Appeal judgment in case 2273/07.9TMLSB‑A.L1‑2: “Having particular regard to subparagraph (b) of article 13 of the 1980 Hague Convention, the Brussels II‑bis Regulation (which, in relations between EU Member States, prevails over the Convention, pursuant to the explicit provision contained in article 60(e) of the same Regulation), article 11(4) provides verbatim that ‘a court cannot refuse to order the return of a child under article 13(b) of the 1980 Hague Convention if it is established that adequate arrangements have been made to secure the protection of the child after his or her return’” and further adds: “Considering — in parentheses — that the socio‑political conditions of all the States which today form part of the European Union are such as to allow, by means of the existing social structures, full protection of children in accordance with European standards and international conventions in this area, it must therefore be concluded that, in the present case, the only circumstance which could allow Portugal to issue a decision of retention is that provided for in subparagraph (a) of article 13 of the 1980 Hague Convention.” The Lisbon Court of Appeal held in case 19176/22.0T8LSB‑A.L1‑7 that “The court cannot refuse the child’s return under article 13(b) of the 1980 Hague Convention if it is proved that adequate measures have been taken to guarantee his or her protection after return.”

The multiple examples already provided allow the High Council for the Judiciary to understand that national case‑law does not apply in Judge Sónia Sousa Bártolo’s court. Considering the applicable case‑law, and given that the State of origin stated that it was willing to ensure the child’s welfare through appropriate measures, it was not lawful to invoke article 13(b) as a ground for refusing return. Yet Judge Sónia Sousa Bártolo argues on p. 89 of her judgment that “There are no social services, however good they may be, that are capable of preventing the suffering to which this child would be subjected if her entire life were now to take place in Luxembourg, without her mother!”

The invocation of article 13 represents the need to create an external basis for avoiding return, as Judge Sónia Sousa Bártolo explains in her judgment: “Notwithstanding what we have just stated, which in itself would suffice for the present judgment to end here, we are mindful of the arguments put forward in submissions both by the Public Prosecutor and by the learned counsel for the parents, and we know that what is to be expected is that this decision will be appealed, and therefore it will be important also to rule on the other matters raised, that is, as to whether there are grounds for excepting the child’s return if there has in fact been unlawful retention.”

In other words, the proceedings were not managed in accordance with the facts or the applicable legal rules, but rather according to the anticipated reaction of the father and the Public Prosecutor’s Office to the decision. When the judgment expressly states that “what is to be expected is that this decision will be appealed”, it already signals an awareness of the weakness of its reasoning, adding the exception under article 13 as a way of reinforcing its position.

Judge Sónia Sousa Bártolo relies on the exception under article 13(b), which requires solid evidence, a restrictive interpretation and places the burden exclusively on the person who unlawfully retained the child (the mother). However, the judgment does not present a single valid document to support article 13, which constitutes a flagrant disregard of the Convention. The Luxembourg authorities declared that they were willing to ensure the child’s return and protection — rendering the exception clearly inapplicable. Nevertheless, the Judge systematically downplays Luxembourg’s capacities, undermining the logic of international cooperation under the Convention.

Case‑law also states that article 11(4) of the Brussels II‑bis Regulation prevails over the Hague Convention (article 60(e)) and that the court cannot refuse return under article 13(b) of the Hague Convention where adequate protective measures have been taken in the State of origin. In an EU Member State the only admissible exception is that under article 13(a) of the Hague Convention (the child’s consent/acceptance). As the Évora Court of Appeal held in case 1210/23.8T8FAR‑A.E1: “The court cannot, however, refuse the child’s return where, in the case of EU Member States, the condition set out in article 11(4) of the Regulation is satisfied [The court cannot refuse the child’s return under article 13(b) of the 1980 Hague Convention if it is proved that adequate measures have been taken to guarantee his or her protection after return].” It is one of two: either Judge Sónia Sousa Bártolo does not know that Luxembourg is an EU Member State, or the legal rule and case‑law apply to all EU countries except Luxembourg

The use of article 13 is based on the child’s medical issues, which were described in contradictory terms in the mother’s applications and were clarified in recorded hearings (audio), but were concealed from the judgment in order to achieve the procedural outcome sought by Judge Sónia Sousa Bártolo.

At the hearing of 03.08.2023, the mother was requested to provide all the child’s clinical documentation, and the documents provided contain no medical diagnoses, but rather verbal accounts by the mother, which health professionals describe as transcriptions of descriptions made by the mother and which are often accompanied by question marks indicating the professionals’ own doubts about the account. These doubts are normal, as the consultation was based solely on symptoms described by the mother and not observed by doctors, the father, the schools or the experts appointed by the court.

The child was seen several times by NIJ and INML experts, and none of them identified any issues. The NIJ reported a child with no health problems, and the INML simply reproduced the material in the case file, which corresponds to the descriptions provided by the mother in the reports filed by her on 08.08.2023.

The father repeatedly insisted that the court request the mother to provide the child’s medical reports, which would clarify the child’s state of health, but to no avail and without any intervention by the court. This issue was also discussed in recorded hearings and concealed by Judge Sónia Sousa Bártolo (audio).

The official documentation in the case file confirms that the schools always denied any eating issues, that the doctors always denied any health problems and that there are no reports in the file describing the health problems referred to in the judgment, since everything rests exclusively on the mother’s allegations.

The mother provided multiple contradictory descriptions of the child’s state of health, and all the documentation in the file was selected so as to align the judgment with the outcome sought by the mother. The mother even used the same medical reports to support the proposition that the child had no health problems and, conversely, to support the opposite proposition. The court concealed the discussions that took place in recorded hearings and chose the version which best served the mother’s claims.

Since the child was described as ill and suffering from various health problems, these issues were exhaustively discussed in recorded hearings, during which the many lies and contradictions were clarified. All of this was omitted from the judgment. It was already known, from the allegation of “anorexia” made on 03.08.2023, that the mother used false diagnoses; however, all the official reports were challenged and the judgment gave credence exclusively to the mother’s accounts.

As discussed in recorded hearings, the first medical consultation in Portugal took place only ten months after the child arrived in Portugal, which is unusual when dealing with a supposedly sick child who was allegedly repeatedly hospitalised (audio). It is also curious that, after her arrival in Portugal, the child was never again hospitalised, even though she was never subjected to any medical treatment. Evidently, no medical reports from Luxembourg were ever provided or requested by the court, which gave Judge Sónia Sousa Bártolo creative freedom to defend any thesis she wished in her judgment.

The child’s state of health was said to be so complex that multidisciplinary follow‑up was required. In multiple confusing and contradictory descriptions made in several recorded hearings (audio), the mother explained that she replaced one specialist doctor with another in the same specialty whenever a doctor terminated follow‑up.

It should be recalled that the mother initially stated that the child had no health problems whatsoever, an element which, like dozens of other relevant facts, was omitted from the judgment. It was only after becoming aware of the return application brought by the Luxembourg authorities that the medical consultations and allegations of health problems began — without any medical reports of that follow‑up ever having been shared.

Suddenly the child was said to require multidisciplinary follow‑up, without doctors issuing reports, despite such reports having been requested numerous times by the father, without ever being provided by the mother (audio) and without the court requiring them from her.

The mother informed the court that the multidisciplinary follow‑up arose from doubts on the part of the child’s paediatrician, who requested several specialist consultations. Yet Judge Sónia Sousa Bártolo considered it normal that none of the specialists who saw the child issued medical reports. These health professionals apparently entrusted the mother with conveying their conclusions orally to the paediatrician (audio). Is anyone supposed to believe that allegedly serious health issues, involving various technical elements — since this was a child who allegedly required multidisciplinary follow‑up — are conveyed orally to a parent? If this version is to be believed, perhaps there will be an oral transmission of the parental regulation judgment, with Judge Sónia Sousa Bártolo giving the mother the information that she should orally convey the court’s decision to the child’s father.

All those who interacted with the child confirmed that the alleged eating problems did not exist, whether this was the school or the witnesses heard by the court: the court requested expert opinions because it claimed to have doubts about the state of health of a child said to suffer from anorexia, and when these official reports stated that the child had no health problems, the expert reports were disregarded; both schools (Portuguese and Luxembourgish) shared their information about the child’s diet, describing her as being like her peers; when the father, the paternal family and other witnesses reported that there were no eating problems (audio), the court chose to attach value only to the mother’s accounts, partially disregarding all others.

The mother reported hospital admissions in Luxembourg due to gastritis and respiratory wheezing (audio), without ever providing a single document to prove or explain them. We do not know whether the child spent a night or a month in hospital, what the reason for the hospitalisation was or what diagnosis was made. We only know that the mother changed the number of admissions according to the application, and that she confirmed a final figure in a recorded hearing (audio). The judgment chose, from among the many possibilities offered by the mother, the highest number of admissions ever mentioned — 12 admissions: “The child has a very particular health background, with the result that, in just 15 months, she was hospitalised 12 times, and it was always the mother who stayed with her in the hospitals or clinics.”

Gastritis and respiratory wheezing are common in early childhood, as any parent knows. The alleged admissions did not stop because of some miracle associated with the child’s arrival in Portugal, but due to the child’s normal growth. Gastritis- sorce CUF and respiratory wheezing - source CUF associated with bronchiolitis affect many young children and are conditions that can be treated in any European country. If respiratory wheezing is very common in children, it is worth recalling that the admissions in Luxembourg took place in the context of COVID, during 2020 and 2021, when the slightest respiratory symptom was treated in a particular way. Luxembourg is no exception to other European countries; there are doctors who treat such health issues.

In a recorded hearing, the mother confirmed that the only documented clinical problem was oesophageal stenosis (diagnosed in 2024, more than a year after the return application), and although she acknowledged that this was the only issue identified (audio), the judgment fabricates several other scenarios disconnected from reality. The mother used the term “documented” intentionally, leaving open the possibility of future unsubstantiated allegations.

The oesophageal stenosis could be treated in either country, as discussed by the parents in a recorded hearing; surgery to resolve the problem was carried out in Portugal purely for reasons of convenience and not due to any inability on the part of the Luxembourg health system. The High Council for the Judiciary should understand that unfortunately there is not a single international ranking which places Portugal as the country where health issues that other European States are unable to resolve are dealt with — see the Euro Health Consumer Index. The parents, having concluded that the court would not take a decision within the legal time‑limits, decided to resolve the problem quickly and while still in Portugal.

The describes on p. 76 a child who “was born with IUGR (Intrauterine Growth Restriction) with significant microcephaly at 5 months…”, in clear contradiction with everything that was discussed in recorded hearings (audio). The mother made this claim to doctors, who included it in one of the reports, with the aforementioned question marks. An incurable brain malformation — microcephaly - source CUF — was fabricated, a condition incompatible with above‑average learning capacities, as described in all official reports. Judge Sónia Sousa Bártolo did not hesitate to include this in the judgment, without at any point stating that a cure for the disease had been found — a piece of information that would be important for every doctor dealing with such health issues — or making any reference to a possible miracle curing a chronic disease.

The judgment states on p. 75 that “In Portugal, and at the mother’s insistence, she came to benefit from multidisciplinary clinical follow‑up, which made a diagnosis and drew up a follow‑up plan in various clinical areas.” This description omits the fact that the said medical follow‑up began when the child’s return to Luxembourg was requested and that over 2023 and 2024 it produced no medical report explaining it. The judgment further states that a follow‑up plan was drawn up in various clinical areas, but this plan was never provided to anyone because it does not exist. Over two years of judicial proceedings, the mother did not provide any medical documents to support what was alleged, and these descriptions are nothing more than fiction based solely on the mother’s accounts.

There were several documents in the file in which third parties denied the existence of such health problems, but these were ignored in order to uphold the mother’s undocumented theses. The judgment states on p. 47 that “In both Luxembourg and at ‘Os Pirralhos do Marquês’ in Portugal, the mother prepared and sent food for the child to eat at nursery, as she does with Colégio São João de Brito, in view of her special dietary needs.” Yet the file contains emails from the schools refusing the mother’s request to allow a feeding therapist to be present during the child’s meals at school, informing her that the child ate like all the other children. The schools corroborated the father’s descriptions and those of the witnesses heard in court, but the court chose to show its complicity with the mother’s lies and fabricated a narrative disconnected from reality. Judge Sónia Sousa Bártolo fabricated facts to align her judgment with the mother’s claims.

And when the mother, in recorded hearings, confirmed, in response to questions put to her, that the child ate normally and that it was only in March 2024 that the diet was altered (audio), this information was concealed from the judgment.

ABSENCE OF EVIDENCE AND AFFRONT TO THE HAGUE CONVENTION

First of all, it is important to emphasise that all of Judge Sónia Sousa Bártolo’s “confusions” do not stem from a mere lack of skill, but attest to a desire, expressed since the first hearings in 2023 devoted to the divorce and custody applications, to keep the child in Portugal with the mother regardless of what the legal regime provides. The Public Prosecutor’s Office highlighted the partiality with which the proceedings were conducted, stating on p. 9 of its appeal that “On the basis of the documentary evidence in the case, the court selected the facts according to its own conviction and the decision it intended to reach, in a partial and not very objective manner, disregarding facts that were relevant for a proper decision in the case.”

The High Council for the Judiciary should also note that this is not an isolated situation in which a particular fact escaped the Judge’s attention. This is a case of clear procedural manipulation, in which the entire essence of the proceedings appears to have been fraudulently distorted by Judge Sónia Sousa Bártolo with a view to obtaining the procedural outcome she sought. Examples of this conduct are numerous and are sufficiently documented in the case file and in the recorded hearings. A few examples found in only two of the twelve recorded hearings have been presented and, should the High Council for the Judiciary so wish, many others can be provided.

By invoking the argument that these proceedings were a matter of voluntary jurisdiction, Judge Sónia Sousa Bártolo has given herself carte blanche to disregard the entire legal order, manipulate the proceedings so as to obtain the outcome she sought and treat all procedural elements with shameful partiality. Case‑law, of which the judgment of the Évora Court of Appeal in case 1210/23.8T8FAR‑A.E1 is an example, states: “Now, as is known, civil tutelary proceedings are of a voluntary jurisdiction nature (see articles 3 and 12 of the General Regime of Civil Tutelary Procedure (RGPTC) approved by Law 141/2015 of 8 September and articles 986 et seq. of the Code of Civil Procedure), and the court is not, in the measures to be taken, subject to strict legality criteria, being guided by the principles laid down in the law on the protection of children and young people and those of simplification, orality, consensus and the hearing and participation of the child (see articles 4 and 5 of the RGPTC and article 4 of Law 147/99 of 1 September), and must in each case adopt the solution that is considered most appropriate and timely in defence of the child’s best interests, which are the core value or fundamental principle of the proceedings, and it is those interests which must guide any decision in the context of such proceedings. However, these guiding principles must be combined and weighed against the specific provisions of the Hague Convention of 25 October 1980 on the Civil Aspects of International Child Abduction, whose purpose is to ensure the immediate return of children wrongfully removed to any Member State and according to which, under article 11 of the Convention and article 11(3) of Regulation (EC) No 2201/2003, the court must adopt urgent procedures with a view to the child’s return, in the light of the child’s best interests.”

The judgment demonstrates total disregard for the Hague Convention, including shocking statements such as that on p. 89, which reads: “There are no social services, however good they may be, that are capable of preventing the suffering to which this child would be subjected if her entire life were now to take place in Luxembourg, without her mother!” This passage, which is tantamount to a call for denunciation of the Hague Convention, and seeks to release Portugal from its international obligations under the pretext of “the irreplaceability of the parent”, reveals ignorance and/or repudiation of the Hague Convention system and absolute partiality.

DEVALUATION OF LUXEMBOURG INSTITUTIONS AND MANIPULATION OF RECORDED HEARINGS

Judge Sónia Sousa Bártolo made several disparaging devaluations of Luxembourg and of emigrant communities in recorded hearings and in her judgment, without any connection to the subject‑matter of the proceedings; she even used disgraceful expressions such as “ghetto of emigrants”, which shockingly violate the duties of courtesy, impartiality and neutrality incumbent on a judicial officer. No one can imagine a Judge using the term “ghetto” in court, as we are all aware of the origins and connotations of that expression.

When confronted with an appeal by a Luxembourg judge to the cooperation mechanism provided for in the Hague Convention (which requires each of the 103 Contracting States to designate a national judge to support matters relating to the Hague Convention), Judge Sónia Sousa Bártolo disparaged the Luxembourg judge responsible for the Hague Convention, stating at a hearing that “the Luxembourg authorities only work because they are pressured by the father”, devaluing institutional professionalism.

The Judge ignored the suggestion made in the last complaint submitted to the High Council for the Judiciary that she obtain the support which the Convention provides for judges. The recommendation that she contact the Honourable President of the Setúbal Court (the Portuguese judge who supports other judges in matters relating to the Hague Convention) to obtain the necessary advice was disregarded because she already had a preconceived outcome.

The manipulation of the hearings against the father was evident (there are multiple recurrent statements recorded), such as: “Do not mention what is in the case file”; “I have not seen it”; “Answer only the question asked.” This censorship paved the way for the judgment to claim that “the father did not challenge the lies described” and when the father did challenge them he was aggressively silenced: “The father says things even when he is instructed not to challenge.”

If we compare the judgment with only two of the mother’s hearings referred to in this complaint, it is easy to see that Judge Sónia Sousa Bártolo merely manipulated and transcribed the mother’s positions into the judgment. Even if we disregard all documents filed in the case, the impression is that the father was not heard and that there were no other witnesses, such is the extent to which the judgment mimics one party’s accounts. This is yet another example of the partial manner in which the entire case was conducted.

NEXT STEPS

Judge Sónia Sousa Bártolo states that she is responsible for managing the lives of a thousand children at the Cascais Family and Minors Court. However, what we have here is a model of judicial management which, having already failed in the Hague Convention proceedings with a delay of 98 weeks and procedural manipulation, is now continuing in the regulation of parental authority with similar negligence. On 06.02.2024 an application for a change of the child’s residence was submitted, duly reasoned and with detailed grounds. Over the following nine months, both parents filed multiple additional applications. It was only on 15.12.2025 — 323 days later — that the Judge issued an order on this matter, repeating the pattern of non‑compliance with the requirement of speed already observed at the Hague stage.

If the Hague proceedings unfolded as they did, and all warnings were disregarded by the High Council for the Judiciary, we are currently witnessing identical management in the proceedings for the regulation of parental authority. It is imperative that the High Council for the Judiciary examines the elements now being provided.

It is one of two things: either Judge Sónia Sousa Bártolo is truly incapable of performing the tasks entrusted to her, failing to understand the applications submitted to the court, or she does not read the applications filed with her, providing the simplistic answer that there are only dietary issues. I ask the High Council for the Judiciary to explain how it is possible for this order to exist when this is the initial application. The High Council for the Judiciary cannot allow the lives of thousands of children to be managed in this way without investigating the serious indications presented to you.

These proceedings were brought by the mother during the summer holidays of 2022. Almost four years later, all we have seen is the Judge promoting instability in the child’s life and fuelling conflict between the parents. When citizens turn to the courts, they seek a mediator to help them overcome existing conflicts and not someone who stimulates and encourages conflict.

As I did in my two previous complaints, I once again alert the High Council for the Judiciary to unacceptable case management and call on it to intervene by investigating a form of management which jeopardises the family life of many Portuguese families and the safety of thousands of children in Portugal.

The management of the Hague proceedings raises many questions regarding the intergenerational impact of a judicial decision and I recall the Judge’s express statement that “without agreement, children do not leave countries.” No one has the right to make a two‑year‑old child grow up believing that she did not live with her father because he had no interest in doing so. Not even an unconscious Judge, who has no awareness of the lasting impact that her decision will have on the entire future relationship between a father and his daughter. Decades later, that adult daughter will confront the father with a judicial narrative fabricated against all the objective facts in the case file.

As a father, I will not silently accept this judicial decision and I will bring proceedings before the criminal courts in order to clarify this matter. Nonetheless, I hereby inform you of my concern regarding the management of the parental authority regulation proceedings. Judge Sónia Sousa Bártolo has already indicated how she intends to manage those proceedings.

CONCLUSIONS AND DISCIPLINARY FRAMEWORK

Judge Sónia Sousa Bártolo’s conduct constitutes serious cumulative breaches of articles 6(c) (courtesy/impartiality/objectivity) and 7(c) (diligence/speed) of the Statute of Judicial Magistrates: (i) 91 weeks in Hague Convention proceedings (when the legal time‑limit is six weeks); (ii) systematic concealment of evidence and official documents such as the official Luxembourg request (24.01.2023); (iii) disregard for expert reports (NIJ/INML/medical) as a way of supporting false allegations (“anorexia nervosa” in a child under 3); (iv) alteration of the subject‑matter of the proceedings, turning Hague proceedings into parental regulation proceedings; (v) support for contradictory narratives by the mother without any adversarial debate and providing her with the means to achieve the outcome she sought; (vi) manifest sexist prejudice (“the father is learning to care”); (vii) falsification of the timeline as a way of creating artificial integration; (viii) constant disregard for national case‑law, ignoring the warnings given and unlawfully invoking the exception under article 13(b) in the EU context.

These proceedings were so poorly conducted and show such clear signs of what appears to be fraudulent conduct on the part of a judge that it is easier to ask what was done correctly — the answer is brief. Listing in detail everything that did not work would generate an endless list; this description is therefore necessarily selective, but it is sufficient to demonstrate the need for disciplinary measures

I draw attention to the fact that this complaint relies on only two of the twelve recorded hearings and only about one‑sixth of all documents filed in the case. I recommend that the High Council for the Judiciary carry out an analysis of all elements in the case file and of the remaining ten recorded hearings, as numerous other serious elements will be found.

Judge Sónia Sousa Bártolo, as a way of excusing her repeated disregard for procedural time‑limits, states in her hearings that she has more than a thousand cases in her hands. The management of these proceedings demonstrates a behavioural pattern and is certainly not an isolated case; I therefore believe it is the duty of the High Council for the Judiciary to examine the other cases assigned to the Judge. Judicial bodies cannot leave the lives of thousands of children in the hands of someone who can manage their lives in this way.

I would also like to emphasise that this complaint will be shared with the national and Luxembourg authorities mentioned, and will be available in French and English in order to ensure transparency, prevent any cover‑up and enable the Luxembourg authorities fully to understand and respond. Until now I have refrained from any publicity, but restraint cannot be synonymous with impunity: institutions are only strengthened by correcting their errors.

SPECIFIC REQUESTS

1. Opening of disciplinary proceedings (or, subsidiarily, preliminary proceedings) against Judge Sónia Sousa Bártolo for the facts described above, which constitute serious breaches of the Statute of Judicial Magistrates, in particular articles 6(c) and 7(c)

2. Penalty for the offences established at the end of the disciplinary proceedings: given the gravity of the conduct, I consider that no sanction less than transfer (article 91(1)(c) of the Statute of Judicial Magistrates) can reasonably be accepted.

3. At a minimum, and inasmuch as the proceedings for the regulation of parental responsibilities are still pending before Judge Sónia Sousa Bártolo, I propose that she voluntarily stand down, given that she has already ruled on this issue in the proceedings for return under the Hague Convention. Admitting the contrary would be a flagrant breach of my fundamental rights, in respect of which I hereby reserve all my rights.

4. A guarantee that there will be no procedural reprisals against the father who lodged this complaint, thus ensuring the complainant’s protection and confidence in the judicial system.

Luxembourg, 13 February 2026