FBI says child was kidnapped, taken to Cuba for gender surgery

FBI agents brought a child safely home after one parent allegedly kidnapped him to Cuba for a gender transition, FBI Director Kash Patel said Wednesday. Agents from Utah, Virginia, and the agency’s critical incident response group were involved, he said.

The child’s father, Eri Ethington, who also uses the name Rose, and his romantic partner are accused of taking the 10-year-old boy to Havana without his mother’s consent. The group were supposedly camping in Canada, but flew from Canada to Mexico and then to Cuba, according to the U.S. Attorney’s Office in Utah.

The boy’s mother contacted law enforcement after he was not returned to her custody on April 3 as planned. Family members told authorities they were concerned that the boy’s father, who identified as a woman, intended to schedule the child for a gender reassignment surgery in Cuba. The boy had begun identifying as female, possibly due to his father’s influence, according to court documents. Searches of the father’s residence also showed he likely did not plan to return to the United States, according to court documents.

On April 13, a Utah court gave the mother sole custody and ordered the boy’s immediate return. Cuban authorities located the group in Havana on April 16, according to the U.S. Department of Justice. They assisted a bevy of federal agents in bringing back the child and delivering the two adults into federal custody, according to the attorney’s office. Ethington and his partner were charged with international parental kidnapping and aiding and abetting the commission of a crime, according to court documents. They are legally innocent until proven guilty in court.

Dig deeper: Read Christina Grube’s report on a California court ruling removing a state requirement for federal agents to display identification.