Tuesday, November 26, 2013

Children of the Underground

A reader provided more info on the case below. The NY Daily News reports:
According to The Australian, Barnett initially fled to South Africa, where she married a man, Juan Geldenhuys in 1995.

She later gave birth to a son, now 17, before moving to New Zealand. From there, she moved to Australia after splitting with Geldenhuys, who recently died of bone cancer. It was a friend of Geldenhuys who helped tracked down Savanna's father after becoming suspicious of the mother and tracking him down via the Internet.

She was apparently helped in the US by an organization called Children of the Underground, which helps women stuck in apparently abusive relationships.
Another source says:
Since then, he has spent nearly all his assets in an effort to recover Savanna. Leveraged to the hilt, he lives simply and works seven-day weeks at two jobs: as a stockbroker for Merrill Lynch and as a father engaged in a full-time search for his child.

There are hundreds of people like Todd, mostly fathers, who say they are victims of an underground network that willingly helps mothers and their children go into hiding - in violation of court orders.

Most of these fathers say they have been falsely accused of molesting their children. While the courts believe them, the underground's organizers don't; instead, they take the law into their own hands, leaving fathers cut off from their sons and daughters for years at a time, sometimes forever.

The most public of those underground leaders, Faye Yager, says she will only hide mothers who have extensive documentation of sexual abuse - medical reports, psychological evaluations, police statements.

But no such papers existed in Todd's case. Barnett never made any sexual abuse allegations during the long, nasty court battle for custody of Savanna. She called Harris Todd lots of names, but "child molester" wasn't one of them.
Just as I suspect, there is an underground network of child kidnappers that help moms violate child custody court orders. They tell themselves that they are preventing child molesters, or some such nonsense. Fathers no not molest their one-year-old babies. This is just a phony charges that is dreamed up by moms because they are vindictive, delusional, paranoid, possessive, borderline, or whatever.

10 comments:

Anonymous said...

http://www.santacruzsentinel.com/santacruz/ci_24600240/santa-cruz-county-child-support-services-has-new?source=most_viewed

see comments as well.

marilynn said...

I help parents and family members find their kids. If they've been adopted out of CPS or if its a nasty divorce or whatever I do it for free. Nobody should prevent a parent from trying to do right by his or her child. If someone is a true danger to their family they should be behind bars or have a restraining order. I don't care if the kid is underage either. I do it for free. I helped the security guard at my office find his daughters that had been taken from him when they were ten - he still paid child support but had no idea where mom moved them. When I found them on my space (a few years ago now) they said their mom told them he was dead. I checked him out first to make sure he was not an ax murderer. Those are his kids. I don't feel guilty.

Anonymous said...

Listen to yourself ...

1. there are hundreds of child abduction cases. hundreds. a very small percentage of the millions of children who go through divorce.

2. fathers do not molest 1 year olds.

I am not saying these fathers molested their 1yo's but 1 yo's do get molested by fathers, its not common but its not unheard of. Certainly hundreds of 1yo's have been molested by their fathers. which is again, a very small percentage.

Anonymous said...

1 yo's get molested by mothers too, its not just fathers and its a very small % but still...

Anonymous said...


I feel for Todd, but the underground does God's work. Maybe not in this case, i dont know this case but the underground has saved hundreds of children from predators and that is worth a mistake or 2.

George said...

I believe people are innocent until proven guilty. Guilt should not be decided by some underground criminal network. I defy you to give even one example of a child saved by the underground.

Anonymous said...


i put a child's safety before anything.

the people in the underground are effective and keep the FBI at bay because they would rather go to jail protecting children than be free not protecting them. and also because the FBI is scared of arresting a person doing this sort of work. Its a PR nightmare.

George said...

You sound like a gangster. Kidnapping kids based on malicious hearsay against the parents is not protecting them. Just try to tell me how this girl was being protected in Australia.

Anonymous said...

I cant speak for this case, but I will say Im okay with making a few mistakes if it means saving 1 child.

we just have to agree to disagree i guess. Todd is collateral damage in a very just cause.

George said...

Kidnapping children from their parents is not a just cause.