by REERA YOO | @reeraboo
editor@charactermedia.com
Nan-hui Jo, a single mother who fled to South Korea with her American-born daughter in hopes of escaping physical and emotional abuse inflicted by her former partner and child’s father, Jesse Charlton, was found guilty of child abduction on Tuesday.
Judge David Rosenberg has delayed the sentencing until April 1 to review the decision, according to the Sacramento Bee. However, Jo’s conviction could result in her deportation and Charlton maintaining full custody of their daughter Vitz Da, also known as Hwi, who is now 6 years old.
Charlton, who served as a machine-gunner for two tours in Mosul, Iraq, has admitted that he suffers from traumatic brain injuries and severe PTSD and has been determined to be 70 percent disabled by the Veterans Affairs Department. While he has never been arrested for domestic violence, Charlton has testified in court that he once grabbed Jo by the throat and threw her against a wall.
After her student visa expired in 2009, Jo took her daughter from Sacramento to South Korea without notifying her partner. While Jo cared for Hwi in her home country, Charlton emailed her threats of hiring a bounty hunter and filed charges against her for child abduction. Thus, when Jo landed in Hawaii last July to look for schools for her daughter, she was immediately arrested and sent to Yolo County jail, where she remained incarcerated since December.
It is unclear when Jo will be reunited with her daughter again.
Over the past several months, Jo’s case has been closely followed by Asian American, domestic violence and immigration advocates, who have rallied support with the #StandWithNanHui social media campaign.
“We are very disappointed and saddened to hear that the jury decided to convict Nan-Hui Jo today,” Hyejin Shim of Korean American Coalition to End Domestic Abuse (KACEDA) told NBC News. “However, we know that when it comes to the criminal legal system, it is very common for survivors of domestic violence to be criminalized and blamed, not supported. What happened today is precisely why so many survivors fear our justice systems.”
Despite the guilty verdict, advocates will be organizing a rally on Thursday, March 5 at the San Francisco office of Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) and Customs and Border Protection (CBP). A new petition is also currently being circulated on social media, urging people to call and demand ICE and CBP to exercise its prosecutorial discretion to drop Nan-Hui’s case.
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Featured image by Dillon Sung via KACEDA
