Amber Alert case
Welland mom pleads guilty...
A Welland mother at the heart of a custody battle over a nine-yearold girl which resulted in a Canadawide manhunt last year has been granted a conditional discharge after pleading guilty to breaching a family court order.
Under the terms of the discharge, Allana Haist was placed on probation for nine months.
If she stays out of trouble for the duration of her probation, there will be no criminal conviction registered against her.
Judge Tory Colvin said the 39-year-old, who has no prior criminal record, has learned a “very expensive and painful lesson.”
“… court orders, whether you like it or not, have to be obeyed,” he said.
“There are ways of challenging them, but none of those ways involves simply taking the law into your own hands.”
“We cannot return to the law of the jungle or we would no longer have a civilization. To do anything otherwise is to simply undermine the rule of law.”
Assistant Crown attorney Tim Hill told court Haist and her husband Mohamed Abdel-Motaleb had been living in Egypt with their daughter when there was a “family breakdown.” Court proceedings with respect to custody and access were ongoing in an Egyptian court.
Haist fled from the Middle East with her daughter in 2015, despite a court order prohibiting her from taking the child out of the country.
When her husband learned of their whereabouts, he traveled to Canada and commenced child custody proceedings in Niagara.
At the start of the custody hearings, a family court judge imposed several orders, including one which prohibited Haist from removing the girl from Welland.
Niagara Regional Police, fearing for the “safety of the child” issued an Amber Alert on Dec. 2, 2016 after Haist failed to attend a court hearing in Welland.
A Canada-wide warrant was issued for her arrest a few days later and she was later apprehended in Hamilton.
Haist had originally been charged with child abduction. That charge was withdrawn May 31 in an Ontario Court of Justice in Welland after she pleaded guilty to breaching the court order.
After reviewing the file, Hill told the judge, the Crown concluded a charge of breaching a court order was the most appropriate offence given the circumstances.
“There has been already a great deal of judicial ink spilled on this matter and this should bring at least this unfortunate chapter to a close,” he said.
Defence counsel George Walker had presented a book of character references on behalf of his client, some 50 in total.
“There is an immense amount of popular support for you which is not a factor in terms of arriving at a decision,” the judge said.
“Is is a factor, however, in recognizing that you have support in the community. You can now start to look forward and build a positive life for yourself in this community. That is the good news.”
Colvin told Haist the discharge could be revoked and a conviction entered in its place if she fails to comply with conditions of her probation. If convicted of breach of probation, she could face a jail term of up to six months.
“I hope this is the beginning of a new and very successful life and career for you,” the judge added.
Abdel-Motaleb returned to Egypt with his daughter last January after a local judge ruled that Ontario courts would not assume jurisdiction in the custody case.
During a week-long hearing, Haist claimed her estranged husband had sexually assaulted their young daughter.
That judge in that matter ruled he could find “no credible evidence of the prospect of sexual abuse,” and dismissed the allegations as “a malicious contrivance of the mother.”
He referred to Haist, who has a PhD in philosophy, as a “remorseless and persistent liar.”