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Court Won't Bar Return of Boy In Abuse Case to Zimbabwe

Court Won't Bar Return of Boy In Abuse Case to Zimbabwe
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January 1, 1988, Section 1, Page 33Buy Reprints
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A New York State appeals panel ruled yesterday that state courts may not block the forcible return to Zimbabwe of a 9-year-old boy whose father, a Zimbabwean official with diplomatic immunity, is accused of brutally beating him at their Queens home.

But city welfare officials, arguing that the child was terrified of being reunited with his family, said they would lodge an urgent appeal with the State Department, asking it to block the return on humanitarian grounds. The State Department, acting on behalf of Zimbabwe under diplomatic law, has argued in court for the boy's return. ''Our examination of the child indicates that there could be serious psychological problems if the child is returned to Zimbabwe,'' said the city's Commissioner of Human Resources, William Grinker. ''We want the transfer delayed until we can assure that he will not be damaged by a precipitous return to his native country.''

City officials said yesterday's ruling exhausted the principal legal avenues for preventing the boy's transfer. But they said a final disposition of the case would await a decision on a petition for asylum that had been filed on the boy's behalf by city officials and Legal Aid lawyers.

The boy, Terrence Karamba, was placed by the Human Resources Administration in a foster home on Long Island on Dec. 11 after his elementary school teachers noticed suspicious scars and injuries. The child and his 7-year-old sister, who was also placed in city custody but was later released to the family, told officials the wounds had been inflicted by their father, Floyd Karamba, an administrative attache at the Zimbabwean Mission to the United Nations. No Charges Filed

Since Mr. Karamba has diplomatic immunity, no charges were filed against him, and the case has become a sensitive diplomatic issue between his country and American authorities. Federal officials said Mr. Karamba and his family were preparing to leave New York and return to Zimbabwe.

In court proceedings, the State Department has asked that the boy be released from foster care, asserting his father's immunity from prosecution. Federal officials also said theyhad received assurances from the Zimbabwean Government that the boy's welfare would be protected and that he would not be returned to his family.

But lawyers from the Legal Aid Society, which has argued against the transfer, said psychological tests had shown that the boy, who speaks colloquial American English and likes to wear a New York Yankees baseball cap, was deeply afraid of returning to his country. Where He Feels Safe

''The psychological test that was done a few days ago indicates that his foster home is the one place in the world where he feels safe,'' said Lenore Gittis, an attorney in charge of the Juvenile Rights Division of the Legal Aid Society in Manhattan.

In court papers, the city's Human Resources Administration and the Legal Aid Society accused the boy's father of regularly beating the family's three children, and of singling Terrence out for special brutality in their home at 184-35 Midland Parkway in Jamaica, Queens.

''The respondent father has, on several occasions, removed all of Terrence's clothing,'' the lawyers argued in a family court petition, ''tied his arms behind his back with wire or rope, tied his legs together, and hung him by his bound arms from a pipe in the basement of the case address. After doing so, the respondent has then beaten Terrence with an electrical extension cord.''

At least once, the petition asserts, Mr. Karamba untied his son while he was suspended from the ceiling, sending him to the floor face first and injuring his nose and lips.

According to lawyers who have worked on the case, the beatings left Terrence with cuts, welts and scars over most of his body.

''His back almost looks like a Venetian blind,'' said Erving Weisberg, a Legal Aid attorney who is working on the case. ''He had been beaten up and down.''

Telephone calls to Mr. Karamba and to the Zimbabwean Mission were not answered yesterday.

City officials said Mr. Karamba's other two children, a 7-year-old girl and a 3-year-old girl, did not appear to be injured and have been returned to their family.

But they said that, in psychological terms, Terrence had ''reverted to age 1'' when he was asked about returning to his home.

When told he was to meet with his mother one week ago, child welfare officials said, the boy locked himself in a bathroom and refused to come out. Brought to another meeting with his mother a day later, he pulled his coat over his head and refused to speak with her except to shout angrily that she had allowed him to be beaten.

When the case was brought before Family Court in Queens, the State Department won a dismissal on the ground of Mr. Karamba's immunity from prosecution. That dismissal was upheld in yesterday's ruling by a four-member panel of the Appellate Division of State Supreme Court.

The assistant United States attorney who handled the case for the State Department, Igou Allbray, said the United States had no choice but to return the child under diplomatic law. And he stressed that American diplomats in Zimbabwe had arranged to insure the boy's welfare in his own country.

''They have there a well-developed administrative and legal structure to deal with child abuse,'' Mr. Allbray said after yesterday's ruling. ''His Government has been most anxious to have his return, and the President of Zimbabwe has taken a personal interest in the matter.''

But the Human Resources Administration lawyer who handled the case, Robert F. Wayburn, said the city would appeal for a delay in the transfer despite their weak legal grounds for doing so.

''There is no question my mind that, legally, they are entitled to effect the transfer,'' Mr. Wayburn said. ''But that doesn't do away with our concerns for the child. It's not a matter of law or legal proceeding, but simply a humanitarian appeal - don't do this if it's going to harm the boy.''

A version of this article appears in print on  , Section 1, Page 33 of the National edition with the headline: Court Won't Bar Return of Boy In Abuse Case to Zimbabwe. Order Reprints | Today’s Paper | Subscribe

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