QCOSTARICA (Via Nydailynews.com) A New Hampshire man who remained on the lam for more than a decade after taking his 8-year-old stepdaughter with her mother to Central America surrendered at the U.S. Embassy in Costa Rica Monday.
“It was time to come home,” Scott Kelley, 50, told People Magazine.
Kelley and his wife Genevieve are charged with taking her daughter Mary Nunes, then 8, from their New Hampshire home without a trace in 2004. Nunes, now 19, has returned to the U.S. and is living in an undisclosed location, the magazine reported.
Genevieve Kelley, a physician, and Scott Kelley, a teacher, were wanted on unlawful flight to avoid prosecution and noncustodial interference kidnapping, according to the U.S. Department of Justice. They lived in Whitefield N.H. and were last known to live in Aurora, Colo. before fleeing to South America.
Authorities conducted an exhaustive and highly publicized search for the parents and said they were concerned for Mary Nunes’ well-being.
Genevieve Kelley surrendered to authorities in November to get medical treatment for a son born to her and her husband while on the lam, reports the New Hampshire Union Leader.
It was time to come home.
Mark Nunes, Genevieve Kelley’s ex-husband, got custody of their daughter and planned to take her to a clinic in Maine for treatment for an illness, the newspaper reported.
But the mother claimed her ex-husband had sexually abused Mary and took her to a facility in Colorado. They then left the country and did not return for 10 years.
The state Division of Children, Youth and Families investigated and said any claims of abuse were “unfounded,” the newspaper reported. Mark Nunes was never charged.
The non-custodial kidnapping charge for Genevieve Kelley was dismissed by a judge but she is scheduled to stand trial on the other charge in May.