Actress Kelly Rutherford has taken the custody battle for her children to federal court, claiming they have been "deported" by their father, who lives in France, but her efforts to keep them stateside appear to have failed Wednesday.
The New York Daily News said Rutherford “stormed out of” the Manhattan Federal courtroom where her case was being heard when she learned a judge would rule against her and send the children to live with their father, Daniel Giersch, in France.
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Rutherford has gone through a very public fight over custody of her son Hermes, 7, and daughter Helena, 5, with whom she shares a 50-50 caretaking split with their father.
But Giersch, a German citizen, was given physical custody of the children by a California Superior Court judge in August 2012, after his visa was revoked, making it impossible for him to co-parent on American soil. Rutherford was ordered to travel to France to see them.
An ABC News commentary from 2012 after that decision called it “one of the worst custody decisions. Ever.”
In her latest legal efforts to keep the children stateside, Rutherford is trying to get the federal government to “take legal custody” of the children,
“ensuring that they remain in the United States,” ABC quoted a court filing.
“This is a clever attempt on her part to circumvent the state court and go directly to a federal court claiming that her children are being deported,” legal analyst Dana Cole, who is not involved in the case, told ABC News.
But the attempt appears to have failed after U.S. District Court Judge Andrew Carter said he would not overrule the California custody order from 2012, the Daily News said.
“I went bankrupt fighting to keep my own children in my own country as a U.S. citizen,” Rutherford told the Daily News. “My own country won't protect the rights of my own children. My ex-husband got kicked out of the country and my children are with him. I'm not the one that got my visa revoked.”
Rutherford has appeared in "Gossip Girl" and soap operas "Generations" and "Melrose Place."
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