The legal question is whether the Uniform Child Custody Jurisdiction and Enforcement Act gives courts authority to determine the custody, or jurisdiction of custody cases, based on the location of the pregnant mother. The tabloid question is who gets to raise baby Samuel Bode Miller-McKenna -- son of Olympic downhill ski legend Bode Miller and a former Marine he met through a "high-end" match-making service -- and where. The New York Times covers the story in "Custody Battle Raises Questions About the Rights of Women."
The child's mother, Sara McKenna, moved from California to New York City while pregnant to enroll at Columbia University. After the baby was born last February she filed in New York courts for temporary custody and was denied by a referee who said that while McKenna had not engaged in abduction, “her appropriation of the child while in utero was irresponsible, reprehensible.” An appeals court panel reversed the decision this month, writing that “putative fathers have neither the right nor the ability to restrict a pregnant woman from her constitutionally protected liberty.”
