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Stepfamily: Sean Wants To Stay In Brazil

The nine-year-old boy at the center of a bitter international custody tug-of-war wants to continue to live with his Brazilian stepfamily and doesn't want to move back to New Jersey to live with his biological father, two of his Brazlian step-relatives asserted in an exclusive interview on The Early Show Tuesday.

Sean Goldman was taken in 2004 by his mother, Bruna Bianchi, for what was portrayed as a vacation to her native Brazil. They never returned. She later filed for divorce, married a Rio de Janeiro lawyer and died last year giving birth to a daughter. Sean is now living with his mother's new husband, Joao Paulo Silva, who wants to retain custody.

Sean's father, David Goldman, who lives in Tinton Falls, N.J., has been waging a heated battle, seeking custody of Sean under the Hague Convention on international child abductions.

It's a dramatic fight that's reached the highest levels of the Brazilian legal system and United States diplomacy.

But on The Early Show, Silvana Bianchi, Sean's maternal grandmother, told co-anchor Harry Smith there was deep trouble in the Goldman marriage before her daughter left New Jersey. Goldman has described the marriage as a good one.

Bianchi and Silva said Sean loves his stepfamily and feel safe and secure with them, and wants to continue living with them. Silva said he loves Sean as much as he does his biological daughter, and Bianchi said Goldman is welcome to visit Sean as frequently as he wants. Goldman has been accusing the stepfamily of blocking such efforts.


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