U.S. sends plane to Cuba to return child in custody dispute

A federal plane was sent to Cuba to bring home a 10-year-old Utah child, a move that pushed an already tense custody fight into extraordinary territory. What started as a family dispute in Logan ended with international parental kidnapping charges, a cross-border hunt and a rare U.S.-Cuba retrieval operation.

The U.S. Attorney’s Office in Utah said Rose Inessa-Ethington, 42, also known as Eri Ethington, and Blue Inessa-Ethington, 32, also known as Carly Ann Crosby, were deported from Cuba with FBI assistance and later appeared for arraignment in Richmond, Virginia, before being transported to Utah. Prosecutors charged each with one count of international parental kidnapping.

According to the Justice Department, the family was supposed to leave by car for Calgary, Alberta, for a camping trip running from March 29 to April 2, 2026. Instead, investigators say, the group crossed the U.S.-Canada border on March 29, flew from Vancouver to Mexico City and then flew from Mérida, Mexico, to Havana on April 1 using U.S. passports. The child told the biological mother by phone on March 28 that they had arrived in Canada. The custody agreement called for the child to be returned on April 3, but that never happened.

The case escalated after a Utah state court ordered the child returned to the mother on April 13 and granted her exclusive custody. Cuban law enforcement located the group in Cuba on April 16. Logan City Police Chief Jeff Simmons said investigators first treated the case as custodial interference and only later learned about concerns tied to gender-transition surgery. A Logan police spokesperson said those concerns came from one family member.

Federal agents also said Blue Inessa-Ethington withdrew $10,000 from her checking account before leaving. The FBI found a handwritten note at the home with instructions to send a therapist the money and with notes about gender-affirming medical care for children. The complaint does not say whether the adults actually intended to obtain surgery in Cuba, and the charges do not spell out how that would have worked. Gender-affirming surgery is not legal for children in Cuba, though the country’s parliament approved legal gender change for adults without surgery in July 2025.

What makes the case so unusual is not only the allegations, but the machinery used to unwind it. A government plane is not a normal tool in a family-law dispute. Here, federal resources, diplomatic coordination and a criminal kidnapping case were all pulled into the same file, making the return of one child a flashpoint far beyond Utah family court.