A woman who has been on the run from police for the last three years after kidnapping her son and fleeing the country has been arrested in Belize and returned to Canada to face charges.
Lethbridge police launched an investigation in January of 2014 after Robin Leanne Greenway-Trockstad failed to drop off her 11-month-old son, Treyson, to her ex-husband for a court-ordered visit.
Investigators say she then sent a text message saying she had left the country.
A couple of days later, a court order gave Treyson’s father sole interim custody and his mother was ordered to return the boy to Canada.
The order was also emailed to Greenway-Trockstad and family members who were in contact with her and police say they made several attempts to reach her but she did not respond.
In February 2014, Greenway-Trockstad was charged with child abduction and an arrest warrant was issued.
Investigators tracked her and her son to Mexico, Guatamala and Belize and say she has moved around Central America over that last few years to intentionally evade capture.
“One of the significant challenges of an international investigation is navigating foreign bureaucracy,” said Sgt. Cam Van Roon, a member of the Criminal Investigation Section and the primary investigator. “The agencies we worked with were all very cooperative and helpful, but the laws, rules and regulations they are bound by sometimes differ from ours so there was a lot of red tape that caused delays and those delays often resulted in the accused being able to move before authorities were able to apprehend her.”
Lethbridge police were contacted on July 19, 2017 with information about the wherabouts of the mother and son.
Belize police were able to locate Greenway-Trockstad and Treyson, now four, in San Ignacio in the Cayo District and they were taken into custody.
Greenway-Trockstad was moved to a jail in Belmopan and fined for failing to produce valid immigration documents.
She was deported to the U.S. on August 9th and arrested and then returned to Canada where she was taken into custody by Lethbridge police at the Calgary airport.
The little boy was placed in the care of Belize Human Services and will return to Canada with Global Affairs officials where he will be reunited with his father.
“This has been an extremely lengthy and complex investigation but we are pleased to be one step closer to being able to return this young boy to his father and family in Canada who have been waiting more than three years to get him back,” said Van Roon.
Robin Leanne Greenway-Trockstad, 33, is charged with child abduction and on Thursday was remanded into custody.
She is scheduled to appear in court on Tuesday, August 15, 2017.
