Nishika Samaratunga abducted her sons in March, in breach of a court order, and has not been heard from since.
An American father has called on the public to come forward with information which could locate his British ex-wife, who abducted their two sons in the UK earlier this year and has been on the run for almost six months.
Nishika Samaratunga, a 34-year-old British citizen from a prominent Sri Lankan tea-making family, has been concealing the whereabouts of five-year-old Blaine Baier and three-year-old Nathaniel Baier, known as Nate.
The boys were born in the United States and were being cared for by their father, Ben Baier, who lives near Denver, Colorado.
In March, Mr Baier brought the boys to the UK so they could visit their mother as part of court-ordered contact following their separation, but she failed to return them to him, and he has not seen his sons since.
Court proceedings in both the High Court in the UK and a court in Colorado remain ongoing as Mr Baier seeks his sons’ return, with the latter previously authorising American law enforcement to take custody of the children due to a “credible risk that the children are in imminent danger”.
Late last month, the Colorado court ordered that Ms Samaratunga be prevented from seeing the boys as she “presents an ongoing significant risk of harm” to them.
In a 29-page ruling, District Judge Michal Anne Lord-Blegen said: “Her abduction of the children, a crime in both the United States and the United Kingdom, confirms that she will take any measure to keep the children from (their) father.”
Mr Baier’s lawyers have previously expressed concern that the two boys, who have autism, do not appear to be attending school or nursery and are not receiving medical care.
The 43-year-old has now urged anyone with information about his children’s whereabouts to come forward.
He said: “My only concern at this point is ensuring that Blaine and Nathaniel are safe – children should not have to grow up on the run.
“Anything the British public can do to help us locate the children will help them get the support that they need.
“For more than five months now they have been cut off from friends, family and the only home they’d ever known, without access to the necessary resources to support their health and development.
“Please, Nishika, bring the boys home.”
The pair married in 2020, with Ms Samaratunga moving to the US, but their relationship broke down in 2024.
Ms Samaratunga then applied to a Colorado court to relocate the children to London in August last year.
After this was refused, she returned to the UK without them the following month, leaving them in the care of their maternal grandmother in the US.
Judge Lord-Blegen said that while caring for the boys before she left the US, Ms Samaratunga allowed the family home to become “uninhabitable” and to “deteriorate to the point that it was unsafe and unsanitary for the children to reside”.
She said: “The children were residing in a home the condition of which bordered on injurious and neglectful, putting her desire to punish, harm, and disparage (their) father ahead of the children’s need for a secure, safe, and clean residence.”
The judge continued that after Ms Samaratunga returned to the UK, she made further requests to relocate the children and falsely accused Mr Baier of child abuse and domestic violence as part of her “plotting against him” in a bid to prevent him from “having any meaningful contact” with their sons.
The Colorado court ordered in October that Mr Baier become their sons’ primary custodial parent and that the children live in the state, but also ordered Mr Baier to take the children to England so they could spend time with Ms Samaratunga, with a first visit taking place between December and January.
But when Mr Baier went to the airport to take his sons back to the US following the second visit in March, Ms Samaratunga failed to return them, in breach of the order of the Colorado court.
The judge said that Mr Baier’s “worst fear has been realised when mother executed her premeditated and routinely threatened abduction of the children”.
Mr Baier began High Court proceedings after the abduction, with judges in the UK issuing orders against several companies in a bid to trace Ms Samaratunga, including JP Morgan Chase, HSBC, Thames Water and the NHS, without success.
Amy Rowe, a partner at Hunters Law LLP, representing Mr Baier, said: “It is vital for Blaine and Nathaniel’s welfare, both short- and long-term, that they are returned home safely.
“Please contact us confidentially if you have any information about their whereabouts.”
