INQUISITR.COM / Entertainment

Kelly Rutherford’s Shocking Claim That Her Daughter Almost Drowned Under Her Father’s Supervision

By Niki Cruz
Published on: 10:43 PST, Aug 12, 2015

Actress Kelly Rutherford’s children were just ordered to go back to Monaco with their father, Daniel Giersch, after a short stay with their mother in New York. It was the first time that Rutherford has had the children in the States in years after battling for custody since 2010.

Now, People magazine has obtained a shocking claim that Rutherford’s daughter almost drowned under her father’s watch. A former Merrill Lynch trader has come to the defense of the Gossip Girl actress and said that she witnessed Helena almost drowning while on a 2012 trip to Bermuda.

“I observed Helena fall into the hotel pool and nearly drown.”

This piece of evidence was filed in 2012 as part of Rutherford’s custody battle with her estranged ex-husband. In the statement it’s said that Giersch didn’t realize what was happening until she was already in the pool trying to save Helena.

“As soon as the man [Giersch] saw me holding his daughter, who was still whimpering, he jumped over and ran to us. He appeared terrified and took Helena from my arms.”

As the Inquisitr reported, yesterday a judge ordered Kelly to hand over her children to Monaco. The actress had originally kept the children in New York with her, and didn’t intend on returning them due to the new ruling that the U.S. courts don’t have any jurisdiction over her children. Rutherford was only recently granted a temporary summer visit with her two children, Hermes, 8, and Helena, 6, and was supposed to return them to Monaco.

On Tuesday night Daniel Giersch’s mother, the children’s grandmother, returned to Nice, France, with Hermes and Helena.

Of the judge’s ruling, Kelly said, “Judge Ellen Gesmer effectively arrested my children, claiming she had authority under habeas corpus to take them into custody because of a foreign country’s court order. But the law is clear that a New York judge cannot enforce any order from a foreign country unless and until the foreign order is ‘registered’ in the United States.”

She continued, “Not only was there no Monaco court order registered in New York, no government official from Monaco asked the New York judge to register an order, or take any action against me or my children.”

“The children’s father didn’t care enough about his children to be here himself. Contrary to his many false claims, he, like all German citizens, can come to this country anytime on his German passport. But he didn’t bother.”

Many people seem to have very mixed feelings about this case.

[Photo by Kris Connor / Getty Images]

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