A federal judge in Mobile on Monday accepted a no-jail sentencing recommendation for Haley Leah Harris, the woman convicted of international parental kidnapping after taking her 3-year-old daughter from the child’s father’s Orange Beach home and fleeing to Mexico in a case that drew statewide attention last year.
Chief U.S. District Judge Jeffrey Beaverstock sentenced Harris to time served for the period she spent in custody following her return from Mexico in October 2025 until the judge agreed to release her on June 15. Harris, 24, will also spend one year under supervision by the U.S. Probation Office and will not be permitted to leave Oregon, where she currently resides.
Case Background
The case began when Harris took her daughter, Kionni, from the Orange Beach home of the child’s father, Bryce Haugen, and traveled to Mexico. The disappearance prompted a widespread search effort that drew the involvement of some of Alabama’s highest elected officials, who worked to secure the child’s return.
After a jury deadlocked in March, both prosecutors and the defense agreed to allow Beaverstock to decide the case. The judge found Harris guilty of international parental kidnapping.
Defense Plans Appeal
Defense attorney Richard Shields said his client intends to appeal the conviction. The central argument of the appeal will rest on the same defense advanced at trial: that because no court order had revoked Harris’s custody rights at the time she left with Kionni, she had every legal right to travel with her own daughter.
“It was a recommendation by the government that we thought was acceptable,” Shields said of the sentence, noting the prosecution’s agreement to the no-jail outcome.
Conditions of Supervised Release
The terms of Harris’s supervised release include a mandate that she receive mental health treatment and have no contact with the victim or the victim’s family. While incarcerated in Alabama following her return from Mexico, Harris gave birth to a second child fathered by the man she had gone to Mexico to be with. Shields said his client has custody of that baby and remains engaged to the man.
Haugen submitted a written victim impact statement and addressed the court on Monday, describing the two-week period when his daughter’s whereabouts were unknown as one of extreme distress for his family.
Future Custody Questions
Looking ahead, Shields indicated that Harris plans to seek joint custody of Kionni once her supervised release term concludes. “At some point, she’d like to go back and have a normal relationship with her daughter,” he said. Whether such a request would be granted remains an open question that could keep this closely watched case in the courts for years to come.