Chieti, 22 November 2025 – “We would like to stay, but we are considering another option: we take the passports, my wife with the children returns to Australia and I stay here to look after the animals. We hope not, because we like our home here”. Talking is Nathan Trevallion51, former chef originally from Bristol, UK, father of three children removed from their parents by order of the Juvenile Court of L’Aquila, revealing the pain and frustration of the forced separation. The story of family Anglo-Australian that lives in the woods Of Palmoliin the province of Chieti, sparks a lively debate on the boundary between educational freedom and protection of minors’ rights. The deputy prime minister Matteo Salvini expresses his desire to go to Palmoli to support the family, stigmatizing the action of the State which “in a shameful way enters into the merits of private education and personal life choices”. While, according to Adnkronos, the Prime Minister Giorgia Melonialarmed by the story, would have had a conversation with the Minister of Justice, Carlo Nordio. The hypothesis is that the soldiers could be sent from via Arenula in the next few hours inspectors to shed light on the measures of Juvenile Court.
The family, which has long lived in a condition of almost self-sufficiency – without running water and with very poor sanitary facilities, in a dilapidated ruin and a caravan in the woods -, saw her three children (an eight-year-old girl and two six-year-old twins) moved to a family home in the Vasto area. There they will remain together with their mother Catherine Birmingham45 years old, even though the woman is forced to sleep in a room downstairs, separated from her children, a situation that the father defines as “the hardest thing” to bear. “The children are sad, but they are also agitated, excited, hyperactive. They are running away from their feelings, from the pain,” Catherine tells the ‘Centre’.
The order ordering the removal of the three minors is based not on the lack of right to education, but on the “danger of violation of the right to social life”, indicating i serious psychological and educational effects arising fromisolation of minorswho do not compare themselves with their peers and live in unsafe housing conditions. The Court also highlighted the impossibility of guaranteeing the safety of the ‘house in the woods’, the absence of essentials electrical, water and heating systemsin addition to the refusal of parents to subject their children to health checks and treatments mandatory by law. The family’s lawyer, Giovanni Angelucci, disputes the provision, defining it as unfounded and assures the appeal: “Falsehoods were written in the sentence”.
Among the objections there is also that concerning theschool eligibility certificate for the older girl. “The ordinance still insists on the education of minors who would not have authorization tohome schooling. The eldest is also contesting the certificate of suitability for moving to the third class because it has not been ratified by the ministry. Certification that, however, it exists and is also registered”. From a pedagogical point of view, the Court’s decision was judged excessive by Saverio Santamaitafull professor of History of Pedagogy at the University of Chieti-Pescara. The scholar underlines how the right of parents to educate their children is constitutionally guaranteedalthough not absolute, and argued that the measure is disproportionate with respect to the situation. According to him, a dialogue could be opened with the family by attempting to convince parents to send their children to schoolinstead of proceeding with the removal and suspension of parental rights.
