Mississippi · Snapshot Mississippi Code Release 78 (2020-07), retrieved 2026-09-17

Miss. Code Ann. § 97-3-51: Interstate removal of child under age fourteen by noncustodial parent or relative.

(1) For the purposes of this section, the following terms shall have the meaning herein ascribed unless the context otherwise clearly requires:
(a) “Child” means a person under the age of fourteen (14) years at the time a violation of this section is alleged to have occurred.
(b) “Court order” means an order, decree or judgment of any court of this state which is competent to decide child custody matters.
(2) It shall be unlawful for any noncustodial parent or relative with intent to violate a court order awarding custody of a child to another to remove the child from this state or to hold the child out of state after the entry of a court order.
(3) Any person convicted of a violation of subsection (2) of this section shall be guilty of a felony and may be punished by a fine of not more than Two Thousand Dollars ($2,000.00), or by imprisonment in the state penitentiary for a term not to exceed three (3) years, or by both such fine and imprisonment.
(4) The provisions of this section shall not be construed to repeal, modify or amend any other criminal statute of this state.

Where this section sits in the code

Title 97. Crimes
Chapter 3. Crimes Against the Person

(1) For the purposes of this section, the following terms shall have the meaning herein ascribed unless the context otherwise clearly requires:

(a) “Child” means a person under the age of fourteen (14) years at the time a violation of this section is alleged to have occurred.

(b) “Court order” means an order, decree or judgment of any court of this state which is competent to decide child custody matters.

(2) It shall be unlawful for any noncustodial parent or relative with intent to violate a court order awarding custody of a child to another to remove the child from this state or to hold the child out of state after the entry of a court order.

(3) Any person convicted of a violation of subsection (2) of this section shall be guilty of a felony and may be punished by a fine of not more than Two Thousand Dollars ($2,000.00), or by imprisonment in the state penitentiary for a term not to exceed three (3) years, or by both such fine and imprisonment.

(4) The provisions of this section shall not be construed to repeal, modify or amend any other criminal statute of this state.

Collected 2026-10-27T05:55:07Z. Source file · JSON

Compilation CC BY 4.0, Open US Law (Vaquill AI). GroundRules uses only the releases published under CC BY 4.0: from v2026.09 the compilation is licensed CC BY-NC 4.0, and GroundRules does not use those releases. Each affected row names its release in its vintage label. GroundRules parsed and filtered the compilation to retain enacted text. Source · License

Mississippi electronic product files were republished by Public.Resource.Org under a public-domain dedication. GroundRules uses enacted text from Release 78 only as a labeled supplement to the newer Open US Law rows. Source

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