For months now, Paul Staehle and Karine Martins have been fighting for custody of their two young sons.
Most custody battles involving a pair of exes have the two facing off. Oddly, in this case, Paul and Karine are on the same side.
Neither Paul nor Karine has custody of Pierre and Ethan right now. They both dearly wish to change this.
Now, Paul has shared a milestone in their efforts to get their kids back. They have both completed a batterer’s intervention program.
This week, Paul Staehle took to his Instagram Story to update his followers and other 90 Day Fiance fans.
“Myself and Karine were both ordered to complete this course by CPS,” he captioned.
Paul added that he and Karine had to fulfill this precondition “along with other programs and requirements.”
Paul’s actual post was a photograph (or perhaps a scan) of a certificate.
It was a “Batterer’s Intervention Program Certificate of Completion.”
There, in awkward lettering, Paul had printed his name. The date of completion lists January 13, 2023.
Why did Paul wait nearly a month to share the news? With Paul, you honestly never know.
But it is possible that he was waiting until Karine completed her course and received her certificate. After all, his post suggested that she, too, has a matching cert.
At the same time, maybe they just took a few weeks to send him the document. Paul may have felt that he needed to upload the document in order to share the news.
As always, you never know quite what Paul may be thinking. Particularly when it comes to what he posts on Instagram.
Or says in interviews.
In fact, it is almost entirely through Paul’s lack of a coherent filter that we have so much information on this distressing mess.
In late 2021, a video made the rounds on social media, appearing to show Karine pulling Paul’s hair.
The possible domestic incident took place in front of one of their children.
Notoriously, Paul records everything in and around the home. This unnerving practice has come up before.
It is possible that Karine was physically abusing Paul when this happened. Some longtime fans suspect that the video may have received dishonest editing.
(Relatedly, a number of fans wonder if Paul released the video as retaliation after Karine left him … though this is speculation)
Either way, it was around this time that Karine lost custody of their sons.
Then, several months later, in 2022, 90 Day Fiance fans noted that Pierre Staehle was a “missing person.”
Did Paul kidnap his young son? If so, from whom? Well … that’s complicated.
Simply put, we know that Paul took Pierre to another state while traveling for work. During that time, apparently CPS came looking to check on Pierre and couldn’t find him.
It’s unclear what Paul was thinking at the time (are you seeing a pattern?) except that Pierre has attachment issues.
However, when he and Pierre returned, he found himself in family court. Like his ex, he no longer had custody of either of his sons.
To Paul’s distress, his family could not take in his children, either. Apparently CPS did not consider them reliable, either for caring for the boys or for abiding by court instructions regarding things like supervision.
Paul has since made multiple, sometimes competing claims about this.
At one time, he claimed that family court and CPS were on his back because Karine had told them that he wanted to kill her.
More recently, Paul’s story has been that he allowed Karine to see the boys unsupervised, and that this cost him custody. Who knows?
We don’t know how many hoops Paul or Karine will have to jump through to regain custody. If that is even possible.
(Yes, worse people have regained custody. But better people have lost it. This is not a good system; it’s just the one that we have)
Many 90 Day Fiance fans are leery of Paul and Karine’s parenting, either separate or together. So people have mixed feelings about literally every part of this.
Paul Staehle: I Finished My Batterer’s Intervention Program! Can I Have My Kids … was originally published on The Hollywood Gossip.