Mother Ordered Released From Jail : Courts: Catherine F. Thomas, accused of stealing her own child, is to be supervised and must wear an electronic monitoring device.

A woman accused of stealing her own child was ordered released from jail Wednesday after a judge found her to be an unlikely flight risk because she has lost all parental rights, including visits.

While freeing Catherine F. Thomas, Los Angeles Municipal Court Commissioner Abraham Khan ordered that she remain under close supervision and wear an electronic monitoring device.

The ankle bracelet will immediately alert authorities if she comes within 200 yards of her 5-year-old daughter, Courtney, whose custody was awarded to a former family friend with no biological ties to the child.

Thomas, 46, had been held at the county jail’s Sybil Brand Institute for a week since her return from Pittsburgh, Pa., where she was seized with her daughter Sept. 17 after a seven-week disappearance.

Charged with felony child abduction and probation violation for having fled with Courtney once before, she had been unable to post the $120,000 bond Khan set last week.

But on Wednesday, after reviewing a favorable report from the county Probation Department and “quite a few letters” from friends, Khan was persuaded that the former Thousand Oaks resident should not remain behind bars.

Her old employer is willing to rehire her, “she has learned her lesson,” and she now intends to fight for her daughter through the legal system, according to the county report.

“Perhaps the ends of justice here could be better achieved by allowing Ms. Thomas released through some supervised program,” said Los Angeles Municipal Court Commissioner Abraham Khan, who scheduled a preliminary hearing on Oct. 12.

Thomas’ attorney, David S. Kestenbaum of Van Nuys said afterward that Thomas’ “first wish” was to hug her two sons, ages 13 and 16. Then she plans to prepare her criminal defense and finally, he said, “to get Courtney back from family court.”

Deputy District Atty. Linda Acaldo opposed Thomas’ release, citing her record of twice fleeing with the child.

Acaldo said that an investigator for the district attorney’s office had turned up evidence that during her recent disappearance, Thomas had used a Nevada driver’s license issued under an alias in April--indicating that her flight had been “premeditated and not done in a momentary panic.”

But Khan apparently agreed with Thomas’ attorneys that without access to Courtney, the woman now had no reason to run.

Thomas, a single mother of three, says she fled with her youngest child during a monitored visit July 29 because she was told that the girl’s legal father, Kevin Thomas of Van Nuys, was going to court the next morning to seek an end to her visitation rights, and that she “just panicked.” The next day her parental rights including visitation were revoked as a result of her flight.

Kevin Thomas, an openly gay, 43-year-old bill collector, successfully sued for paternity rights to Courtney after he and her mother, once close friends, had a falling out and she began denying him visits with the child. Neither he nor his lawyer could be reached for comment Wednesday.

He claims they had an informal agreement to raise Courtney together and that the girl considered him to be her father. Catherine Thomas claims he has exaggerated his role as a baby-sitter and friend and became obsessed with her daughter.

A hearing is set for tomorrow in family court on Kevin Thomas’ motion to revoke Catherine Thomas’ right to seek a new trial because of her flight. Catherine Thomas’ attorneys cited the hearing as evidence that Kevin Thomas is trying to keep the mother and daughter apart, despite claims that he wants them to maintain a relationship.

Earlier this month, after Catherine and Courtney Thomas were seized in Pittsburgh, Kevin Thomas testified during an emergency hearing there that he had no intention of pursuing criminal charges against Catherine Thomas and that “he was going to do everything within his power to make sure the child and mother maintain contact,” according to Patricia Diulus-Myers, Catherine Thomas’ Pittsburgh attorney.