This week on Legally Us, Rachael Bennett, a certified family law specialist and senior attorney at Sullivan Law & Associates, breaks down Gleb Savchenko and ex-wife Elena Samodanova’s international custody dispute.
“In California, the threshold age is 14, so when a child who is 14 or older has formed what’s called an independent preference for living with one parent over the other, the court does have to take that into consideration,” Bennett tells Us. “I would highlight there’s a ton of caveats to that. The child is still ultimately a child, and the judge still has to consider what will be in the child’s best interest, even if it doesn’t fully align with her preferences.”
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On August 11, Samodanova, 41, filed an emergency court order requesting sole legal and physical custody of the exes’ daughters, Olivia, 15, and Zlata, 8. She also asked for Olivia to be returned to her care in Hong Kong, claiming she doesn’t know where Savchenko and their daughters were and was only able to communicate with Olivia through Instagram messages.
The Dancing with the Stars pro, 42, vehemently opposed the choreographer’s motion, alleging that Olivia didn’t want to be in frequent contact with her mother.
Savchenko filed for sole custody of Olivia in July, asking the court for permission to enroll his eldest child in high school in Los Angeles.
Savchenko and Samodanova appeared in court on Tuesday, August 18, (Samodanova joined virtually from Hong Kong), but their hearing was postponed due to technical difficulties.
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Bennett explains, “In this case, Olivia is old enough to state her preference for who to live with, and she will have the opportunity to explain her reasoning behind it, but even if she sides with one parent over the other, it won’t automatically guarantee that’s who she’ll live with. The court will ultimately make that decision.”
On Tuesday, Savchenko exclusively told Us outside the courthouse, “I feel frustrated, but I feel good because the truth always wins. Hopefully, in a couple of days, we can figure it out and Olivia can go to school and be happy and live with me and visit her sister and her sister can come here and we can all live a good happy life with no problems.”
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Samodanova claimed that Olivia was thriving at her international school and in her amateur ballroom dance career, telling Us in an August 17 statement, “Olivia loves both of her parents deeply, and her father is an important part of her life. I respect that relationship and always will. But loving both parents should never require a child to be placed in the middle of a legal or public battle. As her parents, we have a responsibility to put her future ahead of our disagreements.”
Despite the two heading back to court, Bennett tells Us that this case could be far from over adding, “If there’s some ambiguity over the child’s preference, and either parent thinks that they may be able to sway her, they may push it towards trial and drag this out even further, but if it’s fairly certain what the child wants, and there’s not many other facts that support the other parent’s position, they may just let it go.”
Samodanova and Savchenko were married for 14 years and welcomed two daughters before calling it quits in November 2020. (The former couple, who wed in July 2006, finalized their divorce in October 2021.)
Samodanova and her partner, Vlad Kvartin, are based in Hong Kong, where Olivia and Zlata are enrolled in school. Samodanova and Kvartin also welcomed their daughter, Victoria, in December 2025.
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