Luka Dončić flew back to Los Angeles without Gabriela and Olivia, and the only instrument left was a sealed filing under the 1980 Hague Convention. The Lakers’ 27-year-old franchise guard spent the entire offseason in Slovenia trying to bring his daughters to the United States. He hosted a team minicamp there. He set a personal resolution target of September 25. That date passed with nothing locked. He returned for training camp with no public guarantee of when he would see them during the season.
A source with knowledge of the matter confirmed to PEOPLE that Dončić has now filed the petition in Slovenia. The Athletic first reported it. Under Slovenian rules the document itself stays private. The Convention, which both the United States and Slovenia have joined, can be used to organize or secure effective rights of access; it does not automatically relocate the children or award permanent custody. It simply forces the stalled private track into a formal process.
“Nothing is more important to me than my daughters,” Dončić said in the statement shared with The Athletic. “I will do whatever it takes to make sure they have both parents present in their lives.”
I read that as operational, not ornamental. An NBA season runs roughly eight months on U.S. soil. Gabriela is 2. Olivia is 9 months. Their mother, Anamaria Goltes, has them in Slovenia. Without an enforceable access order, the geometry never closes.
The Calendar That Broke Private Talks
The record is chronological and public. Gabriela was born in the United States in late 2023 while Dončić still played in Dallas. Olivia was born in Slovenia in December 2025; he missed the Lakers’ games against Toronto and Boston to be there. Around that visit a disagreement over bringing Gabriela to the U.S. produced a police call. The police report reviewed by ESPN found no criminal offense.
On February 26 he filed an interim parental-contact petition in Slovenian courts. Days later Goltes sought child support and attorney fees in Los Angeles County Superior Court. Dončić ended the engagement in the same window.
“I love my daughters more than anything and I’ve been doing everything I can for them to be with me in the U.S. during the season, but that hasn’t been possible, so I recently made the tough decision to end my engagement,” he told ESPN. “Everything I do is for my daughters’ happiness and I will always fight to be with them and give them the best life I can.”
He skipped Slovenian national-team duty after the Lakers’ playoff exit, citing how difficult it had been to see the girls over the prior eight months. In August Goltes withdrew the California support petition without prejudice, writing that she had the “specific intention of resolving this matter amicably and by a mutual agreement which is in the best interests of our children.” Custody remained under Slovenian jurisdiction. A large settlement figure circulated in earlier tabloid reporting; that number is not confirmed in the October Hague coverage and I am not treating it as fact.
By early October the amicable lane had produced no daughters on the return flight. The Hague petition followed.
Leverage Arguments Meet an NBA Schedule
The cleanest counter-reading is leverage. Goltes holds day-to-day care. She stepped back from the California support case and put mutual agreement on the record. A cross-border filing can look like escalation from that side of the table. That case deserves to be stated plainly.
The answer sits in the job description itself. Dončić works under a three-year, $165 million Lakers extension. His workplace is Los Angeles for the bulk of the year. He spent the summer on the ground in Slovenia and still left empty-handed after the September 25 target. When interim Slovenian contact efforts and private negotiation have not secured regular season-long access, the Convention is the remaining tool built for exactly that problem. Proceedings stay sealed. No ruling has been made public. No travel date exists yet.
I am not grading parenting quality from box scores. I am grading enforceability against an immovable NBA calendar and two children still measured in months and single digits.
Lakers camp does not pause for foreign court dockets. Focus, travel, and availability now partially live outside basketball control. The franchise bought the superstar version. The version that boarded the plane without his daughters is the one filing the petition because every softer channel failed. The next date that matters will not appear on the league schedule. Until it does, the public file is the September miss, the sealed Hague step, and two little girls still in Slovenia while their father starts another Lakers season.
