tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-60752250709620286592024-02-18T20:56:46.816-08:00Kansas Court WhoresClaudine Dombrowskihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00174108218219442634noreply@blogger.comBlogger2116125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6075225070962028659.post-73869729272942527672013-09-26T05:53:00.001-07:002013-09-26T05:53:51.027-07:00APA: Fathers who batter their children's mothers can be expected to use abusive power and control techniques to control the children<p><img src="http://web.archive.org/web/20050303225918/http://www.apa.org/images/bluebara.gif" width="586" height="38" /><img src="http://web.archive.org/web/20050303225918/http://www.apa.org/images/Pubint01.gif" /></p> <p>Report of the American Psychological Association Presidential Task Force On Violence And The Family</p> <h4><a href="http://www.nnflp.org/apa/issue5.html" target="_blank">ISSUES AND DILEMMAS IN FAMILY VIOLENCE</a></h4> <i></i> <hr /> <h4><u><b>Issue 5</b></u></h4> <h5><b>WHEN PARENTS SEPARATE AFTER AN ABUSIVE RELATIONSHIP, SHOULDN'T FATHERS HAVE AS MUCH RIGHT AS MOTHERS TO BE GRANTED PHYSICAL CUSTODY OF AND VISITATION RIGHTS WITH THEIR CHILDREN?</b> <p><b><i>Tensions exist between children's need for contact with their father and their need to be protected from the physical, sexual and psychological abuse that is common in families where there has been other forms of violence such as woman abuse.</i></b></p> Although most people believe that fathers should have equal access to their children after the termination of a relationship between the parents, the equal-access option is based on the assumption that the fathers will act in their children's best interests. However, that is a naive assumption in situations where family violence has occurred.</h5> <p><strong><font color="#ff0000">Fathers who batter their children's mothers can be expected to use abusive power and control techniques to control the children, too</font></strong>. In many of these families, prior to separation, the men were not actively involved in the raising of their children. To gain control after the marital separation, the fathers fight for the right to be involved. Often children who have been exposed to violence in the family are frightened to confront their father's negative or abusive behavior, and mothers cannot protect them. Sometimes the father tries to alienate the child from the mother by using money and other enticements, negative comments, or restricted access to the telephone during visitation with him. Other times, fathers may threaten or actually kidnap the child to punish the mother for leaving, or to try to force her to return.</p> <p>Most people, including the battered woman herself, believe that when a woman leaves a violent man, she will remain the primary caretaker of their children. Family courts, however, may not consider the history of woman abuse relevant in awarding custody. Recent studies suggest that an abusive man is more likely than a nonviolent father to seek sole physical custody of his children and may be just as likely (or even more likely) to be awarded custody as the mother. Often fathers win physical custody because men generally have greater financial resources and can continue the court battles with more legal assistance over a longer period of time.</p> <p>Family courts frequently minimize the harmful impact of children's witnessing violence between their parents and sometimes are reluctant to believe mothers. If the court ignores the history of violence as the context for the mother's behavior in a custody evaluation, she may appear hostile, uncooperative, or mentally unstable. For example, she may refuse to disclose her address, or may resist unsupervised visitation, especially if she thinks her child is in danger. Psychological evaluators who minimize the importance of violence against the mother, or pathologize her responses to it, may accuse her of alienating the children from the father and may recommend giving the father custody in spite of his history of violence.</p> <p>Some professionals assume that accusations of physical or sexual abuse of children that arise during divorce or custody disputes are likely to be false, but the empirical research to date shows no such increase in false reporting at that time. In many instances, children are frightened about being alone with a father they have seen use violence towards their mother or a father who has abused them. Sometimes children make it clear to the court that they wish to remain with the mother because they are afraid of the father, but their wishes are ignored.</p> <p>Research indicates that high levels of continued conflict between separated and divorced parents hinders children's normal development. Some practitioners now believe that it may be better for children's development to restrict the father's access to them and avoid continued danger to both mothers and the children.</p> <p><a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20050303225918/http://www.apa.org/pi/pii/familyvio/issue4.html"><img border="0" hspace="10" alt="Last Page" src="http://web.archive.org/web/20050303225918/http://www.apa.org/pi/pii/familyvio/back.gif" /></a> <a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20050303225918/http://www.apa.org/pi/pii/familyvio/homepage.html">Table of Contents</a> <a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20050303225918/http://www.apa.org/pi/pii/familyvio/issue6.html"><img border="0" hspace="10" alt="Next Page" src="http://web.archive.org/web/20050303225918/http://www.apa.org/pi/pii/familyvio/next.gif" /></a></p> <hr noshade="noshade" /> <p><a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20050303225918/http://www.apa.org/pi/about.html">About Public Interest</a> � <a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20050303225918/http://www.apa.org/pi/conf.html">Conferences</a> � <a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20050303225918/http://www.apa.org/pi/edmessages.html">Executive Director Messages</a> <br /><a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20050303225918/http://www.apa.org/pi/">Public Interest Home Page</a> <br /><a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20050303225918/http://www.apa.org/pi/programs.html">Program Areas</a> � <a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20050303225918/http://www.apa.org/pi/publicat.html">Publications</a> � <a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20050303225918/http://www.apa.org/pi/student.html">Student Information</a> <br />American Psychological Association <br />Public Interest Directorate <br />750 First Street, NE <br />Washington, DC 20002 <br />E-mail: <a href="mailto:publicinterest@apa.org">publicinterest@apa.org</a></p> <hr /> <p>�1998 American Psychological Association <br /><a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20050303225918/http://www.apa.org/">APA Home Page</a> . <a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20050303225918/http://baldwin.apa.org:88/best/index.html">Search</a> . <a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20050303225918/http://www.apa.org/sitemap.html">Site Map</a></p> Claudine Dombrowskihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00174108218219442634noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6075225070962028659.post-27673333358377614592013-08-25T08:45:00.001-07:002013-08-25T08:45:39.757-07:00Shared Custody Issues in the Context of Domestic Violence<p>Written by Barry Goldstein</p> <p>Sunday, 25 August 2013 08:52</p> <p><img alt="THIS IS what MANDATORY SHARED Parenting does. KILLS" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjW76K3k7_XBrU6l9AJ1cYUKeioS5dpqIuhwpbfvqqEKYWixqYmLexZEWwS6F4ACgNTkXHqVxTi_0QJk8QfHdErKrLXhbLO27DgVwdnVHJlO8eNECFUXM9hOUiIU5V24Xww4XIxURJbDW0/?imgmax=800" /></p> <p>source: <a href="http://site.nomas.org/shared-custody-issues-context-domestic-violence/">NOMAS</a></p> <p>In a Queens New York custody case, the court appointed a prominent psychologist to evaluate a young couple. The psychologist was frequently used as an expert in the New York courts despite a fathers’ rights bias that included a quotation in a New York Times article supporting shared parenting. Throughout his testimony supporting the abusive father, the evaluator could not respond to any of my questions asking for research to support any of his claims. Finally I asked him if there was any research to support his belief that children benefit from a 50-50 division as compared to 70-30. He cited Judith Wallerstein, but could not cite a particular book or article. A colleague put me in touch with Ms. Wallerstein who sent me an email for my continued cross-examination of the evaluator. She said that earlier research had indicated shared parenting might be beneficial in cases where the parents are able to cooperate, but more recent research has demonstrated that shared parenting is in fact harmful to children. One of the problems in our custody courts is that this psychologist, like most experts relied on by the courts does not have the knowledge of up-to-date research or the ability to apply it to custody cases.</p> <p>Shared custody, sometimes referred to as joint custody involves joint decision making by the parents and sometimes also requires something close to a 50-50 division of time with each parent. The equal time division is often important to parents wishing to avoid paying child support. Proponents of shared parenting say it is only fair that parents have the same rights to parenting time with their children and courts claim that they must treat each parent that comes to court equally. This seems fair unless we understand the unstated part that parents should be treated the same <strong>regardless of the quantity and quality of time </strong>each parent spent with the child before the separation. Research about primary attachment is not controversial and demonstrates that a child’s primary attachment figure is more important to the well being of a child than the other parent. Furthermore, although research supports the belief that children benefit from having both parents in their lives, this is not true if one of the parents is abusive. Nevertheless many courts think it is their obligation to treat each parent the same even when one is much more valuable to the child.</p> <h5 align="center">Custody When Neither Parent is Abusive</h5> <p>The concept of shared parenting was supported by an initial study that found a favorable response. Courts were delighted to support shared parenting because it served as a way to compromise a difficult issue and could remove many cases from an already crowded calendar. Abusive fathers who had little involvement with the children during the relationship strongly supported shared parenting as a way to avoid child support and maintain access and control over their victims.</p> <p>The initial study was based on a very limited population and most favorable circumstances that included parents who enthusiastically supported the use of shared parenting, were able to cooperate and lived close together. Later studies that included larger populations and more long term effects of the arrangement demonstrated shared custody to be harmful to children, but these studies failed to dampen the enthusiasm for shared custody in the legal system and by abusers.</p> <p>The studies found that children with two homes in reality had no homes. Children forced to bounce back and forth between their parents’ homes were denied a sense of security and continuity. They could not spend the time with friends that they wanted and often could not participate in a variety of activities because they had to be with the other parent when some of the events occurred. Children were often embarrassed when articles they needed for school or other activities were left in the wrong home. In other words, even when parents were able to cooperate, the shared custody arrangement placed added pressure on the children and made their lives more difficult. Their success in academic studies and social interaction was negatively impacted by the shared custody arrangement.</p> <h5 align="center">Shared Custody in Domestic Violence Cases</h5> <p>Many of the laws and proposed legislation seeking to promote shared custody purport to contain language to create an exception for domestic violence cases and sometimes for other cases in which the parties are unable to cooperate. There is a good reason to treat domestic violence cases differently as shared custody is particularly harmful to children when one of the parents is an abuser. A parent cannot co-parent with an abuser because it is unsafe to challenge him and compromise is impossible when there is unequal power. The fundamental problem, too often missed by courts is that abusers are willing to see their children harmed in order to maintain what they believe is their right to control or punish their partner. Most contested custody cases that courts mistakenly label “high conflict” are in reality domestic violence cases in which fathers use the common abuser tactic of seeking custody to maintain control of their partner or punish her for leaving. Children who witness domestic violence (including non-physical abuse) are more likely to engage in dysfunctional behavior when they are older. Depending on their age when they witness his abuse, their stage of development is disrupted. All batterers have been found to engage in harmful parenting practices including undermining the relationship with the other parent, teaching bad values (sexism) and providing a bad example. In other words, up-to-date research establishes that abusers are not appropriate candidates for custody or shared custody.</p> <p>The benefit of an exception for domestic violence is limited because of the widespread failure of courts to recognize domestic violence in custody cases. Thirty plus years ago when domestic violence first became a public issue there was no research available. Courts, like other bodies developed practices and approaches to consider domestic violence without knowing what worked. At the time domestic violence was mostly focused on physical abuse. The assumption was that mental problems and substance abuse caused domestic violence and that women’s behavior contributed to their partner’s abuse. Courts therefore chose to use mental health professionals as experts although they had no training in the dynamics of domestic violence. Courts assumed that children were not harmed by domestic violence unless they were directly assaulted and his abuse would end once the parties separated. Up-to-date research demonstrates that all of this and many other assumptions still relied on by many professionals in the custody court system are wrong.</p> <p>There is now a specialized body of knowledge about domestic violence, but too often judges and the professionals they rely on are overconfident in their own understanding of domestic violence and fail to consider up-to-date research. Judge Mike Brigner wrote in his chapter for DOMESTIC VIOLENCE, ABUSE and CHILD CUSTODY that when he trains judges they often ask him what to do about women who are lying. When asked what they mean, they cite women who return to their abusers, fail to pursue petitions for protective orders, don’t have police reports or hospital records and the myth that women frequently make false allegations of abuse to gain an advantage in litigation (in reality this occurs only one-two percent of the time). None of these behaviors indicates the women are lying and in fact this is often the safest response they can make particularly when still living with their abuser. Similarly inadequately trained professionals often cite the fact that the children did not seem afraid of the alleged abuser when they observed them as proof the allegations are false. The children understand what the “experts” don’t that the abuser is not going to hurt them in front of others and in fact they could be punished if they demonstrated fear in public. Many professionals in the court system believe they have the ability to determine who is lying just from observation. In fact research shows that aside from a very few elite CIA and FBI agents, no one has been shown to possess this skill. Accordingly these professionals through this belief become more susceptible to abusers who are skilled manipulators. While the unqualified professionals often discredit allegations of abuse for these and other invalid reasons, they fail to look at the pattern of controlling and coercive behaviors that would help them see the pattern of abusive behavior.</p> <p>The result of this and many other mistakes by professionals in the custody court system is that thousands of children are being forced to live with abusers and many protective mothers, who are wrongly dismissed as disgruntled litigants and denied any meaningful role in their children’s lives. Legislatures and courts should be focusing on using the available up-to-date research to protect the safety and secure the potential of children caught up in domestic violence custody cases. Today, shockingly, courts are getting a majority of domestic violence custody cases wrong. This is one of the reasons we recommend that all professionals receive not just general domestic violence training, but specific training in Recognizing Domestic Violence, Gender Bias and The Effects of Domestic Violence on Children. Until courts have and apply this information, our children will not be safe when courts decide their fate.</p> <p>In domestic violence custody cases, the use of shared parenting does not save court time and resources, but rather only postpones extensive litigation at great expense to the parties and harm to the children. Abusers eventually contrive incidents as an excuse to seek sole custody or protective mothers are forced to seek custody because the abusers are hurting the children. Abusive parents with limited parenting skills use shared parenting to get their foot in the door while continuing to harass and abuse their former partners. Court professionals often pressure protective mothers to accept shared custody with their abusers and punish them for trying to protect themselves and their children. Over forty states and many other court districts have sponsored gender bias commissions that have found widespread gender bias. Gender bias is particularly hard to overcome because judges and other professionals engage in gender bias without realizing they are doing so. The studies have shown that in custody cases, mothers are given higher standards of proof, less credibility and are blamed for their abuser’s behavior.</p> <p>When mothers seek to limit contact between their children and their abuser for safety reasons and courts routinely treat this as if she is trying to interfere with the relationship between the children and abusive father, this is an example of blaming mothers for the father’s behavior. Instead of courts pressuring the abuser to stop his controlling and threatening behavior, protective mothers often face retaliation and punishment for trying to protect their children. This is particularly common when courts fail to recognize domestic violence and then punish mothers who continue to believe their abuse allegations. Provisions in shared custody laws that purport to make an exception for domestic violence will continue to be ineffective as long as there is widespread failure to recognize domestic violence and to take it seriously. Accordingly shared custody laws are not beneficial in cases where the parties can voluntarily cooperate and create serious danger to children in domestic violence cases</p> <p> </p> <p>See more at: <a href="http://americanmotherspoliticalparty.org/ampp-article-library-family-court-custody-abuse-dv/5-family-criminal-law-and-research-abuse-dv-child-custody/94-batterers-revenge-punishment-and-continued-abuse-via-court#sthash.OhT2CBag.dpuf">http://americanmotherspoliticalparty.org/ampp-article-library-family-court-custody-abuse-dv/5-family-criminal-law-and-research-abuse-dv-child-custody/94-batterers-revenge-punishment-and-continued-abuse-via-court#sthash.OhT2CBag.dpuf</a></p> Claudine Dombrowskihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00174108218219442634noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6075225070962028659.post-10399668586006087942013-07-24T21:03:00.001-07:002013-07-24T21:03:47.218-07:00Announcement for all Protective Mothers<h5><a href="http://thetruthaboutthefamilycourt.blogspot.com/2013/07/announcement-for-all-protective-mothers.html">Announcement for all Protective Mothers</a></h5> <p>Due to recent revelations by Janice Levinson and Lundy Bancroft of Protective Mother's Alliance, as a contributor to this blog, I hereby denounce JL, LB and PMA. I do not support either of them, the organization with which they are affiliated, and in fact do believe by Levinson's recent actions that both are needlessly and shamelessly throwing TRUE victims of horrendous abuse under the proverbial bus. If you decide to align with either Levinson or Bancroft, please do so with caution.</p> <p><a href="http://thetruthaboutthefamilycourt.blogspot.com/2013/07/announcement-for-all-protective-mothers.html">http://thetruthaboutthefamilycourt.blogspot.com/2013/07/announcement-for-all-protective-mothers.html</a></p> <p><a href="http://claudinedombrowski.blogspot.com/2013/07/reply-to-lundy-bancroft-change-is-here.html">http://claudinedombrowski.blogspot.com/2013/07/reply-to-lundy-bancroft-change-is-here.html</a></p> <p><a href="http://glennscult.blogspot.com/2013/07/due-to-recent-revelations-by-janice.html">http://glennscult.blogspot.com/2013/07/due-to-recent-revelations-by-janice.html</a></p> <p><a href="http://bx.businessweek.com/open-government/janice-levinson-using-the-blood-of-battered-mothers-and-children-for-her-personal-gain/7420065467279087640-54223d6685f4e599a8d5d17d4bb694b9/">http://bx.businessweek.com/open-government/janice-levinson-using-the-blood-of-battered-mothers-and-children-for-her-personal-gain/7420065467279087640-54223d6685f4e599a8d5d17d4bb694b9/</a></p> Claudine Dombrowskihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00174108218219442634noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6075225070962028659.post-32857620248851522622013-07-24T20:16:00.001-07:002013-07-24T20:16:15.187-07:00Kansas Mother Lost Custody to State because she WORKED! Foster Parent Grandmother not allowed to Care For her own Grandson. #Child #Trafficking #Federal #Funded<blockquote> <p><font size="3"><em>On Monday, July 29, 2013, there will be a rally in front of KVC, 1223 Meadow Lark Lane, Kansas City, Kansas, from 9:00 a.m. to 12:00 p.m.</em></font></p> <p><font size="3"><em>This is a rally for the grandmother, Patricia, who was on the local Kansas City News, Channel 4, reporter Tess Koppelman,  last week who stated that even though she had been a foster parent for years for KVC, Patricia was not allowed placement or adoption of her 4 year old grandson.   Patricia's grandson was placed in stranger foster care and her grandson has had cuts and bruises which is possible abuse while in foster care.</em></font></p> </blockquote> <p><a href="http://changingkansas.blogspot.com/2013/07/kansas-kvc-takes-child-from-mother-and.html"><font size="2">http://changingkansas.blogspot.com/2013/07/kansas-kvc-takes-child-from-mother-and.html</font></a></p> <p></p> <p><strong></strong></p> <p></p> <h3>Grandmother fights for custody of own grandson</h3> <div class="post-body entry-content" itemprop="description articleBody"><i>Grandmother is a foster placement for other KVC foster children </i><script height="315px" src="http://player.ooyala.com/iframe.js#ec=lrZ3U1ZDqxjyziJgUKE8AQLwDE3CPakF&pbid=99b31ca60977447aac65383d61b8503b" width="560px"></script><a href="http://fox4kc.com/2013/07/09/grandmother-fights-for-custody-of-own-grandson/">http://fox4kc.com/2013/07/09/grandmother-fights-for-custody-of-own-grandson/</a></div> <p>KANSAS CITY, Kan. — A Kansas grandmother says there’s no reason why she shouldn’t be able to have custody of her own grandson, but for some reason, the state won’t let her have him. Patricia Madison says she is approved by the state of Kansas to be a foster parent, and she’s fostered many children over the last five years. But for some reason she’s not allowed to take in her own grandson.</p> <p>This custody battle has been going on for about a year and a half now. But Madison says she turned to fox 4 for help because she fears her grandchild will never be returned to his family now that the child’s foster parents are interested in adopting him.</p> <p>For more than a year, the only way Madison has been able to see her almost four year-old grandson Tristen is with supervised visits. She used to see him weekly, but then it was changed to once a month.</p> <p>“When I do see him I really don’t know if that’s the last time,” she said tearfully.</p> <p>Madison says about a year and a half ago her grandson was taken away from her son and put into state care. For awhile Tristen was placed with Madison’s daughter, but Madison says KVC, the agency that oversees foster care, took the child away. Madison says it was because they told her daughter that she worked too much.</p> <p>“She works 40 hours a week, I think that’s normal,” Madison says, “you have to work to pay your bills.”</p> <p>Madison says she’s made it clear from the start she wanted to take in her grandson.</p> <p>“I told them I wanted him placed in my care because I had been working with KVC keeping their foster kids,” she said, “and they told me ‘no.’”</p> <p>Madison says she’s never been told exactly why she can’t have Tristen. At one point she says KVC told her it was because of an abuse allegation from 1998. But letters from the state dated last year and last week both confirm that Madison is not on the Abuse and Neglect Registry and is not barred from working with kids.</p> <p>“I want all of this to be investigated,” Madison said, “this is not a way of putting families together this is not the way it’s supposed to be.”</p> <p>Madison keeps the bedroom ready for her grandson to come home but she’s losing hope, and fears that her grandson’s foster family will be allowed to adopt Tristen.</p> <p>“If he’s taken from me, I will never be the same,” she said, “I love him and I miss him and I hope soon he’ll be back with us again.”</p> <p>Both KVC and the state’s Department of Children and Families say they can’t comment on specific cases. But KVC says it does place kids with family members whenever possible. The agency adds that it works with the state and the courts to determine what is best for the child.</p> <p>Kansas, KVC, Child Trafficking, Mother-less, DCF, Whores of the Court, Social Workers, Foster Care, Profit, Patricia Madison, Kansas City,</p> Claudine Dombrowskihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00174108218219442634noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6075225070962028659.post-57114662539469991752013-06-04T08:44:00.001-07:002013-06-04T08:44:45.287-07:00Bill Windsor Sexual Deviant, Homeland Terrorist and His Cult Group Lawless America<h5>Courtesy of the joeys’ – head over and read the comments as Billy boy implodes.</h5> <h5><a href="http://joeyisalittlekid.blogspot.com/2013/05/sexual-deviant-bill-windsor.html">http://joeyisalittlekid.blogspot.com/2013/05/sexual-deviant-bill-windsor.html</a></h5> <h5>Sexual Deviant Bill Windsor</h5> <p><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjEwLSQeEjSEM0ABm2HH3dSt8KWDYvJ4SlhKCFBl-iNSKK3e0uf8GemI5Id9TKnb-7kZg1rb7oQ-ZOSFO_bSLSehKamFuEiK5lgh2eh3kCBKOsB4EQcI1Kk0MXjJCZVFEakZfq8ONxMEn0/s1600/sexual-predator-predators-sex-crime.jpg"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjEwLSQeEjSEM0ABm2HH3dSt8KWDYvJ4SlhKCFBl-iNSKK3e0uf8GemI5Id9TKnb-7kZg1rb7oQ-ZOSFO_bSLSehKamFuEiK5lgh2eh3kCBKOsB4EQcI1Kk0MXjJCZVFEakZfq8ONxMEn0/s1600/sexual-predator-predators-sex-crime.jpg" /></a></p> <p>So Bill tried to co-op a real reporters story on rape and incest.  Bill used it as an opportunity to seek out people to tell him their stories involving rape and incest.  He can no longer be bothered by women with custody issues, but he is more than happy to hear a detailed sordid story of rape or incest.  He sent out this plea: <br />DO YOU HAVE A STORY OF SPOUSAL RAPE OR INCEST? <br />I am communicating with a newspaper writer who is researching a story on spousal rape and incest. He is particularly interested in speaking with survivors whose abuse allegations were handledeither in criminal or family courts. If you would be interested in sharing your story, please email nobodies@att.net with the subject in all caps: RAPE. <br />Well this started a fire-storm as one woman named Jan, rightfully gave the direct contact info to the real reporter doing the story, telling the lemmings to bypass the creepy old man trying to get in the middle.  Bill then lashed out at her <a href="https://www.facebook.com/lawlessamerica">Lawless America</a> Hey Jan, go away. You must be one of the sickos. <br />Then her friend Lynn stuck up for her saying that she said nothing that was either on the order of a liar or a sicko.  So bill then lashed out at her saying all kinds of sexist and delusional things, Bill asked for stories about rape, but instead he exposed himself as being a liar and a perverted fraud:</p> <ul> <li> <p><a href="https://www.facebook.com/lawlessamerica">Lawless America</a> Lynn, you are a liar and a slanderer. Go away. Cease and desist the slander and stalking. I have helped many true victims, not you liars. No one named Lynn Buss has ever em ailed me nor is there a Lynn Buss in my database. You are one of the pathetic liars out there.</p> <p><a href="https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=308303425970622&set=a.267168686750763.1073741826.267163020084663&type=1&comment_id=729224&offset=0&total_comments=21">54 minutes ago</a></p> </li> <li> <p><a href="https://www.facebook.com/lawlessamerica"><img alt="" src="https://fbcdn-profile-a.akamaihd.net/hprofile-ak-ash4/s32x32/373033_267163020084663_1698339765_q.jpg" /></a></p> <p><a href="https://www.facebook.com/lawlessamerica?fref=ts#"></a></p> <p><a href="https://www.facebook.com/lawlessamerica">Lawless America</a> I am asking anyone with information about Jan Halley or Lynn Buss to contact me. I want to expose these people.</p> <p><a href="https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=308303425970622&set=a.267168686750763.1073741826.267163020084663&type=1&comment_id=729232&offset=0&total_comments=21">51 minutes ago</a></p> </li> <li> <p><a href="https://www.facebook.com/lawlessamerica"><img alt="" src="https://fbcdn-profile-a.akamaihd.net/hprofile-ak-ash4/s32x32/373033_267163020084663_1698339765_q.jpg" /></a></p> <p><a href="https://www.facebook.com/lawlessamerica?fref=ts#"></a></p> <p><a href="https://www.facebook.com/lawlessamerica">Lawless America</a> No, Ardith Cunningham. Lynn Buss never emailed me anything. She appears to be a serial liar...as you likely are. You say you know, well, put up or shut up. Paste the proof right here for all to see. I won't ban you for an hour to give you the opportunity. You have libeled me with your comment here, so I demand an immediate apology and retraction. Absent that, I shall see you in court.</p> <p><a href="https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=308303425970622&set=a.267168686750763.1073741826.267163020084663&type=1&comment_id=729237&offset=0&total_comments=21">46 minutes ago</a></p> </li> <li> <p><a href="https://www.facebook.com/lawlessamerica"><img alt="" src="https://fbcdn-profile-a.akamaihd.net/hprofile-ak-ash4/s32x32/373033_267163020084663_1698339765_q.jpg" /></a></p> <p><a href="https://www.facebook.com/lawlessamerica?fref=ts#"></a></p> <p><a href="https://www.facebook.com/lawlessamerica">Lawless America</a> I didn't lose a damn thing. You are a libeler, slanderer, and liar, and your associates are the same. You aren't in my email or database either -- just another scumbag in my opinion. You have 50 minutes. Show us the proof you hav4e "right there on your computer."</p> <p><a href="https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=308303425970622&set=a.267168686750763.1073741826.267163020084663&type=1&comment_id=729242&offset=0&total_comments=21">42 minutes ago</a></p> </li> <li> <p><a href="https://www.facebook.com/lawlessamerica"><img alt="" src="https://fbcdn-profile-a.akamaihd.net/hprofile-ak-ash4/s32x32/373033_267163020084663_1698339765_q.jpg" /></a></p> <p><a href="https://www.facebook.com/lawlessamerica?fref=ts#"></a></p> <p><a href="https://www.facebook.com/lawlessamerica">Lawless America</a> I am sick and tired of all the women who lie their a$$e$ off. Anyone with information about Jan Halley, Lynn Buss, and Ardith Cunningham are encouraged to contact me at nobodies@att.net. I am interested in speaking to former spouses or significant others in the case of some.</p> <p><a href="https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=308303425970622&set=a.267168686750763.1073741826.267163020084663&type=1&comment_id=729245&offset=0&total_comments=21">39 minutes ago</a></p> </li> <li> <p><a href="https://www.facebook.com/lawlessamerica"><img alt="" src="https://fbcdn-profile-a.akamaihd.net/hprofile-ak-ash4/s32x32/373033_267163020084663_1698339765_q.jpg" /></a></p> <p><a href="https://www.facebook.com/lawlessamerica?fref=ts#"></a></p> <p><a href="https://www.facebook.com/lawlessamerica">Lawless America</a> You are a real sicko, Ardith Cunningham. You are a liar, a serial liar, and I look forward to pursuing you and all the liars in court and with law enforcement.</p> <p><a href="https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=308303425970622&set=a.267168686750763.1073741826.267163020084663&type=1&comment_id=729252&offset=0&total_comments=21">32 minutes ago</a></p> </li> <li> <p><a href="https://www.facebook.com/lawlessamerica"><img alt="" src="https://fbcdn-profile-a.akamaihd.net/hprofile-ak-ash4/s32x32/373033_267163020084663_1698339765_q.jpg" /></a></p> <p><a href="https://www.facebook.com/lawlessamerica?fref=ts#"></a></p> <p><a href="https://www.facebook.com/lawlessamerica">Lawless America</a> Horse manure. I don't know Lynn Buss. She's a liar. The only thing I care about with her is exposing her as a liar. If she has an ex, I want to talk to him or her. My experience is that anyone who would lie about contact with me will damn sure lie claiming abuse. It's a disease among a bunch of you that severely damages the efforts of honest women who have been abused.</p> <p><a href="https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=308303425970622&set=a.267168686750763.1073741826.267163020084663&type=1&comment_id=729258&offset=0&total_comments=21">27 minutes ago</a></p> </li> <li> <p><a href="https://www.facebook.com/lawlessamerica?ref=stream"><img alt="" src="https://fbcdn-profile-a.akamaihd.net/hprofile-ak-ash4/s32x32/373033_267163020084663_1698339765_q.jpg" /></a></p> <p><a href="https://www.facebook.com/lawlessamerica?fref=ts#"></a></p> <p><a href="https://www.facebook.com/lawlessamerica?ref=stream">Lawless America</a> Ardith Cunningham is probably a fake identity being used by someone like All Lie</p> </li> </ul> Claudine Dombrowskihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00174108218219442634noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6075225070962028659.post-45933354116295119932013-06-01T10:01:00.001-07:002013-06-01T10:01:37.870-07:00Court Licensed Abuse - OUR FAMILY COURTS ARE ENABLING CHILD SEXUAL ABUSERS! BATTERED MOTHERS TAKE THEIR CASE TO WASHINGTON<p><img src="https://fbcdn-sphotos-a-a.akamaihd.net/hphotos-ak-ash4/525229_121867651338005_1910821126_n.jpg" /></p> <p><a href="http://www.batteredmotherscustodyconference.org/">www.Batteredmotherscustodyconference.org</a></p> <p>Court Licensed Abuse by <a href="https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=579328998754019&set=a.404998956187025.89722.402177413135846&type=1" target="_blank">Clare Hardy O'Toole</a></p> <p><a href="https://www.facebook.com/SafeKidsInternational">Safe Kids International</a></p> <p>ARE OUR FAMILY COURTS ENABLING CHILD SEXUAL ABUSERS? <br />BATTERED MOTHERS TAKE THEIR CASE TO WASHINGTON</p> <p> <br />When 16-year-old Damon Moelter took advantage of Nevada’s liberal marriage laws and tied the knot at one of Reno’s iconic kitsch “chapels” recently, his ceremony marked the start of something remarkable. It wasn’t his age or the fact that he had only met his bride in person a few hours prior to the wedding that was most significant. <br />What distinguishes this marriage and this groom from any other who might travel to Nevada to experience its offbeat brand of wedding services was that Damon chose to marry to protect himself from Family Court custody decisions stemming from his parents longstanding divorce battle. A marriage certificate gave him legal emancipation from his father, whom he claims has repeatedly sexually molested him, and from Family Court rulings that stripped his protective mother of custody and forced him to live under the sole confines of his abusive father.</p> <p> <br />Damon’s mother, Cindy Dumas, explained:</p> <blockquote> <p> <br /><em>“I have never doubted my son. I fought for 10 years to protect him in the Family Court system. I did everything I could but the judges wouldn’t listen to me. They wouldn’t listen to my son. So when he’d turned 14, he ran away from his father and was in hiding for a year and a half.”</em></p> </blockquote> <p> <br />Unlike most custody battles that are played out privately behind the closed doors of Family Court, Damon’s story captured public attention when, from the age of 13, he began to upload videos to YouTube calling for recognition that he was a victim of his sexually abusive father whom he said had threatened to kill him if he spoke out. His father, Eric Moelter, has persistently denied the accusations, maintaining his son and former wife are delusional.</p> <p><img src="https://fbcdn-sphotos-g-a.akamaihd.net/hphotos-ak-ash4/264442_248783648592852_1540913004_n.jpg" /> <br />Phyllis Chesler, Emerita Professor of Psychology and Women’s Studies at City University, New York, has spent at least three decades observing cases such as Damon’s.</p> <p>She says no one would argue that all mothers are perfect, but most are “good enough” and very few go to court with a record that suggests they are genuinely “unfit” to parent. Yet, she says, increasingly, mothers are losing custody to fathers they allege are abusing the children.</p> <p> <br />Chesler is also a psychotherapist, expert courtroom witness and author of the recently updated, seminal treatise on abuse and child custody, <strong>“Mothers on Trial.” In her opinion:</strong></p> <blockquote> <p> <br /><em>“The courts don’t seem to realize a good father, by definition, doesn’t launch the custody battle from hell. Battles can take tens of years – like going through a war. No one emerges unscathed, least of all the children whom the courts are supposed to protect.”</em></p> </blockquote> <p><a href="https://www.facebook.com/pages/Mothers-on-Trial-The-Battle-for-Children-and-Custody/209469375756133?fref=ts" target="_blank"><img src="https://sphotos-b.xx.fbcdn.net/hphotos-ash4/260204_209469995756071_8042303_n.jpg" /></a></p> <p> <br />Over the years, Chesler has seen a pattern emerging: <br />As she explains:</p> <blockquote> <p> <br /><em>“Some mothers lost custody of their children to their batterers. Many battered mothers lost their children when they alleged their violent husbands had also been sexually abusing their child. Often such mothers are seen as “crazy,” and as “alienating” the child from their “perfectly nice” father. <br />The court system does not want to believe that a well-spoken, charismatic man could really be a savage wife-beater or child abuser. It is easier to believe that his traumatized, sleepless, frightened and rapidly impoverished wife is lying, exaggerating or imagining things. I have interviewed many such mothers.”</em></p> <p><em></em></p> </blockquote> <p> <br />In 1986, after eight years of researching, Phyllis Chesler was the first academic to debunk the common misconception that mothers are more likely to win custody battles than fathers. She makes the significant distinction that mothers are usually the primary parent caring for children during the marriage, therefore they do not “win” custody as such, they “retain” it when fathers chose not to fight and custody of the children is agreed upon between parents. Chesler vouches for an increasing body of statistical research that demonstrates when fathers do fight for custody, and divorces goes to trial - contesting fathers win custody at least 70 percent of the time. <br /></p> <p><a href="http://www.civicresearchinstitute.com/dvac.html" target="_blank"><img alt="pb with burst" src="http://www.civicresearchinstitute.com/covers/DVAC_PB_burst_white.gif" /></a></p> <p>Many mothers might have cracked under the pressure of losing custody to a man they believe is molesting their child, but Cindy Dumas has shown remarkable tenacity and held her nerve. Likewise, over the course of proceedings, Damon came under the scrutiny of several judges, and an array of court appointed evaluators and therapists. Some tried to persuade him the abuse never happened; yet, he never veered from his molestation claims. He’s remained adamant that he has no wish to live with his father. He said he would not feel safe.</p> <p> <br />While on the run from his father, Damon moved between secret havens provided by Good Samaritans. He conducted a social media campaign and petitioned the court to honor his right to be safe, to grant custody to his mother or give him emancipation. All avenues failed to bring him the security he desperately sought.</p> <p> <br />An unlikely champion stepped forward, and Damon’s story was taken up by <strong>Fox 11-LA</strong> which followed the fugitive. His attorney, Pat Barry, told Fox 11:</p> <blockquote> <p> <br /><em>“The legal system refuses to acknowledge just how much, how badly they botch these cases for children.”</em></p> </blockquote> <p> <br />Typically, mainstream media exhibit extreme reticence to cover divorce and custody cases that are not celebrity focused, often citing privacy issues or limited resources to investigate the complexities of highly contentious cases and deliver balanced, objective reports. Even cases considered newsworthy because they involve the death of a child at the hands of a parent previously identified by a former spouse as abusive, tend to be treated as isolated incidents. <br /></p> <p>Significant stories and trends that should be newsworthy are therefore being missed, and in some cases - ignored. Crimes, such as the kidnappings of three women in Cleveland and Jaycee Dugard, draw huge response from media and public. But, crimes of equal depravity and ongoing cruelty that are Family Law based don’t get the scrutiny they deserve.</p> <p> <br /><strong>Fox11 is, so far, one of the few media outlets to cover what is emerging as a tragedy of epidemic proportions in the U.S., mirrored by equally disturbing cases around the world.</strong></p> <strong> <p><img src="https://fbcdn-sphotos-f-a.akamaihd.net/hphotos-ak-prn1/150419_120336854824418_682889903_n.jpg" /> <br /></p> </strong> <p>Figures released by the Leadership Council on Child Abuse & Interpersonal Violence (a nonprofit independent scientific organization composed of scientists, clinicians, educators, legal scholars, and public policy analysts), <a href="http://www.leadershipcouncil.org/1/med/PR3.html" target="_blank">show as many as 58,000 U.S. children a year</a> are being taken from their protective parent and placed into custody or unsupervised visitation with molesters and batterers.</p> <p> <br />The National Safe Child Coalition (NSCC) has appealed to the Surgeon General to have child sexual abuse declared an epidemic, and are in communications with the Victims’ Rights Caucus to raise concern about Human Rights violations of child victims.</p> <p><img src="https://fbcdn-sphotos-e-a.akamaihd.net/hphotos-ak-ash3/945260_248785758592641_451122851_n.jpg" /> <br />While there are protective fathers, and couples in same sex relationships battling over child custody and visitation rights, these cases are comparatively small in number. It is evident from reports and statistics emerging from The Leadership Council, various domestic violence agencies and the Center for Disease Control - vast numbers of children are being taken from “good enough” mothers and placed in harm’s way in the custody or care of their abusive fathers.</p> <p> <br />Statistics on domestic violence and child sexual abuse show that perpetrators are, most likely, male - usually the child’s father or someone who is part of the child’s familial circle of trust. In the case of child sexual abuse, the Leadership Council examined law enforcement as well as victim self-report data. As a result, it is estimated up to 90% of the perpetrators are male.</p> <p> <br />When divorce rates over time are factored in, Dr. Joy Silberg, <strong>Executive Vice President of the Leadership Council says;</strong></p> <blockquote> <p> <br /><em>“A conservative estimate, based on available research leads us to conclude: at any point in time, it is likely that half a million children are left unprotected from a violent parent after their parent’s divorce and this parent is, more often than not - their father.”</em></p> </blockquote> <p> <br />Many of these children are said to be held captive -psychologically and sometimes physically -by their abusive father, restrained from contact with their healthy, protective mother and subjected to subversive reasoning powers.</p> <p> <br />The behavior has been termed “Domestic Violence By Proxy.” It was first coined by Dr. Alina Patterson in her book “Health and Healing,” published in 2003, and is used in Leadership Council reports.</p> <p> <br />In these cases, it is said, the father might threaten to harm the children if they display a positive bond with their mother. He might destroy favored possessions given by the mother, or use emotional torture; telling the child the mother doesn’t want to see them because she doesn’t love them. In reality the mother may be court ordered not to see her children or may have severely restricted contact. The father may coach the children to make false allegations against their mother and combine this with creating and presenting fraudulent documents to the court to disadvantage the mother further.</p> <p> <br />In the most severe cases, DV By Proxy may lead to a child becoming trapped in a state of emotional mind that psychologists trained in domestic violence describe as: “traumatic bonding” – similar to Stockholm syndrome.</p> <p><img src="https://fbcdn-sphotos-g-a.akamaihd.net/hphotos-ak-ash4/485464_248801411924409_1875907841_n.png" width="169" height="223" /><img alt="domestiv Violence, abuse and child custody" src="http://www.civicresearchinstitute.com/covers/DVAC.jpg" /> <br />The Fox 11 series “Lost in the System” refers to specific cases, whereas, the Washington Post published an editorial based on developments at the tenth, annual Battered Mothers’ Custody Conference (BMCC X). This year, it was held in Washington DC at the George Washington University Law School over the Mothers’ Day weekend, in a bid to bring battered mother’s child custody concerns to the heart of government.</p> <p> <br />The conference offers a national, public forum to explore and expose the many complex issues facing battered women and the children they seek to protect when facing the machinations of Family Court Law and those practitioners involved in the cottage industry associated with divorce and child custody matters.</p> <p> <br />For ten years, speakers, representing many of the keenest minds in research and advocacy for battered mothers and their children have gathered to share ideas and push for change. They represent the vanguard of the fight for improved outcomes from the justice system, with child safety the paramount objective. </p> <p><strong>The lessons learned from this year’s conference will be carried forward over the months ahead.</strong></p> <p> <br />Currently, custody rulings are made on a judge’s arbitrary interpretations of legal tenets relating to the “Best Interests of the Child.” Findings from studies conducted by Phyllis Chesler, The Leadership Council and others, have been confirmed by Barry Goldstein and Dr. Mo Therese Hannah, co-editors of <strong>“Domestic Violence, Abuse and Child Custody.”</strong> The authors agree that Family Court judges show a marked deference to fathers’ rights and a casualty of this practice has been child safety.</p> <p> <br />I attended the conference and listened to several speakers explain how millions of taxpayer dollars have been poured into the federally funded “Fatherhood Initiative” to encourage fathers to become more involved in child rearing. It seems a tragic and unforeseen result has been the reunification of children with their abusive fathers, to the detriment of child safety concerns.</p> <p> <br />Likewise, Adjunct Professor of Sexual Violence at New England Law, Boston, impact litigator, former prosecutor and author of “And Justice for Some,” Wendy Murphy, told how judges - faced with the decision of whether to put sex offenders and abusers behind bars -are pressured to put them back on the street to take advantage of questionable treatment programs funded by public money. <br /></p> <p>One of the most striking revelations came from Camille Cooper, Director of Legislative Affairs for “Protect,” which spearheaded two successful acts of Congress to further child protection. Cooper unveiled an interactive map produced by the “Internet Crimes against Children Taskforce.” She said law enforcement knows the whereabouts of 500,000 individual IP addresses trading in sadistic images. <br /><img src="https://fbcdn-sphotos-g-a.akamaihd.net/hphotos-ak-prn1/164980_248786811925869_628295111_n.jpg" /></p> <p>She said it was the first time in the history of this issue that such a map had ever been shown to the American public showing the magnitude of child sexual abuse. But even with the tools to nail sex offenders through their Internet activity, it emerged there is a gross disparity between known offences and actual prosecutions in criminal or family court. Due to lack of resources to fund an adequate response, only 2% of cases identified have been investigated. <br /></p> <p>Cooper said the evidence gives the lie to claims that incidences of child sexual abuse are on the decline. And she insisted it is not appropriate to refer to the 30 million images produced simply as child pornography.</p> <p> <br /><em>“These are crime scene images of very young children being tortured and raped.”</em></p> <p> <br />Combined with CDC findings that there is an incidence reported of overall child abuse or neglect every 10 seconds, the clear record of criminal Internet activity involving child sexual abuse casts a dim light on the trend of family court judge’s to automatically doubt the validity of mothers’ claims when they make allegations of domestic violence and child sexual abuse.</p> <p> <br />Phyllis Chesler, who was keynote speaker for the conference, used strong language to define her frustration:</p> <blockquote> <p> <br /><em><strong>“There is now a toxic bias in the family courts, resulting in court enabled incest and the legal torture of protective mothers.”</strong></em></p> </blockquote> <p> <br />Some solutions were suggested by Murphy. She argued that domestic violence and child sexual abuse should be handled by criminal court and not left to the intervention of social workers and family court judges. She also argued for civil rights, regarding gender discrimination, and human rights issues to be brought to the fore. She stressed that violence against any person based on who they are in society is a crime against the fabric of civilized democracy.</p> <p> <br />I met with Damon and his mother. They had both come to the conference and appeared calm and collected and very relieved Damon is now free to take up a more “normal” life. Conference events concluded with a march and vigil with advocacy group, Mothers of Lost Children outside the White House, followed by a day of lobbying on Capitol Hill at the invitation of the NSCC.</p> <p> <br />Damon’s mother, Cindy Dumas, addressed a crowd outside the White House:</p> <blockquote> <p> <br /><em>“I’m here to speak out for other kids and hope the public become aware that this is a very serious and prevalent problem in our courts. Our Family Court judges every day give custody of children to abusers and molesters. This is not an accident. It is not out of ignorance and incredulity. It is a systematic, methodical cover-up of abuse, especially of sexual abuse. Just like Penn State, the Catholic Church and the Boy Scouts. We have to do something about it. Kids are suffering. There are thousands and thousands of children suffering because our Family Court judges are handing them over to abusers.”</em> <br /></p> </blockquote> <p>The NSCC is supporting Mothers of Lost Children in asking for a Federal Oversight Hearing into the violation of civil rights when protective parents lose custody of the children they are trying to protect.</p> <p> <br />Compelling evidence was presented to senators and congressmen outlining the failure of family courts in the 50 States to protect victims of domestic abuse and their children during divorce and custodial hearings. The follow-through from these meetings is expected to gather pace in the coming weeks as the mothers continue to organize and hone their campaign for justice and safety for their children. <br />Members of the NSCC met with staff members from the offices of Senators Durbin, Franken, Boxer, Feinstein, Casey, Gillibrand, Hagan, Brown, Portman, Menendez, Schumer, Toomey, Thune, Leahy, Sanders, Kaine, Lautenberg, Reid, and Merkley, along with Congress members Conyers, Hoyer, Cardenas, Maloney, Neal, Poe, and Costa. Initial responses were encouraging, and behind the scenes, the work goes on.</p> <p> <br />A strong supporter of improved justice and safety for protective mothers and their children is White House advisor to the Vice President on the Violence Against Women Act (VAWA) Lynn Rosenthall. She has openly acknowledged the high levels of discrimination against women in family courts. Rosenthall is encouraging protective mums to petition for change. She has offered to use her position to pass on any targeted recommendations stemming from the conference and its aftermath to Congress. She said a Federal task force was being convened to respond to the Family Court crisis.</p> <p> <br />One, wheelchair-bound mother told representatives of the Congressional Judiciary Committee her back had been broken by her violent former husband and her eldest son had committed suicide while in the care of his family. She said the combined trauma and tragedy had limited her ability to maintain employment and yet she’d been court ordered to pay child support to her custodial ex. She described how she’d been put in jail for accepting and smoking a cigarette after the judge told her she was under order to hand any gifts over to her ex in lieu of child support. She said he told her she should have sold the cigarette and given the income to her former husband.</p> <p><img src="https://fbcdn-sphotos-h-a.akamaihd.net/hphotos-ak-ash4/482848_120376328153804_1973893568_n.jpg" /> <br />Hearing her story and others, Ron Legrand, Democratic Counsel for the <strong>U.S. House of Representatives Committee on the Judiciary said:</strong></p> <blockquote> <p><em>“I’m truly shocked and disturbed. Once in a lifetime something comes along that you feel you have to go out on a limb and give your all to support. This is such a cause.”</em></p> </blockquote> <p> <br />Likewise, for Nevada, Senator Reid’s office promised to do whatever it took to bring some satisfactory resolution to the dire state of custody rulings in the Family Court and the clear failure of the court system to keep children safe.</p> <p> <br />Dumas’ story is typical of protective mothers around the nation. Lobbyist, Connie Valentine, a vocal member of the California Protective Parents Association (CPPA), said she’s observed over the years of attending the conference: <br /></p> <blockquote> <p>“One mother can start her story and another can finish it. Specific details may be different but the general stories are all the same.”</p> </blockquote> <p> <br />Since the inception of BMCC, ten years ago, mothers have shared how they and their children suffer, often years, of abuse from their partners. They’ve described domestic violence that can manifest as physical, psychological or sexual in nature. They’ve agreed all forms are interrelated, equally threatening and totally unacceptable. They’ve told how they are wrongfully profiled by judges, attorneys, and an assorted variety of custody evaluators as being the parent most responsible for the collapse of the marriage, the hostility of the divorce and any detrimental effects on the children. <br /></p> <p>Victimized mothers injured first by their abusers and then again by court processes, have persistently identified the act of making an allegation of abuse as the trigger that results in an onslaught of false accusations and misrepresentation from the opposing party. Too many times, protective mothers have sought to defend themselves and fight for the safety of their children, only to be undermined by court practices. <br /></p> <p>They’ve found no alternative but to take the child into hiding and face very serious charges of abduction. When mothers have chosen not to run, but to continue in a seemingly never ending fight for custody of their child, they have found themselves forced into bankruptcy or facing jail sentences when they cannot pay child support to the custodial father. <br /></p> <p>Phyllis Chesler’s advice to battered mothers is stark and dramatic. She said:</p> <blockquote> <p> <br /><em>“Battered mothers need excellent court representation and the best lawyers, often exemplified by those prepared to represent a mother pro bono. These lawyers are prone to ‘burn-out.’ Helping a custodial embattled mother is very demanding.”</em></p> <p><em> <br />“The police do not rescue abused children. In fact, the courts often award custody to their abusers and severely limit or cut altogether the “crazy’ mothers’ visitation. When such mothers finally run away to save their children, they are routinely captured, imprisoned and lose access to them for a very long time.”</em></p> </blockquote> <p> <br />Chesler likened the plight of battered mothers to: <em><strong>“the days of battling for Jews wanting to escape Nazi torture and control.”</strong></em> Conference attendees asked her whether it was necessary to launch another world war to keep children safe in America.</p> <p> <br />Luckily for Damon, in Nevada a marriage license can be obtained with notarized permission from one parent only. He could therefore pursue emancipation through marriage without seeking his father’s approval. </p> <p>The worst of his personal war is over and yet he is keen to stress he does not see this as a victory:</p> <blockquote> <p><em>“I didn’t beat the system, I circumnavigated it,” he said. “I spoke to numerous professionals and none of them protected me.”</em></p> </blockquote> <p> <br />His experience has led him to become a staunch advocate for children’s rights and his closing comment, aimed at protective mothers and other child victims of abuse, was chilling:</p> <blockquote> <p><em>“One in five kids is sexually abused. It’s not as if the professionals don’t know what they’re doing, they deliberately cover-up abuse. They are entrenched. If you don’t recognize it’s deliberate, you may make the wrong choices and then you won’t be able help yourselves.”</em></p> </blockquote> <p> <br />Media Contact: <br />Clare Hardy O'Toole <br />otoolec.1000@gmail.com <br /><a href="https://www.facebook.com/messages/100001328452316">https://www.facebook.com/messages/100001328452316</a></p> <p> <br />-------------------------------------- <br />(Sidebar story)……….</p> <p> <br />Hera McLeod, is a special education teacher and mother of Prince McLeod Rams who was murdered by his father on an unsupervised court ordered visit has given a moving testimony.</p> <p> <br />In an open letter to Jude Michael J. Algeo of Montgomery County (full text at cappuccinoqueen.com); the bereaved, battered mother writes:</p> <blockquote> <p> <br />“Dear Judge Algeo,</p> <p> <br />You may not remember me, but I will remember you for the rest of my life…. <br />I was the woman who came into your court room begging you to keep my son safe from his father…</p> <p> <br />I watched my son’s body slowly shut down for nearly two days as I waited for the doctors to officially declare him brain dead. As I watched my innocent baby boy die, I thought about you. I remembered how you told us you hated Family Court.</p> <p>I remembered how you blamed me for falling in love with a con man. I remembered how you talked about fairy dust and how you explained that my son would need to come home with cigarette burns before you would believe Luc was abusive. I remember how you rolled your eyes, appeared to fall asleep on the bench, and opened up your computer as if to read your email – you did all of this as I pleaded with you to keep visitations supervised…..</p> <p> <br />You told us that you made your Custody decision based on what you would do if he was your child….</p> <p> <br />How terribly sad it is that you have become so jaded that when a mother comes to you pleading for your help, you dismiss her concerns as merely those of a scorned woman. Prince deserved better. He deserved to live just as your own child would have….. <br /></p> <p>I can’t stop thinking about how my life would be different if I hadn’t trusted you – if I had fled the country – if I had simply refused to comply with the court order. <br /></p> <p>Sadly, the story of Prince McLeod Rams is not unique. The testimonies of protective mothers who have lost their children in disturbing custody battles are increasing in volume. At the annual BMCC, on the Internet, among advocacy groups and catalogued by legal researchers, their stories of injustice are gaining ground. They tell of courts dismissing or trivializing material evidence of abuse, favoring fathers’ rights over child safety and displaying entrenched prejudice toward mothers.</p> </blockquote> <p><a href="https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=579328998754019&set=a.404998956187025.89722.402177413135846&type=1" target="_blank">Read More Here</a></p> <p> </p> <h4>Barry Goldstein’s <a href="https://www.facebook.com/BarryGoldsteinRepresentingDomesticViolenceSurvivor?fref=ts" target="_blank">Representing the Domestic Violence Survivor</a></h4> <h3><a href="http://ncmbts.blogspot.com/">Battered Women, Battered Children, Custody Abuse</a></h3> Claudine Dombrowskihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00174108218219442634noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6075225070962028659.post-16755368306992088092013-05-17T05:27:00.001-07:002013-05-17T05:27:35.180-07:00Is World War Needed to Protect Our Children? Battered Mothers, Abused Children, A National Crisis<p> </p> <p>The <a href="http://www.phyllis-chesler.com/1116/is-world-war-needed-to-protect-our-children" target="_blank">Phyllis Chesler Organization</a></p> <h3>Is World War Needed to Protect Our Children?</h3> <p><strong>Every time</strong> a news story breaks about a woman imprisoned as a sex slave (for example<a href="http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2013/05/07/missing-women-cleveland-brothers-arrested/2140359/"> the Cleveland Three</a>) people are, appropriately, shocked and horrified.</p> <p>What is even more shocking is the fact that such crimes are committed every single day in every country on earth. Children and adult women are routinely sold, tricked or kidnapped in epidemic numbers and <a href="http://www.unodc.org/documents/data-and-analysis/glotip/Trafficking_in_Persons_2012_web.pdf">trafficked into sex slavery</a> for profit. Rarely do such pimps and profiteers bother to keep one girl (or boy) only for themselves.</p> <p><img hspace="6" alt="" align="left" src="http://ontheissuesmagazine.com/hottopicimages/chesler2.jpg" />Civilian pedophiles do that. We think of pedophiles as depraved older men or, increasingly, as men of the cloth, whose prey is an under-age stranger. Once caught, they are registered as sex offenders and law enforcement can, potentially, keep eyes on them.</p> <p>But what if the pedophiles are fathers and their captive prey are their own children? How will the police ever learn about this? There is no system that monitors children in their own homes. When mothers try to do so, they often lose custody of their children. Pedophiles, including a child's own father, are often charming, docile, and seem "normal."</p> <p>Given that it is almost impossible to "police" a man's home (which is still his castle), mothers are on the front line in terms of protecting children. There is no one else. But when mothers try to protect their children from physical or sexual abuse they often lose custody of them.</p> <p>This past weekend I delivered a keynote speech at the <a href="http://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/conference-shines-light-on-plight-of-battered-mothers-seeking-custody/2013/05/10/8a2830fc-b8f1-11e2-92f3-f291801936b8_story.html">tenth annual Battered Mothers Custody Conference</a>. This conference was founded by Dr. Maureen ("Mo") Hannah and has functioned as a life line forbattered and "protective" mothers. The <a href="http://www.batteredmotherscustodyconference.org/BMCC%20Tenth%20Anniversary%20program%205-7-13.pdf">program</a> included keynote speeches by Terry O'Neill, NOW's national President and Toby Kleinman, prominent family law attorney and champion for women's rights. More than 15 sessions took place, led by the most dedicated and fearless lawyers, mental health professionals, and mothers. More than 150 people attended this conference. Forty people delivered lectures; 10 of them were custodially challenged mothers.</p> <p>Some mothers lost custody of their children to their batterers. Many battered mothers lost their children when they alleged that their violent husbands had also been sexually abusing their child. Often such mothers are seen as "crazy," and as "alienating" the child from their perfectly nice father. I first broke this scandal 27 years ago when I published my book Mothers on Trial. The Battle for Children and Custody. There have been some improvements. Documented domestic violence is often factored in a bit more often; where there are assets, judges may award mothers a greater percentage of them; gay parents and mothers with demanding careers do not lose custody as they once did for these reasons.</p> <p>However, matters have worsened in many areas—so much so, that I added eight chapters to the 25th<a href="http://www.amazon.com/Mothers-Trial-Battle-Children-Custody/dp/1556529996">anniversary edition</a> of this book. Two chapters are titled "Court-Enabled Incest in the 1980s and 1990s," and "Court-Enabled Incest in the Twenty-First Century."</p> <p><img hspace="6" alt="" align="right" src="http://ontheissuesmagazine.com/hottopicimages/chesler1.jpg" />The court system does not want to believe that a well-spoken, charismatic man could really be a savage wife-beater or child abuser. It is easier to believe that his traumatized, sleepless, frightened and rapidly impoverished wife is lying, exaggerating or imagining things. I have interviewed many such mothers, and many more were present at this extraordinary conference which was held in Washington DC at the George Washington University Law School.</p> <p>The police do not rescue these children. In fact, the courts often award custody to their abusers and severely limit the "crazy' mothers' visitation. When such mothers finally run away to save their children, they are routinely captured, imprisoned and lose access to their children for a very long time.</p> <p>One such mother, <a href="http://nowayoutbutone.com/?page_id=15">Holly Collins</a>, was beaten badly for a very long time in the American state of Minnesota. Her children were beaten, too. No one came to their rescue. On the contrary. Eventually, the father, who terrified his children, gained custody of them. The court system nearly destroyed this mother and her children. And so, in 1994, Holly fled the country. She carried her entire legal file with her in her suitcases. In 1996, after an extensive legal review and appeal, Holland granted this American mother political asylum (!) on the grounds that America had not protected her or her children and did not seem likely to ever do so. Garland Waller directed a riveting documentary about Holly, titled <a href="http://www.nowayoutbutone.com/">No Way Out But One</a>. The film was shown to the conference. According to Dr. Hannah, their reaction was "highly positive."</p> <p>The National Coalition Against Domestic Violence, the Battered Mothers Custody Conference and The National Organization of Men Against Sexism presented an award to the "People and Government of the Netherlands and to the extraordinary lawyer who fought for Holly and her children, Els Lucas.</p> <p>The BMCC mothers asked me amazing questions. "Do we need to launch another world war to keep the children safe in America?" "Where is our Abraham Lincoln on this subject?" "What country should we live in if not here?" The mothers, including a group calling itself the "<a href="http://www.mothersoflostchildren.org/">Mothers of Lost Children</a>" demonstrated outside the White House.</p> <p>According to the testimonies of these mothers, their children either witnessed their mothers being beaten on a daily basis and/or were also beaten; some children were also sexually abused. These were households of terror, ruled over by a legal husband and father, not by a stranger. Yes, I know, some mothers falsely allege domestic violence; most do not, nor do most mothers allege incest unless a teacher, pediatrician, social worker or other mandated reporter does so first. And why? Because 21st century mothers have all been advised by their lawyers that they risk losing custody if they make such an allegation. Even so, these mothers still lost custody of the children they were trying to protect.</p> <p>Jennifer Collins, Holly's daughter, has created a <a href="http://www.courageouskids.net/">website</a> for children who, like her, are living "<a href="http://americanchildrenunderground.blogspot.com/">underground</a>." Both Jennifer, who is working as a para-legal, and Holly, led a workshop at the conference.</p> <p>The work I began in 1976, when I testified in my first custody case for a mother and when I worked with "protective" mothers in the 1980s,continues. Now, there is a growing movement underway. I salute all those who are part of it.</p> <p><b>Related Topics:</b> <a href="http://www.phyllis-chesler.com/topics/4/motherhood-custody">Motherhood & Custody</a></p> Claudine Dombrowskihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00174108218219442634noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6075225070962028659.post-55058592180247048072013-05-13T10:31:00.001-07:002013-05-13T10:31:54.647-07:00THE WASHINGTON POST: Battered Mothers Custody Conference This Weekend Shine Light On Child Custody Abuse<h5><a href="http://www.batteredmotherscustodyconference.org/BMCC%20Tenth%20Anniversary%20program%205-7-13.pdf">Battered Mothers</a> Custody Conference </h5> <h5>Conference shines light on plight of battered mothers seeking custody</h5> <p><a href="http://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/conference-shines-light-on-plight-of-battered-mothers-seeking-custody/2013/05/10/8a2830fc-b8f1-11e2-92f3-f291801936b8_story.html" target="_blank">Board</a>, <a href="http://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/conference-shines-light-on-plight-of-battered-mothers-seeking-custody/2013/05/10/8a2830fc-b8f1-11e2-92f3-f291801936b8_story.html#license-8a2830fc-b8f1-11e2-92f3-f291801936b8"></a>Published: May 10</p> <p><img src="https://fbcdn-sphotos-f-a.akamaihd.net/hphotos-ak-prn1/150419_120336854824418_682889903_n.jpg" width="686" height="552" /> </p> <p> </p> <p>THE BATTLES over child custody that unfold in courtrooms across the United States don’t get much attention. If a celebrity is involved, there might be headlines, but publicity is generally shunned out of the not-unreasonable urge to protect the privacy of children. Unfortunately, though, that has tended to shroud problems in how these critical decisions are made. That’s why a conference focusing attention this week on systemic issues in family court is so important.</p> <p>The <a href="http://www.batteredmotherscustodyconference.org/BMCC%20Tenth%20Anniversary%20program%205-7-13.pdf">Battered Mothers</a> Custody Conference started Friday at George Washington University Law School and concludes Sunday with a vigil at the White House. It brings together victims of domestic abuse, advocates and experts in an effort to reform a system they say doesn’t do enough to protect children. Too often, said organizers of the event, which is now in its 10th year, custody or access in contested cases where domestic violence has been alleged is given to abusive fathers because of a misguided emphasis on parental rights that discounts or disbelieves the concerns of women who have been battered. Victimized parents, often suffering from trauma caused by the abuse, are bankrupted and punished for fighting for their children.</p> <p>“Cascading disasters and shattered lives are predictable and inevitable,” said Eileen King, executive director of Child Justice in the District and a speaker at the conference. She pointed to the case of 15-month-old Prince McLeod <a href="http://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/montgomery-court-system-failed-prince-mcleod-rams/2013/01/25/30987302-673f-11e2-85f5-a8a9228e55e7_story.html">Rams</a>, allegedly drowned by his father after his mother unsuccessfully tried to block unsupervised visits, and the infamous deaths in 2008 of <a href="http://articles.baltimoresun.com/2009-10-25/news/0910240118_1_cheryl-wharton-amy-castillo-room-service">Amy Castillo’s</a> young children by a father she warned was dangerous.</p> <p>Mo Hannah, a psychologist at Siena College near Albany, N.Y., who helped start the conference because of her own divorce experience, said the broad-based coalition of people who attend the event collects data on the extent of the problems, provides support and, most important, advocates for better practices in how decisions are made and monitored.</p> <p><img src="https://fbcdn-sphotos-a-a.akamaihd.net/hphotos-ak-ash3/525229_121867651338005_1910821126_n.jpg" width="670" height="379" /></p> <p><a href="http://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/conference-shines-light-on-plight-of-battered-mothers-seeking-custody/2013/05/10/8a2830fc-b8f1-11e2-92f3-f291801936b8_story.html">http://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/conference-shines-light-on-plight-of-battered-mothers-seeking-custody/2013/05/10/8a2830fc-b8f1-11e2-92f3-f291801936b8_story.html</a></p> Claudine Dombrowskihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00174108218219442634noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6075225070962028659.post-54472421043219458032013-04-12T18:36:00.001-07:002013-04-12T18:36:11.734-07:00Anatomy of a Broken Heart<p><a href="http://angelzfury.files.wordpress.com/2013/04/brokenbrokenheart26794260520523.jpg"><img style="border-bottom:0;border-left:0;display:inline;border-top:0;border-right:0;" title="Broken-broken-heart-26794260-520-523" border="0" alt="Broken-broken-heart-26794260-520-523" src="http://angelzfury.files.wordpress.com/2013/04/brokenbrokenheart26794260520523_thumb.jpg" width="243" height="244" /></a> <a href="http://angelzfury.files.wordpress.com/2013/04/brokenheartwallpapers42.jpg"><img style="border-bottom:0;border-left:0;display:inline;border-top:0;border-right:0;" title="Broken Heart Wallpapers-42" border="0" alt="Broken Heart Wallpapers-42" src="http://angelzfury.files.wordpress.com/2013/04/brokenheartwallpapers42_thumb.jpg" width="244" height="184" /></a>  </p> <h3>Anatomy of a Broken Heart: A Screenplay</h3> <p>Posted on <a href="http://janiemcqueen.com/anatomy-of-a-broken-heart-a-screenplay/">April 3, 2013</a> by <a href="http://janiemcqueen.com/author/jmcqueen/">JMcQueen</a></p> <blockquote> <p><em> ”Ma’am, give him the children and there won’t be any trouble. Alright? Do you understand? Just give Mr. Duckworth the children.”–Kentucky State Trooper Elliot</em></p> </blockquote> <p>Brash talk show host <strong>Wendy Williams</strong> profoundly angered a multitude of mothers–custodial and non-custodial alike–with a flippant remark on her TV show yesterday. She devoted a portion of her show toward lambasting beleaguered Texas mom <a href="http://janiemcqueen.com/a-nation-of-motherless-children/"><strong>Pilar Sanders</strong></a><strong>, who  lost custody of her three children to football hero Deion Sanders last month, for her emotional distress.</strong></p> <p>Williams contemptuously declared: <strong>”When a man gets custody, the mother is full of crazy.”</strong> She concluded by saying,  ”I would say good luck, but I’ll just say oh well.”</p> <p>That Williams is a mother herself isn’t the only reason for outrage; in her big booming voice she embodies the lack of empathy, of understanding, of the plight of so many mothers who are losing their children to a lopsided legal system. <strong>This system continually, and increasingly, favors the fathers–to the point of literally taking the children away from their mothers forever. And then society steps in to join the condemnation by ridiculing the bereft mother’s pain and laughing and scoffing at her concern for her children and her pleas for justice.</strong></p> <p>Playwright/scriptwriter Christopher Karr wrote a poignant, spot-on (because he was there) screenplay chronicling the day his younger siblings from his mother <a href="http://janiemcqueen.com/something-is-rotten-in-the-state-of-texas/">Robin Karr</a>‘s second marriage,  Matthew and Laura, were taken away from their home on court orders.</p> <p><strong>Already too old for his years from his experience </strong><a href="http://janiemcqueen.com/a-bright-beam-in-a-dark-forest/"><strong>watching an abusive system punish his mother for protecting all three of her children</strong></a><strong>, Christopher was just a boy of 13 when he wrote this heart-searing screenplay.</strong> Technically powerless to do anything about what he witnessed–as would be anyone–he not only watched in horror but tried his valiant boyish best to intervene.</p> <p> </p> <p> </p> <p> ”Matthew and Laura”</p> <p>By Christopher Karr</p> <p>OVER BLACK;</p> <p>INSERT–TITLE CARD</p> <p>This movie is based SOLELY upon a true story.</p> <p>INSERT–IMAGE</p> <p>Photo of MATTHEW (2) and LAURA (1) with their mother ROBIN in a restaurant at a supervised visit in Rockwall Texas. Matthew and Laura have OBVIOUSLY been brutally beaten. Matthew has a black eye and Laura has a large scrape across her forehead. Robin is holding them, forcing a smile.</p> <p><a href="http://janiemcqueen.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/03/Robin-Karr-1.jpg"><img alt="Robin Karr 1" src="http://janiemcqueen.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/03/Robin-Karr-1.jpg" width="413" height="350" /></a></p> <p><a href="http://janiemcqueen.com/anatomy-of-a-broken-heart-a-screenplay/" target="_blank">READ THE REST HERE</a></p> Claudine Dombrowskihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00174108218219442634noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6075225070962028659.post-75757354245560289082013-04-12T18:31:00.001-07:002013-04-12T18:31:25.113-07:00The Devil’s Advocate<p><a href="http://angelzfury.files.wordpress.com/2013/04/fathersrightsareabusers.jpg"><img style="border-bottom:0;border-left:0;display:inline;margin-left:0;border-top:0;margin-right:0;border-right:0;" title="Fathers Rights Are Abusers" border="0" alt="Fathers Rights Are Abusers" src="http://angelzfury.files.wordpress.com/2013/04/fathersrightsareabusers_thumb.jpg" width="416" height="390" /></a> <a href="http://angelzfury.files.wordpress.com/2013/04/devilfathers.jpg"><img style="border-bottom:0;border-left:0;display:inline;border-top:0;border-right:0;" title="devil fathers" border="0" alt="devil fathers" src="http://angelzfury.files.wordpress.com/2013/04/devilfathers_thumb.jpg" width="381" height="382" /></a> </p> <p> </p> <p>Posted on <a href="http://janiemcqueen.com/the-devils-advocate/">April 12, 2013</a> by <a href="http://janiemcqueen.com/author/jmcqueen/">JMcQueen</a></p> <blockquote> <p align="left"><em>“Get a life and quit wasting my time and yours.” </em><em>–Texas Fathers’ Rights advocate in response to an inquiry from a woman</em></p> <p align="left"><em>“Be nice and get a grip.” –Delaware Fathers’ Rights advocate two days ago when I politely asked him to remove my address from an email circle</em></p> </blockquote> <p>We’re paring down a recent post to get straight to what everyone wants to know lately: <strong>“How are abusers winning custody of their children and being outrageously successful barring the concerned parents out of their children’s lives forever, without any recourse? Isn’t this a sort of kidnapping?”</strong></p> <p>Yes.  <a href="http://janiemcqueen.com/something-is-rotten-in-the-state-of-texas/">Robin Karr</a> will show you how.</p> <p><a href="http://janiemcqueen.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/04/Matthew-and-Laura-with-outfits.jpg"><img alt="Matthew and Laura with outfits" src="http://janiemcqueen.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/04/Matthew-and-Laura-with-outfits.jpg" width="717" height="489" /></a></p> <blockquote> <p>Matthew and <a href="http://janiemcqueen.com/someone-is-hurting-our-babies/">Laura Duckworth</a> at one of the <strong><em>few supervised visitations</em></strong> their mother Robin Karr had with them. They’re holding up outfits they wore in the last formal photographs Robin has.</p> <p>These photos appeared in this kidnapping flyer for Judge Sue Pirtle, who was soon voted out of office. However, the damage was done to these children, <strong><font color="#ff0000">who never saw their mother again.</font></strong></p> <p><a href="http://janiemcqueen.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/04/Judgee-Pirtle-Wanted-for-Kidnapping.pdf">Judge Pirtle Wanted for Kidnapping</a></p> </blockquote> <p><em><strong>PART ONE:</strong> In which embattled mother Robin Karr goes <strong>undercover as a man named “Chris” to get information about what a Texas Fathers’ Rights organization is doing to keep her from her children</strong>. She knows her abusive, increasingly threatening ex is heavily supported and guided by this group. It is 2002 and she is still trying to get her children back.</em></p> <blockquote> <p><em>At this point the<strong> Fathers’ Rights Guy, heretofore known as FRG, thinks she’s a man as there is no reason to think otherwise. Buddy to buddy.</strong> The pounce is immediate. Notice how quickly FRG seeks to recruit Chris and welcome him into the fold, even as FRG doesn’t know squat about him or his integrity. Heck, he doesn’t even know Chris (“RC”) is a girl.<strong> In his eyes he’s just a guy. And that’s enough.</strong></em></p> <p><i>(Editor’s Note: I’ve flagged some comments for readers’ benefit and the bolding is my own. I’ve removed some verbiage where nothing conveys information of interest to the reader, but I’ve been careful not to alter any context.)</i></p> </blockquote> <p><b>RC:</b></p> <p><a href="http://janiemcqueen.com/the-devils-advocate/" target="_blank">READ THE REST HERE</a></p> Claudine Dombrowskihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00174108218219442634noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6075225070962028659.post-26620087174646214922013-03-19T20:13:00.001-07:002013-03-19T20:13:51.369-07:00Claudine Dombrowski Congressional Testimony to the fake Movie Lawless America and CON MAN Bill Windsor<p> </p> <p><a href="http://www.AmericanMothersPoliticalParty.org">www.AmericanMothersPoliticalParty.org</a></p> <p><em>Mothers Supporting Mothers. Because We can.</em></p> <object width="500" height="282"><param name="allowfullscreen" value="true" /><param name="allowscriptaccess" value="always" /><param name="movie" value="http://vimeo.com/moogaloop.swf?clip_id=62204637&force_embed=1&server=vimeo.com&show_title=1&show_byline=1&show_portrait=1&color=00adef&fullscreen=1&autoplay=1&loop=0" /><embed src="http://vimeo.com/moogaloop.swf?clip_id=62204637&force_embed=1&server=vimeo.com&show_title=1&show_byline=1&show_portrait=1&color=00adef&fullscreen=1&autoplay=1&loop=0" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowfullscreen="true" allowscriptaccess="always" width="500" height="282"></embed></object> <p><a href="http://vimeo.com/62204637">Claudine Dombrowski Congressional Testimony to the fake Movie Lawless America and CON MAN Bill Windsor</a> from <a href="http://vimeo.com/user2335274">Claudine Dombrowski</a> on <a href="http://vimeo.com">Vimeo</a>.</p> <p> </p> <p>###</p> <p>Dear Bill (fat boy) Windsor [<em>and your fake Lawless America movie</em>]</p> <p>This IS MY PAIN, MY life, MY face, MY voice. <br />YOU do not OWN me or anything that has anything about me. </p> <p>You do NOT have any rights over my person in any way shape or form!!</p> <blockquote> <p>VICTIMS BEWARE!! BILL WINDSOR IS a 'AMERICAN TERRORIST' <br /><a href="http://joeyisalittlekid.blogspot.com/">joeyisalittlekid.blogspot.com/</a></p> <p>Remember that 'gut' feeling...you had/ have? LISTEN to it!!</p> </blockquote> <p>*Side note to Billy boy </p> <blockquote> <p><em>Sue me you fucking freek. I dare you, to bring that fat ass to to the land of OZ. You will need a lot more than target lessons to take me on. You will need an ENTIRE army. <br />You will even have home advantage with the ppl here you are working with. </em></p> <p><em>c'mon.... bring it on. </em></p> </blockquote> <blockquote> <p>[and all your little minions too… Janice Levinson]</p> </blockquote> <p><em>Bill, I will see you in Missouri. </em></p> <blockquote> <p>Allies Hearing… your idle lil threats do not hold a candle to my presence. And I am the brick and wire wall you will never get through. Keep following the yellow brick road……..</p> </blockquote> <p><em>Janice, See you at BMCC!! So excited!! How bout you?</em></p> <p>“<em>Beware of Flying Monkeys” [Wizard of Oz]</em></p> Claudine Dombrowskihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00174108218219442634noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6075225070962028659.post-69057691404909652192013-03-02T07:38:00.001-08:002013-03-02T07:38:36.299-08:00Showcases how GAL's destroy mothers and children.<p>Please Share</p> <h3>Immunity for Guardian Ad Litem destroys Connecticut family</h3> <p> <br />Read more: <a href="http://communities.washingtontimes.com/neighborhood/heart-without-compromise-children-and-children-wit/2013/mar/1/immunity-guardian-ad-litem-destroys-connecticut-fa/#ixzz2MOeN5szj">http://communities.washingtontimes.com/neighborhood/heart-without-compromise-children-and-children-wit/2013/mar/1/immunity-guardian-ad-litem-destroys-connecticut-fa/#ixzz2MOeN5szj</a> <br />Follow us: <a href="http://ec.tynt.com/b/rw?id=bFUy1y59er4B9Macwqm_6l&u=wtcommunities">@wtcommunities on Twitter</a></p> <p><img alt="Some Guardian Ad Litem's favor abusive and unnecessary billing over what is best for the child." src="http://media.washtimes.com/media/community/viewpoint/entry/2013/03/01/Skipp_family_photo_s640x427.jpg?73b8e21685896c3f2859310aaa5adb253919b641" width="640" height="427" /> Photo: Susan Skipp and her children</p> <p><em><strong>The following post is by guest author, Aine Nistiophain</strong></em></p> <h5><strong>This is part II of a two-part article.  Read Part I, Finding Ground Zero in Connecticut, </strong><a href="http://communities.washingtontimes.com/neighborhood/heart-without-compromise-children-and-children-wit/2013/feb/28/finding-ground-zero-connecticut-part-i/"><strong>here</strong></a><strong>.</strong></h5> <p><strong>WASHINGTON</strong>, DC, March 1, 2013 - In Connecticut, the phrase “for the sake of the children” is often thrown around on custody cases involving child victims of violent crimes.  However, cases like 9-year old Max Liberti’s suggest that some family court appointees are more likely to favor the opportunity to continue billing families for unnecessary, even fraudulent services, over what is best for the child.</p> <p>After all, children living in safe environments do not need Guardian Ad Litems (GAL), evaluations, or therapy to protect and rehabilitate them.  When Max disclosed that his father raped him, the GAL and other professionals charged his family a whopping total of $1.5 million for their services. Yet most of the 40+ professionals assigned to his case spent little or no time with Max, or did not know him at all before making recommendations that forever severed his relationship with his mother. </p> <p>Often the court appoints a GAL to advocate for the child’s “best interests” instead of asking the children for direct input. The GAL then bills the parents for asking other strangers appointed onto the case what’s best for the children.   </p> <p>In 2003, the Connecticut court decided that the GAL has the exclusive right to speak on the child’s behalf, yet there are no requirements as to how much time a GAL must spend with their ward.  To clarify the GAL’s role, the court drew the bright line rule that <em>“Just as it is not normally the province of the attorney to testify, it is <strong>not</strong> the province of the guardian ad litem to file briefs with the court.”</em> (<em>In re Tayquon H.,</em> 821 A.2d 796 [Conn. Ct. App. 2003]).</p> <p>While the Judicial Branch provides free certification trainings<a href="http://communities.washingtontimes.com/neighborhood/heart-without-compromise-children-and-children-wit/2013/mar/1/immunity-guardian-ad-litem-destroys-connecticut-fa/#_ftn1">[1]</a> for GAL’s, there is no central oversight process in place to review the quality of their work, yet they enjoy qualified immunity for their actions.<a href="http://communities.washingtontimes.com/neighborhood/heart-without-compromise-children-and-children-wit/2013/mar/1/immunity-guardian-ad-litem-destroys-connecticut-fa/#_ftn2">[2]</a></p> <p>What exactly is the Judicial Branch training GAL’s to do?</p> <p> </p> <h4>GUARDIAN AD WHO? THE SKIPP-TITTLE CHILDREN</h4> <p>When Susan Skipp’s daughter Gabrielle truthfully disclosed<a href="http://communities.washingtontimes.com/neighborhood/heart-without-compromise-children-and-children-wit/2013/mar/1/immunity-guardian-ad-litem-destroys-connecticut-fa/#_ftn3">[3]</a> that her father assaulted her family, Susan was ordered to use the majority of her income to pay the fees of various court appointed professionals she could not afford. Attorney Mary Brigham was appointed as the children’s GAL, and Dr. Kreiger<a href="http://communities.washingtontimes.com/neighborhood/heart-without-compromise-children-and-children-wit/2013/mar/1/immunity-guardian-ad-litem-destroys-connecticut-fa/#_ftn4">[4]</a> and Dr. Horowitz<a href="http://communities.washingtontimes.com/neighborhood/heart-without-compromise-children-and-children-wit/2013/mar/1/immunity-guardian-ad-litem-destroys-connecticut-fa/#_ftn5">[5]</a> were appointed to assess the family and provide them with therapy. A court issued an order forbidding Susan from speaking to the children about the litigation, seeking domestic violence support for them, or “disparaging” the father who allegedly assaulted them. </p> <p>As GAL, Brigham billed the children’s home at a rate of $300 per hour to represent the children’s wishes and best interests. Billing records show that between September 2010 and November 2011, she billed over 196 hours, including only five meetings with the children.<a href="http://communities.washingtontimes.com/neighborhood/heart-without-compromise-children-and-children-wit/2013/mar/1/immunity-guardian-ad-litem-destroys-connecticut-fa/#_ftn6">[6]</a> It’s impossible to tell whether the children met with Brigham alone, how long these meetings were, or what was said.</p> <p>Invoices show during this period, Brigham’s time was largely spent talking to other providers who barely knew the children or recently met them, emailing unnamed parties, speaking to Dr. Tittle and his attorney, and talking about billing matters. Susan was also charged for the time Brigham spent drafting, filing, and successfully prosecuting motions, including as many as three motions she personally filed seeking to hold Susan in contempt for nonpayment of GAL fees. Susan says that last July, Judge Robert Resha held her in contempt, then threatened to incarcerate her if she refused to immediately liquidate her teacher’s retirement pension to pay Brigham $20,000 in fees.  </p> <p>Susan also saw Horowitz and Kreiger’s unorthodox billing practices as red flags that made her doubt the legitimacy of the appointments.</p> <p><em>“</em><em>My divorce agreement states that the parents will see Dr. Krieger for parent counseling. Instead, Dr. Krieger drafted up an agreement for co-parent mediation,” </em>says Susan. This was improper she says, because<em> “Mediation is a legal service that is not covered by health insurance and must be court ordered.”</em></p> <p>Susan says that Kreiger charged Aetna for treatment, despite the fact that she was required to provide him with a $2,500 retainer and pay expenses out of pocket.  She questioned whether Dr. Kreiger was billing for treatments that were unnecessary or improperly performed. </p> <p>“<em>Dr. Krieger also performed psychological evaluations on the family,” </em>Susan says.<em> “Those need to be ordered by the court too, and were outside the scope of his appointment as a counselor.” </em>Susan adds that one such evaluation had flawed results because it was done against medical advice immediately after her car exploded, leaving her hospitalized with head injuries.</p> <p>When Susan requested copies of the records and bills, then questioned Dr. Horowitz and Dr. Krieger’s refusal to address the assaults or the father’s struggles with addiction and the law with the children, both providers recused themselves from the case.<a href="http://communities.washingtontimes.com/neighborhood/heart-without-compromise-children-and-children-wit/2013/mar/1/immunity-guardian-ad-litem-destroys-connecticut-fa/#_ftn7">[7]</a> <a href="http://communities.washingtontimes.com/neighborhood/heart-without-compromise-children-and-children-wit/2013/mar/1/immunity-guardian-ad-litem-destroys-connecticut-fa/#_ftn8">[8]</a>  However, Brigham then asserted privilege on the children’s behalf, thereby prohibiting Susan from obtaining documentation from either provider.<a href="http://communities.washingtontimes.com/neighborhood/heart-without-compromise-children-and-children-wit/2013/mar/1/immunity-guardian-ad-litem-destroys-connecticut-fa/#_ftn9">[9]</a></p> <p><em>“While Kreiger and Horowitz testified in trial that there was no domestic abuse, they both used domestic violence codes when billing Aetna,”</em> says Susan.  Dr. Horowitz testified that he used one medical chart for 2 children, used the wrong billing codes with the insurance company, then failed to inform the parents and the GAL that he had diagnosed the children with serious mental disorders.<a href="http://communities.washingtontimes.com/neighborhood/heart-without-compromise-children-and-children-wit/2013/mar/1/immunity-guardian-ad-litem-destroys-connecticut-fa/#_ftn10">[10]</a></p> <p>Brigham decided it was “not in the children’s best interests” to have them testify at trial.</p> <h5>“ARE YOU HERE TO SAVE US?”</h5> <p>Once when their father refused to pick his children up for three days of parenting time, I had the pleasure of meeting Susan’s children. The children seemed traumatized not only by the violent crimes perpetrated against them, but also by the fickle will of the courts to intervene on a moment’s notice and upend their lives without including them in these decisions. Given their isolation and the infrequent, yet intensely hostile interactions between Brigham and the children, it was no wonder they sought answers from me the moment their mother left the room.</p> <p><em>“Are you here to save us?” </em>Gabby asked.<em> “Someone has got to help mom stop my father. We are afraid because he hurts us.”</em></p> <p><em>“No honey,”</em> I told them, <em>“I’m just a journalist, I can’t save anyone.”</em></p> <p>They begged me <em>“Please write something to make Mary Brigham listen so the court will not make us live with my father.”</em></p> <p>My heart was heavy because they too felt the inevitable, that darkness was coming for them, and they knew they were helpless to stop it. </p> <p>With Judge Munro’s trial decision not yet issued, in September 2012 Dr. Tittle sought to permanently sever all of Susan’s parenting rights and access to the children. Judge Gerard Adelman heard testimony that the children refused to visit with Dr. Tittle for the stated reason that they feared for their safety. When Brigham refused to talk to them about these concerns, the children refused to get in the car with her. Brigham told the children she was unconcerned, then demanded they get in the car so she could bring them to Dr. Tittle’s [which they did not do.]  Consequently, Judge Adelman granted Dr. Tittle’s motion for sole custody with the caveat that the court would permanently terminate all of Susan’s parenting rights if she were even 5 minutes late for any future visits.</p> <p>One week later, I attended the hearing on Dr. Tittle’s second motion to terminate Susan’s parental rights.  Judge Munro called Judge Adelman’s orders “draconian,” then criticized Brigham’s role in instigating the proceedings by acting outside the scope of her appointment as Dr. Tittle’s “taxi driver.” As we left the courtroom, Brigham informed me that she had filed her affidavit of fees a month ago. Subsequently, neither I nor the court staff were able to locate Brigham’s affidavit.</p> <p>Ultimately, Judge Munro awarded Dr. Tittle sole custody of the children, then constructed a “set-up-to fail” parenting plan that effectively terminated Susan’s access to the children. Susan retains the right [on paper] to purchase a few hours per week with her children at Visitation Solutions, Inc.,<a href="http://communities.washingtontimes.com/neighborhood/heart-without-compromise-children-and-children-wit/2013/mar/1/immunity-guardian-ad-litem-destroys-connecticut-fa/#_ftn11">[11]</a> which is affiliated<a href="http://communities.washingtontimes.com/neighborhood/heart-without-compromise-children-and-children-wit/2013/mar/1/immunity-guardian-ad-litem-destroys-connecticut-fa/#_ftn12">[12]</a> with Horowitz and Krieger, and located over an hour away from the home she and her children once shared. </p> <p>Judge Munro denied Susan’s request for alimony, then awarded Brigham $70,000 in fees, despite the fact that Brigham never filed an affidavit disclosing her billing. After Judge Munro recused herself from hearing Susan’s case, Brigham’s subsequent motions to garnish Susan’s wages were denied pending the outcome of Susan’s appeal.<a href="http://communities.washingtontimes.com/neighborhood/heart-without-compromise-children-and-children-wit/2013/mar/1/immunity-guardian-ad-litem-destroys-connecticut-fa/#_ftn13">[13]</a></p> <p>Since October 2012, Susan filed for bankruptcy and has not been able to afford to purchase time with her children. Dr. Tittle<a href="http://communities.washingtontimes.com/neighborhood/heart-without-compromise-children-and-children-wit/2013/mar/1/immunity-guardian-ad-litem-destroys-connecticut-fa/#_ftn14">[14]</a> has refused to allow the children any contact with their mother, and remains on criminal probation for driving under the influence, reckless driving, and evading responsibility (leaving the scene of an accident.)<a href="http://communities.washingtontimes.com/neighborhood/heart-without-compromise-children-and-children-wit/2013/mar/1/immunity-guardian-ad-litem-destroys-connecticut-fa/#_ftn15">[15]</a></p> <p>Brigham has scheduled a status conference for April 4<sup>th</sup> to discuss payment of her fees, garnishment of Susan’s assets and tax returns.</p> <p>Who’s best interests have been served?</p> <p> </p> <h4>IS THERE A COMMON DENOMENATOR?</h4> <p>Horowitz and Dr. Kenneth Robson often conduct the court’s “free” GAL certification trainings together with Judge Munro.  Court records show that when Dr. Kenneth Robson<a href="http://communities.washingtontimes.com/neighborhood/heart-without-compromise-children-and-children-wit/2013/mar/1/immunity-guardian-ad-litem-destroys-connecticut-fa/#_ftn16">[16]</a> and Horowitz<a href="http://communities.washingtontimes.com/neighborhood/heart-without-compromise-children-and-children-wit/2013/mar/1/immunity-guardian-ad-litem-destroys-connecticut-fa/#_ftn17">[17]</a> are involved and the State is paying, the parents are often ordered not to communicate with their children about the trauma they experience. The GAL exclusively communicates directly with Horowitz about the children’s care, and only the GAL will speak to the children about the litigation.</p> <p><em>“One of the core issues is the qualified immunity GAL’s enjoy, which results in much of the judicial outsourcing to them,”</em> says advocate Peter Szymonik. He points out that a major reason why parents cannot even find relief from excessive GAL fees in bankruptcy is that the court categorizes it as child support, which is nondischargable. <em>“This leads to excessive and unnecessarily billings which permanently financially devastate parents.”</em></p> <p>While Szymonik says the system is biased against fathers, Journalist Keith Harmon Snow has documented over 70 CT cases<a href="http://communities.washingtontimes.com/neighborhood/heart-without-compromise-children-and-children-wit/2013/mar/1/immunity-guardian-ad-litem-destroys-connecticut-fa/#_ftn18">[18]</a> where fathers who committed legal offenses, have gained custody of child victims. The mothers were often required to purchase parenting time through outrageously expensive, even corrupt supervised visitation providers, who extorted them out of relationships with their children. Now permanently destroyed and bankrupted by abusive, often deadly State sponsored litigation, these families have no recourse.</p> <p><em>“GALs are, in fact, paid by judges even ahead of child support,”</em> says Szymonik. <em>“</em><em>This translates into a multi-million dollar fraud and state sponsored corruption which is financial devastating families and parents, harming children, and fleecing taxpayers.”</em></p> <p><em></em></p> <p><strong>To additional documentation related this journalist’s investigative report on the Connecticut courts:</strong></p> <p><strong></strong></p> <p><strong>http://www.scribd.com/JournalistABC</strong></p> <p><em></em></p> <p><strong>REFERENCES:</strong></p> <p>(1)        2-22-2011 Transcript re: Liberti v. Liberti:</p> <p><a href="http://www.scribd.com/doc/126529767/Liberti-v-Liberti-Transcript-of-2-22-2011-Hearing">http://www.scribd.com/doc/126529767/Liberti-v-Liberti-Transcript-of-2-22-2011-Hearing</a></p> <p>(2)        CT Resource Group Contract With CT Judiciary re: Court Staff Education:</p> <p>http://www.scribd.com/doc/125730813/Dr-Howard-M-Krieger-s-Contract-With-Connecticut-Judicial-Branch-re-Professional-Trainings</p> <p>(3)        CT Resource Group Court Invoices Part 1:</p> <p>http://www.scribd.com/doc/125725460/Connecticut-Court-Billing-Invoices-Part-1-Dr-Howard-M-Krieger-and-Dr-Sidney-S-Horowitz</p> <p>(4)        CT Resources Group Court Invoices Part 2:</p> <p>http://www.scribd.com/doc/125730381/CT-Court-Billing-Invoices-Part-2-Dr-Howard-M-Krieger-and-Dr-Sidney-S-Horowitz</p> <p>(5)        Dr. Horowitz’s Testimony re: Medical Billing Irregularities (Tittle v. Tittle):</p> <p><a href="http://www.scribd.com/doc/126272714/Dr-Sidney-Horowitz-Testimony-re-Medical-Billing-Irregularities-Shawn-Tittle-v-Susan-Skipp">http://www.scribd.com/doc/126272714/Dr-Sidney-Horowitz-Testimony-re-Medical-Billing-Irregularities-Shawn-Tittle-v-Susan-Skipp</a></p> <p>(6)        Dr. Horowitz’s Bills re: Boyne v. Boyne:</p> <p><a href="http://www.scribd.com/doc/126239188/Dr-Sidney-Horowitz-s-Billing-Records-PART-3-Boyne-v-Boyne">http://www.scribd.com/doc/126239188/Dr-Sidney-Horowitz-s-Billing-Records-PART-3-Boyne-v-Boyne</a></p> <p>(7)        Dr. Kreiger’s Documentation re: Tittle v. Tittle:</p> <p>http://www.scribd.com/doc/126588063/Skipp-Kreiger-Documents</p> <p>(8)        GAL Mary Brigham’s Invoices re: Tittle v. Tittle:</p> <p>http://www.scribd.com/doc/125759601/Attorney-Mary-Brigham-s-Billing-on-Shawn-Tittle-v-Susan-Skipp-Case-Middletown-CT-FA10-4022922-S</p> <p>(9)        Maureen Murphy’s billing re: Liberti v. Liberti:</p> <p>http://www.scribd.com/doc/126246491/GAL-Maureen-Murphy-s-bills-re-Liberti-v-Liberti-Guardian-ad-Who</p> <p>(10)      N.J. Sarno’s Billing re: Liberti v. Liberti:</p> <p>http://www.scribd.com/doc/126246254/NJ-Sarno-s-Billing-Invoices-Robert-Liberti-v-Sunny-Liberti</p> <p>(11)      Dr. Robson’s Court Invoices:</p> <p>http://www.scribd.com/doc/122480531/Dr-Kenneth-Robson-s-payment-records-obtained-from-the-CT-Judicial-Branch</p> <p>(11)      Dr. Robson’s Billing re Liberti v. Liberti:</p> <p>http://www.scribd.com/doc/126252311/Dr-Kenneth-Robson-s-Bills-re-Liberti-v-Liberti</p> <hr align="left" size="1" width="33%" /> <p><a href="http://communities.washingtontimes.com/neighborhood/heart-without-compromise-children-and-children-wit/2013/mar/1/immunity-guardian-ad-litem-destroys-connecticut-fa/#_ftnref1">[1]</a> http://www.jud.ct.gov/external/news/AMC_GAL_Training_Poster.pdf</p> <p><a href="http://communities.washingtontimes.com/neighborhood/heart-without-compromise-children-and-children-wit/2013/mar/1/immunity-guardian-ad-litem-destroys-connecticut-fa/#_ftnref2">[2]</a> http://www.cga.ct.gov/2013/rpt/2013-R-0098.htm</p> <p><a href="http://communities.washingtontimes.com/neighborhood/heart-without-compromise-children-and-children-wit/2013/mar/1/immunity-guardian-ad-litem-destroys-connecticut-fa/#_ftnref3">[3]</a> http://www.scribd.com/doc/126588063/Skipp-Kreiger-Documents</p> <p><a href="http://communities.washingtontimes.com/neighborhood/heart-without-compromise-children-and-children-wit/2013/mar/1/immunity-guardian-ad-litem-destroys-connecticut-fa/#_ftnref4">[4]</a> http://www.scribd.com/doc/126588063/Skipp-Kreiger-Documents</p> <p><a href="http://communities.washingtontimes.com/neighborhood/heart-without-compromise-children-and-children-wit/2013/mar/1/immunity-guardian-ad-litem-destroys-connecticut-fa/#_ftnref5">[5]</a> http://www.scribd.com/doc/126272714/Dr-Sidney-Horowitz-Testimony-re-Medical-Billing-Irregularities-Shawn-Tittle-v-Susan-Skipp</p> <p><a href="http://communities.washingtontimes.com/neighborhood/heart-without-compromise-children-and-children-wit/2013/mar/1/immunity-guardian-ad-litem-destroys-connecticut-fa/#_ftnref6">[6]</a> http://www.scribd.com/doc/125759601/Attorney-Mary-Brigham-s-Billing-on-Shawn-Tittle-v-Susan-Skipp-Case-Middletown-CT-FA10-4022922-S</p> <p><a href="http://communities.washingtontimes.com/neighborhood/heart-without-compromise-children-and-children-wit/2013/mar/1/immunity-guardian-ad-litem-destroys-connecticut-fa/#_ftnref7">[7]</a> http://www.scribd.com/doc/126272714/Dr-Sidney-Horowitz-Testimony-re-Medical-Billing-Irregularities-Shawn-Tittle-v-Susan-Skipp</p> <p><a href="http://communities.washingtontimes.com/neighborhood/heart-without-compromise-children-and-children-wit/2013/mar/1/immunity-guardian-ad-litem-destroys-connecticut-fa/#_ftnref8">[8]</a> http://www.scribd.com/doc/126588063/Skipp-Kreiger-Documents</p> <p><a href="http://communities.washingtontimes.com/neighborhood/heart-without-compromise-children-and-children-wit/2013/mar/1/immunity-guardian-ad-litem-destroys-connecticut-fa/#_ftnref9">[9]</a> http://www.scribd.com/doc/126588063/Skipp-Kreiger-Documents</p> <p><a href="http://communities.washingtontimes.com/neighborhood/heart-without-compromise-children-and-children-wit/2013/mar/1/immunity-guardian-ad-litem-destroys-connecticut-fa/#_ftnref10">[10]</a> http://www.scribd.com/doc/126272714/Dr-Sidney-Horowitz-Testimony-re-Medical-Billing-Irregularities-Shawn-Tittle-v-Susan-Skipp</p> <p><a href="http://communities.washingtontimes.com/neighborhood/heart-without-compromise-children-and-children-wit/2013/mar/1/immunity-guardian-ad-litem-destroys-connecticut-fa/#_ftnref11">[11]</a> http://visitationsolutions.com</p> <p><a href="http://communities.washingtontimes.com/neighborhood/heart-without-compromise-children-and-children-wit/2013/mar/1/immunity-guardian-ad-litem-destroys-connecticut-fa/#_ftnref12">[12]</a> http://www.collaborativedivorceteamct.com</p> <p><a href="http://communities.washingtontimes.com/neighborhood/heart-without-compromise-children-and-children-wit/2013/mar/1/immunity-guardian-ad-litem-destroys-connecticut-fa/#_ftnref13">[13]</a> http://civilinquiry.jud.ct.gov/CaseDetail/PublicCaseDetail.aspx?DocketNo=UWYFA104022992S</p> <p><a href="http://communities.washingtontimes.com/neighborhood/heart-without-compromise-children-and-children-wit/2013/mar/1/immunity-guardian-ad-litem-destroys-connecticut-fa/#_ftnref14">[14]</a> http://www.newstimes.com/local/article/Danbury-man-charged-with-DUI-</p> <p><a href="http://communities.washingtontimes.com/neighborhood/heart-without-compromise-children-and-children-wit/2013/mar/1/immunity-guardian-ad-litem-destroys-connecticut-fa/#_ftnref15">[15]</a> http://www.jud2.ct.gov/crdockets/CaseDetail.aspx?source=Pending&Key=371c238b-8016-481a-ab71-61ede4040160</p> <p><a href="http://communities.washingtontimes.com/neighborhood/heart-without-compromise-children-and-children-wit/2013/mar/1/immunity-guardian-ad-litem-destroys-connecticut-fa/#_ftnref16">[16]</a> http://www.scribd.com/doc/122480531/Dr-Kenneth-Robson-s-payment-records-obtained-from-the-CT-Judicial-Branch</p> <p><a href="http://communities.washingtontimes.com/neighborhood/heart-without-compromise-children-and-children-wit/2013/mar/1/immunity-guardian-ad-litem-destroys-connecticut-fa/#_ftnref17">[17]</a> http://www.scribd.com/doc/125730381/CT-Court-Billing-Invoices-Part-2-Dr-Howard-M-Krieger-and-Dr-Sidney-S-Horowitz</p> <p><a href="http://communities.washingtontimes.com/neighborhood/heart-without-compromise-children-and-children-wit/2013/mar/1/immunity-guardian-ad-litem-destroys-connecticut-fa/#_ftnref18">[18]</a> http://www.consciousbeingalliance.com/2013/01/summary-of-connecticut-court-judicial-abuse-cases-january-2013/</p> <p>Read more: <a href="http://communities.washingtontimes.com/neighborhood/heart-without-compromise-children-and-children-wit/2013/mar/1/immunity-guardian-ad-litem-destroys-connecticut-fa/#ixzz2MOeN5szj">http://communities.washingtontimes.com/neighborhood/heart-without-compromise-children-and-children-wit/2013/mar/1/immunity-guardian-ad-litem-destroys-connecticut-fa/#ixzz2MOeN5szj</a> <br />Follow us: <a href="http://ec.tynt.com/b/rw?id=bFUy1y59er4B9Macwqm_6l&u=wtcommunities">@wtcommunities on Twitter</a></p> <p>Showcases how GAL's destroy mothers and children. </p> <p>Please share! </p> <h4>Immunity for Guardian Ad Litem destroys Connecticut family</h4> <p> <br />Read more: <a href="http://communities.washingtontimes.com/neighborhood/heart-without-compromise-children-and-children-wit/2013/mar/1/immunity-guardian-ad-litem-destroys-connecticut-fa/#ixzz2MOdzG8MU">http://communities.washingtontimes.com/neighborhood/heart-without-compromise-children-and-children-wit/2013/mar/1/immunity-guardian-ad-litem-destroys-connecticut-fa/#ixzz2MOdzG8MU</a> <br />Follow us: <a href="http://ec.tynt.com/b/rw?id=bFUy1y59er4B9Macwqm_6l&u=wtcommunities">@wtcommunities on Twitter</a></p> Claudine Dombrowskihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00174108218219442634noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6075225070962028659.post-26280059720815346572013-02-20T18:25:00.001-08:002013-02-20T18:25:37.276-08:00joeyisalittlekid: William M Windsor: An American Terrorist<small>In <a href="http://angelzfury.wordpress.com/category/domestic-law/">domestic law</a> on <strong><a href="http://angelzfury.wordpress.com/2013/02/21/joeyisalittlekid-william-m-windsor-an-american-terrorist/" target="_blank">February 21, 2013</a></strong> at <strong>2:11 am</strong></small> <p>This is the ‘go to blog’ for updates about the twisted psychopath Bill Windsor and his fake “Lawless America – con game”. Daily updates sometimes twice daily – open comments each post gathering in excess of over 200 un moderated comments. If you want to know — this is the place to go. <a href="http://joeyisalittlekid.blogspot.com/2013/02/william-m-windsor-american-terrorist.html">http://joeyisalittlekid.blogspot.com/2013/02/william-m-windsor-american-terrorist.html</a> <blockquote> <p><em>Kudos to joeysalittlekid and many other blogs, video mixers and so much more. WE ARE the people and we invite free thinking. I am sure that some dictators could be good… but his Fuher Bill y Windsor is most definitely not good for anyone but him self.</em></p></blockquote> <p>This entry is just one of many – one that needs reposted and shared. <p><strong>William M Windsor: An American Terrorist</strong> <p><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjGihiTCehMjmJDRLHU8FdIvkKkYQ6xhQxAfAMscq8CqkoHtuAtBvX6kH1J_QXJNYAM1aJ3HcQlu6qyDh_37GFMxAuGJsNIOIKdlmXtaOM0vCteZY0sMzpbkQQFMpds9m86ufhDou0lIjY/s1600/american_terrorist.jpg"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjGihiTCehMjmJDRLHU8FdIvkKkYQ6xhQxAfAMscq8CqkoHtuAtBvX6kH1J_QXJNYAM1aJ3HcQlu6qyDh_37GFMxAuGJsNIOIKdlmXtaOM0vCteZY0sMzpbkQQFMpds9m86ufhDou0lIjY/s320/american_terrorist.jpg" width="320" height="215"></a> <p>So I have been doing some reading up. First, on the latest over at Quatloos about Billy: <p><a href="http://www.quatloos.com/Q-Forum/viewtopic.php?f=37&t=7690&hilit=windsor&start=40">http://www.quatloos.com/Q-Forum/viewtopic.php?f=37&t=7690&hilit=windsor&start=40</a> <p>As you can see, these guys have been <a href="http://joeyisalittlekid.blogspot.com/2013/02/william-m-windsor-american-terrorist.html#">following</a> him along with a hoard of other characters they all call a part of the Sovereign Citizen Movement. This got me to really thinking back to when Windsor devoted an hour of filming to his buddy Carl Swensson of the Birther Movement. Then I ran across this article: <p><a href="http://www.salon.com/2009/04/01/birthers/">http://www.salon.com/2009/04/01/birthers/</a> <p>Did you catch that? He pulled this citizen grand jury on the very day, April 1st, that Billy has announced he will do his own version on. Obviously Carl is advising him on this. Windsor is trying to learn from the mistakes Carl did in limiting it to just the Birther movement. The Why isn’t important, its the end result that matters. This is why Windsor is allowing any and everything into his fake movie. We can go from a guy who wants his cybersquatting rights, to mothers trying to get their kids back, to a guy trying to make his own currency and then to a slum lord trying to put up big billboards wherever he wants. There is nothing that connects these people other than they<a href="http://joeyisalittlekid.blogspot.com/2013/02/william-m-windsor-american-terrorist.html#">agree</a> with Billy’s preamble that the court system is broken and needs to be fixed. As long as you agree to that tenant, you are on his team. Your particular issue matters not, just the end goal. <p>But lets get back to this Sovereign Citizen Movement that all these characters seem to fit under. The FBI considers the SCM a domestic terrorist group and a growing threat to law enforcement. <a href="http://www.fbi.gov/stats-services/publications/law-enforcement-bulletin/september-2011/sovereign-citizens">http://www.fbi.gov/stats-services/publications/law-enforcement-bulletin/september-2011/sovereign-citizens</a> <blockquote> <p>"They could be dismissed as a nuisance, a loose network of individuals living in the United States who call themselves “sovereign citizens” and believe that federal, state, and <a href="http://joeyisalittlekid.blogspot.com/2013/02/william-m-windsor-american-terrorist.html#">local</a>governments operate illegally. Some of their actions, although quirky, are not crimes. The offenses they do commit seem minor"</p></blockquote> <p>"However, a closer look at sovereign citizens’ more severe <a href="http://joeyisalittlekid.blogspot.com/2013/02/william-m-windsor-american-terrorist.html#">crimes</a>, from financial scams to impersonating or threatening law enforcement officials, gives reason for concern." <p><strong>And they conclude with this:</strong> <blockquote> <p>"Although the sovereign-citizen movement does not always rise to violence, its members’ illegal activities and past violent—including fatal—incidents against law enforcement make it a group that should be approached with knowledge and caution"</p></blockquote> <p><strong>Lets look at what the Anti-Defamation League has to say about this movement and the similarities we can see in Billy:</strong> <p><a href="http://archive.adl.org/learn/ext_us/SCM.asp?xpicked=4">http://archive.adl.org/learn/ext_us/SCM.asp?xpicked=4</a> <blockquote> <p>"The key distinguishing characteristic of the sovereign citizen movement is its extreme anti-government ideology, couched in conspiratorial, pseudohistorical, pseudolegal and sometimes racist language. Many extremist movements in the 20th century have been anti-government in the sense that they opposed governmental policies, but few have been so purely anti-government that they challenged its very legitimacy"</p></blockquote> <p><strong>This sounds like our guy doesn’t it?</strong> <p>"Members of the Posse Comitatus believed that the county was the true seat of government in the United States. They did not deny the legal existence of federal or state governments, but rather claimed that the county level was the "highest authority of government in our Republic as it is closest to the people." The basic Posse manual stated that there had been "subtle subversion" of the Constitution by various arms and levels of government, especially the judiciary." <blockquote> <p><em>Uh huh, this is why he wants people in all 3,300 counties across the nation to bring the charges at the county level</em>.</p></blockquote> <p><strong>Paper Terrorism</strong> <p>"Yet despite a pattern of violent activity, the preferred weapon of members of the sovereign citizen movement is what has come to be called "paper terrorism." Paper terrorism involves the use of fraudulent <a href="http://joeyisalittlekid.blogspot.com/2013/02/william-m-windsor-american-terrorist.html#">legal documents</a> and filings, as well as the misuse of legitimate documents and filings, in order to intimidate, harass and coerce public officials, law enforcement officers and private citizens" <blockquote> <p><em>There is our boy Billy to the T. And don’t forget his illegal use of a 501c3 non-profit.</em></p></blockquote> <p>"One of the first tactics of the resurgent sovereign citizen movement was the formation of vigilante "common law courts." Members of these courts used them as a forum for grievances against the "de facto" government or for assistance in attempts to harass their enemies" <blockquote> <p><em>Yep, this is exactly where we are headed with this next phase in the Lawless Terrorist Network.</em></p></blockquote> <p>"The filing of frivolous lawsuits and liens against public officials, law enforcement officers and private citizens, on the other hand, has remained a favorite harassing strategy. These paper "attacks" intimidate their targets and have the beneficial side effect of clogging up a court system that sovereign citizens believe is illegitimate." <blockquote> <p><em>OMG, just stop it, this is way to accurate and telling.</em></p></blockquote> <p>So, as you can see, this is who Bill Windsor is, and this is also where we are headed. When the lemmings file their made up charges against law enforcement officials, they will be engaging in domestic terrorism along with Bill. And it needs to be overstated that everyone involved with Lawless America is connecting themselves with terrorist activities specificity delineated by the FBI. Ignorance is no excuse. You either wake up now, or finally figure it out when you are behind bars. The Pied Piper is leading you down a patch of certain destruction. <blockquote> <p>Hop on over to joeyisalittlekid and <a href="http://joeyisalittlekid.blogspot.com/2013/02/william-m-windsor-american-terrorist.html?showComment=1361289463389#c5010893843812507747">read and leave a comment!</a></p></blockquote> Claudine Dombrowskihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00174108218219442634noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6075225070962028659.post-92125552804627979942013-01-14T12:26:00.001-08:002013-01-14T12:26:15.445-08:00Connecting the Sniper case to family court corruption and federal fatherhood program fraud<p>John Muhammad, a Devoted Dad?<br>Connecting the Sniper case to family court corruption and federal fatherhood program fraud. (Part 1)<br>by Cindy Ross © October 28, 2002 <p><a href="http://www.newsmakingnews.com/ross,cindy10,28,02.htm">http://www.newsmakingnews.com/ross,cindy10,28,02.htm</a> <p>For three weeks in October, the "Beltway Sniper" terrorized the Metropolitan Washington, DC area. Ten people were shot to death and three seriously wounded while they were doing routine activities like shopping, mowing grass, pumping gas, or going to school. The "Sniper" left cryptic and chilling messages referring to himself as "God" and threatening that children were not safe "anywhere, at any time."<br>After 22 days, following leads that took them from Maryland to Alabama and New Jersey to Tacoma, Washington, authorities arrested two suspects. John Allen Muhammad, 41, and John Lee Malvo, 17 were found at a rest stop sleeping in their car. Rifles confiscated from Muhammad's vehicle included an XM-15 and ballistic tests linked the rifle to the .223 caliber bullets used to shoot most of the victims.<br>Although John Muhammad has been described as a Muslim sympathetic to the September 11 attacks, a neighbor who knew him in Washington State described him as "... far less interested in talking religion than he was in complaining about his estranged second wife and the custody dispute over their three children". See NY Times, "Once Calmed by Faith, Suspect Turned Furious".<br>URL: <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2002/10/27/national/nationalspecial/27RELI.html">http://www.nytimes.com/2002/10/27/national/nationalspecial/27RELI.html</a> <p>The Washington Post described Mr. Muhammad as a twice divorced "frustrated father...whose ex-wives didn't trust him with his children." See Washington Post, "John Allen Muhammad".<br>URL: <a href="http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A14152-2002Oct24.html">http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A14152-2002Oct24.html</a> <p>Mr. Muhammad's ex-wives had good reason not to trust him, as well as to be fearful for their safety. In violation of court orders, he abducted his three children (with his second wife Mildred) and took them to Antigua. He later enrolled them in school in Tacoma under false names. According to Mildred Muhammad, John was "a handy gun enthusiast" who "can make a weapon out of anything" and who threatened to kill her. After she finally regained custody in Washington State, Ms. Muhammad fled into hiding in Maryland.<br>According to the NY Times, authorities in Tacoma are reviewing unsolved murder cases that might be linked to John Muhammad. They are especially interested in the death of Keenya Cook, who was shot in the face on Feb. 16 when she opened her front door. Ms. Cook was the niece of a woman (Isa Nichols) who had worked for Mr. Muhammad as a bookkeeper. Ms. Nichols had previously had a falling out with Mr. Muhammad, because she had sided with his ex-wife Mildred in their divorce. See NY Times, "Co-Owner of Car Linked to Sniper Attacks Is Seized in Michigan as a Material Witness".<br>URL: <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2002/10/27/national/nationalspecial/27FRIE.html?p">http://www.nytimes.com/2002/10/27/national/nationalspecial/27FRIE.html?p</a><br>Despite concerns regarding John Muhammad's potential for violence and his violation of court orders, attorney John S. Mills of Tacoma, tried to help him find the children and regain custody after Mildred was forced to go "underground". According to the Washington Post (see previous linked article), Mr. Mills said of Mr. Muhammad: "He was angry at how he was treated over his kids...He was never able to locate her. That went on for two or three months. Then he vanished."<br>The Washington Post reported that Mr. Mills described Mr. Muhammad as "devastated" by the "loss" of his children. According to Mr. Mills, his client was frustrated when he couldn't find the children, but he did not seem irrational: "He was a very normal, thoughtful, reasonable guy," Mills said. "He tried diligently to work it out. I don't know what people are supposed to do when they run up against a system where they are banging their heads up against the wall and there is no remedy."<br>John Mills' attitude, i.e., that Mr. Muhammad is a "nice guy" justifiably angry at getting caught up in a family court "system" (in which men "lose" children because of anti-father bias), is typical of all so-called "Fathers' Rights" (FR) attorneys. FR lawyers routinely assist abusive men get custody by covering up evidence and dismissing women's reports of abuse and attempts to protect themselves and their children as "false allegations" fabricated to maliciously prevent the father's "access" to the children.<br>Abusive men gaining visitation and custody with the assistance of FR groups and lawyers, is a well documented occurrence in courts across the country, most recently described in this article: See: "Fit California Moms Losing Custody to Abusive Dads published in womensnews.com. <p>URL: <a href="http://womensenews.com/article.cfm/dyn/aid/1080%22%3EClick">http://womensenews.com/article.cfm/dyn/aid/1080</a> The connections between the Fathers' Rights agenda and the systematic bias against and victimization of mothers in courts, has been documented, including in the CA National Organization for Women "Family Court Report 2002", released in June 2002. See California NOW Family Court Report 2002, URL:<a href="http://www.canow.org/fam.html%22%3EClick">http://www.canow.org/fam.html</a> <p>The National Alliance for Family Court Justice, founded in 1993 by Elisabeth (Liz) Richards of Virginia, is a group of volunteers dedicated to addressing system failure in the courts and social services resulting in retaliation against non-offending parents who complain of family abuse, especially mothers of children who disclose sexual abuse. NAFCJ activists have determined that the problem underlying family court corruption is federal program fraud connected to the Fathers' Rights agenda: URL: <a href="http://nafcj.org/%22%3EClick">http://nafcj.org/</a> <p>"Through the efforts of various highly financed Fathers Rights groups affiliated with secret judicial associations of family, conciliation, mediation and juvenile courts, who are united under the guise of promoting non-litigious domestic dispute resolution along with other smokescreen covers such as responsible fatherhood, millions of middle and lower income citizens have been deliberately cheated of their legal right to due process. The efforts of "well-oiled" fathers rights activists who tap into "deep pockets (in their own words) of federal and private grants while traveling North America, Europe and Australia promoting pedophile friendly syndromes such as Parental Alienation Syndrome, have effectively silenced women and children's outcries of brutality, rape and incest to a vast array of professionals in the divorce industry." <p>For a summary of how FR groups and their court allies obtain -- and misuse -- federal program grant funds through DHHS (Access/Visitation programs, DOJ (Arbitration/Mediation) programs, Responsible Fatherhood Programs, Co-Parenting Programs, and other mislabeled court-based federally sponsored “Family Services", please see my summary, originally posted at NewsMakingNews.com in July, 2002, "Family Court Corruption".<br>URL: <a href="http://newsmakingnews.com/ross7,8,02familycourtcorruption.htm%22%3E%C2%A9%3C/A">http://newsmakingnews.com/ross7,8,02familycourtcorruption.htm</a> <p>NAFCJ has obtained program documents regarding the Responsible Fatherhood programs, which show that Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF)/Welfare programs are being used to recruit abusive men -- including incarcerated criminals -- into fathers' groups, where they are provided with "benefits" including free or low cost legal services to assist them with getting custody and getting child support obligations reduced or eliminated.<br>NAFCJ has been working with legislators across the country, requesting an investigation at the federal level into Fatherhood and related Child Support Enforcement Program, Access to Visitation Enforcement and Welfare Program fraud. One of the primary programs we have looked into, is the "Devoted Dads" program in Tacoma, Washington.<br>NAFCJ has determined that John Muhammad's former attorney, John Mills, is an attorney for -- and his legal assistant, Mario Young provided paralegal services to "indigent clients" at -- the Devoted Dads program: (See Footnote following this article which excerpts the relevant PDF FILE (Adobe Acrobat required).<br>URL: <a href="http://auditor.co.pierce.wa.us/Elections/Archives/September2001/VP_pdf/fire6pos1.pdf">http://auditor.co.pierce.wa.us/Elections/Archives/September2001/VP_pdf/fire6pos1.pdf</a> <p>Devoted Dads is funded by the Metropolitan Development Council. According to NAFCJ Washington State Director Martha Jacobson, Devoted Dads received at least 1.3 million dollars in federal grants between May 1998 and May 2000. On 8-5-02, in a tape recorded interview with Ms. Jacobson, Doug Swanberg of the Metropolitan Development Council confirmed that Mr. Mills was the "part time attorney" for Devoted Dads. This suggests that John Muhammad -- a "homeless" dad who abducted his kids and then applied for Welfare in Tacoma -- was not only a personal client of Mr. Mills, but was one of the "indigent clients" being provided services and "benefits" through the Devoted Dads program.<br>Ms. Jacobson has also obtained copies of correspondence between Doug Swanberg and David Arnaudo. Mr. Arnaudo is the administrator of the $10 million in federal access grants to the states, U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, who gave a presentation entitled "How to Obtain Access/Visitation Grants" at the Children's Rights Council National Conference in 1999. URL: <a href="http://www.vix.com/crc/conf/%22%3EChildren's">http://www.vix.com/crc/conf/</a><br>Children's Rights Council is the same organization identified by NAFCJ as the "umbrella" organization of the Fathers' Rights movement, which is cross affiliated with the Association of Family and Conciliation Courts (AFCC). As described in my article "Family Court Corruption", CRC/AFCC crafted "Parental Alienation Syndrome" (PAS) methodology -- working with "experts" who advocate pedophilia and incest -- as the means to assist child molesters and other abusive men get out of both criminal prosecution and child support obligations, while punishing mothers in supervised visitation and jail for reporting abuse.<br>There are many disturbing questions about the case of John Muhammad:<br>What was the nature of the relationship with John Malvo, a teenaged boy, whose mother "told school officials that something strange and Svengali-like was occurring between Mr. Muhammad and her son John Lee Malvo", who "was said to be devoted to the man, slavishly referring to him as father"? See NY Times, "A Teenager From Jamaica Is Seen as Devoted Stepson",<br>URL: <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2002/10/26/national/nationalspecial/26MALV.html?p">http://www.nytimes.com/2002/10/26/national/nationalspecial/26MALV.html?p</a><br>Does the Tarot card left at the scene of one of the murders suggest connections to an occult group such as the Ordo Templi Orientis? See "O.T.O. U.S. Grand Lodge: Welcome to Ordo Templi Orientis", URL: <a href="http://www.otohq.org/oto/%22%3EClick">http://www.otohq.org/oto/</a> <p>Did John Muhammad come to the East Coast because he was told he could receive "assistance" with his own "custody" case from a DC based "fatherhood" group?<br>While we may not have answers to all of our questions regarding the case of the "Sniper", we believe that John Muhammad is exactly the type of "Devoted Dad" that is being assisted by federal programs and funds in custody proceedings across the country, by contracted attorneys like John Mills. And the "terror" inflicted by the "Sniper" is the same type of "terror" inflicted on women and children -- especially abuse victims -- seeking "justice" in family courts.<br>For more information, please visit the NAFCJ website, URL: <a href="http://nafcj.org/">http://nafcj.org/</a> <p>Coming soon:<br>Part 2: More on federal program fraud, conflicts of interest, the National Fatherhood Initiative and HHS Asst. Sec. Wade Horn<br>Part 3: How the California "Conciliation Court Law" is the basis of court corruption and fraud nationwide.<br>Cindy Ross<br>California Director<br>National Alliance for Family Court Justice<br>Email: <a href="mailto:nafcjcal@aol.com">nafcjcal@aol.com</a> <p><a href="http://newsmakingnews.com/ross7,8,02familycourtcorruption.htm%22%3E%C2%A9%3C/A">http://newsmakingnews.com/ross7,8,02familycourtcorruption.htm</a> <p>Please note references to NY Times and Washington Post articles contained in this article, may require "free" registration with these organizations in order to view the articles. <hr align="center" size="2" width="100%"> <p><b><u>FOOTNOTE:</u></b> <p>Source: <a href="http://auditor.co.pierce.wa.us/Elections/Archives/September2001/VP_pdf/fire6pos1.pdf">http://auditor.co.pierce.wa.us/Elections/Archives/September2001/VP_pdf/fire6pos1.pdf</a> <p><b>CENTRAL PIERCE FIRE & RESCUE, FIRE PROTECTION DISTRICT NO. 6</b> <p><b>COMMISSIONER POSITION 1 SHORT TERM - SIX YEAR TERM</b> <p><b>Mario E. Young</b><br>10409 Canyon Rd E PMB 268 <br>Puyallup, WA 98373 (253) 232-3200 <br><a href="mailto:mosaymo@qwest.net">mosaymo@qwest.net</a> <p><b>Education: </b>Clover Park HS, 1980's. 1990 Griffin College: AAS in Computers and Robotics. 2001 <b>Tacoma</b> Community College: AAS and Legal AssistantCert. Begin Poli-Sci / Philosophy BA at UPS in Fall of 2001. <b>Occupation:</b> Freelance paralegal; Legal Assistant to <b>John Mills</b> WSBA # 15842; Provide legal services to indigent clients at Metro DevelopmentCouncil <b>Devoted Dads</b> program. <b>Professional Qualifications:</b> Been working since I was 16. 8 years in labor- related fields. 4 years as Chimney Sweep: environmental and safety educa- tion surrounding solid fuel heating systems. 6 years in the copier industry: Technical and Management. 6 years as a Sole Proprietor. TCC Administra-tion: Tenure, ADJ Chair Hiring, and ADJ Steering committees. TCC Student Body: President Lambda Juris Club, Senator, and Bylaws Committee. <b>Personal Information:</b>Born and raised in the greater Puget Sound area. Lived in Pierce County since 1969. Divorced Father. <b>Community Involvement:</b> <b>Tacoma</b> Pierce County Bar Association # 407; <b>Devoted Dads</b> Fatherhood Support Group; <b>Tacoma</b> Sportsman Club. <b>Personal Views:</b> Balancing fire safety issues against tax burdens isn't easy.My combined experiences allow me to see all sides of the issues and pro- ceed in an organized fashion. <i>I am committed to protecting our community whileadvocating for lower taxes and limited government.</i></p> Claudine Dombrowskihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00174108218219442634noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6075225070962028659.post-52547414240498588242013-01-05T19:19:00.001-08:002013-01-05T19:19:46.719-08:00En Re: Bill Windsor - Endangering Domestic Violence Victims and Survivors<h3></h3> <p><strong></strong></p> <p><strong>“Neutrality helps the oppressor, never the Oppressed. Silence encourages the tormentor, never the tormented. Sometimes we must interfere.” -Elie Wiesel, Holocaust Survivor</strong></p> <p><em>“How wonderful it is that nobody need wait a single moment before starting to improve the world.” -Anne Frank</em></p> <p><em>"It is error only, and not truth, that shrinks from inquiry. " <br />-Thomas Paine</em></p> <p> </p> <p><a href="http://AmericanMothersPoliticalParty.org" target="_blank">American Mothers </a></p> <p>Political Party</p> <p>Any cause, is good when always -- in all that you do, you maintain your <strong>honor,</strong> <strong>dignity </strong>and <strong>self respect</strong>. Life’s guiding tool. I learned this from my <strong>Romanian grandmother and Father who survived the death camps in </strong><a href="https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=web&cd=5&cad=rja&sqi=2&ved=0CFgQFjAE&url=http%3A%2F%2Fhistory1900s.about.com%2Fod%2Fholocaust%2Fa%2Fauschwitz.htm&ei=Z-PoUPi_FuHI2wWy7oCoBQ&usg=AFQjCNHHnsJNxI5KxexGhn-oLe7BCvDdWA&sig2=auowlHFRpbhd0p8Hh"><strong>Auschwitz</strong></a><strong> and then </strong><a href="https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=web&cd=3&cad=rja&ved=0CE4QFjAC&url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.ushmm.org%2Fwlc%2Fen%2Farticle.php%3FModuleId%3D10005214&ei=quPoULXPMejs2AW-q4GgBw&usg=AFQjCNGVesyH8FcuVV9PoThTiOA8eq1fQg&sig2=WWfrQ6sBkOqhsEZgjCtk5w"><strong>Dachau</strong></a><strong> – when finally they were liberated by the US - my grandfather - 2<sup>nd</sup> wave of Normandy</strong>. The reason I exist is because of the way humanity works when the heart is in the right place.</p> <blockquote> <p>We can learn about ourselves all throughout history. I encourage this as it is besides being interesting, it is repeated. I have had to learn that by abiding to the simple human rights of humanity that <strong>we can, or will, ‘’Rise a Nation’’ in a good cause, or even at minimum, because this is the good battle, the high road, the ultimate justice.</strong></p> </blockquote> <p>I watched a very good miniseries today, <a href="http://movies.netflix.com/WiMovie/World_Without_End/70260323?trkid=2361637"><b>World Without End</b></a>. Throughout it, I kept thinking of ‘the very notable parallels’ of the sudden 180 turn by Bill on so many people, and in doing so, the use of my website to hide behind for ‘his own’ actions.</p> <p>Throughout my almost two decades of being involved in a inhumane civil <strong>society that rewards for ‘criminal violence’</strong> and continues to perpetrate atrocious human rights violations against any people, usually a ‘category’ of people -- in what I do and with the countless mothers I have personally worked with – is a ‘category’ of people, a holocaustic hatred towards mothers and their children when they try to regain their Human Rights to be free of torture -- only to be tortured further by their tormentor in yet <a href="http://americanmotherspoliticalparty.org/ampp-article-library-family-court-custody-abuse-dv/5-family-criminal-law-and-research-abuse-dv-child-custody/72-one-more-battleground-domestic-violence-child-custody-and-the-batterers-relentless-pursuit-of-their-vic"><b>One More Battleground</b></a> of an already full arsenal. Family Court.</p> <blockquote> <p>I do not usually ‘feed’ into those who are so driven with all their time, to try to hurt a ‘category’ of already oppressed people. Real humans know this, so no words are needed, those who do not, no words are adequate. Besides, quite simply, I don’t do drama. </p> </blockquote> <p>In order to carry on -- although Bill has hurt so many through black mail, coercion and has threatened the safety of so many mothers and their children by sharing their intimate and confidential information on the non real world of face book – a dangerous place anyways, because ‘he thinks’ something - and his excuse for ‘his’ own actions and behavior is to ‘hide’ behind American Mothers Political Party website (AMPP). I would ask, “Why would someone do this?” However, I long ago stopped asking that and worrying about those types of people who feed on the frailty of vulnerable people.</p> <p>So with that, I will simply state that American Mothers Political Party (AMPP) and I -- are one in the same. My 1<sup>st</sup> and last (and imo to much) but if it will cease your obsession of endangering mothers or any one for that matter, my statement <i>(and I am being nice - most get a ‘two word’ statement from me when they act like you have)</i></p> <blockquote> <p>I, <a href="https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=web&cd=4&cad=rja&ved=0CEwQFjAD&url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.stopfamilyviolence.org%2Fpages%2F308&ei=fOToUI7gDpP02wXDhoGgDQ&usg=AFQjCNFBBI3BB-31qNJujncv-v6V1057lg&sig2=XGcS_YMJBR3uBxUOaqEqhg&bvm=bv.1355534169,d">Claudine Dombrowski </a>or AMMPP (again only I am AMPP) state that everything you Bill have said about AMPP is and has been and likely to remain “intentionally distorted and inaccurate.” Let the record be clear, <b>I, and I alone maintain the website</b> <a href="http://www.AmericanMothers.PoliticalParty.org">www.AmericanMothers.PoliticalParty.org</a> Bill, you know this – and always have.</p> </blockquote> <blockquote> <p>Bill, I have not threatened you, I have not, nor do I have the power to stop your goal. No copy right violations (I do know them, just ask PBS). I had thought, the concept of LA was a good idea, is why it saddened me (when, although I have broad shoulders) that you systematically began removing mothers who have been ‘battered’ by the fathers of their children, in horrendous ways, because you- 'gave them' (bill almighty) a chance to disengage with American Mothers Political Party or to ‘tell’ their side of story, wow!! Talk about demanding and classic black mail - and you do, hold that power - 'control' of fear over them with their personal, sensitive and life threatening information, entrusted to you, a power which you have misused and freely wield. </p> </blockquote> <p>You see, I need no public support, the truth is self-sustained. I will not hurt others to prop myself up. I will not alter, nor publish or intimidate others so basically I just ignore you. As I have with others like you throughout the last two decades, as I am sure will be others in the next two decades. I will not drop everything because you or any other ‘demands’ it. I will not defend myself against ignorance or ‘play’ into the need for self absorption. </p> <p>I will not engage in your feeding frenzy obsession and with American Mothers Political Party as simply, I try to spend my energy doing what I always have, keeping my energy focused on the positive and future real change, for all - as well with a ‘special’ heart held dream of freedom for that 'category' of people - battered mothers and their children.</p> <blockquote> <p>Anyone with any inclination, can research easily, any ones ignorance towards these mothers and the issues surrounding them. For those who do not, no amount of dialogue is possible to change their mind, nor their narcissistic - attention seeking behaviors.</p> </blockquote> <p>So perhaps, maybe you can come back down to reality and realize that all the good you have done you are destroying – hiding behind the ‘hatred of myself and my website American Mothers Political Party’. I have always told mothers, fathers and grandparents and cps victims that there is no ‘messiah’ or any –one sure way to regain so many freedoms lost on top of the already human rights freedoms that Domestic Violence Victims have and continue to endure.</p> <p>It’s just not important to society, dead women and children, terror and fear of those - perpetrated by their most intimate partner, lover and at one time friend. It is a terror a betrayal that is more than just a crime. Simple Human rights. </p> <p>I have not looked today what fear and terror you have stricken in others in the name of yourself, behind the skirt of American Mothers Political Party, but from a email post that you say you received (although was meant for me/ AMPP) and the oddly twisted cognitive thought process to assume that out of that email, you deduce ‘your own’ mantras of what ‘you think’ I said, what you ASSume...</p> <p>I alone, own, operate and maintain <a href="http://www.AmericanMothersPoliticalParty.org">www.AmericanMothersPoliticalParty.org</a> I alone, no one else. Simple enough?</p> <p>Now, you know as do others. Come after me and leave everyone else alone. You can no longer hide behind the ‘skirts’ of amp as to why, with your twisted excuses, of why you are hurting these mothers. </p> <p>Bill - you have already posted my address, email along with so many others. You know where to send your law suits.</p> <p><b><a href="http://americanmotherspoliticalparty.org/ampp-article-library-family-court-custody-abuse-dv/5-family-criminal-law-and-research-abuse-dv-child-custody/79-southern-poverty-law-center-on-the-fathers-rights-movement">Southern Poverty Law Center on the Fathers' Rights Movement</a> </b></p> <p>Listed as a HATE Group e.g. Skin heads, Westborough Baptist Church, Neo Nazi’s etc…<b></b></p> <p>· <a href="http://americanmotherspoliticalparty.org/ampp-home">AMPP Home</a></p> <p>· <a href="http://americanmotherspoliticalparty.org/ampp-article-library-family-court-custody-abuse-dv">AMPP Article Library</a></p> <p><a href="http://americanmotherspoliticalparty.org/ampp-article-library-family-court-custody-abuse-dv/8-news-action-alerts-press-release">News and Events</a></p> <p>§ <a href="http://americanmotherspoliticalparty.org/ampp-article-library-family-court-custody-abuse-dv/8-news-action-alerts-press-release/81-american-mothers-political-party-denounces-dominicks-law-in-michigan">American Mothers Political Party Denounces “Dominick’s Law” In Michigan</a></p> <p>§ <a href="http://americanmotherspoliticalparty.org/ampp-article-library-family-court-custody-abuse-dv/8-news-action-alerts-press-release/76-monsters-short-animated-video-that-depicts-devastating-view-of-domestic-violence-from-a-childs-perspective-launched-by-verizon-and-national-domestic-violence-hotline">Monsters In the Closet - Domestic Violence From a Child's View</a></p> <p>§ <a href="http://americanmotherspoliticalparty.org/ampp-article-library-family-court-custody-abuse-dv/8-news-action-alerts-press-release/68-parental-alienation-a-mythical-legal-argument">Parental Alienation: A 'Mythical Legal Argument'</a></p> <p>§ <a href="http://americanmotherspoliticalparty.org/ampp-article-library-family-court-custody-abuse-dv/8-news-action-alerts-press-release/66-press-release-historic-us-supreme-court-case">PRESS RELEASE: HISTORIC US SUPREME COURT CASE</a></p> <p>§ <a href="http://americanmotherspoliticalparty.org/ampp-article-library-family-court-custody-abuse-dv/8-news-action-alerts-press-release/62-its-not-angst-over-custody-fathers-kill-their-children-to-punish-their-ex-partners">It’s Not Angst Over Custody: Fathers Kill Their Children to Punish Their Ex-Partners</a></p> <p>§ <a href="http://americanmotherspoliticalparty.org/ampp-article-library-family-court-custody-abuse-dv/8-news-action-alerts-press-release/61-hearts-across-america-million-mom-march-mothers-day-2011-at-1600-pennsylvania-ave-washington-dc">“Hearts Across America” -- Million Mom March Mother's Day 2011, at 1600 Pennsylvania Ave. Washington, D.C.</a></p> <p>§ <a href="http://americanmotherspoliticalparty.org/ampp-article-library-family-court-custody-abuse-dv/8-news-action-alerts-press-release/60-500-million-from-the-fatherhood-initiative-and-hold-congressional-hearings">Cut $500 Million from the Fatherhood Initiative and Hold Congressional Hearings</a></p> <p>§ <a href="http://americanmotherspoliticalparty.org/ampp-article-library-family-court-custody-abuse-dv/8-news-action-alerts-press-release/59-family-courts-helping-pedophiles-batterers-get-child-custody">Family Courts Helping Pedophiles, Batterers Get Child Custody</a></p> <p>§ <a href="http://americanmotherspoliticalparty.org/ampp-article-library-family-court-custody-abuse-dv/8-news-action-alerts-press-release/57-stop-violence-against-mothers-and-their-children">UN Mothers UNiTE to End Violence Against Mothers And Their Children Campaign</a></p> <p>§ <a href="http://americanmotherspoliticalparty.org/ampp-article-library-family-court-custody-abuse-dv/8-news-action-alerts-press-release/55-mothers-of-lost-children-rally-in-washington-dc-february-13th-and-14th-2011">Mothers Of Lost Children Rally In Washington, D.C. FEBRUARY 13th and 14th, 2011</a></p> <p>§ <a href="http://americanmotherspoliticalparty.org/ampp-article-library-family-court-custody-abuse-dv/8-news-action-alerts-press-release/54--its-about-a-uterus-divorce-papers-and-bruises">Parental Alienation and Domestic Violence</a></p> <p>§ <a href="http://americanmotherspoliticalparty.org/ampp-article-library-family-court-custody-abuse-dv/8-news-action-alerts-press-release/49-battered-women-abused-children-child-custody-a-national-crisis">Battered Women, Abused Children, Child Custody A National Crisis</a></p> <p>§ <a href="http://americanmotherspoliticalparty.org/ampp-article-library-family-court-custody-abuse-dv/8-news-action-alerts-press-release/48-msmag-and-realitycheck-slamm-huffpos-censorship-protecting-abusers-warshack">Ms.Mag and Reality Check SLAMM HuffPo’s Censorship Protecting Abusers Tool by Dr. Warshak</a></p> <p>§ <a href="http://americanmotherspoliticalparty.org/ampp-article-library-family-court-custody-abuse-dv/8-news-action-alerts-press-release/46-failures-of-us-courts-forces-mothers-to-turn-to-international-law">Failures of U.S. Courts Forces Mothers to Turn to International Law</a></p> <p>§ <a href="http://americanmotherspoliticalparty.org/ampp-article-library-family-court-custody-abuse-dv/8-news-action-alerts-press-release/45-press-release-ampp-stands-behind-christian-coffey-his-mother-and-all-their-supporters">PRESS RELEASE: AMPP Stands Behind Christian Coffey HIS Mother and All Their Supporters</a></p> <p>§ <a href="http://americanmotherspoliticalparty.org/ampp-article-library-family-court-custody-abuse-dv/8-news-action-alerts-press-release/43-run-mommy-run-help-me-mommy-help-me-daddy-hurts-me">Melinda Stratton: Another Mother 'Hunted' Down</a></p> <p><a href="http://americanmotherspoliticalparty.org/ampp-article-library-family-court-custody-abuse-dv/7-pbs-documentaries-shows-national-media-exposure-abusers-court-crisis-children-at-risk">Multi Media</a></p> <p><a href="http://americanmotherspoliticalparty.org/ampp-article-library-family-court-custody-abuse-dv/7-pbs-documentaries-shows-national-media-exposure-abusers-court-crisis-children-at-risk/47-documentaries-video-index">Documentaries Of Importance</a></p> <p>§ <a href="http://americanmotherspoliticalparty.org/ampp-article-library-family-court-custody-abuse-dv/7-pbs-documentaries-shows-national-media-exposure-abusers-court-crisis-children-at-risk/38-dr-phil-exposes-the-crisis-in-family-court-">Dr. Phil Exposes the Crisis in Family Court</a></p> <p>§ <a href="http://americanmotherspoliticalparty.org/ampp-article-library-family-court-custody-abuse-dv/7-pbs-documentaries-shows-national-media-exposure-abusers-court-crisis-children-at-risk/34-interview-with-dominique-lasseur-producer-of-breaking-the-silence-the-childrens-stories">INTERVIEW WITH DOMINIQUE LASSEUR, PRODUCER OF “BREAKING THE SILENCE: CHILDREN’S STORIES”</a></p> <p>§ <a href="http://americanmotherspoliticalparty.org/ampp-article-library-family-court-custody-abuse-dv/1-research-articles-family-court-bias-custody-abuse-battered-moms">Family Court Related Research and Articles</a></p> <p>§ <a href="http://americanmotherspoliticalparty.org/ampp-article-library-family-court-custody-abuse-dv/1-research-articles-family-court-bias-custody-abuse-battered-moms/89-mistakes-mothers-make-in-child-custody-litigation">MISTAKES MOTHERS MAKE in Child Custody Litigation</a></p> <p>§ <a href="http://americanmotherspoliticalparty.org/ampp-article-library-family-court-custody-abuse-dv/1-research-articles-family-court-bias-custody-abuse-battered-moms/84-top-5-hhs-programs-endangering-women-and-children-billions-of-your-tax-dollars-fuel-it">Top 5 HHS Programs Endangering Women and Children - Billions Of Your Tax Dollars Fuel The Genocide Against Mother's And Her Children</a></p> <p>§ <a href="http://americanmotherspoliticalparty.org/ampp-article-library-family-court-custody-abuse-dv/1-research-articles-family-court-bias-custody-abuse-battered-moms/83-us-family-courts-sacrificing-mothers-a-children-all-the-usual-suspects-guardian-ad-litems-psychologists-case-managers-custody-evaluators-access-visitation-supervisors-parenting-coordinators-and-therapeutic-jurisprudence">U.S. FAMILY COURTS SACRIFICING MOTHERS & CHILDREN all the usual suspects; Guardian ad Litem’s, Psychologists, Case Managers, Custody Evaluators, Access Visitation Supervisors, Parenting Coordinators, and *Therapeutic Jurisprudence</a></p> <p>§ <a href="http://americanmotherspoliticalparty.org/ampp-article-library-family-court-custody-abuse-dv/1-research-articles-family-court-bias-custody-abuse-battered-moms/82-endless-tupidity-domestic-violence-victim-advocacy-for-supervised-visitation-centers">Endless $tupidity: Domestic Violence Victim Advocacy For Supervised Visitation Centers</a></p> <p>§ <a href="http://americanmotherspoliticalparty.org/ampp-article-library-family-court-custody-abuse-dv/1-research-articles-family-court-bias-custody-abuse-battered-moms/75-u-s-department-of-justice-v-custody-court-system">U. S. Department of Justice v. Custody Court System</a></p> <p>§ <a href="http://americanmotherspoliticalparty.org/ampp-article-library-family-court-custody-abuse-dv/1-research-articles-family-court-bias-custody-abuse-battered-moms/71-when-battered-women-lose-custody-dangerous-parents-or-systems-failure">WHEN BATTERED WOMEN LOSE CUSTODY: Dangerous Parents or Systems Failure?</a></p> <p>§ <a href="http://americanmotherspoliticalparty.org/ampp-article-library-family-court-custody-abuse-dv/1-research-articles-family-court-bias-custody-abuse-battered-moms/70--dear-custody-court-judge-extreme-custody-decisions-that-risk-lives">Dear Custody Court Judge: EXTREME CUSTODY DECISIONS THAT RISK LIVES</a></p> <p>§ <a href="http://americanmotherspoliticalparty.org/ampp-article-library-family-court-custody-abuse-dv/1-research-articles-family-court-bias-custody-abuse-battered-moms/67-pas-as-a-religion-parental-alienation-syndrome">PAS as a Religion - Parental Alienation Syndrome</a></p> <p>§ <a href="http://americanmotherspoliticalparty.org/ampp-article-library-family-court-custody-abuse-dv/1-research-articles-family-court-bias-custody-abuse-battered-moms/65-what-is-fair-for-children-of-abusive-men">What is Fair for Children of Abusive Men?</a></p> <p>§ <a href="http://americanmotherspoliticalparty.org/ampp-article-library-family-court-custody-abuse-dv/1-research-articles-family-court-bias-custody-abuse-battered-moms/64-want-to-be-a-good-dad-support-mom-and-avoid-fathers-rights-groups">Want To Be A Good Dad? Support Mom And Avoid Father’s Rights Groups</a></p> <p>§ <a href="http://americanmotherspoliticalparty.org/ampp-article-library-family-court-custody-abuse-dv/1-research-articles-family-court-bias-custody-abuse-battered-moms/63-insanity-nope-its-family-court-">Insanity? Nope, it’s Family Court</a></p> <p>§ <a href="http://americanmotherspoliticalparty.org/ampp-article-library-family-court-custody-abuse-dv/1-research-articles-family-court-bias-custody-abuse-battered-moms/58-175-killer-dads-fathers-who-ended-their-childrens-lives-in-situations-involving-child-custody-visitation-andor-child-support-usa">175 Killer Dads: Fathers who ended their children's lives in situations involving child custody, visitation, and/or child support (USA)</a></p> <p>§ <a href="http://americanmotherspoliticalparty.org/ampp-article-library-family-court-custody-abuse-dv/1-research-articles-family-court-bias-custody-abuse-battered-moms/56-batterer-manipulation-and-retaliation-denial-and-complicity-in-the-family-courts">Batterer Manipulation and Retaliation; Denial and Complicity In the Family Courts</a></p> <p>§ <a href="http://americanmotherspoliticalparty.org/ampp-article-library-family-court-custody-abuse-dv/1-research-articles-family-court-bias-custody-abuse-battered-moms/44-a-cancer-spreading-in-the-custody-court-system">A Cancer Spreading in the Custody Court System</a></p> <p>§ <a href="http://americanmotherspoliticalparty.org/ampp-article-library-family-court-custody-abuse-dv/1-research-articles-family-court-bias-custody-abuse-battered-moms/42-some-concerns-about-false-allegations-of-abuse-are-accurate">Some Concerns About False Allegations of Abuse Are Accurate</a></p> <p>§ <a href="http://americanmotherspoliticalparty.org/ampp-article-library-family-court-custody-abuse-dv/1-research-articles-family-court-bias-custody-abuse-battered-moms/41-how-many-children-are-court-ordered-into-unsupervised-contact-with-an-abusive-parent-after-divorce">How Many Children Are Court -Ordered Into Unsupervised Contact With an Abusive Parent After Divorce?</a></p> <p>§ <a href="http://americanmotherspoliticalparty.org/ampp-article-library-family-court-custody-abuse-dv/1-research-articles-family-court-bias-custody-abuse-battered-moms/39-child-custody-and-visitation-decisions-in-domestic-violence-cases-legal-trends-risk-factors-and-safety-concerns">Child Custody and Visitation Decisions in Domestic Violence Cases: Legal Trends, Risk Factors, and Safety Concerns</a></p> <p>§ <a href="http://americanmotherspoliticalparty.org/ampp-article-library-family-court-custody-abuse-dv/1-research-articles-family-court-bias-custody-abuse-battered-moms/36-family-court-and-fathers-rights-a-deadly-combination">Family Court and Fathers’ Rights = A Deadly Combination</a></p> <p>§ <a href="http://americanmotherspoliticalparty.org/ampp-article-library-family-court-custody-abuse-dv/1-research-articles-family-court-bias-custody-abuse-battered-moms/33-mothers-day-proclamation-mothers-of-lost-children-at-the-white-house-on-mothers-day-may-9-2010-">Mother’s Day Proclamation at the White House 1870 and 2010</a></p> <p>§ <a href="http://americanmotherspoliticalparty.org/ampp-article-library-family-court-custody-abuse-dv/1-research-articles-family-court-bias-custody-abuse-battered-moms/23-maternal-deprivation-brain-scans-monkey">NIMH - Monkey Brain Scans With and Without Mom</a></p> <p>§ <a href="http://americanmotherspoliticalparty.org/ampp-article-library-family-court-custody-abuse-dv/1-research-articles-family-court-bias-custody-abuse-battered-moms/15-courts-are-biased-against-mothers">Confirmed: Protective Mothers Were Right</a></p> <p>§ <a href="http://americanmotherspoliticalparty.org/ampp-article-library-family-court-custody-abuse-dv/1-research-articles-family-court-bias-custody-abuse-battered-moms/14-justice-is-biased-the-laws-play-russian-roulette-with-childrens-lives">Justice is biased!! The laws play Russian Roulette with children’s lives</a></p> <p>§ <a href="http://americanmotherspoliticalparty.org/ampp-article-library-family-court-custody-abuse-dv/1-research-articles-family-court-bias-custody-abuse-battered-moms/13-138-killer-dads-the-fathers-rights-to-kill">138 Killer Dads: Fathers who ended their children's lives in situations involving child custody, visitation, and/or child support (USA)</a></p> <p>§ <a href="http://americanmotherspoliticalparty.org/ampp-article-library-family-court-custody-abuse-dv/1-research-articles-family-court-bias-custody-abuse-battered-moms/11-high-conflict-cases-likely-have-history-of-domestic-violence">High Conflict Cases Likely Have History of Domestic Violence</a></p> <p>§ <a href="http://americanmotherspoliticalparty.org/ampp-article-library-family-court-custody-abuse-dv/1-research-articles-family-court-bias-custody-abuse-battered-moms/1-family-law-act-aids-abusive-fathers-imperils-children">Family Law Act Aids Abusive Fathers, Imperils Children</a></p> <p>§ <a href="http://americanmotherspoliticalparty.org/ampp-article-library-family-court-custody-abuse-dv/3-federal-fatherhood-initiatives-dept-health-and-human-services">Federal Fatherhood Initiatives</a></p> <p>§ <a href="http://americanmotherspoliticalparty.org/ampp-article-library-family-court-custody-abuse-dv/3-federal-fatherhood-initiatives-dept-health-and-human-services/91-congressional-report-on-fatherhood-funding-used-in-family-courts-child-support-agencies-engaged-in-financial-fraud-senate-finance-committee-hearing-june-2012">TANF Fraud Diverts Billions To Dangerous Unfit Fathers. Healthy Families Initiatives, Responsible Fatherhood Initiatives, Access and Visitation Initiatives</a></p> <p>§ <a href="http://americanmotherspoliticalparty.org/ampp-article-library-family-court-custody-abuse-dv/3-federal-fatherhood-initiatives-dept-health-and-human-services/37-control-of-women-and-children-under-the-guise-of-qresponsible-married-fatherhoodq">U. S. Fatherhood Initiatives - Control of Women and Children Under the Guise of "Responsible Married Fatherhood"</a></p> <p>§ <a href="http://americanmotherspoliticalparty.org/ampp-article-library-family-court-custody-abuse-dv/3-federal-fatherhood-initiatives-dept-health-and-human-services/35-how-to-avoid-child-support-and-hurt-the-mother-of-your-children">Attention Judges and Lawmakers: This is the REAL AGENDA of the Father’s Rights Movement</a></p> <p>§ <a href="http://americanmotherspoliticalparty.org/ampp-article-library-family-court-custody-abuse-dv/3-federal-fatherhood-initiatives-dept-health-and-human-services/25-maternal-deprivation-inflicted-battered-mothers">Maternal Deprivation Inflicted on Battered Women and Abused Children</a></p> <p>§ <a href="http://americanmotherspoliticalparty.org/ampp-article-library-family-court-custody-abuse-dv/3-federal-fatherhood-initiatives-dept-health-and-human-services/12-senate-judiciary-chairman-response-to-proposed-changes-to-child-custody-law">Senate Judiciary Chairman - Response to Proposed Changes to Child Custody Law</a></p> <p>§ <a href="http://americanmotherspoliticalparty.org/ampp-article-library-family-court-custody-abuse-dv/3-federal-fatherhood-initiatives-dept-health-and-human-services/10-hearing-to-review-responsible-fatherhood-programs">Hearing to Review Responsible Fatherhood Programs</a></p> <p>§ <a href="http://americanmotherspoliticalparty.org/ampp-article-library-family-court-custody-abuse-dv/3-federal-fatherhood-initiatives-dept-health-and-human-services/2-the-national-fatherhood-initiative-supporting-a-misogynistic-agenda">The National Fatherhood Initiative: Supporting a Misogynistic Agenda</a></p> <p>§ <a href="http://americanmotherspoliticalparty.org/ampp-article-library-family-court-custody-abuse-dv/5-family-criminal-law-and-research-abuse-dv-child-custody">Family / Criminal Law and Research</a></p> <p>§ <b><a href="http://americanmotherspoliticalparty.org/ampp-article-library-family-court-custody-abuse-dv/5-family-criminal-law-and-research-abuse-dv-child-custody/79-southern-poverty-law-center-on-the-fathers-rights-movement">Southern Poverty Law Center on the Fathers' Rights Movement</a> A Known HATE Gruop</b></p> <p>§ <a href="http://americanmotherspoliticalparty.org/ampp-article-library-family-court-custody-abuse-dv/5-family-criminal-law-and-research-abuse-dv-child-custody/78-qjust-say-good-byeq-new-study-fathers-kill-children-for-revenge-on-their-mothers-when-the-women-leave-them">"Just Say Good-Bye" New Study -- Fathers Kill Children For Revenge On Their Mothers When The Women Leave Them</a></p> <p>§ <a href="http://americanmotherspoliticalparty.org/ampp-article-library-family-court-custody-abuse-dv/5-family-criminal-law-and-research-abuse-dv-child-custody/72-one-more-battleground-domestic-violence-child-custody-and-the-batterers-relentless-pursuit-of-their-victims-through-the-courts">One More Battleground: Domestic Violence, Child Custody, and the Batterers’ Relentless Pursuit of their Victims Through the Courts</a></p> <p>§ <a href="http://americanmotherspoliticalparty.org/ampp-article-library-family-court-custody-abuse-dv/5-family-criminal-law-and-research-abuse-dv-child-custody/69-mothers-on-trial-the-battle-for-children-and-custody-motherhood-under-siege">Mothers On Trial: The Battle for Children and Custody. Motherhood Under Siege</a></p> <p>§ <a href="http://americanmotherspoliticalparty.org/ampp-article-library-family-court-custody-abuse-dv/5-family-criminal-law-and-research-abuse-dv-child-custody/40-abusive-fathers-are-more-likely-to-seek-sole-custody-in-child-custody-battles">ABUSIVE FATHERS ARE MORE LIKELY TO SEEK SOLE CUSTODY IN CHILD CUSTODY BATTLES</a></p> <p>§ <a href="http://americanmotherspoliticalparty.org/ampp-article-library-family-court-custody-abuse-dv/5-family-criminal-law-and-research-abuse-dv-child-custody/31-coercive-control-how-men-entrap-women-in-personal-life">Coercive Control: How Men Entrap Women in Personal Life</a></p> <p>§ <a href="http://americanmotherspoliticalparty.org/ampp-article-library-family-court-custody-abuse-dv/5-family-criminal-law-and-research-abuse-dv-child-custody/30-court-whores-rape-american-justice">Whores Of The Court and the Rape of American Justice</a></p> <p>§ <a href="http://americanmotherspoliticalparty.org/ampp-article-library-family-court-custody-abuse-dv/5-family-criminal-law-and-research-abuse-dv-child-custody/21-domestic-violence-abuse-and-child-custody">Domestic Violence, Abuse, and Child Custody</a></p> <p>§ <a href="http://americanmotherspoliticalparty.org/ampp-article-library-family-court-custody-abuse-dv/9-vawa-parental-alienation-syndrome-and-fathers-rig">VAWA, Parental Alienation Syndrome, Fathers Rights</a></p> <p><a href="http://americanmotherspoliticalparty.org/ampp-article-library-family-court-custody-abuse-dv/9-vawa-parental-alienation-syndrome-and-fathers-rig/88-vawa-title-ii-the-entire-missing-section-of-the-vawa-identifying-use-of-pas-legal-strategies-as-violence-against-women-which-endangers-children">VAWA - Title II - The Entire MISSING Section of the VAWA Identifying Use of PAS Legal Strategies as Violence Against Women Which Endangers Children</a></p> Claudine Dombrowskihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00174108218219442634noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6075225070962028659.post-84708191867992525052012-12-13T10:50:00.001-08:002012-12-13T10:50:16.288-08:00Kansas - Lawless America Congressional Testimony of Claudine Dombrowski to Bill Windsor Lawless America<p><em><b><a href="http://www.lawlessamerica.com/" target="_blank"><img style="border-bottom: 0px; border-left: 0px; margin: 0px 5px 0px 0px; display: inline; border-top: 0px; border-right: 0px" title="3908_195698540566484_502655422_n" border="0" alt="3908_195698540566484_502655422_n" src="http://lh4.ggpht.com/-bkedJlSLFeU/UMoirHUhc0I/AAAAAAAABZE/u1hBii2uhYI/3908_195698540566484_502655422_n%25255B23%25255D.jpg?imgmax=800" width="431" height="155"></a></b></em></p> <p><em></em></p> <blockquote> <p><font size="2"><em>“CLAUDINE HAS BEEN BEATEN WITH CROWBARS, THROWN OUT OF CARS, FORCED TO LIVE WITH COFFINS, BUT HE HAS CUSTODY, AND SHE HASN'T SEEN HER CHILD IN 13 YEARS...”</em><strong> </strong></font><a href="https://www.facebook.com/lawlessamerica/posts/101817146656657"><font size="2">https://www.facebook.com/lawlessamerica/posts/101817146656657</font></a><font size="2"> </font></p> <p><em><font size="2"><strong>“</strong>CLAUDINE'S SUIT AT THE INTERNATIONAL COURT FOR HUMAN RIGHTS IS THE LEAD ACTION. SHE IS A HORRENDOUS VICTIM OF DOMESTIC ABUSE. SHE IS FULLY DISABLED FROM THE ABUSE. THIS STORY TAKES SEVERAL CAKES” </font></em><a href="https://www.facebook.com/lawlessamerica/posts/179860735488206"><font size="2">https://www.facebook.com/lawlessamerica/posts/179860735488206</font></a><font size="2"> </font></p></blockquote> <blockquote> <p><b><font size="2"></font></b></p> <p><b><font size="2"></font></b></p></blockquote> <p><font size="2"><b>Related Documentaries: </b>* </font><a href="http://www.mefeedia.com/watch/57138144?board=2652"><font size="2">Breaking The Silence: Children’s Stories</font></a><font size="2"> * </font><a href="http://www.mefeedia.com/watch/57095124?board=2652"><font size="2">Family Court Crisis – Our Children At Risk</font></a><font size="2"> * </font><a href="http://www.mefeedia.com/watch/57095349?board=2652"><font size="2">Domestic Violence Continued Through Child Custody Litigation</font></a><font size="2"> * </font><a href="http://www.mefeedia.com/watch/57095464?board=2652"><font size="2">Interviews - Battered Mothers Custody Conference</font></a><font size="2"> <b>{WARNING: GRAPHIC} </b>* </font><a href="http://www.nowayoutbutone.com/"><font size="2">No Way Out But One</font></a><font size="2"> * </font><a href="http://www.mefeedia.com/AMPP/customchannels"><font size="2">More</font></a><font size="2">…..and </font><a href="http://lockerz.com/z/21184618/collections"><font size="2">more</font></a><font size="2"> and more </font><a href="https://www.youtube.com/feed/playlists"><font size="2">here</font></a><font size="2"> </font></p> <blockquote> <p><strong><a href="http://www.lawlessamerica.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=1202:plans-announced-to-bring-criminal-charges-against-every-corrupt-government-official-in-america&catid=133:lawless-america-the-movie&Itemid=105" target="_blank"><font size="2">Plans announced to bring Criminal Charges against Every Corrupt Government Official in America (including Kansas)</font></a></strong><i></i><font size="2"> by Bill Windsor of Lawless America <strong>Lawless America Movie Promo: </strong></font><a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wK6Un98ZzFQ&feature=youtu.be&a"><strong><font size="2">Nobody -- Claudine Dombrowski</font></strong></a></p></blockquote> <p><b><font size="2"></font></b></p> <p><strong><font size="2">Kansas - Lawless America Congressional Testimony 10-29-2012 of </font></strong><a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lBsHkK06MGM&list=FLTgDrfnNlGwUpMWZCd6lVHw&index=1"><strong><font size="2">Claudine Dombrowski to Bill Windsor Lawless America</font></strong></a></p> <div style="padding-bottom: 0px; margin: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; display: inline; float: none; padding-top: 0px" id="scid:5737277B-5D6D-4f48-ABFC-DD9C333F4C5D:02bac804-3885-4e3b-b3b2-9f1eae8605c0" class="wlWriterEditableSmartContent"><div id="9978a0b1-67ab-49e0-b788-82a75491c8cf" style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px; display: inline;"><div><a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lBsHkK06MGM&feature=youtube_gdata_player" target="_new"><img src="http://lh3.ggpht.com/-skWPnXvnFb8/UMoisnQmIfI/AAAAAAAABZM/b3-opR1_hZ8/video2ff84a7cd090%25255B6%25255D.jpg?imgmax=800" style="border-style: none" galleryimg="no" onload="var downlevelDiv = document.getElementById('9978a0b1-67ab-49e0-b788-82a75491c8cf'); downlevelDiv.innerHTML = "<div><object width=\"425\" height=\"355\"><param name=\"movie\" value=\"http://www.youtube.com/v/lBsHkK06MGM&hl=en\"><\/param><embed src=\"http://www.youtube.com/v/lBsHkK06MGM&hl=en\" type=\"application/x-shockwave-flash\" width=\"425\" height=\"355\"><\/embed><\/object><\/div>";" alt=""></a></div></div></div> <p><font size="2"><b>Occupation: </b>Nursing, Co-founder & Webmaster of </font><a href="http://www.americanmotherspoliticalparty.org/"><font size="2">American Mothers Political Party</font></a><font size="2">, Kansas Mothers For Custodial Justice, Kansas Family Court Reform, International Commission on Human Rights (IACHR) </font><a href="http://www.batteredmotherscustodyconference.org/"><font size="2">Battered Mothers Custody Conference</font></a><font size="2"> </font></p> <p><font size="2"><b>State: </b>Kansas<b></b> </font></p> <p><font size="2"><b>Corruption Experienced: </b>Domestic Violence, Criminal Courts, Lack of Prosecution, Family Court, Government Corruption, Attorney Misconduct, Deprivation of Civil Rights, Deprivation Constitutional Rights, Deprivation Basic Human Rights, Maternal Deprivation, Torture, Other </font></p> <p><font size="2"><b>Subject Type</b>: Victim/Survivor, Domestic Violence Activist/Advocate, Expert Speaker/Consultant </font></p> <p><font size="2"><b>Complaint Details</b>: </font></p> <p><font size="2">My name is </font><a href="https://www.google.com/#hl=en&sugexp=les%3B&gs_nf=3&gs_rn=0&gs_ri=hp&tok=2p00UC0ZTCe0UFlbZ3MjvQ&cp=7&gs_id=q&xhr=t&q=claudine+dombrowski&pf=p&safe=off&tbo=d&output=search&sclient=psy-ab&oq=claudin&gs_l=&pbx=1&bav=on.2,or.r_gc.r_pw.r_cp.r_qf.&bvm=bv.1355272958,d.b2U&fp=c666ec7bd4"><font size="2">Claudine Dombrowski</font></a><font size="2">, I have one daughter Rikki who will be 18 in December 2012. We are victims of </font><a href="http://www.kansas.net/~freepress/7-12-01-8.html"><font size="2">Judicial Corruption</font></a><font size="2"> in Topeka, Kansas. Our Case leads the suit filed at the (IACHR) Inter American Commission on Human Rights (</font><a href="http://www.stopfamilyviolence.org/pages/308"><font size="2">Dombrowski et el v US 2007</font></a><font size="2">) on behalf of all Mothers Nationwide <b><i>for the practice and policies of US courts routinely granting child custody to abusers and pedophiles when Battered Mothers file for divorce</i></b>. Petition can be viewed in its entirety on the Stop Family Violence website. </font><a href="http://www.stopfamilyviolence.org/pages/308"><font size="2">www.stopfamilyviolence.org/pages/308</font></a></p> <p><font size="2">I am a US Army Veteran, Co-founder & webmaster for </font><a href="http://www.americanmotherspoliticalparty.org/"><font size="2">American Mothers Political Party</font></a><font size="2">. In 2006, I was placed on the Kansas Secretary of State’s, Address </font><a href="http://www.kssos.org/safeathome/main.html"><font size="2">Confidentiality Program</font></a><font size="2"> - Safe At Home for Victims of </font><a href="http://www.kssos.org/safeathome/how_sah_work.html"><font size="2">Domestic Violence</font></a><font size="2">. I was a psychiatric nurse for thirteen years with the State of Kansas and the Veterans Administration, Until December 2000 when I was placed on 100% physical disability related to the violence inflicted by the batterer. </font></p> <p><font size="2">I, like many Battered mothers <b>thought that I had the right to be free from Violence. <a href="http://www.scribd.com/doc/15555694/1997-KS-Court-of-Appeals-Brief-of-Appellant-Dombrowski-v-Richardson?in_collection=2728794">I was wrong</a>.</b> Due to both the Criminal and Family Court Failures. Having been </font><a href="http://www.scribd.com/my_document_collections/2728796"><font size="2">beaten with crowbars</font></a><font size="2">, thrown out of moving vehicles, have had both wrists and several ribs broken, thrown through plate glass windows, tied up, raped, sodomized then left in a crawl space for several days. </font><a href="http://www.scribd.com/my_document_collections/2728794"><font size="2">Just to name a few of the Criminal Assaults</font></a><font size="2">-by an already 8 time criminally convicted perpetrator </font><a href="http://www.scribd.com/my_document_collections/2728798"><font size="2">to include but not limited</font></a><font size="2"> to: <i>(Battery, Attempted Battery, Battery of a Law Enforcement Officer, Obstruction of Legal Process, Possession of Marijuana, Violation of Open Container law, Violation of Restraining Orders, Domestic Violence and Terroristic Death threats)</i> </font></p> <p><font size="2">Even with </font><a href="http://www.scribd.com/my_document_collections/2728798"><font size="2">8 criminal convictions</font></a><font size="2">, the perpetrator filed for custody of my child in </font><a href="http://www.scribd.com/AnotherAnonymom/collections"><font size="2">family court</font></a><font size="2"> and after being ‘beaten’ with a crow bar to which he admits, but was never charged, but in fact was given early release from probation for ‘good behavior’ and Without motion from any party the Judge simply on his own issued an </font><a href="http://www.scribd.com/doc/32127370/2000-Custody-Switch-Order-3-pdf"><font size="2">11 page Order</font></a><font size="2"> by ‘snail mail’ giving complete custody of my daughter to an admitted and convicted batterer. I was immediately placed in supervised visits after a complete suspension of any contact with my daughter. The past 13 years I have had minimal contact w my child and absolutely no contact at all this past 3 years. Due to the </font><a href="http://www.thelizlibrary.org/site-index/site-index-frame.html"><font size="2">‘therapeutic jurisprudence’</font></a><font size="2"> access to justice – deniers, whom </font><a href="http://www.thelizlibrary.org/site-index/site-index-frame.html"><font size="2">advocate for the perpetrator</font></a><font size="2">, who state; <b><i>‘that is not in the best interest of the child to know that her father is a batterer,’ and instead of protecting mother and child, all contact was to be eliminated between myself and my child.</i></b><i></i> </font></p> <p><font size="2">I last held my daughter 13 years ago. </font></p> <p><font size="2">The Criminal Courts have failed to offer to myself and my daughter equal protection under the law, failed to use simple common sense in giving a victims child to the admitted and convicted perpetrator. <br>The <b>complete ‘Failure of Justice’</b> for myself and for my daughter, <b>in criminal and in family court</b>, our denial of any ‘Access to Justice’ is the current state of the Courts, the lawyers and Mental Health so called experts known as </font><a href="http://www.thelizlibrary.org/site-index/site-index-frame.html"><font size="2">Therapeutic Jurisprudence</font></a><font size="2"> - a lucrative business that denies access to justice to society’s most vulnerable victims, battered mothers and their children and only for profit. </font><a href="http://www.thelizlibrary.org/site-index/site-index-frame.html"><font size="2">It’s monetary, it’s all about the money and it can be prevented.</font></a><font size="2"> </font></p> <p><a href="http://www.thelizlibrary.org/site-index/site-index-frame.html"><font size="2">Eliminate all Therapeutic jurisprudence</font></a><font size="2"> –do-gooders-Psychologists, Gal’s, case managers, return to Rule of Law not the Rule of man. <b>The</b> <b>lesson is clear – do not report abuse. Or never see your child again.</b></font></p> Claudine Dombrowskihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00174108218219442634noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6075225070962028659.post-44737444125245732602012-09-30T21:08:00.001-07:002012-09-30T21:08:06.633-07:00The Hero’s, The Warrior’s: The ‘Survivors’ - October Domestic Violence ACTION Month<p><a href="http://claudinedombrowski.blogspot.com/2012/09/the-heros-warriors-survivors-october.html" target="_blank">October</a> means a lot too many people, fall, Halloween, preparing for winter- but to <strong>1 in 3 women</strong> it represents Domestic Violence <strike>Awareness</strike> ACTION– (Intimate Partner Violence) month. </p> <p>For 18 years, I have been a hardcore advocate/activist. I have met and worked with so many wonderful people like <a href="http://murphymilanojournal.blogspot.com/2012/09/holding-my-hand-through-hell-officially.html?utm_source=twitterfeed&utm_medium=twitter" target="_blank">Susan Murphy Milano</a>, Delilah Jones, Mo Hannah, <a href="http://www.barrygoldstein.net/" target="_blank">Barry Goldstein</a>, The <a href="http://BatteredMothersCustodyConference.org" target="_blank">Battered Mothers Custody Conference</a>, <a href="http://www.stopfamilyviolence.org/info/custody-abuse/legal-documents/petition-to-inter-american-commission-on-human-rights" target="_blank">Stop Family Violence</a>, The <a href="http://www.leadershipcouncil.org/1/pas/1.html" target="_blank">Leadership Council</a>, DV Leap…. the list of organizations and people who some like myself and others because they simply care - all work year round -- are endless. </p> <blockquote> <p>Not to mention all the hundreds of mothers who have lost custody because of abuse. I spent the last 15 years networking mothers on a national and local level – even international. In October we really pound it out — we do all year, but by storm we take it to the internet, the streets, the conferences, the National and State AG’s, Coalitions, judiciary and the community. This is “our month” to further not just awareness - but solutions. </p></blockquote> <blockquote> <p>Domestic Violence aka Intimate Partner Violence, rape, torture, and death – IPV: A Human rights issue that is violated from the beginning and it seldom ever ends, has not gotten any better – only worst. </p></blockquote> <p><strong>Awareness? Oh, we are all ‘well aware’ </strong>- 1 in 5 high school girls will report being abused by their boyfriend either physically or sexually before they graduate. 1 in 3 women you know has survived it, is going through it, or maybe she died ‘accidently’ e.g. drowned in a dry bath tub, (this btw is a very common ‘accident’ the many mothers have) falls, blunt force trauma, or you know of, or have heard of, the father viciously slaughter his entire family, the wife, mother and children – most all are under age 10. And EVERYONE in their life time will know someone or be intimately affected by Domestic Violence (DV) – Intimate partner Violence (IPV) </p> <p><strong>I am a survivor. The color purple bleeds. <a href="http://americanmotherspoliticalparty.org/ampp-article-library-family-court-custody-abuse-dv/1-research-articles-family-court-bias-custody-abuse-battered-moms/15-courts-are-biased-against-mothers" target="_blank"><img style="border-right-width: 0px; display: inline; border-top-width: 0px; border-bottom-width: 0px; margin-left: 0px; border-left-width: 0px; margin-right: 0px" title="296588_240990569286453_876103963_n" border="0" alt="296588_240990569286453_876103963_n" align="right" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhVNBpzgh9L1udW0mUPQ7iMhTfMqshfKoqr4pQYWFKHjC2r3CO4x_C3_j30uerCZMKGbRGtvQpPHWI7WOUFMNTOqmGtPl8AoHgEYGYr6jpYRBUInFKnoghJT977X5RJ7WFUr-zpTUqaXDg/?imgmax=800" width="191" height="128"></a></strong></p> <p>I am boycotting the yearly rally I have attended here in Topeka, Kansas since its inception 17 years ago – I have never missed a single rally. Not one. October was my month to ‘be the change’ to take my <a href="http://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL0A501E485BF719CC&feature=view_all" target="_blank">knowledge and experience</a> and expound upon it. To let others know- ‘NO it is NOT alright to live in constant fear’. </p> <p>But after the City of <a href="https://www.google.com/search?hl=en&gl=us&tbm=nws&q=Topeka%2C+Kansas+Domestic+Violence&oq=Topeka%2C+Kansas+Domestic+Violence&gs_l=news-cc.12..43j43i400.1633.6203.0.11075.18.2.0.13.0.1.198.330.0j2.2.0...0.0...1ac.1.DRJESF2atko#q=Topeka%2C+Kansas+Domestic+Violence&hl=en&safe=off&gl=us&source=lnms&sa=X&ei=YAVpUNfsI4eO2wXRx4GQDA&ved=0CAkQ_AUoAA&bav=on.2,or.r_gc.r_pw.r_cp.r_qf.&fp=e144f1b25e45ee57&biw=1366&bih=655" target="_blank">Topeka, Kansas</a>, Removed Domestic Violence from Cities Ordinance codes - in essence ‘decriminalize’ Domestic Violence, last October 2011 – (THIS STILL REMAINS) – The City Ordinance prohibiting DV has not been re instated, but ‘dog at large’, tall weeds, prostitution, drunk and disorderly’ along with all other misdemeanor’s and misdemeanor assaults – remain. But NOT ‘Domestic Violence’ – still remains retracted. The county does its best but the case loads are over whelming. But again—it’s just Domestic Violence cultural attitudes. </p> <p>I simply cannot go out to the rallies, marches, activities - screaming at the top of my lungs – chants, (more lies.) Slogans like <em><a href="http://ncmbts.blogspot.com/feeds/posts/default?alt=rss" target="_blank">“Get Out” – “Get Help”</a> – “You Don’t have to live this way”</em> – you have all heard them. They are all lies.<strong> 1 in3</strong> – yet we still do our community customs of: ‘<em>See we care about___(fill in the blank) – but;</em> (really it’s just an annual fall walk, political shoulder rubbing, a few victims find validation (if it’s their 1st one). </p> <p><strong>‘Policy and procedure’</strong> – ‘Women and Children are top Priorities’ <em>everyone ‘talks the talk.’</em> Still—no one holds these most evil of society’s criminals accountable – it’s just domestic violence, as they turn away from the realities of it every other day of the year. <strong>No one <em>‘walks the walk’</em> except those survivors turned advocate/activist. They are the true hero’s and warriors, shakers and World changers</strong>. They do it so that no one else will have to endure needlessly or die needlessly as so many already have. </p> <p><a href="http://americanmotherspoliticalparty.org/ampp-article-library-family-court-custody-abuse-dv/1-research-articles-family-court-bias-custody-abuse-battered-moms/83-us-family-courts-sacrificing-mothers-a-children-all-the-usual-suspects-guardian-ad-litems-psychologists-case-managers-custody-evaluators-access-visitation-supervisors-parenting-coordinators-and-therapeutic-jurisprudence" target="_blank"><img style="border-right-width: 0px; display: inline; border-top-width: 0px; border-bottom-width: 0px; margin-left: 0px; border-left-width: 0px; margin-right: 0px" title="Coercive-Control" border="0" alt="Coercive-Control" align="left" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiv4h5rYE1ZPCLbZ_wrnwieY6PglHHN8P1Tqhe3VOfpuQR2DELN8UgtncUH3hSPJCPvzskpGXIg7Iaj2UEi3YywsVRe4U9-TuTgtJqApToQs73p_7TZ5gg3QTcLKNax0ErBOEjZjrI36FE/?imgmax=800" width="179" height="204"></a> Domestic Violence as Evan stark so clearly writes in <a href="http://americanmotherspoliticalparty.org/ampp-article-library-family-court-custody-abuse-dv/5-family-criminal-law-and-research-abuse-dv-child-custody/31-coercive-control-how-men-entrap-women-in-personal-life" target="_blank">Coercive Control</a> – “Why the domestic violence revolution has stalled” and further explains it as what it really is. <strong>Human rights violations</strong>. <em>It is a pattern of coercive control, emotional, physical, verbal that chains the victim to the perpetrator</em>, sometimes they break free, sometimes they endure, some survive, some die and sometimes they leave – only to find that living w a batterer was much easier than dealing with the abusers in the judiciary, criminal courts, family courts. </p> <p><strong>1 in 3 women.</strong> How many of those three have children? You can quote me stats all you want but the very fact that the leading cause of death to pregnant women is homicide by their male partner and the very real fact that Mothers are vanishing, the fact that the cemeteries’ are filled with women and children who were of the most profound types of crimes a complete stripping of autonomy, prisoner of war, concentration camp – comes close. It is their dead bodies in that fill those cemeteries. </p> <p><a href="http://americanmotherspoliticalparty.org/ampp-article-library-family-court-custody-abuse-dv/3-federal-fatherhood-initiatives-dept-health-and-human-services/91-congressional-report-on-fatherhood-funding-used-in-family-courts-child-support-agencies-engaged-in-financial-fraud-senate-finance-committee-hearing-june-2012" target="_blank"><img style="border-right-width: 0px; display: inline; border-top-width: 0px; border-bottom-width: 0px; margin-left: 0px; border-left-width: 0px; margin-right: 0px" title="64795_482000300228_469045_n" border="0" alt="64795_482000300228_469045_n" align="right" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgdlR-VF9S8Jihhb9kptIm5OhMvgDaVp1yL3BOU_VugVcdWG9tsbfEOZmEE5TuUGzen-loolHHbRToFFeZFbAtTRmETmdsNR_bLeikf8_i_jp9eyAhK4n9MCYzEhMRdE5jLHSHmzzKI2IU/?imgmax=800" width="170" height="212"></a> It’s not about awareness; this has been ongoing since the beginning of time. We all know about – some judge, some ignore, some become impassioned. But Domestic Violence – Intimate partner Violence <strong>exist because we as a society socially accept it</strong> - Bottom line. It is acceptable to beat your wife. Beat your kids, murder them all under this so called “domestic violence’ umbrella. Ahhh ‘so sad’ we say, the media articles write <em>“he was such a nice guy”</em> in regards to yet another familicide or murder-suicide within the family. </p> <p><strong>The most dangerous place for a woman is in her home. A man’s castle is his home.</strong> This actually goes a long way in showing why Domestic Violence is a societal accepted norm. </p> <p>A man’s home is his castle- how many men are removed from ‘their’ home and placed in a shelter. None. They take the victims, mothers mostly with usually small children to a ‘shelter’? Shelters are for animals, the stay is the same for both the animal shelters and the battered mothers – about 2 weeks. Then….with many mitigating and very coercive factors, mother returns to the “Man’s castle – HIS home’ with her children. On average, if mother survives, she will leave 7 times. -- Then she will think that like all those slogans above that she is better than that, she and her children don’t have to live like that in fear 24-7. I mean look at the rest of the world- they don’t go through what she goes through – or so she thinks, again its all lies. 1 in 3. But so ‘perfect the couple appeared’ – such a nice family” so quiet and on and on…… when we hear finally outrage. </p> <p>Not tragedy but <a href="http://www.thelizlibrary.org/outrage/index.html" target="_blank">outrage</a>, as you see every crime of IPV is preventable. Every murder of another mother and her children, preventable. </p> <blockquote> <p><b>Trag·e·dy (trj-d) n. pl. trag·e·dies </b>- 1. A drama or literary work in which the main character is brought to ruin or suffers extreme sorrow, especially as a consequence of a tragic flaw, moral weakness, or inability to cope with unfavorable circumstances... <p><b>THESE CASES ARE NOT "TRAGEDIES". THEY ARE <b>OUTRAGES</b></b></p></blockquote> <p>With blinders on, we as society see the world through rose colored glasses. Perfect. The perfect wife, the perfect family the perfect father. All lies. <a href="http://www.mefeedia.com/watch/57335482?board=2821" target="_blank">Domestic Violence RARELY ENDS –except in death.</a></p> <p><strong><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiPlJ3qQLRrKnMp4eqMOtdolBZlNJy2jVBa-Q4SgswY2s4RvLvEaBr7BzIU-9bw8CPOjENM0BdngD5TfhhS9jP1ICfDcAVwgMt0eRCriayK2zJb8BCPk4bOhk0x3T0zGp9e3DMpoiRfvGA/s1600-h/mothers_vanishing%25255B6%25255D.jpg"><img style="border-right-width: 0px; display: inline; border-top-width: 0px; border-bottom-width: 0px; margin-left: 0px; border-left-width: 0px; margin-right: 0px" title="mothers_vanishing" border="0" alt="mothers_vanishing" align="left" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi0a2_YYp66hlh7h95TvWOLSFZcZ5afsB3Nhyl1XK9ucN_p64hDIM00ocyNWqyHk_SwZnnnUyCJ8VZccv7FhgqbafqW3DmUZx-YfXkC4z6Gz3Um5dWriiunSAW87WScD_LF5SqQNG34Pqg/?imgmax=800" width="165" height="165"></a> The blood flows. Another mother disappears. <a href="http://mothersarevanishing.blogspot.com/" target="_blank">Mothers Are Vanishing</a>. </strong></p> <p>Those mothers are always up and leaving their kids, their purse, cell phone car etc….. this is the nuts and sluts view of our society. But if a man ups an disappears leaving behind his wallet, his car his cell phone – something IS wrong, became harmed in some way accidental but usually would be seen and viewed from society’s rose colored glasses as a crime. I mean men (<em>who truly are the nuts and sluts</em>) would never leave. </p> <p>Further, many States, like here in Kansas, the Federal and State Grant Funding for Domestic Violence ”…<em> is to encourage the battered mothers to go back to the abuser.!”</em> <strong>WHAT?</strong> We have taken giant leaps over tall buildings, sometimes it is like for every ‘one’ good we achieve – we get thrown back into the dark ages. Well, that is the goal. Oppression, slavery, ownership, entitlement and belief system, of not only the batterer, but that of society’s. </p> <p>I have no doubt, that ‘We… ‘will eventually change that too. </p> <p><strong>So here is to the true Hero’s -</strong><strong>The real Warrior’s</strong></p> <p><strong>The ‘Survivors’ - Who Take What happened To them and indeed create a ‘Better’ world as a result.</strong></p> <p><strong></strong> </p> <p><strong>##### </strong></p> <p><em>Special Dedication to </em><a href="http://murphymilanojournal.blogspot.com/2012/09/holding-my-hand-through-hell-officially.html?utm_source=twitterfeed&utm_medium=twitter" target="_blank"><em>Susan Murphy Milano – Holding My hand Through Hell</em></a><em> </em></p> <p><img style="display: inline; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px" alt="Holding My Hand Through Hell" align="left" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgkvgdCdNHzpJL7WW9jKniZR-KqB8j2hw1NBuQ5XihAf5nRBOGTIDKprMt_sjAbzE5Ca1IvylasUm_YXMbsnfYCvtz8xPP5MmR2AlnCPCpIz723oLr5e_KBN5OR_8S78W4oAgc-i9SB_PUR/s290/newHolding+My+Hand+Cover.jpg"></p> <p><strong>Holding My Hand Through Hell</strong> is much more than a story of survival, the book is a re-enactment of how God reaches through the fire of chaos and brings peace and hope. A woman questioning her faith through a multitude of experiences finds herself continually in the midst of battle, within her own relationships, and through the thousands of high risk intimate partner violence victims whom she rescued and became a thread in the tapestry of her life. <p><em>"More than a memoir <strong>Holding My Hand Through Hell</strong> is like a true crime drama played out through the years of one woman's life."</em> <p>The premise of <strong>Holding My Hand Through Hell</strong> is gripping, yet heart wrenching, and readers say they are compelled to follow Murphy Milano through her journey to the end. After years of torment and abuse, her <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chicago_Police_Department">Chicago Police Department</a> father murdered her mother in the family home, and took his own life, but Murphy-Milano decided not to be another crime victim, but to survive the worst tragedy of her life and make sure it didn't happen to others. Leaving a lucrative career as an investment banker, she spent the next 20 years in the trenches with other victims of abuse, like her mother, enriching the lives of each and every one who enlisted her help. <p>Often shunned by traditional domestic violence organizations, Susan Murphy-Milano became like a one man band, utilizing unique strategies specific to each individual she helped. Using her connections within courtrooms and the media, she found herself face to face with some of the worst abusers, often questioning whether God would bring her through the next crisis. <blockquote> <p><em>“My Sear Sweet Susan - </em><em>Had it not been for the hell we endured we would have never met, you have taught me and thousands of other’s how to be the –change- we want, by your selfless, 200% nonstop commitment and compassion. Thank you sister! You are my hero!” xoxo C</em></p></blockquote> Claudine Dombrowskihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00174108218219442634noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6075225070962028659.post-18559343514916933242012-09-20T20:43:00.001-07:002012-09-20T20:43:37.405-07:00Leaving The War Zone: A Battered Mothers Memoirs For her Daughter<h5 align="left"><a href="http://theloveforherdaughter.blogspot.com/2012/09/chapter-7-witchs-hat_20.html" target="_blank">CHAPTER 7 – The Witch’s Hat</a></h5> <p align="center"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgtYQ0x8I5785XdX7tlkRCx6_X9RVv_tGLZjxfqf4BpQp0ZyRNO0stTvnYNZ49CZlpWq40I2l5oSM54WYeIpXw4JGODoD3Ls8dV6hdFgrU9fl-oivFAKiZa2GtYQlMeblrqRrVppG1327I/s1600-h/015_15%25255B3%25255D.jpg"><img title="015_15" border="0" alt="015_15" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjiZn2iAgJInt2qDhH4qZ_cwCI2yaquHcZWO524lOlTjh4_mY2hQszrOheuCjY41vjyWDQ-EqF2ikfq49HBCSFlFWrDxHIKTLTVFpgIYPkdtE6SA-5qrpR5lJNrLFc6uLg8fTGOK0lJv8w/?imgmax=800" width="223" height="244" /></a><img src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhbFUbWN-s2-tODZo3-W15X28rNt3uK6FnTrafEdkyfs9un6T_xKM_oh-0d2SfGoBFn5mh68sFkhWooF9Qb-KJdOND9ie2X3V4FGsryrclvGNl5SEhgr_4TzqfS2oTjJ_eHqCvFAf__Nt4/s631/photo.jpg" width="214" height="256" /></p> <p align="center"><embed type="application/x-shockwave-flash" src="https://picasaweb.google.com/s/c/bin/slideshow.swf" width="288" height="192" flashvars="host=picasaweb.google.com&hl=en_US&feat=flashalbum&RGB=0x000000&feed=https%3A%2F%2Fpicasaweb.google.com%2Fdata%2Ffeed%2Fapi%2Fuser%2F106192456536943612939%2Falbumid%2F5733956487788430769%3Falt%3Drss%26kind%3Dphoto%26hl%3Den_US" pluginspage="http://www.macromedia.com/go/getflashplayer"></embed></p> <p><strong><a href="http://theloveforherdaughter.blogspot.com/2012/09/chapter-7-witchs-hat_20.html" target="_blank">The Witch’s Hat</a></strong> </p> <p>This past few weeks have been pretty good. I usually get very sad when summer ends. The pool, the heat. This has been one of the absolute hottest summers I can ever recall in my 46 years. Triple digits were the normal. On Labor Day, my window AC went out. So the following week I stayed in the pool. Stayed cool. I love the solitude of being out in the country. The quiet, the peace. My raw nerves – turned inside out this past two decades have taken such a toll on me. The stress, the emotional pain has shown its self through physical outlets. </p> <p>During the summer, the memories of being in the pool with my daughter, growing up in a pool myself, and the memories’ of my mother. Memories suck. Their were so many bad ones. So much suffering. The torture camps not unlike those of the concentration camps, the fear, the 24-7 fear. </p> <p>The beatings were almost like a release. A Release of that constant fear. As then for a a day, maybe two. All was quiet. Constant chaos soon followed. </p> <p>Present <a href="http://kansasjudicialsystem-casemanagers.blogspot.com/2012/08/case-management-parent-coordination-bad.html" target="_blank">day</a>, in healing from trauma, sometimes one simply cannot recall all the ‘things’ that happened. The mind works like that. It takes care of us. So when trauma is enduring to survive within the mind, you block that ‘trauma’ out. This is a normal thing, a healthy thing and one that is built in to our human composition, of coping adapting and evolving. </p> <p>The thing is, with the blocking of all that bad – went the few precious moments we had, Rikki and I. With even thinking about her, the pain of her loss the pain of the past ‘constant’ 14 years of court litigation (Continued abuse, torment) I have had to put her few pictures away. This past year I have slowly began to convert the old VHS tapes into digital and DVD. I have for all these years been unable to look at them. The pain immense. Even in her photographs, complete strangers could even see in her once very happy , dancing sparkling eyes disappear. Each years school photo they diminished until finally the light was gone altogether. </p> <p>The only photos I was allowed to have, from kindergarten through 6<sup>th</sup> grade. In them alone shows the years of agony she suffered. SCAN PHOTOS HERE Each year, her eyes were darker, until finally the light in them was completely gone. So in order to survive, I have had to put those photos away, in a scrap book. Again, at the loss the helplessness and agony of my baby girl who was <a href="http://kansasjudicialsystem-casemanagers.blogspot.com/2012/09/kansas-judges-merit-selection-good-ole.html?utm_source=BP_recent" target="_blank">robbed</a> of everything, especially her mother. A childhood of fear, loss and torment. Destined to follow her through adulthood. </p> <p>The good memories are precious few, those years were as well stolen, tainted with the ever ending struggle of court abuse, but we were together and we made those few times good. It is no wonder that when the bad is blocked the good as well because they are all attached to the torment our human rights, we had none. We still do not. </p> <p>But this year, as I was packing up my summer clothes, preparing for winter, thankful in fact as the summer damn near killed me. To hot even for hell. I was going through what few things remain from my life. Not much. A few old boxes. It was sorta like a treasure hunt, I saw of course things that reminded me of all the bad, things of my baby girl that I have promised to preserve for her. A gentle smile crossed my face. </p> <p>Then just out of nowhere a Witch’s hat. My hat. Then I recalled the most wonderful of all memories. Halloween. Fall, the entire month was always ours. That was the only one thing that was consistent, one thing that did not come with pain inflicted by the abuser himself or his court whore proxy’s. </p> <p><img style="margin: 0px 10px 0px 0px; display: inline" align="left" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhbFUbWN-s2-tODZo3-W15X28rNt3uK6FnTrafEdkyfs9un6T_xKM_oh-0d2SfGoBFn5mh68sFkhWooF9Qb-KJdOND9ie2X3V4FGsryrclvGNl5SEhgr_4TzqfS2oTjJ_eHqCvFAf__Nt4/s631/photo.jpg" width="270" height="337" /> </p> <p>No one wanted that day, Halloween, not like every other holiday, even mother’s day we were robbed of all. Dad always got her every single holiday. As he was the non custodial parent, I just the evil bitch mom who wanted to set herself and her daughter free of torture. But, Halloween….. became ours. We celebrated the fall the holiday throughout the month. We decorated beginning with fall and working into the Halloween spirit. On this day, we could be anything we wanted. This day was always a ‘safe’ day for us. Nothing bad ever happened. It was ours, it was special and we had so much fun. </p> <p>Every year we would add more to our ‘holiday’ boxes - cool Halloween decorations themes. We had an entire 12 x 15 ft. room filled with storage boxes of nothing but fall and Halloween decorations. Throughout these last 13 true hell years, those were all but lost a little at a time, then a lot. Until about 3 years ago, when I stopped seeing anything. As I did not put them up. Eventually, it left my mind as well. Once again, Those precious few good memories attached to the bad. </p> <p>But this witch’s hat, out of nowhere - in what few things are left at all, (not even enough to fill a 10 x 10 ft room) this hat was ‘just’ there. Instantly I had a very comforting feeling, placed it on my head and continued to go through seeking winter clothing, packing summer clothing. Not really thinking about it nor the significance of the hat - just that all was well, like it had always been there. Just a nice feeling, a feeling odd to me, comfortable somehow ‘connected’ in a life long ago forgotten. The hat has been with me every day since, not consciously aware that, I kept it nor that it is always close to me. </p> <p>But as the days began to pass I realized that it was in my car, on the couch,- kinda like with your keys and billfold. The peacefulness of fall all around, the critters all doing their scurrying around, the trees with the ever so slight sound of the old tired leaves scorched from the summer also awaiting the first freeze, before they turn the most vibrant of all colors - fall colors. The winds slightly beginning to shift. Yes the world, the seasons, Mother Nature. So very beautiful. So with all this and preparing my little house for winter, cleaning rearranging, feeling alive, being creative, thinking about absolutely nothing. There sits this witch’s hat. </p> <p>About a week later, actually just a few days ago - the movie ‘twister’ came on TV late I just happened to be up the with the rain storms this week, they have gone from muggy hot to the classic fall cool. Rikki’s absolute number one favorite movie back then in the late 90’s was “Twister”. As I watched it I was thinking about how granny had dubbed her soaps over Rikki’s twister tape, and Rikki in tears said “granny, you taped your soaps on my twister tape’ – she was heartbroken. Lmao  - So was Granny, bless her heart, she was able to get not one but several more tapes of “Twister”. Yes that was a good memory. J </p> <p>Still the witch’s hat, sits near. I see it has a purple feather and purple stone. Then, I recall why I bought that particular witch’s hat, its purple for the color of anti domestic violence. Even way back then as new a survivor, that purple was sacred. So now I have not only the memory of the Halloween but the subtle deeper meanings coming through as well. I survived, my daughter was safe. (back then – late 90’s) But, Still all is well. These memories are without any fear or pain. They just feel good. Atop my aching heart as I grieve the loss of my child. And at this point all resources long ago depleted to keep that special connection with her. It died when my mother died. The courts and daddy made sure that we never spoke again, nothing. Just gone. Like my mom. But in a more brutal way. You see I know my mom is with Jesus, Rikki however is with pure evil. Brutal does not come close. </p> <p>Then the following day, the movie <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7QBYYEhtzVY&list=PL8p3NZQWoR_mmuNg8frBdaEKgf6Iwpri_&index=4&feature=plpp_video" target="_blank">‘Hocus Pocus</a>’ came on…. Then it was more freeking awesomeness…!! To go along with the rest our ‘safe’ zone of Halloween of course our favorite Halloween movies!! All Disney of course, Rikki was not in school yet and she was legally kidnapped by the age of 7.She began kindergarten in the house of hell, and without her mother. He killed her soul then, a thousand deaths she went through. I was not allowed to be anywhere near her, not allowed to comfort her, to just hold her. L It was several year before I was even allowed to see her ‘supervised’ and then we could not hug we could not talk about what happened, we could not talk about hope, the future, we could not talk about our past out home our life, only what Rikki was currently doing with daddy dearest. Her sadness poured out of every pore her entire body eminated a pain that would knock the wind out of any ‘real’ human. </p> <p><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgtYQ0x8I5785XdX7tlkRCx6_X9RVv_tGLZjxfqf4BpQp0ZyRNO0stTvnYNZ49CZlpWq40I2l5oSM54WYeIpXw4JGODoD3Ls8dV6hdFgrU9fl-oivFAKiZa2GtYQlMeblrqRrVppG1327I/s1600-h/015_15%25255B3%25255D.jpg"><img style="display: inline; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px" title="015_15" border="0" alt="015_15" align="right" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjiZn2iAgJInt2qDhH4qZ_cwCI2yaquHcZWO524lOlTjh4_mY2hQszrOheuCjY41vjyWDQ-EqF2ikfq49HBCSFlFWrDxHIKTLTVFpgIYPkdtE6SA-5qrpR5lJNrLFc6uLg8fTGOK0lJv8w/?imgmax=800" width="332" height="361" /></a> </p> <p>With “<a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7QBYYEhtzVY&list=PL8p3NZQWoR_mmuNg8frBdaEKgf6Iwpri_&index=4&feature=plpp_video" target="_blank">Hocus Pocus</a>”, I watched it, loved it, and with warm memories of Rikki (before dad stole her). Then came the movie ‘<a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r41NAZSAtA8&list=PL8p3NZQWoR_mmuNg8frBdaEKgf6Iwpri_&index=6&feature=plpp_video" target="_blank">Halloweentown</a>’ omg. This was absolutely number one favorite for our ‘safe zone’ time. There were two. HalloweenTown and <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QPxTXg1lZwc&list=PL8p3NZQWoR_mmuNg8frBdaEKgf6Iwpri_&index=1&feature=plpp_video" target="_blank">HalloweenTown 2.</a> As I watched them, a flood of so many wonderful memories opened up. </p> <p>Like I had opened up the door and let the fresh air in, these movies, inspired by the witch’s hat were the answer. If I can get to Rikki these movies especially HalloweenTown, deep inside her blocked off heart - a door will open for her too. I somehow know this with every fiber of my being. </p> <p>I have time. My main goal is for her to just ‘watch’ them. I have began to rip and burn them for myself, but I want Rikki to ‘watch’ them. So I will buy them and have them sent to her. Not from me of course and hope they still make it into her DVD player- just movies packaged and sealed, nothing mom could have ‘sneaked’ in. Nothing from ‘mom’ so perhaps she will one day watch it. Directly to her from Amazon maybe. </p> <p>My hopes are that now – perhaps I can begin to write to you. As I said before, it just hurts to bad to the point of panic, anxiety, chest pains and inability to breath. Avoid pain. That’s what we do naturally. And although it pains my heart now as I write this, it is not debilitating, it is welcome, and it just feels right. Like everything else around me - and busy it is – fall. The power of higher than anything else - that special power of Mother Nature. God’s creations and the ‘ultimate justice’. Just wait - the leaves have not even begun to change yet and I plan on doing every fall Halloween activity I can, the healing has finally begun. I guess, it is just time. </p> <p>The witch’s hat made me feel good. LoL as I look at it now. It sits kinda like the witch hat in harry potter, bent over at middle, old and knowing just comfortable. I smile. I love you my daughter my dearest sweet Rikki. </p> <p>Just believe what the heck - you ain’t got nothing to loose, I sure do not, plus - it just feels good. I do not know where I will be from one day to the next or even if I will be. Weather this will be the first day of the rest of my life or the last day - it will be the best day I can make it. </p> <p></p> <p>Of all that I have done, wished to have done – MOTHER was and is the BEST Blessing, the truest love, the Laws of Nature and everything that I had never dreamed of- but what I wanted more than anything.</p> Claudine Dombrowskihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00174108218219442634noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6075225070962028659.post-44753673511784600372012-09-19T19:04:00.001-07:002012-09-19T19:04:08.447-07:00Parental Alienation Syndrome (PAS) is a Scam Crackpot Logic<h3><strong>PSYCHIATRY IS THE ROOT OF ALL EVIL!</strong></h3> <h3><a href="http://parentalalienationsyndromepas.blogspot.com/">Parental Alienation Syndrome (PAS) is a Scam</a></h3> <p><a name="901065509230946559"></a></p> <h5>Crackpot Logic</h5> <p>"Here is how crackpottery works in real life: let's say I am a crackpot and I have invented a miracle cure for the common cold. My magic cure is to shake a dried gourd over the cold victim until he is all better.</p> <p>If I shake the dried gourd long enough, the victim's cold will get better. My miracle cure always works, it is 100% effective, it is extremely reliable. I deserve recognition for my medical breakthrough. Anyone who wants to dispute myclaim prove that it doesn't work — that all those people who got better, didn't get better.</p> <p><strong>"The crackpot's logic is perfect, and perfectly loony. "Crackpots come in many varieties, but they all have one trait in common -- they don't understand how science works." -- Paul Lutus</strong></p> <blockquote></blockquote> <blockquote> <p><em>Parental Alienation Syndrome/Disorder, Shared Parenting, Co-parenting, Fathers Rights, Fatherhood exaltation, Children need both parents, DSM-5, False Abuse Allegations, women lie, children lie, daddy is always perfect no matter what.</em></p> <p><em>Therapeutic Jurisprudence, Guardian Ad Litems, Custody Evaluators, Parenting Coordinators, Mental Health Experts, Sexual Abuse Prevention (SAPA) Reintegration therapy, shock therapy, false memory syndrome, Draptomania, Family Court Judges, Best Interest Child, Co-parenting therapy, Borderline, mommy caused daddy’s bad behavior, that lying bitch should never have left she and her children are owned.</em></p></blockquote> <p><strong>Psychiatry is a theory, not fact not science. Just a court appointed pocket money lining industry.</strong></p> <h5><a href="http://www.randijames.com/2010/06/amy-j-baker-and-parental-alienation.html"><strong>Amy J. Baker and Parental Alienation: Behind the Veil of Ignorance</strong></a></h5> <p><a href="http://www.randijames.com/2010/05/ever-expanding-parental-alienation.html"><strong>The Ever Expanding Parental Alienation Theory: Amy J. Baker's Research Revisited</strong></a></p> <p> </p> <h3><strong>A Collaboration Of </strong><a href="http://www.naturalnews.com/019380.html"><strong>disease mongering</strong></a><strong> </strong></h3> <p><em>“Disease mongering” is the effort to <strong>enlarge</strong> <strong>the market for a treatment</strong> by convincing people that they are sick and need medical intervention [2]. Typically, the disease is vague, with nonspecific symptoms spanning a broad spectrum of severity—from everyday experiences many people would not even call “symptoms,” to profound suffering. The market for treatment gets enlarged in two ways: by narrowing the definition of health so normal experiences get labeled as pathologic, and by expanding the definition of disease to include earlier, milder, and pre-symptomatic forms (e.g., regarding a risk factor such as high cholesterol as a disease in itself).</em></p> <p><em></em> </p> <ul> <li><a href="http://www.randijames.com/2010/01/amy-baker-and-parental-alienation.html">Amy Baker and Parental Alienation Syndrome: Is This What Scientific Research Looks Like?</a> <li><a href="http://www.randijames.com/2010/01/psychology-and-parental-alienation.html">Psychology and Parental Alienation: Closer to Science? </a> <li><a href="http://www.randijames.com/2010/05/ever-expanding-parental-alienation.html">The Ever Expanding Parental Alienation Theory: Amy J. Baker's Research Revisited </a> <li><a href="http://www.randijames.com/2010/05/parental-alienation-in-hochs-rachel.html">Parental Alienation in The Hochs' Rachel House: This is How They Get Down in Texas, Legally</a></li></ul> <p> </p> <h3>The Manufacture of Madness: Psychiatry Is Social Control Used Against Non Conformists.</h3> <p><strong></strong><a href="http://po.st/4tdPWW">http://po.st/4tdPWW</a></p> <div style="padding-bottom: 0px; margin: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; display: inline; float: none; padding-top: 0px" id="scid:5737277B-5D6D-4f48-ABFC-DD9C333F4C5D:52dbacf6-5d48-4d69-9a3e-c26021c59e7a" class="wlWriterEditableSmartContent"><div id="582586b9-b346-4893-9279-2916e796fe2f" style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px; display: inline;"><div><a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zQegsqYhuZE" target="_new"><img src="http://lh4.ggpht.com/-13J0sy4ZwvA/UFp4A7t6U1I/AAAAAAAABY0/0ZD7QsxzIt8/videoa04e16187126%25255B2%25255D.jpg?imgmax=800" style="border-style: none" galleryimg="no" onload="var downlevelDiv = document.getElementById('582586b9-b346-4893-9279-2916e796fe2f'); downlevelDiv.innerHTML = "<div><object width=\"425\" height=\"355\"><param name=\"movie\" value=\"http://www.youtube.com/v/zQegsqYhuZE&hl=en\"><\/param><embed src=\"http://www.youtube.com/v/zQegsqYhuZE&hl=en\" type=\"application/x-shockwave-flash\" width=\"425\" height=\"355\"><\/embed><\/object><\/div>";" alt=""></a></div></div></div> <h3><strong>PSYCHIATRY IS THE ROOT OF ALL EVIL!</strong></h3> <ul> <li>Dr Thomas Szasz died aged 92, an indefatigable critic of conventional psychiatry, that it offended human dignity infringed rights of the individual.<br><a href="http://po.st/fDst89">http://po.st/fDst89</a></li></ul> <p><strong>“A damning indictment of the psychologizing – and undermining – of the American legal system. With righteous wrath and devastating wit, this sweeping critique should stir national debate.”</strong> <p><a href="http://whoresofthecourt.com/" target="_blank"><img style="margin: 0px 15px 0px 0px; display: inline" align="left" src="http://whoresofthecourt.com/images/bookcover.jpg" width="191" height="286"></a></p> <p></p> <p></p> <p></p> <h2><a href="http://whoresofthecourt.com/" target="_blank"><strong>Whores Of The Court</strong></a></h2> <p><em>Margaret Hagen, Ph.D, reveals how expert psychological testimony is a total fraud, showing how the courts have increasingly embraced not a cutting-edge science but, instead, a discipline that represents a terrifying retreat into fantasy and hearsay; a discipline propelled by powerful propaganda, arrogance, and greed.</em></p> <p><em>Dr. Hagen sounds a clarion wake-up call, offering some startling – and much-needed – recommendations about how we can reclaim our own ability to judge and supplying vital advice on how we can protect ourselves from the ravages of psychological testimony in our own lives.</em> Claudine Dombrowskihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00174108218219442634noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6075225070962028659.post-89506820029623332882012-09-05T12:01:00.001-07:002012-09-05T12:01:02.675-07:00Comments on Kansas Case Manager Guidelines 2012<hr> From: angelfury@live.com<br>To: thompsona@kscourts.org<br>Subject: Comments on Case Manager Guidelines 2012<br>Date: Wed, 5 Sep 2012 13:50:54 -0500 <h3>Comments Below Submitted with permission of <a href="http://www.thelizlibrary.org/site-index/site-index-frame.html#soulhttp://www.thelizlibrary.org/parenting-coordination/index.html">Liz Kates</a></h3> <h3>by </h3> <h3> <p><a href="http://www.stopfamilyviolence.org/pages/308">Claudine Dombrowski</a> <p>Just 'another' Kansas Case Management - <a href="https://www.google.com/#hl=en%26rlz=1C2CHNG_enUS330%26sclient=psy-ab%26tbs=ppl_ids:-100007026314043137352-106192456536943612939-28ef22wgolxz8%2cppl_nps:Claudine+Dombrowski%2cppl_im:lh5.googleusercontent.com/-L7B0LztudrU/AAAAAAAAAAI/AAAAAAAAAAA/f5woHDyrAWM%26dq=%26q=Claudine+Dombrowski%26oq=claudine%26gs_l=hp.1.3.0l3j44i39i27.746.8059.0.10710.15.11.2.0.0.0.350.2232.0j5j5j1.11.0.les%3b..0.0...1c.vQ74Yud_VmQ%26pbx=1%26bav=on.2%2cor.r_gc.r_pw.r_cp.r_qf.%26fp=9873ec4276f803b6%26biw=1440%26bih=765">(non) Success Story</a>, one family - 3 generations ruined and counting - *ker-ching* <p><a href="http://www.angelfury.org/">www.AngelFury.org</a> <p><a href="http://www.AmericanMothersPoliticalParty.org">www.AmericanMothersPoliticalParty.org</a> <p> </p></h3> <h3><b>PARENTING COORDINATION<a name="back"></a> <a href="http://www.thelizlibrary.org/parenting-coordination/">issues</a> - pros and cons Parenting Coordination is a Bad Idea. Why:</b></h3> <p>Let's start with the problems with parenting coordination that every lawyer knows: inappropriate delegation of the judicial function, impediment to court access, and denial of due process. And so on... <p>The parenting coordinator concept encroaches on family liberty interests, bringing the government behind the closed doors of people's lives, injecting into the private realm a third party who is not in any way more capable than either of the parents are to make day-to-day decisions about their own families, values, and goals. <p>Parenting coordination is a made-up, make-work field that has been invented by bottom-feeding extraneous "professionals" who have literally reproduced like bacteria in the family court system. <p><b>There are no studies indicating that parenting coordinators make good decisions, improve the lives of children or parents, or improve child wellbeing. And, there is no reason to believe they would.</b> <p><b>What qualifies a person to make personal family and childrearing decisions for other people</b> -- what physician a child should go to, what school, other academic decisions, what extracurricular activities a child should participate in, family routines and scheduling decisions, seating decisions at the bar mitzvah or soccer game, and so forth? What qualifies a person unilaterally to interpret a court order, or "fill in the gaps" in the details of a legal document, a "parenting plan" (a violation of freedom of contract)? What qualifies a person to do "parenting coordination" to "help other persons implement" a legal contract (marital settlement agreement), as a supposed neutral? <p><b>Nothing.</b> <p><b>What constitutes "success" at parenting coordination?</b> Who knows. To the parenting coordinator, perhaps <b>getting a nice fee.</b> <p>To a judge, perhaps that he thinks he's eliminating work, clearing his docket, or just putting off disputes to another day, or another judge. If a judge thinks this is good for the court system, he's mistaken, because parenting coordination will make the congestion worse in the long run. While the parties are being denied immediate access to the judge, the presence of a parenting coordinator counterproductively requires that the door be left continuously open in the case, generating additional issues. The parenting coordinator's ideas introduced into the case, the minutiae that now has a forum, and the inevitable iatrogenic problems virtually guarantee that this is a short-sighted nonsolution to court congestion. Some of these issues may or may not be immediately apparent, and may even avoid detection in short-term surveys of pilot projects (assuming such studies otherwise are methodologically sound, which is unlikely.) The problems nevertheless are foreseeable. And relieving court congestion by hindering litigants' access to court (without regard to whether this is beneficial to families) is, in any event, of dubious validity as a rationale for the denial of due process. <p>So if relief of court congestion isn't a measure of success in parenting coordination practice, then what is? To one of the parties, that he or she now has an ally? That one of the parties is happy? Parenting coordination advocates of late have been busily setting about to create satisfaction surveys (not unlike the self-serving "evidence" that we saw upon the implementation of mandatory parenting class programs). But that a given litigant is satisfied would not be an indication of success at all unless we know with certainty that that party generally has the more meritable position. It might well be an indication of the complete breakdown of justice. Just as with the parenting class and court docket faux research, we also would have to discount these on studies based on lack of credibility because of $elf-$erving corruption, as well as unintended bias that is built in because of non-random subject selection, unwarranted optimism, self-reporting respondents' fears that negative comments could come back against them, and other methodological problems. <p>How about an objective measure of success, such as increased family well-being? How is this possible when people are burdened with tasks and negotiations and meddlesome reportings of the details of their days to third parties, when their time and money is consumed, pointlessly, when their privacy is intruded upon by the government like this, and when they are forced to kow-tow to the dictates of a court-appointed, decision-making autocrat in every area of their most intimate lives? It's not. <p>Are there better child-rearing outcomes? As compared with what? Defined how? And if not, what the heck are we supposedly doing here? Under any definition, <b>increased child wellbeing has not been shown to flow from any of the ideas of applied therapeutic jurisprudence</b>, i.e. trade promotion, in the family courts. (In fact, increased well-being in the population generally has not been demonstrated by <i>any</i> research from the burgeoning of psychological interventions and therapies over the decades.) <p>Just as with custody evaluators and guardians ad litem, and even to a large extent, the practice of mediation, there is no way to do any decent studies in this area. Benefit is not even apparent informally across demographic groups. Don't fall for self-serving industry articles spinning speculation. Research will never demonstrate any benefits from many of these ideas, including parenting coordination, because credible studies simply cannot be done. Even, inappropriately, after the fact. (If you don't understand why, contact me privately and I will direct you to material on social science versus science, experimental methodology, logic, and how to <i>do critical reading and thinking and not be such a credulous patsy</i>.) <p><b>The parenting coordination concept is an infection that causes all of the problems that custody evaluators and GALs bring into the family court system, and then some.</b> Again, what qualifies a third-party stranger parenting coordinator to make daily family life decisions for other people? Nothing. And nothing ever will. Many of these kinds of decisions are made based on a free individual's own private life, relationships, desires, work needs, schedule, and personal values, beliefs and goals. The parenting coordinator makes decisions based on the parenting coordinator's own private agendas, preferences, motives, work needs, values, beliefs and goals -- and which party the parenting coordinator just happens to like better (which already is the unfortunate but real basis for most of custody evaluator and guardian ad litem opinings). The decision-making is based on, <i>inter alia</i>, intangible personality things as well tangibles such as who likes them and pays them timely and well. <p>Many, if not most, lawyer parenting coordinators as well as many mental health professionals, notwithstanding their ostensible "training", completely lack psychological insight. That's because it's not a function of academic training. Parenting coordination also is not "co-parenting therapy" (which rarely works anyway -- witness all the mental health professionals lobbying, writing, organizing, promoting, bucking for the authority to be mini-judges and dictators in a "parenting coordination" role.) Most mental health professionals also lack a clue regarding the repercussions in law of their ideas (a more obvious deficit, since they are probably not lawyers), yet these are people supposedly interpreting and "filling in the gaps" in legal documents! <p><b>The primary reason there is no valid "training" to be had is that there is no body of expertise, no foundation of knowledge, upon which to base any such training.</b> It's... all just made up. Maybe they're smart? Well, not versus all possible litigants by a long shot, and no stranger will understand the daily life and routines, family members' needs and personalities, the interactions going on in someone else's household or the effects of their ideas in practice unless they actually spend considerable time in that household. Which, of course, they don't. <p>To go back to the court congestion problem that is moving the legislatures and courts to embrace the parenting coordination lobbyists' arguments: parenting coordination provides <b>a forum for the arguing of minutiae</b> that, in the absence of a parenting coordinator, the parties would have to work out, and learn to work out, on their own, or just let go. In other words, it addresses issues that wouldn't be there in the first place! It cannot prevent the litigation of issues that aren't within the purvue of the parenting coordinator to begin with, but still must be addressed by a judge. With regard to these other issues, however, when the parenting coordinator makes a bad decision, or oversteps authority, simply because this was the decision of a third party, that opens the door to the courthouse for matters that otherwise would not have had a forum, or would not have existed at all. The very presence of a parenting coordinator, like an uber-parent for the parents, itself creates opportunity for petty squabbling, encouraging it because, ironically, just like a misguided inept parent, the third party (getting paid for his time) is ready and available to intervene in all manner of disputes, thus retarding rather than encouraging growth and cooperation. Conflict <i>is</i> something that harms children. <p>Parenting coordination creates its own conflicts. And it not only encourages new conflicts, but creates a number of other foreseeable harms. <p>Parenting coordination is expensive, even at hourly rates less than the ordinary rates charged by these professionals when they do real work. This is so because the cost is for extra work, on top of the lawyers and litigation expenses the parties still have to maintain; the parenting coordination process actually does not eliminate any of this. Rather, it adds on additional professional expenses to handle minutiae that otherwise would not be creating expense. Ultimately, it's very expensive because any expense that does not yield something of equivalent value is a <b>waste of money</b>. Moreover, having a parenting coordinator at the ready permits one party to spend the other's funds by unilaterally contacting and choosing to bring issues before the parenting coordinator. Generally, both parties have to pay a portion of the parenting coordinator's fees; usually these are divided 50-50, and timely payment of the parenting coordinator's fees also becomes a matter of high concern for the parenting coordinator, adding that issue into the case. <p>Once appointed, the parenting coordinator has absolutely no incentive to work himself or herself out of a job. The potential amount of work is open-ended and in large part able to be self-generated by the parenting coordinator. The schedule is flexible and the royalties can go on indefinitely, until the parenting coordinator is removed (but not "for cause" because this would have to be based on criteria of success that largely is unable to be established). (How nice for the parenting coordinator.) <p>Frequent and typical make-work by the parenting coordinator includes forcing people to include the parenting coordinator in all communications and emails, provide the parenting coordinator in advance with parents' and children's schedules and activities, meet at the whim of the parenting coordinator, provide the parenting coordinator with school documents and medical records, and the like. Churn, churn, churn, duplicate, churn... <p>Parenting coordination intrudes on privacy. Among other things, parenting coordination permits the state via a state-appointed agent to demand information and details about people's lives that then can be brought back into court by the opposing party, effectively becoming ongoing compelled government discovery, contrary to the Fourth Amendment. <p>Individuals who choose to do this "work", to become parenting coordinators, are the equivalent of <b>paid yentas and neighborhood meddlers.</b> They tend to be individuals who cannot make a go of practicing the profession for which they were ostensibly educated and licensed -- the incompetent, the inexperienced, the nincompoops, the untalented, the lazy and/or the burnt-out. A good number have ulterior agendas, conscious and subconscious, either political agendas, or agendas of the psychologically issued psychic vampire or petty tyrant variety. Many parenting coordinators have axes to grind and strongly held personal beliefs about how other people's lives should work, what constitutes "fairness", fathers' or mothers' rights, parental values and roles, and so forth, as well as a need to re-visit, re-live and normalize their own family-of-origin issues. <p>A big draw for doing parenting coordination work is, of course, that while parenting coordination promoters tout the "lower cost", meaning that they are willing to settle for lower fees per hour for this work rather than their other work, the work itself is relatively brainless. And it's <b>unregulated</b> and practicably unable to be regulated. There is no efficient or effective oversight. Being unregulated means that there is no recourse against the parenting coordinator for malfeasance or malpractice. For good measure, as added insurance against malfeasance, many, if not most parenting coordinators require the parties to sign various consents and waivers of liability. Some statutes and procedural rules have formalized the lack of accountability as well. (How nice for the parenting coordinator.) <p>If you've heard argument otherwise, that the field was chosen in order to "help" (dictate to other) people, or because they were "frustrated" as lawyers or psychologists or mediators in not being able to "help" (dictate to other) people, then given the relatively lower (albeit no-overhead) hourly fees charged for parenting coordination, ask how much unpaid voluntary work the person has done. Query why this ostensible advice-giving do-gooderism wasn't just done through their church, or a community charity agency, and offered to all-comers in their avocational spare time on a no-obligation basis, while in their regular working time, they just continue to practice the profession for which they actually were trained and licensed. That's how good samaritans and persons with kindly, charitable intent usually "help" when that's the actual motive and they already have a real profession to practice in the family court field. <p>The nature of the function as designed enables parenting coordinators to churn money by insisting on all manner of crap that involves them, under circumstances in which their decisions cannot be second-guessed, even by a judge. The parenting coordinator's "work" cannot conveniently be reviewed by a judge because the "proceedings" with a parenting coordinator are informal, undocumented, and outside of the court and due process. In many jurisdictions, the parenting coordination practice essentially is professed to be "confidential except when it's not." (More on this, below.) Also, there is no criteria of "success", no standard of satisfactory practice. All fuzzy. If and to the extent acts or omissions of the parenting coordinator are contested, no matter what occurs, the parenting coordinator simply can "remember" conversations and events differently from the way they really happened. If contested, the parenting coordinator also can -- and will -- employ the ready CYA alibis of "high conflict custody case" and one parent's ostensible irrationality or prevarication. <p>Many of the lawyers, mental health professionals, and erstwhile mediators and guardians ad litem who want to do parenting coordination have no actual experience themselves as parents, let alone as caregiving parents, let alone as single parents -- or with blended family issues, or with children with particular issues, or in "shared parenting" or divorced situations. Some do, and as noted, more often than not, they are normalizing their own issues. These advice-givers do not necessarily hail themselves from successful well-functioning families. Parenting coordinators bring to their job their personal opinions and values and speculations founded on their unknown personal backgrounds, including some of the most dysfunctional (and undisclosed) personal familial histories, and implement their personal and political agendas. <b>They are the antithesis of "wise persons"</b>, who generally are not found among neighborhood gossips or those who relish involving themselves in the mundane details of other people's lives. <p>Time spent with the parenting coordinator, where not catering to the dysfunctional weak or abusive litigants who are hoping for support or a sounding board is tedious and time-consuming for the parents. The same timewasting, of course, represents a <b><i>ca-ching</i></b> in the bank account of the parenting coordinator, which encourages plodding and more time-wasting meetings and talkings. (Meanwhile, the litigant fantasy of having a parenting coordinator "on the case" as an ally will end quickly when the selected parenting coordinator in this crapshoot aligns with the other parent.) <p>Parents are placed at the whim of all kinds of arbitrary demands made by the parenting coordinator, including for the payment for their time, which is largely in the control of the parenting coordinator and possibly the other party. (This applies, to a great extent, as well, to various court-appointed therapists and GALs). Given the presence of the parenting coordinator, and the payment incentive, every decision, no matter how petty or absurd, is open for endless discussion and rumination. In addition to being time-consuming, <b>this is a delight for stalker-harasser abusive types</b>, as well as those who just won't let go of the other party. <p>The parenting coordinator can think up all kinds of activities to do and with which to require the parents to comply: pseudo-therapy (unregulated of course by the licensing boards because it's "not really" therapy, and it's "not really" law); "communications counseling"; "coaching"; reading of materials; various "educational" homework assignments; meetings with one or the other of the parties, meetings together, meetings with various combinations of others; demands for disclosure, frequently in writing, of private thoughts, emotions, and information; consultations and strategy sessions with the children's guardian ad litem and parents' court-ordered or parenting coordinator-ordered therapists; meetings with the children's physicians and teachers; meetings with anyone at all; ordering of a parent into supervised visitation or therapeutic visitation; recommending to the court therapies of all kinds with yet more of the helping professionals -- almost anything. Confidentiality? That's a pipe dream. It's only "confidential" when that suits the parenting coordinator, and there's a court issue. But under the pretext of having to gather information, the PC has authority to yammer to pretty much everyone in the community. And if a parent doesn't comply, there are sanctions, imposed both by the parenting coordinator and the court for "noncompliance". <p>Does this not strike you as an outrageous and unconstitutional denigration of the First Amendment freedom of speech and association, Fourth and Fifth Amendment privacy rights, and the fundamental parental rights of perfectly fit parents, as to whom the state would be unable to file a dependency action and remove their children to foster care? Free, competent individuals are entitled voluntarily to subject themselves to private judges and arbitrators, of course. But why would any informed and reasonably intelligent individual who is not under duress and coercion, ever agree to living with one who cannot be appealed, discharged, or limited to issues brought before him? Answer: they wouldn't. Either these litigants were not properly informed (in any number of ways), or they indeed were under inappropriate coercion of some kind that rendered their consent essentially involuntary. <p>How-to techniques for would-be parenting coordinators in this newly invented "profession" consist of almost anything the parenting coordinator might dream up, sprinkled with suggestions and teachings borrowed from law, psychology, mediation and other practices, as well as fantasies from other imaginative self-styled professional parenting coordinators in the recent explosion of manuals, books and trade-promotion "trainings". (Until enough fools sign on for this cock-'n-bull to fill a workweek, for the ambitious, there's still money that can be earned professing to be a mavin). <p><b> Parenting coordination "training" materials comprise mostly stuff plucked from the asses of their inventors.</b> <p>Doubt me? Read some of it. Parenting coordination methodology includes such things as ordering people how to talk with each other ("use my template"), ordering parents in what method they may or must talk with each other ("email only, and you must copy me"), and even uttering orders to parents regarding when or whether they must or may not meet and/or communicate with each other, with the parenting coordinator, with the court or their own lawyer, and with other people such as extended family, all in astonishing violation of fundamental constitutional rights. To facilitate all of this, parenting coordination orders, agreements, "voluntary" consents, "understandings" and intake forms generally require the parents to sign away all manner of these constitutional rights -- in what is, essentially, a busybody's lucrative wetdream. <p>As previously noted, having a parenting coordinator on a case keeps the case continuously open and invites it to explode into endless issue-making, rather than being finally resolved, and in doing so, actually creates more, not fewer, problems for both the litigants and the courts. Sometimes a case does appear to resolve, but all too often that is only because the financially or emotionally weaker party, or the party unfavored by the parenting coordinator, just gives up in defeat, beaten away by the constant undercurrent threat of litigation, the harassment, and the need to avoid continuing costs. <p>(If judges' goals here are to get people to just shut up and go away, we could eliminate all of the docket problems in the civil courts and achieve equally fine results just by closing the courts altogether.) <p>Parenting coordination, the latest of the therapeutic jurisprudential ideas, is dangerous, and not merely because of the distortion it makes in the judicial system and of due process. <b>In recent years there has been a burgeoning of child abuse and deaths</b> stemming from child custody disputes in which abusive individuals get custody and visitation rights, correlating with the rise of joint custody theory and the intrusion into the family courts of therapeutic jurisprudence. Unqualified strangers can and will make bad decisions that simply cannot timely be brought to court, cannot effectively be reviewed by the court, or which are prohibitively expensive to bring to court. Parenting coordinators have missed domestic violence. Conversely, in one <b><a href="http://www.thelizlibrary.org/parenting-coordination/hastings.pdf">Florida appellate case</a></b>, a parenting coordinator wrongly claimed that domestic violence had occured when it hadn't, prompting an emergency change of custody. Parenting coordinators have assumed facts that are not true. They have perceived emergencies or situations incorrectly. They have mischaracterized events and made egregious judgmental mistakes. They have lied outright. See the cases. The concept is dangerous because parenting coordinators are not and practicably cannot be subject to any effective oversight. Each case is different, there are no studies, there is no body of knowlege, there is no methodology, there are no licenses, there are and can be no effective regulations, there are no actual practice parameters other than aspirational sound-goods, such as "be neutral", there are no definitions of a successful outcome, and it's all vague nonsense or worse. <p>Depending on the vagaries of the practice from time to time in this or that jurisdiction, parenting coordinators effectively have license to wield heavy authority and extremely biased power, opining back to and influencing judges, bringing issues into the public domain that do not belong there and which were not brought into the case by either party, siding with one party unfairly (even developing personal relationships with one of the parties), and recommending or just ordering the parents to hire the parenting coordinator's own cronies for therapies and guardianships and evaluations. It's a recipe for more corruption and <b>an insult to the rule of law</b>. <p>Parenting coordinators can -- and do -- violate the terms of parties' contractual agreements as well as the law. Lobbyists for statutory implementation of this role have argued, speciously, that oversight does indeed exist because, well, "if the parties are not happy, they can always go back to court". But real life doesn't work that way, and it especially does not work that way under these circumstances. <b>"If you don't like it, then take it to court"</b> is a dare that can be thrown out cavalierly, because the parenting coordinator role permits these court appointees to hold over the head of objecting parties the power -- baselessly presumed to be executed in good faith -- to obtain the ear of the judge first, and to poison the well. They also hold more credibility before before the judge than those lunatic, bitter, embattled, unreasonable, "high-conflict", personality-disordered parents. They can and do function as shadow witnesses <i>ex parte</i>, to provide the judge (directly as well as indirectly through guardians ad litem, other witnesses, and even via support to one of the parties) with information, evidence and innuendo. Their inexpert opinions can and frequently will label one of the parties as the recalcitrant, the wrongdoer, the deadbeat, the crazy, or the "uncooperative" one. <p>So "take it to the judge" does not work, particularly post-decree, when a party may be short of time or funds, or may no longer even have a lawyer. And it does not work because in many courts, days or weeks, or months may go by before a party can get a hearing. And it does not work because an objecting party has to overcome not only the parenting coordinator but also the opposing party -- being out-voted from the git-go, two against one, a problem also inherent in the family court guardian ad litem role, but potentially even worse in this instance because the parenting coordinator solicits support from the guardian ad litem, the appointed therapists, and the rest of the courthouse cronies. And it does not work because "going back to court" means risking the <i>irritation of the judge who appointed the parenting coordinator in the first place precisely because he didn't want to hear about it</i>. There is <b>no oversight</b>. <p>Difficult to remove in any event once appointed, the parenting coordinator is even more difficult to remove when he or she is biased (and that's a better than even bet, given the nature of ongoing informal relationships with people, especially where there is money at stake, and especially given who is drawn to this line of work). Bias should be one of the grounds that immediately would mandate removal of a parenting coordinator, but it also means that the parenting coordinator will be vested in preserving his own aura of competence and neutrality (as well as current and future income stream), all the while being validated by the party with whom he is aligned. Moreover, how does a party prove "bias" when the ubiquitous explanation is that the "disgruntled" party who didn't get his or her way always makes this claim of "bias". <p>There is no way to tell in advance who might be a "good" or "helpful" parenting coordinator. Families differ, circumstances differ, and personalities differ. To parties disputing this, or buying into a sell-job from some mental health professional, mediator, or burnt-out lawyer, I would ask: how great were you in deciding in advance who to marry, or with whom to have a child. What makes you believe that the third party who wants this easy work will be a second voice on "your" side? <p>In the inane insistence that "both" parents "participate" in making decisions regarding the child, in order to avoid stalemate, parenting coordination is the <b>tool for unworkable custody and timeshare arrangements</b>, notably joint custody, which removes from BOTH parents the right to function with authority and automony. A big flaw in the concept of joint custody is that, instead of having at least one functional parent, the joint custody child now has two ineffective half-parents who may not function except in tandem, and ironically they are typically the kind of parents least able to pull this off. With a parenting coordinator or guardian ad litem added into the mix, the child does not even have that, because instead of two half-parents sharing an undivided fundamental parental liberty interest, the child has half-parents who report to a parenting boss. It's involvement by the state in the complete absence of any actual threat to the child that ordinarily would justify state intrusion like this. <p>One should counter: if a third party stranger, based upon no established field of expertise whatsoever, is supposedly qualified to make and facilitate decisions impacting other people's family lives, something that is not even usually encouraged in clinical therapy, then why is not the better solution just to assign that authority to one of the parents? The spheres of decision-making authority can be allocated too. It would be easier, cheaper, quicker, and done. And at least then the child would have one real and functional authoritative parent, something that IS demonstrably evidenced in the research to be necessary for child security and well-being. <p>While the rhetoric is rampant that parents are less likely or unlikely to consider their children before themselves in their decision-making when they are embattled in divorce and post-divorce issues, <b>no research actually substantiates this concocted rationale</b>. <p>The rationale first was invented by psych trade groups to lobby state legislatures for guardians ad litem in family law cases, and later was used to justify in part the appointment of custody evaluators. It's become yet another family court system truism without a shred of foundation. The anecdotal claims (if you even get that much, get any anecdotes) of individuals who have a political or profit motive, peddling their services to the market, are just not credible, especially as to historic primary caregivers. No one is as interested in or vested in their own children's happiness and wellbeing as the child's own parent, or, if you must, as between two parents, than the one who already has shown higher attachment and commitment. <p>Parenting coordination stands as proof positive that something is very, very wrong with the substantive direction of child custody law in recent years. As more and more mental health professionals stream into the court system, get involved in bar associations, and encourage lawyers to mix it up in "multidisciplinary" organizations, the substantive laws are getting worse. The problems consequently are getting worse. The solutions for the iatrogenic problems caused by these therapeutic interventions are more and more of them. That's dysfunctional.<b> That cure is "hair of the dog that bit you" and goodgod, the "science" of the psychological experts is about as valid. There's a better solution. You should know what that is by now. Just Say No.</b> <h3>Comments Submitted with permission of <a href="http://www.thelizlibrary.org/site-index/site-index-frame.html#soulhttp://www.thelizlibrary.org/parenting-coordination/index.html">Liz Kates</a></h3> <h3>by </h3> <h3> <p><a href="https://www.google.com/#hl=en%26rlz=1C2CHNG_enUS330%26sclient=psy-ab%26tbs=ppl_ids:-100007026314043137352-106192456536943612939-28ef22wgolxz8%2cppl_nps:Claudine+Dombrowski%2cppl_im:lh5.googleusercontent.com/-L7B0LztudrU/AAAAAAAAAAI/AAAAAAAAAAA/f5woHDyrAWM%26dq=%26q=Claudine+Dombrowski%26oq=claudine%26gs_l=hp.1.3.0l3j44i39i27.746.8059.0.10710.15.11.2.0.0.0.350.2232.0j5j5j1.11.0.les%3b..0.0...1c.vQ74Yud_VmQ%26pbx=1%26bav=on.2%2cor.r_gc.r_pw.r_cp.r_qf.%26fp=9873ec4276f803b6%26biw=1440%26bih=765">Claudine Dombrowski</a> <p>Just 'another' Kansas Case Management - <a href="https://www.google.com/#hl=en%26rlz=1C2CHNG_enUS330%26sclient=psy-ab%26tbs=ppl_ids:-100007026314043137352-106192456536943612939-28ef22wgolxz8%2cppl_nps:Claudine+Dombrowski%2cppl_im:lh5.googleusercontent.com/-L7B0LztudrU/AAAAAAAAAAI/AAAAAAAAAAA/f5woHDyrAWM%26dq=%26q=Claudine+Dombrowski%26oq=claudine%26gs_l=hp.1.3.0l3j44i39i27.746.8059.0.10710.15.11.2.0.0.0.350.2232.0j5j5j1.11.0.les%3b..0.0...1c.vQ74Yud_VmQ%26pbx=1%26bav=on.2%2cor.r_gc.r_pw.r_cp.r_qf.%26fp=9873ec4276f803b6%26biw=1440%26bih=765">(non) Success Story</a>, one family - 3 generations ruined and counting - *ker-ching* <p><a href="http://sn110w.snt110.mail.live.com/mail/www.AngelFury.org">www.AngelFury.org</a> <p><a href="http://sn110w.snt110.mail.live.com/mail/www.AmericanMothersPoliticalparty.org">www.AmericanMothersPoliticalParty.org</a></h3></p> Claudine Dombrowskihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00174108218219442634noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6075225070962028659.post-33228321700239511022012-09-02T05:45:00.001-07:002012-09-02T05:45:21.301-07:00Patriarchy, Feminism, Fathers Rights and Feminism. Equality? Divorce and Child Custody -Why we are where we are now - and how we got there.<p><b></b> <p>A very important history lesson for Every Woman, man and “offspring”. Reproduced with permission <a href="http://TheLizLibrary.org" target="_blank">The Liz Library</a> <p><b></b> <p><b><a href="http://www.thelizlibrary.org/liz/002.htm">MALE-BASHING? </a><br></b><b>It's a misguided notion that speaking out against "fathers' rights" is anti-male gender bias.</b> <p>Prior to the 1960s, women rarely could get out of marriages in which they were abused or just plain miserable. In order to obtain a divorce, they had to prove "fault." Some of the first speakers against the fault-based laws, and against the difficulty women had in leaving marriages in which they were unhappy were feminists. Before much changed, however, mens' rights groups discovered that the words and ideas of feminism could in fact cleverly be turned around and used against women, and for the advantage of men. <p>Thus it began... <p>The pattern of women's making gains on one hand without realizing that something else has been taken from them on the other has been one of the pervasive problems for feminist activism. <p>One of the reasons it's been able to happen is that women by and large simply have been newbies in the political process. Women have not even yet become astute about the impact of compromised agendas, or visionary about how compromises and nice-sounding rhetoric will "pan out" in practice and down the road. <p>Additionally, women's information networks move slow -- much slower than the existing old boy networks, which are highly organized, both formally and informally. Consider how the father's rights activism has permeated the internet over the past few years, making noise. creating new organizations, and establishing "names" and "credentials" for itself far out of proportion to the numbers of men actually involved. <p><b><font color="#ff0000" size="4">Changes Without Progress.</font></b> <p>What has happened over the last thirty years in family law legislation has been, in the main, for women, a series of gains on the one hand coupled with reversals on the other, all of which have occurred without fanfare or critical media commentary or, outside of very limited feminist legal scholarship circles, much of any feminist awareness. Why. <p><b>First, as more and more women moved into the workforce during the 70s (as much the result of economic factors as any success of the feminist movement), anti-mother, pro-career rhetoric was picked up strongly by the media.</b> <p>The media liked the career-woman theme because, well, frankly, it was trendy. Different. Free sex, bra-burning, the E.R.A... gender-neutrality was stylish. Titillating. <p><a name="a"></a><b>During this period, as they gained recognition of workplace inequities, women went from leery to terrified of showing much overt interest in family and children, lest they lose hard-won and still-unsecured employment and lifestyle choices, and women's "place" be redefined again for them as *only* wives and mothers.</b> <p>The woman versus woman nonsense (careerist versus homemaker) largely was (and still is) misunderstood. It is just a variation on the old popular theme (slut versus madonna) which, by labelling women, seeks to limit and control them. When we are not whole, and denied a part of ourselves, or the ability to be true to ourselves, we have lost power. And when those who have accordant interests nevertheless believe that reality is otherwise, then they are not a powerful and united group. Not recognizing this, however, many students of 70s feminism, in attempting to avoid being limited as "girls," and "housewives," bought into the woman-dividing in its insideous 70s variation. <a href="http://www.thelizlibrary.org/liz/002.htm#1">[liznote #1]</a> <p><b>Then as now, both women and men, including feminists, fell (and still fall) for this simplistic either-or characterizing of "kinds of women."</b> <p>And falling for this, as far too many self-identified feminists in fact did through the 70s and into the 80s, and out of misplaced fear that continuing interest in their families would harm women's rights progress on other fronts, all major feminist and women's organizations have, until very recently, sorely neglected the family law arena. They focused instead on the peripheral impacting domestic violence and abortion rights areas, as well as a gender-neutral ("we can do it just like-- just as good as -- men") focus on employment rights. <p>Never mind that most women DO get married and have children. The intense fear of defining ALL women as wives and mothers created an arguable paramount priority. Whether justifiable or merely excusable, it was a short-sighted priority. (After all these years, we still don't have decent child care options, do we. Or an economic workplace reflecting that it itself exists FOR the benefit of individuals and families, the enhancement of life, and the good and functioning of society generally, and not vice versa.) <p><b><font color="#de0127" size="4">Lack of a holistic feminist policy and vision.</font></b> <p><b>Family law has been the area of most academic feminist ignorance and least feminist activism, largely due to the fact that motherhood and older women's lives never have been and *still* are not the subjects naturally of most interest to young, scholarly college women.</b><b> </b>Family issues also have not seemed terribly pressing to women who do not choose to marry men and have children -- and many of these women disproportioniately are feminist activists, precisely because traditional patriarchal notions of women's roles offer nothing for them. <p>Added to this, of course, is that, good intentions aside, there are some things that a person just has to live to actually understand. Like what one's children mean and really involve in time, effort and emotional investment. <p><b>While cultural womanhood freely embraces, or at least gives lipservice to notions of "sisterhood," an ageless and roleless and safe term right out of childhood, note, the culture's often schizophrenic, negative and limiting woman-labelling has, perhaps, prevented an empathetic identification of all grown women with "motherhood."</b> (Contrast the readily embraced, frequently metaphorized, and always respected notions of "fatherhood.") <p>But perhaps the biggest reason the importance of family laws to women's lives has not been conveyed successfully to the feminist front-lines has been that women with children, and especially women on welfare, are overall the most isolated, poorest and least-connected group in the society, and the group that has the least time for activism. <p><b><font color="#de0127" size="4">The "Feminization of Poverty."</font></b> <p>What happens to women and children after divorce? They struggle, and struggle mightily! The question is: why haven't decades and decades of broadening career and educational opportunities yet assured women of economic viability? Well, yes, there's the discrimination in the workplace, overt and covert, in all the ways and all the kinds we know about. But <b>the real answer is simply that women STILL bear and care for the children in this world. This is not "equal," it's not "gender-neutral," and it never will be.</b> [See liznotes on <a href="http://www.thelizlibrary.org/liz/006.htm">primary parenting</a> and the effects of <a href="http://www.thelizlibrary.org/liz/004.htm">pregnancy</a>.] <p><a name="b"></a>Both men and women each get the same 24 hours in a day, but by and large, women with children have to allocate their time between two jobs. NO ONE can be in two places at the same time, doing two incompatible things at the same time, both caring for children and a household AND earning a living. A <a href="http://www.thelizlibrary.org/liz/002.htm#2">list of economic studies [#2]</a> compiled by Lynn Hecht Shafran illustrates how this pans out post-divorce, once the support system of marriage is no longer in place (it's not debatable.) <p>The following is from an article by Harriet Newman Cohen, author of <u>The Divorce Book for Men and Women,</u>Avon Books l994, and a partner in the matrimonial law firm of Cohen Hennessy & Bienstock, in New York City: <p>"Fourteen years have elapsed since the equitable distribution law was passed in New York (on June l9, l980) and even more since similar "reforms" were passed, including no-fault divorce on demand in parts of the country. <p><b>"No more "alimony drones," the phrase to describe the bum rap women suffered in the seventies and earlier, when alimony was all a woman could get in courts that were not statutorily empowered to divide up property.</b> <p>"With the "new laws," women traded long-term, even lifetime, alimony for anticipated property distribution and the promised dignity that would accompany it... <p>"We start with assumptions [about]... the relative worth of each party. She... is supported, dependent, and a receiver at his sufferance. These views are frequently held by him, her, the lawyers, and the courts -- throwbacks to another era. They are reinforced by society. After all, the government has refused to enact laws entitling homemakers to Social Security and IRA contributions based on their homemaking services. <p><b>"And people still ask mothers, "Do you work?" It smarts. Outside the house in "gainful" employment, do they mean? The principles of equal partnership characterized by different work assignments in a marriage have not caught hold...</b> <p>"... The equitable distribution laws that were supposed to reform family law premised that women who had been out of the paid work force to raise children and be homemakers -- or simply out of the work force because that was the partners' deal -- could be recycled (i.e. reeducated, retrained, and deployed into a higher-paying job) in short order. <p>"Before that dubious premise could even be tested, short-term spousal support -- about five years even for a long-term marriage -- became the norm. "<b>No-fault" states also became "no support" states.</b> Yet studies showed that a five-year turnaround period... was not enough. <b>Routinely, his standard of living went up, and hers and the children's went down. A new phrase was born: the feminization of poverty...</b> " <p>--Family Advocate Summer l994, American Bar Association <p><b>Over the last twenty or thirty years, in many respects, divorce laws have become more and more punitive and dangerous for women.</b> <p><b><font color="#de0127" size="4">In the beginning.</font></b> <p>Women used to have difficulty getting out of marriages. Traditionally, in patriarchal societies, even today around the world, and in our culture until the last century, women simply had no effective way to get divorced. Divorce largely was a male prerogative. In the rare instances in which women had this <i>legal</i><i> </i>option, often they effectively were kept in marriage by economic disabilities that prevented them from having any real choice to go it alone. <p>Even after some of the economic barriers to women's obtaining divorces began to dissolve, in order to gain the permission of the state to dissolve what only "until death do us part," egregious fault had to be proved. By the 20th century, however, for those women who in fact WERE in the <i>most</i><i> </i>abusive of marriages, that fault could be proven -- and proving it meant custody of the children and some award of support (which wasn't always paid, but at least the need for it was recognized.) In addition, in all those marriages in which MEN wanted out, women had a "bargaining chip" in the fault laws: they could refuse a divorce unless they received a fair property settlement and alimony. <p>This is not to say that there weren't BIG problems of other kinds with fault-based divorce, or with many of the other divorce and family laws preceding the current era. [See, e.g. the <a href="http://www.thelizlibrary.org/suffrage/eracom.htm#contents">comments</a> by U. S. Civil Rights Commission in connection with its support for the failed Equal Rights Amendment.] <p>One problem with fault-based divorce was that while men would just leave marriages without obtaining a divorce, economic pragmatics effectively prevented women from "abandoning" their marriages in this way. Lest they be found themselves to have "abandoned" their marriage for unwarranted reasons, and in the absence of being able to <i>prove</i><i> </i>"fault" based on other grounds, "non-abandoned" women frequently found themselves stuck in miserable situations. Those who were in the worst situations, however, ultimately <i>could</i>get their divorces. And where men were the ones found to be "at fault," or who wanted out of their marriages in order to remarry, the fault-based laws did offer some protections for the "not-at-fault" spouse in the way of bargaining power. The men found to be "at fault" paid. But those women who just could not adequately prove the degree of fault required, or who had less than exemplary marital track records themselves were in trouble. Proving what few or no third parties may have observed behind the closed doors of a marital home (or a paramour's bedroom) was not always feasible. Physical abuse did not always amount (legally) to "mental cruelty." And so feminists from suffragette days onward campaigned for reforms to enable women to more easily get a divorce when they needed or desired one. <p><b>Ironically, though, while feminists had long sought reforms that would enable women to end marriages that were untenable, as the divorce laws began to loosen and as substantive economic and procedural reforms began to achieve more parity and safety for women, by the time the no-fault divorce laws were enacted, they actually were enacted for, and in ways that benefitted, not women, but</b><b> </b><b><u>men</u></b><b>.</b> <p>Although many women still believe that "no-fault" somehow was the end result of women's long-sought-after marriage dissolution rights, "no-fault" ultimately was the way men counter-moved to evade their worsening "held hostage" situation of having to make property settlements and pay alimony (and the more fault the more alimony) as divorce became more easily and safely obtainable by women. The "no-fault" language was presented as the logical extension of "making divorce easier to obtain," and it was cleverly and timely coupled with a distorted application of <a href="http://www.thelizlibrary.org/liz/001.htm">70s feminist</a> rhetoric about women's "independence" and supporting themselves. <b>"Fault" as a basis for equitable remedy</b><b> </b><b><i>in connection with</i></b><b><i> </i></b><b>a divorce was abandoned right along with "fault" as a</b><b> </b><b><i>ground</i></b><b><i> </i></b><b>for divorce.</b> <p>Once the no-fault divorce laws, coupled with gender-equality/neutrality rhetoric took hold in the late 70s and early 80s, the bad news for women was that in all but seven states in the country, most of the marital property was titled solely in husband's names -- and they walked out with it upon divorce. <p><a name="c"></a><b>In addition, with the discarding of fault as the basis for equitable remedy</b><b> </b><b><i>in</i></b><b><i> </i></b><b>divorce, "no-fault" presumptions actually came down hardest on, and yielded the worst outcomes for precisely those women who suffered the most during their marriages to abusive, nonsupporting, or dysfunctional men! One step forward, two steps back.</b><b> </b><a href="http://www.thelizlibrary.org/liz/002.htm#3">[liznote #3]</a> <p><b></b> <p><font size="4"><font color="#ff0000"><b>"</b><b>Equitable Distribution" and "Equality."</b></font></font> <p>Once the problems with "no-fault" divorce (as it had been fashioned) started to become apparent, another wave of "divorce reform" via "corrective" legislation started rolling along, and it came about largely in the way of something known as "equitable distribution." But that wasn't all. It is no accident that timing-wise, it followed in the 80s right on the heels of women's greater entry into the workforce in the 70s, and feminists' clamoring for equality. Mens-rights forces coopted the idea of equality, and turned it back into their favor, using the the same "equitable" language. To this day, many persons -- judges and scholars included -- have difficulty distinguishing between the terms "equitable," and "equal." <p><b>The claim was made by men and bought by many women, including (or even particularly) many self-described feminist women, that inasmuch as men and women now were "equal partners," and inasmuch as women would be getting an "equitable distribution" upon divorce, women should no longer "childishly" depend on being "supported."</b> <p>The women who fell for this, a good percentage of them optimistic young women, often childless, in academia, and also women lawyers, many married to successful and supportive men, and also "overachiever" types desperate to be seen to be as fully as capable as their male peers, unfortunately pretty much represented the "consensus" of women's voices heard from on these issues. They were the only women who HAD a "voice" and a platform from which to be heard. (This problem remains pervasive today in connection with women's issues in areas outside of domestic violence activism and abortion rights.) <p><b>The mens-rights interests succeeded in coupling most of the equitable distribution laws with anti-alimony laws.</b> <p><a name="d"></a><b>The (faulty or fraudulent, you pick) thinking was: why should women be supported if they are "equal?"</b><b> </b>Divide the accumulated marital "partnership" property, and then henceforth, the former husband and wife would have "equal opportunity" to work and support themselves. <a href="http://www.thelizlibrary.org/liz/002.htm#4">[liznote #4]</a> <p>But fifty-year-old women, who had spent all of their married lives moving where their husbands had moved, entertaining his clients or working for his business, or simply picking up all of life's other chores and child-rearing to enable him to work, found themselves being told that they could "rehabilitate" themselves, and that they had "equal opportunity" to work. <p>Such thinking ignores that in commencing the economic race ten, twenty or thirty years behind out of the starting gate, there simply is never going to be any kind of catch-up. There's no catch-up in salary levels or overall career achievement, there's no catch-up in pension plan vesting, and there's no catch-up in post-marriage asset accumulation. Equitable distribution standing alone is a particularly noxious remedy where, for one reason or another, at the time of the divorce, there isn't much marital property to be "equitably divided," and the couple's biggest maritally-developed asset, the result of the joint efforts of both, is the husband's future earning power. And it's a double-whammy when women, already operating under THIS impairment, also have children to continue to care for. <p>For young women, with one or several infants and young children, not only have fewer marital assets accumulated or pension plans vested, but also it's just not reasonable to expect that an individual with children to care for -- even a mother with the very same education, experience and ability as her former husband -- will be able to earn equivalently to her ex-husband. <p>Without even getting into the employment sector barriers which still exist, it's flat-out not possible to both care for children and work in outside employment at the same time. Either childcare or financial care is needed. Even with babies warehoused for inappropriate and unhealthy amounts of time in third party care, the cost of such care leaves mothers with little or no earnings remaining after taxes and other expenses of employment. Even with optimal child care, mother's employment is hampered by contraints on travel, distance, hours, overtime, emergency flexibility, sick children, breastfeeding requirements, daytime errands, and the weight of "buck-stops-here" responsibility for little others' lives. <p><a href="http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0465015328/ref=sim_books/"></a><a href="http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0465015328/ref=sim_books/"></a><b><font color="#ff0000" size="4">The rise of joint custody theory and politics.</font></b> <p>By the time the flaws in equitable distribution/no-alimony schemes became apparent in the late 70s and 80s, divorce reform was humming long at breakneck speed, along with an increase in divorces, breeding its own systemic problems to be addressed (such as more courts.) A more sophisticated political wave and a counter-wave rose at the same time, posing as an ostensible "fix." <p>To mend some of the holes left by the first equitable distribution laws, in the 80s, feminist activists helped get recognition for women's contributions to mens' schooling and careers, and helped strengthen "rehabilitative alimony" laws, and child support laws. As these bills came into legislatures, however, they threatened to take from men their beloved possessions. <p><b>While feminists worked to enact laws that would help women retain their share of some of the economic security they had "in partnership" helped accumulate, along came joint custody theory and joint custody laws -- once again, using feminists' own words about equality against them, and in a weird way, rendering children yet another possession for equitable division.</b> <p><b>The (faulty or fraudulent, you pick) thinking</b><b> </b><b>was: If women are entitled to seek equality in the workforce, well, then men are entitled to seek it in custody laws.</b><b> </b>Equity and the interests of the children be damned. Never mind that women who had achieved some personal semblance of "equality" in the workforce had in fact taken considerable initiative to do so, gaining the education and experience, and putting in the requisite time and effort toward that career. In the home, men, on the whole had done nothing much different from what they always had done, with only minor increases in male parenting time with children, largely in the area of recreational time. <p>Affirmative action? This is hardly the time for it. It's not the time for it, even if "affirmative action" in the workplace were analogous to a theory of "affirmative action" by one divorcing mother to benefit one husband. And it's hardly analogous given that children are not property to be divvied up and experimented with like just so many entry-level jobs or freshman class openings. <p><b>One of the specious arguments goes: this will free up mothers' time, enabling them to work, and improving the quality of their life!</b> Ridiculous. If an alternate custody arrangement were beneficial to a particular mother, she hardly would need to have it mandated by law. Half-time children don't free up full-time career needs: few employers pay full time salaries plus benefits for part time work. Or offer jobs of one week on, one week off. Nor are women's lives in the throes of divorce and afterward likely to be improved by adding economic pressure and visitation packing and schlepping onto everything else they have to do, not to mention "negotiating" childcare minutiae with a hostile ex. <p>The ideas about "equal parenting" and "fathers are parents too," etc. are about men's wants, not "equality" vis a vis women, and *certainly* not about children' needs! It's all about men, who, having taken advantage of women's different reproductive and child-rearing role during marriage, and having made no effort during marriage to take on an equalizing *greater* share of the housework, suddenly, upon divorce, realizing that it would be cheaper to replace the mother altogether with the second wife (or the girlfriend, or the housekeeper, or grandma.) <p><b>Joint custody is a backlash response to the increased enforcement of men's post-divorce financial obligations. The primary political goal is the reduction (or elimination altogether) of the payment of child support. Of secondary appeal is the promise it holds out for two separate autonomous and ostensibly "equal" households, minimizing the need for contact and cooperation with the ex-wife.</b> <p>Joint custody also appeals to those individuals who seek to regain the means to continue to control the family members they once controlled. In practice, it frequently devolves post-order and over time into a time-share arrangement that differs little from traditional sole custody with visitation (but differs a lot in the amount of the child support order.) Where this does NOT happen, that's because the male-option-granting joint custody order is sought and used as a means for a later second bite at the custody determination apple. Joint custody (in both forms, legal and physical) is a legally-engineered decision-delayer, and a stepping-stone for use by the nonprimary parent in marriage to later seek and obtain full custody. IF he wants to. He's free to come and go, start another family, move or not, always paying less child support than he otherwise would have paid. Well what about his wanting to "parent" his child? Where this isn't about something a bit squeamish and mawkish, chances are very good it's all about replacing the fungible woman/mother/caregiver with one he prefers, and maybe even "saving" some money in the process. <p><b>The parent seeking joint custody is almost always that parent who would not be the custodial choice on an up-front either-or determination. After a few years, however, and perhaps a new wife, and coupled with the decreased financial support and ostensible "increased involvement" that accompanies "shared parenting" schemes, it sets up men as the advantaged party in a later custody redetermination</b><b> </b><b><i>de novo</i></b><b> </b><b>(another side benefit.) The need for a redetermination down the road is virtually guaranteed, when, as should have been predicted, joint custody is found to be unworkable over the long haul.</b> <a href="http://www.thelizlibrary.org/liz/008.htm">[See Nick's comments on this issue.]</a> <p><b><font color="#ff0000" size="4">Unwed father's rights.</font></b> <p>At first, after the enactment of no-fault divorce, and perhaps with the increased social rhetoric of equality making unhappy marriages even less tolerable, where once they would have remained, miserable "for the sake of the kids" -- especially since fault-ground divorce was a long, drawn-out process anyway -- more and more women began filing for divorce in the earliest years of their marriages. As they did, however, and with small children, it became clear that instead of the egalitarian partnership that those who had pushed for the original family law reforms had sought to create, the original no-fault changes themselves had created new inequities. While Band-aid revision after Band-aid revision was enacted in every state, and with each correction in the laws, along came a new set of "unforeseen" hurdles and counterproductive consequences, all moving toward putting women back in their traditional place. <p>In response to women's legal and social ability to leave marriage, and to the correction after correction in the laws impeding them, and to the simultaneous trend of women marrying later or shunning marriage altogether (coinciding with women's increased entry into the employment sector), the men's rights, and religious right anti-abortion forces became more agitated and threatened, and more and more vocal. Anti-abortion, anti-divorce, anti-welfare and "pro-family/fathers" sentiment grew throughout the capitalistic, merger-and-acquistion 80s. While this trend was observed, all of ts manifestations and repercussions were not. This had an interesting effect. <p><b>Women's groups happily (and shortsightedly) bought into the anti-welfare pro-child support movement initiated by those whose actual primary interest was in reducing government spending and replenishing welfare coffers, and whose secondary interest was in re-restricting women's freedom to "break up" families by reimposing the old economic disabilities that had for centuries forced women to get into marriages and remain married.</b> <p>In joining in the movement seeking increases in child support guidelines and stronger enforcement neasures, women missed the concurrent fathers-rights countermotion. Once again couched in the rhetoric of equality, father's rights groups used some of the very same arguments to achieve a surge of support for father's rights, including the revolutionary UNWED father's rights, all under the same guise of "parental responsibility."<b> </b><b>Even many feminists embraced "equal parental responsibility" rhetoric along with the post-hippy-era California notion of "joint custody," which ironically, set up the perfect ploy toward an ultimate agenda of doing away with child support altogether!!</b> <p>Pushing for "child support" post-divorce as "parental responsibility" appealed to feminists for several reasons. First, it eliminated the need to argue roles and choices in marriage, and all those distasteful issues of women's economic dependence -- a continuing factor notwithstanding two decades of second wave feminism and women's entry into the workforce. Second, <b>it provided a way to enable financial support for mothers that did not carry the negative connotations of "alimony." It looked "neutral" and unassailable</b> as a theory. It would be fair, and predictable, and not subject to the vagaries of who had the better lawyer, or a judge's discretionary biases. <p>But there is no "responsibility" without concurrent "rights." And there's the kicker. <p><b>All the focus on child support (child support being "owed" to the child and all), kept the scholar's focus away from examining issues of marriage, contract, and support that might in fact be owed to a *woman* who has, at great and usually lifetime cost to herself far in excess of the mere loss of current income, provided a man with the child or children to which he lays equal claim.</b> <p>Collecting "child support," and talking about "parental responsibility" felt much more palatable to those women who had bought into being shamed at the idea of receiving support for themselves (that alimony drone argument.) And it came packaged in the gender-neutral surface appeal, if one did not dig deeper, of the "equality words." As could have been predicted, the "parental responsibility" rhetoric was swiftly plucked up by the anti-woman forces straight from the child support arena and plunked down into the child custody arena, where many bought it. <p><b>The "parental responsibility-child support" bandwagon also lent itself wonderfully to louder and louder finger-pointing cries of unwed welfare mother "irresponsibility."</b> While the FRs were quick to seize upon the usage "deadbeat dad" as unfairly painting all divorced men in a ngative light (a specious claim to begin with), neither they nor the government nor the media have had any compunction against blaming nearly all of the society's problems on "feminism" and "single motherhood." <p>Even as the financial detriments still facing women post-divorce were becoming apparent, the stage was being set for widespead propaganda against single mothers generally, previously married or not, responsibe or not. Feminists missed the big picture, and continued to carry the child support ball, originally thrown by the anti-welfare set, of pushing for more and more (and more and more draconian) "child support enforcement." They pushed for it without thinking about or making any cognitive distinction between child support for previously married women (an idea arising out of marriage contract and divorce law theory and substituting for what probably should have been alimony in the first place) and child support "for the children" of never-married women (an idea with no basis in jurisprudential logic, supported by those interested solely in reducing government spending, and believed in by those who never understood that "for the child" was a subrogation fiction.) <p>While all this was occurring, young women were busily resolving to have their families anyway, but in a new feminist-inspired and "responsible" planned way: to prepare for them first with educational and economic achievement and then, once careers were set, if no compatible partner came along, to just "go it alone."<b>Young women who still planned on marriage were encouraged with the idea that if they only "established" themselves in a career first, they could avoid economic dependency in marriage when babies came along.</b> <a href="http://www.thelizlibrary.org/liz/006.htm">[liznote: probably not.]</a> Focusing on this notion, though, ended up delaying marriage and motherhood for educated women generally, and thwarted the likelihood of marriage for some women -- but pointing this out has been seen as subversive fear-mongering. <p><b><font color="#ff0000" size="4">Murphy Brown, et al. instead became the better, and trendy but fleeting feminist answer</font>.</b> It won't be permitted to succeed as a solution. <blockquote> <p>Economically and socially viable unwed motherhood is the ultimate in women's independence -- complete autonomy over their own bodies, lives and families, IF they wish it. Not that most women would ever really want lives without partners, but recognizing that reality does not appear in the anti-feminist position for a number of reasons. <p>Women's merely <i>having</i><i> </i>the OPTION to bear and rear children and go life alone without men would grant women the complete and unfettered marital bargaining power that nature's biology originally gave them, as well as a powerful chip to play in achieving full equal social gender status, notwithstanding motherhood. <p>It's a threatening prospect, particularly to men who have had women leave them, or who have doubts about their own self-worth, abilities and desirability. And so it only added more fuel to the backlash fires. </p></blockquote> <p><b>The response to "Murphy Brown" was that mens-rights groups (using the rubrik of gender equality) successfully started to advocate for the ultimate control over adult women's bodies and lives: fathers' rights completely outside of marriage, and with no obligations at all to the *mothers* of their children.</b><b> </b>The push to seek child support from unmarried fathers provided the perfect tit-for-tat "equitable" argument, and guaranteed an easy ride for this absolute nonsense. <p>Some scholars, e.g. Martha Fineman, have recognized that "unwed father's rights," never before widely acknowledged in the history of the world, and an idea that that largely has cropped up in the United States only in the last 15-20 years, is essentially the imposition back again on women of the marriage laws, a definition of the family as man-woman-child, and a way for the government to get around women's thinking that they are free to conduct their lives, bear children, or use their own bodies as they will outside of the constraints of marriage or men's approval and collaboration. <p>However, <b>THIS imposition of "family" laws on women's sexual and reproductive independence comes without ANY history or promise of relationship or obligation of the fathers to the mothers of the children. All of the detriments without even a semblance of benefit.</b> <p>If marriage ever was *anything* remotely partnership in the abstract social theory, it was the bargain by which a woman shared her reproductive investments, her children, and unrecupable time and effort from her life in return for a supportive partner. But patriarchal notions and social, economic and political disabilities traditionally imposed on women in order to force them to enter and remain in marriage as the ONLY viable route open to them, cheapened women's worth and reduced their "bargaining power" and expectations in return for what they had to "trade." An "agreement" made under duress and disability is hardly an equal partnership arrangement. <p>Patriarchy 's promise to the loyal troops and patriots and believers and followers, is that the behavior from them that will be rewarded with a "chick in every pot" is effort for and in support of the sovereign, not devotion to a woman. Women are not life partners, but possessions and spoils. It's a system of maintaining sovereign authority. Male sovereign authority. <p><b>In supporting notions of child support obligations and "equal parental responsibility" OUTSIDE of marriage, OUTSIDE of a contracted-for relationship and "deal," women</b><b> </b><b><i>have</i></b><b><i> </i></b><b>been DISabling their bargaining power and their hopes for appropriate laws and equal power IN marriage, IN partnership with men, and as mothers.</b> Since most women <i>will</i><i> </i>be mothers during their lifetimes, this has the domino effect of disempowering all women generally in all other spheres of life. <p><b>The upshot is that in the family laws, women have taken one or two steps forward, and then one or two steps back. Women have made, on balance, NO gains at all in rectifying gender inequity in marriage and divorce.</b> <p>And if women have no equality in marriage and in their personal lives, then they have no equality in the workforce, either. "<b>Equal pay" is an illusion when there's an unequal personal price that has to be traded for it.</b> <a href="http://www.thelizlibrary.org/liz/003.htm">[See liznote on gender neutral inequality.]</a> <p><b><font color="#ff0000" size="4">The Father's Rights Movement.</font></b> <p>"Men's rights" began as germ of an idea born of feminism's equality notions, and feminism's pointing out the real ways in which patriarchy has harmed and also controls men. But don't kid yourself that that's what it's really about. Words are easy to use. And when it comes down to politics, very few persons are interested in social theories that don't make a good rationale for laws that appear to address for them their immediate personal desires and disappointments. <p>"Father's rights" is a synonym for "mens rights," since ultimately, everything -- from the success of the economic systems in place to the religions to the politics -- boils down to patriarchal control of the efforts and fruit of women's bodies and lives. <p>The groups that are fighting women's efforts on anti-domestic violence laws are "fathers' rights" groups. The groups that are against laws protecting children from child abuse are "fathers' rights" groups. The groups that seek to prevent women from obtaining divorces, or to continue marital controls and rights over them even if they do via shared or father custody, and child support and alimony manipulation are "father's rights" groups. <p>Listen closely: whether they couch their ideas in terms of religion or liberalism, and regardless of whether they disagree on a particular route or rhetoric, e.g. "joint custody" versus "father custody," listen for the theme in common. Whether it's about the "Father in Heaven," or the "Founding Fathers," or "parenting fathers," there's one paramount interest that's shared, and it isn't about women's -- or children's -- best interests. [See liznotes on the <a href="http://www.thelizlibrary.org/fathers/">father's rights movement</a>.] <p>Oh you'll hear a lot about "children's rights," too. When all other arguments are shown up as specious, they have no choice but to fall onto that one. But it's not about children at all. At least not in the sense of being a hands-on caregiver. It's about doing what's good for men and controlling women. <p><b>Odd, isn't it, that when the mothers of men's children are under their control, fathers aren't complaining about not being the caregiver.</b> [See liznotes on <a href="http://www.thelizlibrary.org/liz/005.htm">joint custody</a>, and in response to Wade Horn's position on <a href="http://www.thelizlibrary.org/liz/014.htm">"fatherlessness."</a> Also see a divorced father's <a href="http://www.thelizlibrary.org/liz/008.htm">opinion</a>.] <p>Whether it's a group which has coopted the rhetoric of gender-neutrality and equality, or whether it's a group that makes no bones about being dead-set against feminism, it's one and the same thing: these are still the old boy networks, and with their recruits and their literal armies of grunt foot-soldiers, they still have the connections, wealth, power, political acumen and propaganda machines to decimate women's rights if feminists -- if women -- don't wake up soon. <p><b>The propaganda often *sounds* innocuous. Who could be against "equal rights?"</b> <p><b>Who would agree that they are not an "independent" or "self-sufficient" woman?</b> <p>The rhetoric of gender bias has been turned against women, and sadly, it's been bought, hook, line and sinker by more than a few. <p><b>(And I'm talking to some of you women lawyers out there, too, who are so indoctrinated in male ways of perceiving the world -- and some, still so hung up on male approval -- that you don't use the brains and training you should have to see what's right in front of your nose!)</b> <p>Every time women have made a gain in the family laws, whether married, divorced or single, if they had children, the fathers-rights backlash has responded. Proportionately, women have got poorer and poorer financially, and more and more constrained in their freedom, while fathers-rights groups have got enacted laws and amendments to laws that more and more will keep the mother of/and any child of theirs within their control, given that they now cannot do that through preventing divorce. (Although, note, divorce prevention rhetoric appears to be the next bandwagon song, and from there it will be only a short step to "really doing something" with "teeth in it.") <p>It would appear that the (only) way for any woman to keep her life completely outside the dictates of a man would be for the woman grow to adulthood, not marry, and to not have children at all. But this appearance is deceptive, too. <b>In not supporting mothers IN motherhood and marriage, women who want none of it at all remain at risk and in numbers far too small and powerless to ensure their own options.</b> <p><b>Under a pure patriarchy, even the option to remain childless is denied women.</b> Hand-in-hand with the unwed father's rights movement, more and more men, and not for religious, but for <i>political</i> reasons, also have been demanding the end to abortion rights and demanding the right to "input" over the abortion decision, along with demanding that unwed fathers get a veto power over a woman's giving her baby up for adoption. It's no mere "oversight" that insurance companies generally don't cover women's contraceptive health care, but have rushed right in to offer the new "viagra." <p><b>The men's clamoring notwithstanding, remaining unmarried and childless is not any solution for most women on a more basic ground. They like men, they want to be married with a partner, and they want to have children and families that include a lifetime partner!</b> In the last decade, there has been plenty of documentation of childless women in their thirties and forties and up questioning their having had to accept child-free/family-free lives as the price of "equality" and freedom -- a price that men have never had to pay. <p>Note the agonizing from feminists on both sides of this issue. As with the "mommy-track" issue, those who fear the loss of gains in the employment sector, and the loss of lifestyle choices, immediately suspect, and not without some credible evidence, that the media brouhahas over these kinds of reports are moved, at least in part, by the ulteriorly motivated, backlash propaganda attempting to turn back the clock on women's choices. Other women, often those who have come to some awakening upon their actually having children, but with full feminist goals and sympathies nevertheless intact, are conflicted as to how to deal with these issues and the division in the feminist community over it. These latter women (I submit these are <i>most</i>women) would welcome the opportunity to be able to *choose* to take a relatively small period of their lives in which to focus on and care for the children they *do* have, without suffering life-long economic punishment and repercussions as a result. <p><b><font color="#ff0000" size="4">Redux.</font></b> <p><b>Since permanent singlehood just isn't a viable choice for most women, feminist efforts in the 70s and 80s did try to recharacterize marriage and alternative relationships as a "partnership."</b> <p>A great deal of lipservice (and you'll hear it from some younger and childless women) still is given to the notion of the "new man," i.e. men's "sharing" of homemaking and parenting. It's very fashionable for young, childless couples, as well as professional-type young couples with one young child to babble about their equal arrangements. Lots and lots of media coverage and movies about those Mr. Moms reinforce it. The grand ideas didn't get implemented in any widespread practice; only the rhetoric did. The arrangement just doesn't work in real lives. And the rhetoric will <i>never</i> become the reality. [See liznotes <a href="http://www.thelizlibrary.org/liz/006.htm">primary parenting</a>article.] It's had its opportunity, and we're well past that now. (Even in the "egalitarian" Scandinavian countries that have given men fully-paid childcare leaves, men rarely take them -- when they have, it's frequently been used as a vacation -- and Norway had to go so far as passing legislation in 1998 <i>requiring</i> men to take childcare leaves against their will!) <p>It's also about words that easily are misunderstood and coopted for distorted ideas by the male-power contingent, e.g. Warren <a href="http://www.argate.net/~liz/fathers/farrell.htm">Farrell</a> et al. Gender-neutral participation arguments are misleading when most families have, if any children, more than one. "We share <i>everything</i>" sounds just so easy to the newly coupled and childless, or the equal professionals, in love, in commitment, and with one child and plenty of money. Almost all of them are in for a rude awakening. <p><b>The</b><b> </b><b><a href="http://www.thelizlibrary.org/liz/017.htm"><font color="#ff0000" size="4">reality</font></a></b><b> </b><b>is: men's "equal participation" in either homemaking or childcare during marriage is a myth. Save for the exception which proves the rule and the isolated case, it hasn't happened, and in the main, it never will.</b> <p><b>Many women over the past couple of decades, even feminists and scholars have indeed bought into notions of "equal partnership" that a little thinking could have foreseen would actually result in women's both bearing and rearing children for men,</b><b> </b><b><u>and</u></b><b> </b><b>providing half or more of the family support -- two steps back to *doubly* servicing men! Doing two jobs to his one.</b><b> </b><b><u>That's not equality!</u></b> <a name="e"></a>[<a href="http://www.thelizlibrary.org/liz/002.htm#5">The Whirlpool Foundation Study</a> 5/10/95 found that in 45% of intact households, women provided half to all of the income.] <p>Women going it utterly alone? The fathers-rights answer has been the attack on welfare, the attack on jobs programs, and to slander single motherhood as the cause of crime and immorality. <p>A compromise alternative? Nonmarital "egalitarian" partnerships with no protections and no guarantees? <p><b><font color="#ff0000" size="4">Unwed father's rights. All the burdens without even the semblance of benefits or relationship history that was marriage.</font></b> <p><strong><font color="#ff0000">Father's rights is about control of women, and it comes in many flavors</font></strong> ...whatever it takes to make sure that women will never have the option of living a life in which they are permitted to use their own uteruses and keep the children they grew in them without first obtaining the blessing of, or submitting their lives and freedom to live them as they choose to some measure of control by a man. <p>When I talk against the "fathers' rights" groups, immediately I am accused of "daddy-bashing." Nonsense. "Father's Rights" isn't the counterpart to some "Mother's Rights" organization -- how many of these as feminist groups have you EVER even heard of (!) (WHERE are they!!?) <p>It's clever propaganda. <p><b>"You're a feminist -- or a lawyer, or an educated individual, or a fair person. You wouldn't be against something that stood for equality, would you?"</b> <p><b>"You wouldn't advocate for fairness for mothers but not fathers, would you?"</b> <p><b>You wouldn't be in favor of a group that called itself "Anti-woman's Rights" now WOULD you? C'mon. Smarten up.</b> <p>liz <hr align="center" size="2" width="100%"> <p><b>liznote 1.</b><b> </b>Notice that now, in the 90s, that women have made gains in the employment arena and have turned some focus back to family considerations, the media has begun a campaign of blasting working women. It's always been the most fun to pit women against each other, and define women as one-dimensional subhumans. <b><a href="http://www.thelizlibrary.org/liz/002.htm#a">RETURN TO TEXT</a></b> <p><a name="2"></a> <p><b>liznote 2.</b> THE ECONOMIC STUDIES <b><a href="http://www.thelizlibrary.org/liz/002.htm#b">RETURN TO TEXT</a></b> <p>The Advisory Committee on Women in the Courts, "Report on the Financial Impact of Divorce in Rhode Island" (November l991) <p>Baker, Barbara, "Family Equity at Issue: A Study of the economic Consequences of Divorce on Women and Children," Alaska Bar Association, Alaska Women's Commission (l987) <p>Bell, Rosalyn B., "Alimony and the Financially Dependent Spouse in Montgomery County, Maryland," 22 Family Law Quarterly 225 (Fall l988) <p>Brett, Leslie J., Sharon T. Shepela & Janet Kniffen, "Women and CHildren Beware: The Economic Conseqences of Divorce in Connecticut" (Summer l990) <p>Garrison, Marsha, "Good Intentions Gone Awry: The Impact of New York's Equitable Distribution Law on Divorce Outcomes," 57 Brooklyn Law Review 621 (1991) <p>Gerval, Jean M. & Carelle Muellner Stein, "Spousal Support in Minnesota: Where Are We Going?" 6 Minnesota Family Law Journal 29 (1993) <p>Hammer, Heather, "The Economic Impact of Divorce in Hawaii," Preliminary Report to the Hawaii Supreme Court Committee on Gender and Other Fairness (December l993) <p>McGraw, Robert E., Gloria J. Sterin & Joseph M. Davis, "A Case Study in Divorce Law Reform and Its Aftermath," 20 Journal of Family Law 443 (l982) [Ohio] <p>McLindon, James B., "Separate But Unequal: The Economic Consequences of Divorce for Women and Chidlren," 21 Family Law Quarterly 351 (l990) <p>Rowe, Barbara R. & Alice M. Morrow, "The Economic Consequences of Divorce in Oregon after Ten or More Years of Marriage," 24 Williamette Law Review 463 (l988) <p>Rowe, Barbara R. & Jean M. MLown, "Economics of Divorce and Remarriage for Rural Utah Families," 16 Journal of Contemporary Law 301 (l990) <p>Weitzman, Lenore, The Divorce Revolution (l985) [California] <p>Wishik, Heather R. "Economics of Divorce: An Exploratory Study," 20 Family Law Quarterly 79 (l986) [Vermont] <p>-- compiled by Attorney Lynn Hecht Shafran, director of the National Judicial Education Program to Promote Equality for Women and Men in the Courts, a project of the NOW Legal Defense and Education Fund in cooperation with the National Association of Women Judge. <b><a href="http://www.thelizlibrary.org/liz/002.htm#b">RETURN TO TEXT</a></b> <p><a name="3"></a><b>liznote 3.</b> To a great extent, this is still true. One factor evidencing lawyers' attempts in the face of equitable distribution to achieve some measure of compensation and justice for their clients can be seen in the creeping back in of "fault" through the "back door" -- tort actions connected with separation and dissolution proceedings. <p>Also read: Mason, Mary Ann. _The Equality Trap_ Simon and Shuster, New York, 1988. <p>Fineman, Martha. _The Neutered Mother, the Sexual Family and Other Twentieth Century Tragedies_ Rutledge, New York (1995). <p>Fineman, Martha. _The Illusion of Equality: the Rhetoric and Reality of Divorce Reform_ Chicago: University of Chicago Press (1991.) <b><a href="http://www.thelizlibrary.org/liz/002.htm#c">RETURN TO TEXT</a></b> <p><a name="4"></a> <p><b>liznote 4.</b> Meanwhile, the federal bankruptcy laws were amended to protect from discharge debts arising for "spousal support," equitable *property distribution* laws were omitted from coverage. And, notwithstanding recent *new* changes in the bankruptcy laws, this remains largely the case. The result, almost axiomatic: he files for bankruptcy post-divorce! No property, no alimony, nothing... The right hand giveth and the left hand taketh away...] <b><a href="http://www.thelizlibrary.org/liz/002.htm#d">RETURN TO TEXT</a></b><a name="5"></a> <p><b>liznote 5.</b><b> </b><u>WOMEN: THE NEW PROVIDERS</u>, an extensive study released May 10, l995 by Louis Harris and Associates, Families and Work Institute, funded by the Whirlpool Foundation, indicates: <p><b>In 45% of two-parent households, women provide half or more than half of the household income; in single parent households, women provide more than half to all of the income 82% of the time.</b> <p><b>In 88% of households, women are charged with the responsibility for family care (childcare and housework, family social life, elder care...)</b> <p><b>If mothers were able to choose freely:</b> <p>--51% would not work at paid employment, spending their time instead caring for family and doing volunteer work <p>--33% would work part-time <p>--15% would choose to work full-time Claudine Dombrowskihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00174108218219442634noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6075225070962028659.post-82659147908425194832012-08-27T10:50:00.001-07:002012-08-27T10:50:01.621-07:00Congressional Report On Fatherhood Funding Used in Family Courts, Child Support Agencies Engaged In Financial Fraud, Senate Finance Committee Hearing, June 2012<p><img src="http://w.sharethis.com/images/check-small.png" /> <img src="http://w.sharethis.com/images/check-small.png" /> <img src="http://w.sharethis.com/images/check-small.png" /></p> <p><em>Note: <br /></em><em>"Showing definitively that the child support agencies are engaged in financial fraud when they meddle in custody cases, kids are getting sold out and killed to the abusers the agency promotes and covers for." - <a href="http://americanmotherspoliticalparty.org/ampp-article-library-family-court-custody-abuse-dv/3-federal-fatherhood-initiatives-dept-health-and-human-services/91-congressional-report-on-fatherhood-funding-used-in-family-courts-child-support-agencies-engaged-in-financial-fraud-senate-finance-committee-hearing-june-2012" target="_blank">AMPP</a></em></p> <p><strong>Combating Poverty: Understanding New Challenges for Families</strong></p> <p>Congressional Report on Fatherhood Funding Used in Family Courts and Testimony Submitted to Senate Committee hearing on <strong>“Combating Poverty: Understanding New Challenges for Families” </strong>that took place on <strong>June 5, 2012.</strong></p> <p><strong></strong>http://www.finance.senate.gov/hearings/hearing/?id=0a85a99b-5056-a032-52f7-b827ad9732ba</p> <p>##</p> <p>Dear Senate Finance Committee,</p> <p>Please accept this testimony with regards to the Senate Finance Committee hearing on <strong>“</strong><strong>Combating Poverty: Understanding New Challenges for Families”</strong><strong> </strong>that took place on <strong>June 5, 2012.</strong></p> <p>Attached is a copy of the July 2011 letter from Office of Child Support Enforcement (OCSE) Commissioner Vicky Turetsky to Senator John Kerry which declined to provide Senator Kerry with the information he requested, or follow up on his concerns regarding misappropriated funds. Turetsky essentially states that OCSE does not have any obligation to oversee OCSE program funding once the checks are cut from the Federal office to the State programs. Instead, Turetsky referred Senator Kerry’s concerns over OCSE fraud to the HHS OIG, who months before took the position that they lack jurisdiction to investigate a State child support program. So who is watching the hen house?</p> <p>Our main concern is that Congress should distinguish between and place paramount the TANF programs which are means tested and provided to needy women and children below the poverty line, as opposed to the predatory TANF programs bankrupting the country by placing any unfit or unwilling father--even millionaires who abandon their kids--onto the welfare roles. Attached is a copy of an article this issue for the Huffington Post entitled <strong>“Top 5 HHS Programs Endangering Women And Children”</strong><em> </em>that can also be found on line at: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/anne-stevenson/top-5-hhs-programs-endang_b_1511613.html</p> <p>The <a href="http://aspe.hhs.gov/hsp/abbrev/prwora96.htm#bill">Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Reconciliation Act of 1996</a> and the <a href="http://aspe.hhs.gov/hsp/abbrev/afdc-tanf.htm">Temporary Aid to Needy Families (TANF)</a> program it created transformed welfare policy by drastically reducing and shifting federal assistance away from the homes of mothers and children and into the homes of violent male offenders. The original intent of welfare reform was to require States to function as collection agencies, recovering financial support from parents who had willfully abandoned their parental responsibilities to their children. These policies have drastically backfired because:</p> <ol> <li>it dedicated billions in TANF to programs for childless fathers that are not needs based, </li> <li>created redundant “to work” programs via HHS which were already funded via the Department of Labor and the Department of Education, but then excluded women and children from participation by labeling them Responsible Fatherhood programs, </li> <li>the HHS Office of the Inspector General (OIG)<a href="https://blu169.mail.live.com/default.aspx?id=64855#_ftn1">[1]</a>and the Government Accountability Office<a href="https://blu169.mail.live.com/default.aspx?id=64855#_ftn2">[2]</a>determined that the programs lacked oversight and are riddled with fraud, and </li> <li><strong>State welfare programs adjusted their environment to have a greater need by casting a wider, less transparent net.</strong></li> </ol> <p>90% of those receiving TANF benefits are single mothers,<a href="https://blu169.mail.live.com/default.aspx?id=64855#_ftn3">[3]</a>so does it make sense to exclude them from the “to work” employment assistance component of welfare reform? Instead of helping children, welfare reform created a new breed of dangerous Kings through HHS Office of Child Support Enforcement when it began using non-needs based TANF programs to subsidize the homes and legal battles of the unfit, unwilling, and violent fathers (like mass murderer John Muhammad, the Beltway Sniper.<a href="https://blu169.mail.live.com/default.aspx?id=64855#_ftn4">[4]</a>)</p> <p>OCSE is a federal agency which is supposed to be gender neutral and pro child, but is it? Note that Commissioner Turetsky was previously employed by HHS contractor Manpower Demonstration and Research Corporation (MDRC,<a href="https://blu169.mail.live.com/default.aspx?id=64855#_ftn5">[5]</a>) and that Ron Haskins is on the board of directors at MDRC.<a href="https://blu169.mail.live.com/default.aspx?id=64855#_ftn6">[6]</a>Haskins is co-director of the Brookings Institute’s Center on Children and Families, a senior consultant at the Annie E. Casey Foundation, former Senior Advisor to the President for Welfare Policy at the White House, who spent 14 years on the staff of the House Ways and Means Human Resources Subcommittee.<a href="https://blu169.mail.live.com/default.aspx?id=64855#_ftn7">[7]</a>Haskins is also on the board of the National Fatherhood Leadership Group with several other former HHS affiliated officials,<a href="https://blu169.mail.live.com/default.aspx?id=64855#_ftn8">[8]</a>yet together, Haskins and Turetsky promoted/solicited federal funding for MDRC policies and programs<a href="https://blu169.mail.live.com/default.aspx?id=64855#_ftn9">[9]</a>that diverted TANF assistance to childless, wealthy offender fathers while targeting and excluding abused children and mothers. Is this a conflict of interest?</p> <p><strong>We can identify no legitimate purpose for these programs and request that Congress take the following actions:</strong></p> <ol> <li>Revoke or reduce funding to Administration for Children and Families (ACF) child support incentives, Access and Visitation (AV) programs, and gender based funding to child support agencies. </li> <li>End collateral child support/custody funding mandates. </li> <li>Overhaul Office on Child Support Enforcement (OCSE) on the federal level to remove staff with conflicts of interest and bias. </li> <li>Audit OCSE to find out where our tax dollars are actually going, and then implement rigorous transparency, oversight, and accountability measures on programs.</li> </ol> <p><strong>I.</strong><strong> OIG DETERMINED THAT OCSE PROGRAMS ARE RIDDLED WITH FRAUD.</strong></p> <p>In 2011, the Office of the Inspector General released a report<a href="https://blu169.mail.live.com/default.aspx?id=64855#_ftn10">[10]</a>called <em>“Rollup Review on States' Reporting of Undistributable Child Support Collections as Program Income” </em>that concluded 21 of the 23 States audited failed to properly report program income, and were hoarding tens of millions in child support collections by [intentionally or unintentionally] failing to make sufficient efforts to locate the children the resources are intended to benefit. Only a hand full of counties out of the several hundred contained in the relevant States were audited, and a review of the initial reports shows discrepancies that indicate the problem may be much larger than what the Administration is willing to admit.</p> <p>The State agency classifies child support as “undistributable arrears” when it collects a child support payment but cannot identify or locate the custodial parent or return the funds to the noncustodial parent. Federal mandate requires that at the time when State law deems the funds “abandoned,” States must recognize and report the unallocated funds as program income in order to offset program costs. The Federal policy is that abandoned collections are then split 66% Federal share, 34% are retained by the State. However the OIG determined that all of the States had [intentionally or unintentionally] devised various “set up to fail” support distribution systems that allow the Agency to improperly hoard the child’s money in State coffers by mislabeling it “abandoned property.”</p> <p>Examples of “set up to fail” policies the OIG listed include:</p> <ul> <li>send checks to the wrong address, </li> <li>illegal liens on accounts </li> <li>create massive arrears, give dad the tax benefit, then garnish the tax benefit, </li> <li>put child support it in trust accounts during litigation-that lasts more than 3 years, </li> <li>retroactively abate arrears, then keep it for themselves without telling either parent.</li> </ul> <p>The OIG determined that while some States claimed to be unaware of Federal reporting requirements, <em>“These deficiencies occurred because States did not have adequate controls to ensure that undistributable child support collections were recognized and reported as program income in accordance with Federal requirements.”</em></p> <p>In each instance, the OIG recommended solutions that failed to require State agencies to improve disbursement methods to ensure delivery of the funds to the child’s home. Instead, the OIG’s focus was to ensure the increased the State’s accuracy and compliance with Federal reporting requirements to ensure that the Federal HHS office received its’ 66% share of program income. The audits were done for support collected between 1999-2007, 23 states audited, but only a couple counties within each state were audited---NOT the entire state's child support system. So the fact that like Michigan may have audited 18 counties out of a total of 85 counties, and that those 18 counties stole $8 million from Michigan families is significant. What would the number be if they did audit the whole state?</p> <p>But the 2011 roll up report is also incorrect for another reason---it appears to have under estimated the original auditor's findings. The 2011 "roll up" report is a collection of the findings in the original 23 states, most of which were complete by 2009. So I obtained copies of the original audit reports for every state, and found that many states were caught with their hands in the cookie jar for millions and millions of dollars, but the 2011 has them down as owing $0 sometimes.</p> <p>1. Cook County, Illinois: (102 Counties in IL, not sure why it appears only 1 is audited) <br /><a href="http://oig.hhs.gov/oas/reports/region5/50400039.pdf">http://oig.hhs.gov/oas/reports/region5/50400039.pdf</a> <br />2011 Roll Up Total: $1.8 million, 2005 report: <a href="http://oig.hhs.gov/oas/reports/region5/50400039.pdf">$3.4 Million</a></p> <p><strong>2. Michigan</strong><strong>: (85 counties, only 18 audited?) <br /></strong>2011 Roll Up Total: $5.3 million</p> <p>2006 report: <a href="http://oig.hhs.gov/oas/reports/region5/50500033.pdf">$8 Million</a></p> <p><a href="http://oig.hhs.gov/oas/reports/region5/50500033.pdf">http://oig.hhs.gov/oas/reports/region5/50500033.pdf</a></p> <p>3. Georgia: (159 counties, none audited, just the state program---so my impression was that the county courts contracted by the State who collected support independently but not through state coffers were never reviewed)</p> <p>2011 Roll Up Total: $238,000</p> <p>2007 report: $1.2 million</p> <p><a href="http://oig.hhs.gov/oas/reports/region4/40603506.pdf">http://oig.hhs.gov/oas/reports/region4/40603506.pdf</a></p> <p>4. <a href="http://oig.hhs.gov/oas/reports/region4/40603506.pdf"><strong><em>California:</em></strong><strong><em> </em></strong><strong>(58 Counties, only 3 audited)</strong></a></p> <p><a href="http://oig.hhs.gov/oas/reports/region4/40603506.pdf"><strong></strong></a>2011 Roll Up Total: $1.45m</p> <p>2007 report: $3.3 Million</p> <p>o <a href="http://oig.hhs.gov/oas/reports/region9/90600040.htm">Orange county</a>: $2.2 million <br /><a href="http://oig.hhs.gov/oas/reports/region9/90600040.htm">http://oig.hhs.gov/oas/reports/region9/90600040.htm <br /></a>o <a href="http://oig.hhs.gov/oas/reports/region9/90700049.htm">Riverside County</a>: $245,000 <br /><a href="http://oig.hhs.gov/oas/reports/region9/90700049.htm">http://oig.hhs.gov/oas/reports/region9/90700049.htm <br /></a>o <a href="http://oig.hhs.gov/oas/reports/region9/90800024.asp">Los Angeles county</a>: $878,000 <br />http://oig.hhs.gov/oas/reports/region9/90800024.asp</p> <p>But the LA county report is perhaps inaccurate for another reason, because at the same time the OIG conducted the audit, Attorney Richard Fine sued LA County for holding $14 million in child support collections from LA county children.<a href="https://blu169.mail.live.com/default.aspx?id=64855#_ftn11">[11]</a>He won the case, and the county had to disburse the $14 million to the families. But this total is not included in the OIG's report.</p> <p><strong>II.</strong><strong> TANF CHILD SUPPORT PROGRAMS ADAPT TO ARTIFICIALLY INCREASE NEED FOR THEIR OWN SERVICES</strong></p> <p>These reports and others reflect the fact that TANF’s generous collection incentive policies may have in effect created a child support vacuum as States to adapt their practices to reflect a greater demand and need for resources that are ultimately withheld from needy families.</p> <ol> <li><strong>Recovery Act: Thousands of Recovery Act Contract and Grant Recipients Owe Hundreds of Millions in Federal Taxes</strong></li> <li><strong>Government Accountability Office report recently came out which shows that these HHS grant recipients owe us struggling taxpaying families hundreds of BILLIONS in taxes</strong>. <a href="http://www.gao.gov/products/GAO-11-686T">http://www.gao.gov/products/GAO-11-686T</a><strong></strong></li> <li><strong>GAO REPORT:</strong><strong> Child Support Enforcement: Better Data and More Information on Undistributed Collections Are Needed </strong><a href="http://www.gao.gov/products/GAO-04-377">http://www.gao.gov/products/GAO-04-377</a><strong></strong></li> <li><strong>Medicare and Medicaid Fraud, Waste, and Abuse: Effective Implementation of Recent Laws and Agency Actions Could Help Reduce Improper Payments </strong><a href="http://www.gao.gov/products/GAO-11-409T">http://www.gao.gov/products/GAO-11-409T</a><strong></strong></li> <li><strong>Child Support Enforcement: Departures from Long-term Trends in Sources of Collections and Caseloads Reflect Recent Economic Conditions </strong><strong><a href="http://www.gao.gov/products/GAO-11-196">http://www.gao.gov/products/GAO-11-196</a></strong></li> </ol> <p>In fiscal year 2009, the child support enforcement (CSE) program collected about $26 billion in child support payments from noncustodial parents on behalf of more than 17 million children. The CSE program is run by states and overseen by the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS). States receive federal performance incentive payments and a federal match on both state CSE funds…The Deficit Reduction Act of 2005 (DRA) eliminated this incentive match beginning in 2008, but the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 temporarily reinstated it for 2 years. This 2011 report<a href="https://blu169.mail.live.com/default.aspx?id=64855#_ftn12">[12]</a>found that although the<strong> American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 provided generous matching funds on State support collections:</strong></p> <p><em>“In fiscal year 2009, the CSE program experienced several departures from past trends. For one,</em><em> <strong>child support collections failed to increase nationwide for the first time in the history of the program in fiscal year 2009…</strong> <strong>Also in fiscal year 2009, the number of CSE cases currently receiving public assistance increased</strong>…Preliminary HHS data show that total CSE expenditures grew by 2.6 percent in fiscal year 2008 as many states increased their own funding to maintain CSE operations when the federal incentive match was eliminated…</em>In contrast to fiscal year 2008, <em>a different picture emerged in fiscal year 2009, when the incentive match was temporarily restored but total CSE expenditures fell slightly by 1.8 percent, which HHS officials told GAO was due to state budget constraints.</em> <strong>Most states nationwide have not implemented "family first" policy options…because giving more child support collections to families means states retain less as reimbursement for public assistance costs.</strong></p> <ol> <li><strong>Administrative Expenditures and Federal Matching Rates of Selected Support Programs</strong><a href="http://www.gao.gov/products/GAO-05-839R">http://www.gao.gov/products/GAO-05-839R</a></li> </ol> <p><strong>III.</strong><strong> TANF PROGRAMS FOR CHILDLESS FATHERS ARE NOT NEEDS BASED.</strong></p> <p>If the goal of some Fatherhood programs is so child support benefits “trickle down” to the child during tough economic times, why does Commissioner Turesky’s department make TANF available to the 1% of child support debtors making more than $50,000-who are unfit or unwilling to have kids live in their homes?<a href="https://blu169.mail.live.com/default.aspx?id=64855#_ftn13">[13]</a> Unlike the welfare programs for women and children which had restrictive income eligibility requirements, TANF diverts billions of dollars through the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) Office of Child Support Enforcement (OCSE) to non-needs based programs exclusively available to unfit and unwilling fathers, such as Healthy Families Initiatives, Responsible Fatherhood Initiatives, and Access and Visitation Initiatives.</p> <p><strong>Benefits from Responsible Fatherhood programs to childless abusers</strong><strong> <a href="http://fatherhood.hhs.gov/Evaluation/index.shtml">include</a>:<a href="https://blu169.mail.live.com/default.aspx?id=64855#_ftn14">[14]</a><a href="https://blu169.mail.live.com/default.aspx?id=64855#_ftn15">[15]</a></strong></p> <ul> <li>Child support obligations are suspended </li> <li>Free attorney representation in the family courts to fight for custody </li> <li>Free housing </li> <li>Direct cash incentives </li> <li>Free groceries </li> <li>Free car maintenance, gas, and other transportation costs </li> <li>Free healthcare and dental care</li> </ul> <p>These TANF benefits are not intended to directly reach children, their purpose is to reward the unfit and unwilling childless fathers who lost custody of them. The incentives are structured so that the State will only benefit if children are removed from loving homes, then arbitrarily placed with male offenders who previously lost custody. If the programs do not successfully increase in the percentage of noncustodial fathers who file for and win custody, they will not get paid.</p> <p><strong>HHS reports show that 80% of Fatherhood program participants are court ordered to attend,</strong><strong> <a href="https://blu169.mail.live.com/default.aspx?id=64855#_ftn16">[16]</a>and many are recruited directly from prison.</strong><a href="https://blu169.mail.live.com/default.aspx?id=64855#_ftn17">[17]</a>In 2000, Commissioner Turesky authored a paper for the Center for Law and Social Policy (CLASP) that concluded:<a href="https://blu169.mail.live.com/default.aspx?id=64855#_ftn18">[18]</a></p> <p><em>"Many women trying to leave an abusive home rely on the Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF) program. According to the U.S. Department of Justice, financial assistance to</em><em> <strong>women</strong> in poverty may lessen their risk of violence… about 20 percent of women receiving cash assistance are current victims of domestic violence, while about 50 to 60 percent have experienced domestic violence during their adulthood."</em></p> <p>Considering that Commissioner Turesky also claimed in a 2006 CLASP policy brief that 70% of all child support arrears are owed to the government to pay back TANF costs,<a href="https://blu169.mail.live.com/default.aspx?id=64855#_ftn19">[19]</a>doesn’t this mean that the overwhelming majority of fathers enrolled in compromise of arrears programs are violent, unfit fathers? This may explain why recent studies found children fare far worse when support is court ordered.<a href="https://blu169.mail.live.com/default.aspx?id=64855#_ftn20">[20]</a></p> <p>The programs also punish the majority of responsible fathers who willingly provide love and support to their children. Using the virtually unregulated child support system as a vehicle and the father's will to <a href="http://aspe.hhs.gov/hsp/wtw-grants-eval98/share03/index.htm">evade prison time</a> as collateral,<a href="https://blu169.mail.live.com/default.aspx?id=64855#_ftn21">[21]</a>the fathers are told they can risk their liberty and property attempting to pay down arrears, or alternatively, sue the mother for custody using a variety of federally funded "supports." Children in safe homes do not need rehabilitation, so often times a “need” is created by the State by placing children deliberately in an unsafe home.</p> <p>The <strong>effect of these Fatherhood and welfare reform policies is to place the middle class on welfare by “leaving no family member undiagnosed”</strong> when they come into contact with the family courts.<a href="https://blu169.mail.live.com/default.aspx?id=64855#_ftn22">[22]</a> At the beginning of a custody case, only the offender is sick, but if one violent offender gets custody, the whole family needs treatment. Consequently for courts and social services agencies to appoint dozens of federally funded family court mental health and legal professionals onto the case to sustain the deadly custody rights of a single violent father.<a href="https://blu169.mail.live.com/default.aspx?id=64855#_ftn23">[23]</a></p> <p><strong>IV.</strong><strong> THE GAO DETERMINED THAT OCSE FATHERHOOD PROGRAMS ARE RIDDLED WITH FRAUD.</strong></p> <p>HHS fraud costs tax payers $60 billion per year, and it is not improving.<a href="https://blu169.mail.live.com/default.aspx?id=64855#_ftn24">[24]</a>When you start to look at how many contracts are going to the same network of providers like Manpower, Maximus, Goodwill Industries, etc. with inside connections to HHS Administration, it is also worth asking yourselves if and when Congress will investigate these conflicts of interest?</p> <p><strong>In 2008, the GAO released a report entitled</strong><strong> </strong><em>“HEALTHY MARRIAGE AND RESPONSIBLE FATHERHOOD INITIATIVE:</em><em> Further Progress Is Needed in Developing a Risk-Based Monitoring Approach to Help HHS Improve Program Oversight”</em><a href="https://blu169.mail.live.com/default.aspx?id=64855#_ftn25">[25]</a> that concluded that these programs were riddled with fraud and not performing.The GAO concluded that HHS failed to create oversight mechanisms or standard performance goals prior to disbursing $500 million in grants to hastily chosen programs meant to serve children living in high-risk families:</p> <p><em>“HHS…lacks mechanisms to identify and target grantees that are not in compliance with grant requirements or are not meeting performance goals… Our review of grantee case files found documentation of grantees that were not meeting performance targets…or</em><em> <strong>not in compliance with grant requirements</strong>, such as providing only those services allowed under the grant.”</em></p> <p>Report Highlights:</p> <p><strong>$500 Million Unconditionally Given To Activists:</strong></p> <p><em>Operating under a deadline that allowed HHS 7 months to award grants, HHS shortened its existing process to award Healthy Marriage and Responsible Fatherhood grants to public and private organizations. During this process, HHS did not fully examine grantees’ programs as described in their applications, including the activities they planned to offer,</em><em> and this created challenges and setbacks for grantees later as they implemented their programs. </em>–P. 2</p> <p><strong>Failure to Implement Uniform Standards, Policies, and Procedures:</strong></p> <p><em>HHS uses methods that include site visits and progress reports to monitor grantees, but it lacks mechanisms to identify and target grantees that are not in compliance with grant requirements or are not meeting performance goals, and it also lacks clear and consistent guidance for performing site monitoring visits.</em> –P.2</p> <p><strong>Embezzlement and Fraud Was Likely Vastly Under Estimated:</strong></p> <p><em>Moreover, we did not survey organizations that received money from grant recipients to provide direct services, subawardees. Since making the initial awards, 4 organizations have relinquished their grants, 1 organization had its grant terminated, and 1 new grant was awarded. There are 6 organizations currently pending non-continuation of award funds.</em></p> <p>Please recall that the irresponsible programs are recruiting violent offenders directly from prisons<a href="https://blu169.mail.live.com/default.aspx?id=64855#_ftn26">[26]</a>to help them obtain legal and physical custody of the child victim witnesses they hurt, yet the GAO cannot directly account for the activities or the funding going into the programs.</p> <p>Although groups cannot use TANF money for attorneys, the literature shows that some groups like Illinois Council on Fatherhood<a href="https://blu169.mail.live.com/default.aspx?id=64855#_ftn27">[27]</a>provides fathers with legal advice and exceptional access to judges, Michigan is providing dads with legal assistance,<a href="https://blu169.mail.live.com/default.aspx?id=64855#_ftn28">[28]</a>and the Montrose County, Colorado Fatherhood program<a href="https://blu169.mail.live.com/default.aspx?id=64855#_ftn29">[29]</a>match up fathers with “Fatherhood Coaches” who also just happen to be attorneys who want to help them with their child support and custody problems.</p> <p>You should ask yourselves who represents the victim child’s interests while their violent noncustodial fathers use concealed child support and federal assistance to build up legal arsenals to take custody and silence them? HHS programs are actually a deadly investment given that (a) abusive men <a href="http://www.stopfamilyviolence.org/info/custody-abuse/overview/batterer-manipulation-and-retaliation-denial-and-complicity-in-the-family-courts">win custody of their victims 70% of the time</a><a href="https://blu169.mail.live.com/default.aspx?id=64855#_ftn30">[30]</a>when they ask for it, and (b) regardless of the gender of the victim, it is a public safety issue when <a href="http://www.umbrellanek.org/documents/DV%20General%20Fact%20Sheet.pdf">DOJ studies</a><a href="https://blu169.mail.live.com/default.aspx?id=64855#_ftn31">[31]</a>show men perpetrate more than 95% of violent assaults against women. The Center for Disease Control’s 2010 National Intimate Partner and Sexual Violence Survey<a href="https://blu169.mail.live.com/default.aspx?id=64855#_ftn32">[32]</a>also concluded that men are raped by other men more than 93% of the time, and women are raped by men more than 98% of the time.</p> <p>Programs like the Massachusetts Department of Probation’s<a href="https://blu169.mail.live.com/default.aspx?id=64855#_ftn33">[33]</a>provide “treatment” to thousands of untreatable, incurable violent offenders and sociopaths targeting their victims through the courts Although violence is a voluntary act, HHS now invested our tax dollars into rehabilitating the incurable who choose to assault the most vulnerable members of society. Some <a href="http://www.lovefraud.com/blog/2010/03/01/staggering-statistics-about-domestic-violence/">Studies</a><a href="https://blu169.mail.live.com/default.aspx?id=64855#_ftn34">[34]</a>of male DV perpetrators show that 50% of them are sociopaths and another 25% have sociopathic tendancies. Psychopaths are people who feel no emotional connections to others and have zero regard for the rules and regulations of society, they do not respond to therapy, and cannot be rehabilitated. Dr. Robert Hare reports that psychopaths make up 1% of the general population, but 25% of the prison population:</p> <p><em>"Violence is not uncommon among offender populations, but psychopaths still manage to stand out," he says. "They commit more than twice as many violent and aggressive acts, both in and out of prison, as do other criminals ... The recidivism rate of psychopaths is about double that of other offenders ... The violent recidivism rate of psychopaths is about triple that of other offenders."</em></p> <p>Respectfully, would you as a member of Congress, allow your children to be cared for by convicted murderers and felons? If you believe these “fathers” are harmless, why do you pass budgets that provide for armed guards to protect Congressional hearings and family courts? These programs have no legitimate purpose because here is no epidemic of “fatherlessness” that in itself harms children. There is no “fatherlessness crisis” that would justify such ruthless and irresponsible pork barrel spending on discrimination based TANF programs that exclude 90% of the TANF roles, the women and children they purport to want to get off welfare and “go to work”-but place wealthy single men on the TANF roles instead.</p> <p>We believe the majority of men are genetically programmed to be good fathers, and we do not agree with HHS’s assessment that all men are incompetent and need federally funded parenting lessons. Dangerous offenders have no business raising children. We are a nation of strong single mothers who raised Presidents like Bill Clinton and Barack Obama, both of whom were rescued from the clutches of fathers who were irresponsible, violent addicts. These Fatherhood programs now undermine and punish mothers who try and rescue their children and stay off public assistance, while punishing good fathers and abetting the irresponsible, no matter how rich or poor.</p> <p><strong>V.</strong><strong> CONCLUSION</strong></p> <p>The more federal dollars were receive the less States collected in support. States refuse to distribute child support to "families first," and are instead keeping the money for themselves-without accounting for it. When the OIG identified the embezzled funds, they did not help “struggling agencies” find the children it was intended to benefit, the OIG instructed States to properly report…So the feds could have their 66%. This policy entirely lacks accountability or consequences for this fraud. Subsequent reports demonstrated that the problem has continued to worsen, and there are [still] no protocols and procedures in place to define, identify, and track these monies.</p> <p>The [unlawful] programs are supposed to be ADMINISTRATIVE, but they used quasi judicial power to create, amend, and enforce court orders without judicial authorization. The agency does not provide due process, nor do they have to show you their files. Judges have to look the other way because if they object, they will lose their HHS funding, and at the same time the judge has to accept responsibility for the agency’s badly managed and even crooked interference when litigants are hurt.</p> <p>Instead of fixing these programs, Obama's proposed budget includes billions more in incentives to disburse and collect support to the programs with no oversight. If the core mission of the child support program is to collect and disburse support to needy children, this is an administrative function which in 2012 should be handled electronically through the treasury. There is no need to create billion in incentives to involve the support agency in taking over the judicial branch’s functions in custody cases.</p> <p><strong>Fred Sottile,</strong> the Founder and President of the LA chapter of Fathers 4 Justice says in his view:</p> <p><em>“The President should spend his efforts creating laws and policies that actually encourage father/child relationships, instead of just pretending to promote father/child relationships in extortion based OCSE programs that deprive children and blame dads for being absent.”</em></p> <p><strong>Linda Marie Sacks</strong>, Co-Chair of the Family Court Committee of the Florida chapter of the National Organization for Women:</p> <p><em>“The vast majority of fathers do not abuse children, and there are many instances where courts have unjustly deprived children of good fathers. The problem is that the programs punish children living with healthy strong mothers by incentivizing courts to cash in by arbitrarily minimizing and even eliminating moms from the picture.</em></p> <p>Since there is virtually no oversight of OCSE funding, we have often <strong>found that this funding used to help pedophile rapists and violent predators get custody of child victim witnesses through the family courts</strong>. Studies show<strong>abusers are winning custody 70% of the time</strong>, and we think the programs will have catastrophic results on the next generation if this unsafe trend of maternal deprivation continues. ”</p> <p><strong>Liz Richards,</strong> Director for the National Alliance for Family Court Justice and a certified witness for the Department of Justice agrees.</p> <p><em>“HHS is the source of the funding which is fueling the court corruption problems. Judge are making their rulings according to the program grant requirements and not by the case evidence.</em><em> Past ACF officials like Wade Horn, Ron Haskins, and others were closely associated with the fathers rights groups and leaders, and essentially turned the dept into a pro-father, abuse cover-up agency.”</em></p> <p><strong>In 2012, we ask why the Obama Administration inexcusably ignored the pleas of desperate hard working parents and</strong><strong> doubled the budget for these pork barrel projects, starving them out of their home. It’s time to get serious about deficit reduction, and require the president to exercise fiscal restraint on programs which would target and extort families under the most trying circumstances.</strong></p> <hr /> <p><a href="https://blu169.mail.live.com/default.aspx?id=64855#_ftnref1">[1]</a> “Rollup Review on States' Reporting of Undistributable Child Support Collections as Program Income ” HHS OIG report A-05-11-00025, September 30, 2011 (http://oig.hhs.gov/oas/reports/region5/51100025.asp) <br /><a href="https://blu169.mail.live.com/default.aspx?id=64855#_ftnref2">[2]</a> “HEALTHY MARRIAGE AND RESPONSIBLE FATHERHOOD INITIATIVE: <br />Further Progress Is Needed in Developing a Risk-Based Monitoring Approach to Help HHS Improve Program Oversight “Government Accountability Office Report to the Chairman, Subcommittee on Income Security and Family Support, Committee on Ways and Means, House of Representatives, September 2008. http://www.gao.gov/new.items/d081002.pdf <br /><a href="https://blu169.mail.live.com/default.aspx?id=64855#_ftnref3">[3]</a>http://womenslawproject.wordpress.com/2010/11/02/debunking-the-myth-of-the-“welfare-queen”-who-actually-receives-tanf-benefits/ <br /><a href="https://blu169.mail.live.com/default.aspx?id=64855#_ftnref4">[4]</a> “Parental Rights And Wrongs” By Liz Richards, Washington Times, <br />http://pmashilohlopez.wordpress.com/2011/07/04/from-the-washington-times-parental-rights-and-wrongs-by-liz-richards/ <br /><a href="https://blu169.mail.live.com/default.aspx?id=64855#_ftnref5">[5]</a>http://www.acf.hhs.gov/orgs/bios/vturetsky.htm <br /><a href="https://blu169.mail.live.com/default.aspx?id=64855#_ftnref6">[6]</a>http://www.mdrc.org/about_board.htm <br /><a href="https://blu169.mail.live.com/default.aspx?id=64855#_ftnref7">[7]</a>http://www.politico.com/arena/bio/ron_haskins.html <br /><a href="https://blu169.mail.live.com/default.aspx?id=64855#_ftnref8">[8]</a> http://www.nflgonline.org/Board%20Members.aspx <br /><a href="https://blu169.mail.live.com/default.aspx?id=64855#_ftnref9">[9]</a>http://www.mdrc.org/publications/144/full.pdf <br /><a href="https://blu169.mail.live.com/default.aspx?id=64855#_ftnref10">[10]</a> “Rollup Review on States' Reporting of Undistributable Child Support Collections as Program Income” HHS OIG report A-05-11-00025, September 30, 2011 (http://oig.hhs.gov/oas/reports/region5/51100025.asp) <br /><a href="https://blu169.mail.live.com/default.aspx?id=64855#_ftnref11">[11]</a> <a href="http://www.articles.latimes.com/1999/feb/20/local/me-9885">www.articles.latimes.com/1999/feb/20/local/me-9885 <br /></a><a href="https://blu169.mail.live.com/default.aspx?id=64855#_ftnref12">[12]</a> <a href="http://www.gao.gov/products/GAO-11-196"><strong>http://www.gao.gov/products/GAO-11-196 <br /></strong></a><a href="https://blu169.mail.live.com/default.aspx?id=64855#_ftnref13">[13]</a> Id. At FN [12] <br /><a href="https://blu169.mail.live.com/default.aspx?id=64855#_ftnref14">[14]</a> “OCSE Responsible Fatherhood Programs Early Implementation Lessons” Jessica Pearson, Center for Policy Research, Inc. David Price, Policy Studies, Inc. June 2000 <br />With comments: http://www.nafcj.net/ocsefr.htm <br />Original Text: http://www.eric.ed.gov/PDFS/ED463839.pdf <br /><a href="https://blu169.mail.live.com/default.aspx?id=64855#_ftnref15"><strong>[15]</strong></a>“HHS Around the Regions 2005 Activities” http://fatherhood.hhs.gov/Partners/regions/regions06.shtml <br /><a href="https://blu169.mail.live.com/default.aspx?id=64855#_ftnref16">[16]</a> Id. At FN [8] “OCSE Responsible Fatherhood Programs Early Implementation Lessons” <br /><a href="https://blu169.mail.live.com/default.aspx?id=64855#_ftnref17">[17]</a>http://www.clasp.org/admin/site/publications/files/0349.pdf <br /><a href="https://blu169.mail.live.com/default.aspx?id=64855#_ftnref18">[18]</a> “Safety in the Safety Net: TANF Reauthorization Provisions Relevant to Domestic Violence” <br />http://www.clasp.org/admin/site/publications_archive/files/0167.pdf <br /><a href="https://blu169.mail.live.com/default.aspx?id=64855#_ftnref19">[19]</a> “Staying in Jobs and Out of the Underground: Child Support Policies that Encourage Legitimate Work” Vicki Turetsky, CLASP 2006 http://www.clasp.org/admin/site/publications/files/0349.pdf <br /><a href="https://blu169.mail.live.com/default.aspx?id=64855#_ftnref20">[20]</a> “Young children of unmarried parents fare worse when a father's support is court-ordered” <br />http://www.sciencecodex.com/young_children_of_unmarried_parents_fare_worse_when_a_fathers_support_is_courtordered-91437 <br /><a href="https://blu169.mail.live.com/default.aspx?id=64855#_ftnref21">[21]</a> “Giving Noncustodial Parents Options: Employment and Child Support Outcomes of the SHARE Program” Irma Perez-Johnson, Jacqueline Kauff, and Alan Hershey, Mathematica Policy Research, Inc., October 2003 <br /><a href="https://blu169.mail.live.com/default.aspx?id=64855#_ftnref22">[22]</a> “Unified Family Courts: Treating the Whole Family, Not Just the Young Drug Offender” American Bar Association/Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, November 2000 <br />http://www.rwjf.org/reports/grr/029319s.htm <br /><a href="https://blu169.mail.live.com/default.aspx?id=64855#_ftnref23">[23]</a> “<a href="http://www.consciousbeingalliance.com/2012/05/a-life-sentence-family-courts-sacrificing-mothers-and-children-in-america/">Pedophilia in the Justice System</a>” By Kieth Harmon Snow, Conscious Being Alliance, May 1, 2012 <br />http://www.sott.net/articles/show/245202-Pedophilia-in-the-Justice-System <br /><a href="https://blu169.mail.live.com/default.aspx?id=64855#_ftnref24">[24]</a>http://abcnews.go.com/Nightline/medicare-fraud-costs-taxpayers-60-billion-year/story?id=10126555&page=3#.T-zL5-33C9Z <br /><a href="https://blu169.mail.live.com/default.aspx?id=64855#_ftnref25">[25]</a> “HEALTHY MARRIAGE AND RESPONSIBLE FATHERHOOD INITIATIVE: <br />Further Progress Is Needed in Developing a Risk-Based Monitoring Approach to Help HHS Improve Program Oversight”Government Accountability Office Report to the Chairman, Subcommittee on Income Security and Family Support, Committee on Ways and Means, House of Representatives, September 2008. http://www.gao.gov/new.items/d081002.pdf <br /><a href="https://blu169.mail.live.com/default.aspx?id=64855#_ftnref26">[26]</a> National Fatherhood Initiative: http://www.fatherhood.org/page.aspx?pid=375 <br /><a href="https://blu169.mail.live.com/default.aspx?id=64855#_ftnref27">[27]</a>http://www2.prnewswire.com/cgi-bin/stories.pl?ACCT=104&STORY=/www/story/02-15-2008/0004756780&EDATE <br /><a href="https://blu169.mail.live.com/default.aspx?id=64855#_ftnref28">[28]</a> <a href="http://www.michigan.gov/dhs/0%2c1607%2c7-124--187565--%2c00.html">http://www.michigan.gov/dhs/0,1607,7-124--187565--,00.html <br /></a><a href="https://blu169.mail.live.com/default.aspx?id=64855#_ftnref29">[29]</a> Montrose County, Colorado http://www.montrosecounty.net/DocumentCenter/Home/View/1721 <br /><a href="https://blu169.mail.live.com/default.aspx?id=64855#_ftnref30">[30]</a>http://www.stopfamilyviolence.org/info/custody-abuse/overview/batterer-manipulation-and-retaliation-denial-and-complicity-in-the-family-courts <br /><a href="https://blu169.mail.live.com/default.aspx?id=64855#_ftnref31">[31]</a> http://www.umbrellanek.org/documents/DV%20General%20Fact%20Sheet.pdf <br /><a href="https://blu169.mail.live.com/default.aspx?id=64855#_ftnref32">[32]</a> http://www.cdc.gov/ViolencePrevention/NISVS/index.html <br /><a href="https://blu169.mail.live.com/default.aspx?id=64855#_ftnref33">[33]</a> http://www.mass.gov/courts/probation/pr062707.html <br /><a href="https://blu169.mail.live.com/default.aspx?id=64855#_ftnref34">[34]</a> http://www.lovefraud.com/blog/2010/03/01/staggering-statistics-about-domestic-violence/</p> Claudine Dombrowskihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00174108218219442634noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6075225070962028659.post-50679223043121744652012-08-02T09:51:00.001-07:002012-08-02T09:51:36.119-07:00MISTAKES MOTHERS MAKE in Child Custody Litigation<h3><b></b></h3> <blockquote> <p>After that last post, it is sad that we can not help these moms, except to reach them before they enter family court nightmare. Readers please share this freely, we can not create justice in an unjust system. <a href="http://americanmotherspoliticalparty.org/ampp-article-library-family-court-custody-abuse-dv/1-research-articles-family-court-bias-custody-abuse-battered-moms/89-mistakes-mothers-make-in-child-custody-litigation" target="_blank">We can not fix it.</a> All we can do at this point is ‘avoid’ to the best of your ability, the things that will choke the life out of you when you dare to walk into family court with the insane notion that ‘Justice’ will prevail. Be smart. Think. Think. And then, Think some more.</p> <p>-<a href="http://americanmotherspoliticalparty.org/ampp-article-library-family-court-custody-abuse-dv/1-research-articles-family-court-bias-custody-abuse-battered-moms/89-mistakes-mothers-make-in-child-custody-litigation" target="_blank">AMPP</a></p> </blockquote> <h3><b>MISTAKES MOTHERS MAKE in Child Custody Litigation </b></h3> <p>Courtesy <a href="http://www.thelizlibrary.org/child-centered-divorce/mothers-mistakes-in-child-custody-litigation.html" target="_blank">The Liz Library</a></p> <p><b>Mistake 1. Making threats, complaining, antagonizing, provoking, telling the other side what information you have and what you know, and otherwise disclosing your plans. </b>Don't make threats. Don't complain. Don't exacerbate the situation pointlessly. The fleeting psychic satisfaction isn't worth it. And above all: don't tell the other side what you know, or what information you have and what you're going to do with it. The threats are particularly stupid when they're empty. All they will do is motivate him to better prepare his case. Even if they're not empty, you've lost the element of surprise, and given him a heads up how to prepare his case against you. (And be careful about what you tell mutual friends and coworkers. Too many of them end up being <i>his</i> friends. That includes what you put in writing or on-line or on other electronic devices that make records: email, Facebook, Twitter, cell phone bills, your vehicle's GPS and toll passes, your computer hard drive, all leave discoverable evidence.)</p> <p><a href="http://www.custodyprepformoms.org/index.php"><img border="3" hspace="18" alt="custody prep for moms mothers movement activism, dealing with 
therapeutic jurisprudence in the courts, how to win your child custody case" vspace="9" align="right" src="http://www.thelizlibrary.org/liz/custodyprepformoms.jpg" width="161" height="41" /></a><b>Mistake 2. Failing to prepare.</b> Don't file a lawsuit (and don't threaten to file one -- and do everything possible to keep one from being filed against you) until you have copies of all information, especially all financial information and legal documents, that you will need stored with family or friend in a safe place, including a complete copy of the hard drives of household/shared <a href="http://www.lisamacci.com/downloads/tapes/Couric.mp3">computers</a> (call a professional to do this). Also safely store away all jewelry and precious tangible items, as well as irreplaceable sentimental items such as old photographs. Carefully think through who controls what assets (and in the case of household utilities who has the power to shut them off.) Make a plan to segregate debts, and to assure that debts that will affect your credit rating will continue to be paid. Have at least one separate bank account and ready access to cash. Discuss your future case with a lawyer, or preferably several lawyers. Talk with an accountant (not the family accountant). Thoroughly consider what you will do for income, living arrangements, transportation, and other needs. Have your own medical insurance for you and the kids. Make sure that email accounts are separate and under passwords that only you know, and that you have private communications. Make sure that on-line social, financial and medical accounts are private and passworded. Get a post office box for private mail. (And forpetessake don't use the cell phone he gave you to talk to your lawyer!)</p> <ul> <p><b>(a) Failing to close joint credit lines.</b> Before "anyone" knows you're planning to get divorced, to the extent possible, close all home equity and joint credit card lines that can be run up and used to destroy your credit, fund litigation against you, and disappear your assets. Pay down the debts for which you are separately liable. (Even if debts are "assigned" to be paid by one or the other party in a divorce, that does not bind the third party creditor, who can still come after you.) This rule also applies to signing joint tax returns. See Mistake 9(a), below.</p> <p><b>(b) Filing for divorce near the 10-year social security spousal entitlement date</b>. If you're married for ten years, and you're the lesser-earning spouse, especially a stay-home spouse, this could mean a lot of retirement money in the future. Don't file for divorce in year 8 or 9 without making this calculation.</p> <p><b>(c) Not trading in the old car for a new one, not putting braces on the kid's teeth, or not obtaining that elective surgery "now".</b> These involve big ticket expenses that do not result in having divisible assets, but are or will be needed or wanted fairly soon, and may be far more difficult (or impossible) to purchase later on your own, when cash or credit is low, or when you need his agreement or a court order to obtain contribution. Buy them now with marital funds. Other big ticket expenses could be prepaying college tuition, the kid's tennis lessons, or for next year's summer camp.</p> <p><b>(d) Not living in the jurisdiction you want to live when you file for the divorce.</b> Don't relocate in the first place to follow the spouse to some remote, undesirable, or iffy new location. Maintain your permanent residence where you want to live, especially if he's got a temporary assignment. If your marriage breaks down in the new location, you and the children may be stuck there for a very long time. (And if you have minor children, do not ever, ever, ever move -- or bring them even temporarily for a visit -- to any country such as Saudi Arabia with Muslim sharia laws in which, because you are a woman, your freedom to travel, and your authority over your own children, including leaving with them, can be restricted.)</p> <p><b>(e) Having your baby in a state (<a href="http://www.international-divorce.com/Top-Ten-Tips-for-Expats.htm">or country</a>) in which you may not want to live for the next 18 years.</b> The state where you give birth has initial jurisdiction over that child. If you're pregnant and not married, go home to mama. Do not be lured back to live with him while you are pregnant. Especially without having a job or substantial ties, family and friends, in the area. Even if his entreaties to become family or get engaged are not a ruse, if it doesn't work out, you're stuck. Possibly for the next 18 years. You can always do the "let's move in together", "let's get engaged" or "let's try it and see" later. Fewer and fewer courts these days are permitting women to <a href="http://www.thelizlibrary.org/site-index/site-index-body.html#Relocation">relocate with their children</a>.</p> </ul> <p><b>Mistake 3. Making the custody case primarily about how crappy the man is instead of about the children </b>(usually while professing to be "agreeing with" the proposition that the child "needs a relationship" with the father and/or pretending to be fostering this flimsy fuzzy idea). Not focusing on specifics of what the child needs and the observable tangibles: the child's developmental age, habits, temperament, needs for consistency or stability; the parents' work and school schedules; the child's work and school and sleep schedules (and extracurricular activities that are important and why); other persons in the respective parents' families, households and lives; the quality of the households and homelives of the parents; the parents' respective socio-economic positions, backgrounds, education, and particular things each can offer (or not); how the child might better benefit from this or that schedule rather than another and why; time constraints, the pragmatics of traveling and everyday life; the quality of the communications between the parents; and so forth.</p> <p><b>Mistake 4. Filing for child support, or a child support increase, if there is any way you can manage without it. </b>This is the number one way women end up in <a href="http://www.thelizlibrary.org/site-index/site-index-body.html#Child Custody">custody litigation</a>, losing control of their lives, and possibly losing custody of their children. In too many cases of "custody switch", everything was going fine, and something (the ex's financial windfall, or her family) got her motivated to head into court for more child support. He frequently counters with a bid for increased time share, including a litany of accumulated wrongs she's ostensibly perpetrated as the primary custodial parent. The money is rarely worth it.</p> <p><a href="http://www.psychdiagnosis.net/"><img border="0" hspace="12" alt="therapeutic jurisprudence, custody evaluators, PSYCHDIAGNOSIS.NET" vspace="6" align="right" src="http://www.thelizlibrary.org/liz/psych-diagnosis.gif" width="153" height="58" /></a><b>Mistake 5. Going to a mental health therapist or psychologist. </b>Don't have -- and don't make claims of having -- any kind of emotional disability, disorder, anxiety, depression, inability to cope, or other dysfunction, if you can possibly avoid doing so. Especially do not leave a record of it on his insurance. Cry in the shower, go to church, meditate, or take up jogging. Exercise helps; therapy really doesn't. Drugs don't. Many lawyers endorse going to therapists because they don't want you wasting time and money venting to them, or you're rambling, unfocused, and using them as a sounding board. Some are just spouting the "common wisdom" promoted by mental health professionals. If you absolutely, positively must vent with one of these paid listeners for hire (<a href="http://www.thelizlibrary.org/therapeutic-jurisprudence/index.html">therapist or psychologist</a>) -- or a physician/psychiatrist but only if you're truly dangerously dysfunctional -- then do not tell anyone you are going, pay cash, don't get or fill prescriptions where any record of that can be discovered, and do not take any of their advice that remotely affects legal or financial issues.</p> <p><b>Mistake 6. Taking the children to a therapist. </b>There is absolutely nothing therapy from a mental health practitioner can do to fix a crappy situation. Fix the situation; don't try to train children to cope with it. If children are having problems, then it's far more likely than not that it's the adults around them who are doing something wrong. If they need academic tutoring, then seek that; not mental health therapy and unnecessary diagnoses. Fixing the situation is the only "therapy" that will help. And don't make the mistake of thinking that shlepping the kids to a <a href="http://www.thelizlibrary.org/liz/forensic-fallacies.html">therapist</a> is a way to "build your case", <a href="http://www.thelizlibrary.org/therapeutic-jurisprudence/120713-kleinman.pdf">create "evidence", or get a third party to testify to the children's "disclosures"</a>. It isn't. Better they "disclose" to a teacher in school. Judges have become jaded about clinical therapist testimony, especially therapists unilaterally selected by mothers, who are seen as biased advocates with next to no credibility in court (assuming they're even permitted to testify.) If children are physically injured, see a physician. If children are abused, call the police. If you're abused, call the police.</p> <p><b>Mistake 7. Claiming that the children have physical, emotional, or academic disabilities, and therefore especially "need" you.</b> One thing that helps mothers lose custody is to emphasize or fabricate claims that children are dysfunctional in some way, and hence need them, the primary caregiver under whose watch the kids haven't done so flippin' well. If the children do have disabilities, then de-emphasize these problems, and document realistically how the children have improved, and <a href="http://www.thelizlibrary.org/liz/021.htm">how well they are doing academically</a> and in all other ways. Judges like to see happy people and well-adjusted children. They're burned-out on complaints, have seen far worse (atrocities), and have hardened sympathies. The reality is that unless you or the children are at actual imminent risk of life or limb, your chances of getting primary timeshare will be greater if you appear to have a beautifully functioning life with beneficent feelings for all, than if you or the children are traumatized, victimized and needy. (If this is impossible, then at least project yourself as a capable well-adjusted parent who is managing optimally under the circumstances).</p> <p><b>Mistake 8. Claiming that the children prefer you as parent.</b> If this is true, and if you're the better and more attached parent, it should be obvious. Stating that the children want or do not want this or that also is poisonous to your case (if there are good reasons for what they "want", then the facts alone underlying those reasons should be sufficient -- leave the children's feelings out of it.) If he's abusive or incompetent, you may need to articulate the facts, but only in a balanced way (see item #13 regarding how) without harping and without exaggerating. Custody evaluators especially want to see that you have a rational point of view and can point out "strengths" as well as weaknesses. Also bear in mind that anti-mother fatherhood-exaltation custody evaluators and guardians ad litem (most of them) particularly recoil when women emphasize their super-close loving relationships with their children. Perhaps they resent that they themselves don't have these kinds of relationships with their own children (or any children at all), or as children did not have a good relationship with one or both of their own parents. These professionals too often seem to have their own emotional and family issues, or at best are in it for the money. Any mother who appears to be emphasizing the difference between how the children feel about her versus their father is setting herself up for charges of being a <a href="http://www.thelizlibrary.org/parental-alienation/index.html">parental alienator</a>, "enmeshed", overly protective, controlling, angry, depressed, vindictive, and other mother-dissing phenomena. Also for father-sympathetic increased timeshare or "therapy" to improve the father-child relationship.</p> <p><b>Mistake 9. Allowing your lawyer to make substantive decisions, or to pressure you into signing agreements without adequate time to think about it.</b> It's your case. Your job is to make it easier for the lawyer to promote your case, and to find out what you need to do to accomplish your goals, working together. Read <a href="http://www.collaborativelawflorida.com/Articles/The-Good-Attorney-Client-Relationship.html">The Good Attorney-Client Relationship</a>, and the Custody Prep for Moms website (linked above). Do not ever let your lawyer attend any court hearing or conference without you, or make any agreements in your case without previously discussing the matter with you and giving you time to think about it and decide. (Unless you're more sophisticated in these matters than the other side, that includes pressuring you to sign agreements at mediation too. If it's such a great agreement, it will hold for a day or so.) Make sure your lawyer understands this and agrees. Don't cave to threats from your lawyer of withdrawing or future demands for big lump sums for trial if you don't settle. (That's extortion, by the way, and should warrant bar discipline.) Some common seemingly minor things agreed to hastily or under pressure, but which can have long-term bad consequences, include:</p> <ul> <p><b>(a) Signing, or agreeing to sign a future joint tax return.</b> Be very careful about doing this unless the assured benefits far outweigh the risks, especially if he is self-employed or cheats on his taxes. "Outweighing the risks" means that the money is not merely promised, but in hand.</p> <p><b>(b) Not being the owner of the life insurance policy.</b> There are three roles in a life insurance policy: the owner (the person in contractual privity with the insurance company), the insured, and the beneficiary. Being the beneficiary is useless if you are not also the owner of the policy with the ability to control who the beneficiary is, or even whether the policy gets cancelled. Too many women have discovered that they can't collect a cancelled insurance policy from a dead man's estate.</p> <p><b>(c) Agreeing to a "<a href="http://www.thelizlibrary.org/liz/right-of-first-refusal.html">right of first refusal</a>" that's not well thought through.</b> This rule also applies to anything of importance that is hastily drafted by a mediator or lawyers at a settlement conference.</p> <p><b>(d) Agreeing to a "temporary" timesharing solution -- or "temporary" anything else, such as a<a href="http://www.thelizlibrary.org/parenting-coordination/parenting-coordination.html">parenting coordinator</a></b> -- that you know is difficult or unworkable, or as to which you have doubts. Just don't agree to "try it and see". Say no. Temporary agreements have a way of becoming permanent, or at least extremely difficult to get changed. Contra, adequate temporary financial support if you easily can get it and it's not so much that it will motivate him to up his timesharing demands.</p> <p><b>(e) Agreeing that the family home is a "bad investment", or too expensive for you, and should be sold.</b> Many financial advisors will give this advice as a rule of thumb. But occasionally they're wrong. Everyone still has to live somewhere and housing costs are going to be incurred no matter what. So "it depends". It's not like you can trade the residence for a stock portfolio and live on the street. The financial advisor's assumptions may or may not be correct. Moreover, life is to be lived, and quality and neighborhood counts, especially for kids. There are value judgments here in addition to purely quantitative calculations. The decision should not be made based on shoot-from-the-hip truisms uttered by pencil-pushing strangers (or the other party's desire to minimize support obligations.)</p> <p><b>(f) Seeking <a href="http://www.thelizlibrary.org/supervised-visitation/supervised-visitation-stupidity.html">supervised visitation</a> when it's inappropriate.</b> Unless you and your lawyer both think that there's a good chance that he's going to be criminally convicted of domestic battery or child sexual abuse, or you and your lawyer both are pretty sure that you have or will obtain evidence warranting the termination of his parental rights or at least the permanent cessation of all contact (rare), or you can out-litigate and out-spend him until he goes away, or you're desperate to protect the children even for a short time (and after that come what may), or your situation fits within one of the other limited appropriate uses of supervised visitation, cavalierly seeking this remedy is a way to make an expensive complicated mess of your case, guarantee the appointment of a GAL and probably also a custody evaluator, and place yourself at a 50-50 risk of ultimately losing custody.</p> </ul> <p><b>Mistake 10. Failing to attend every single court hearing and case management conference.</b> The overwhelming most of the time when bad things happen to mothers in litigation, they happen, or the seeds are planted for them to happen in the future, when their lawyer agrees to something without consulting with them. These mistakes include the "innocuous" agreements for the appointment of or choice of custody evaluators, parenting coordinators, therapists and GALs. (See mistake #11, below). Two heads are better than one, and you know the details of your life and needs better than your lawyer does. At worst, a lawyer who says that you<i>should not</i> or may not be present, or does not tell you in advance about every single case event, is more likely than not deliberately or stupidly or lazily going to end up doing something you may not like. Alternatively he may sincerely believe that your presence harms your own case (in which event he should have the balls to tell you this outright and explain why). At any rate, if your lawyer does not adequately inform you so that you can be present, or tells you that you should not or may not attend, then be assured that he is unlikely to be doing so out of concern for your personal time and schedule.</p> <ul> <p><b>(a) Failing to insist on having a court reporter at every single hearing.</b>This includes short motion calendar hearings and case management conferences, no matter how ostensibly unimportant, and no matter whether they're supposedly "taped" by the court. Do not ever let your lawyer suggest that you do not need a court reporter. A lawyer who does this is not representing your interests. It's not a money saver; it's penny-wise, pound-foolish. When it's documented, everyone behaves better, and you have the record you might need on an appeal (or when you hire a new lawyer.)</p> <p><b>(b) Failing to keep on top of and understand your case</b>. It's <i>your</i> case. You need to understand it, you need to demand all information about it from your lawyer, you need to know exactly what is going on at all times, and you need to be making the decisions and receiving all information necessary for you to make the decisions, including -- after explanation, when you are so inclined -- allowing the lawyer to decide between thoroughly described alternatives.</p> </ul> <a href="http://www.thelizlibrary.org/parenting-coordination/parenting-coordination.html"><img border="3" hspace="12" alt="Parenting Coordination" vspace="6" align="right" src="http://www.thelizlibrary.org/child-centered-divorce/parenting-coordination.gif" width="179" height="82" /></a><b>Mistake 11. Allowing a mental health professional, child custody evaluator, parenting coordinator, therapist, guardian ad litem, visitation superviser, or other court-appointed professional into your case. </b>Do everything you can to prevent <a href="http://www.thelizlibrary.org/therapeutic-jurisprudence/TheDetectives.html">court-appointed professionals</a> from coming into your case, and resist if your lawyer appears to be making an ill-thought-through rote suggestion. The odds are far greater than not that the introduction of these people will exponentially increase your costs, complicate your case, and end up hurting your chances of prevailing. This includes seeking inappropriate supervised visitation; see Mistake 9(f) above. <p><b>Mistake 12. Letting your own parents badmouth the ex in front of the kids.</b> You'll be blamed as the parental alienator. They don't understand that times have changed. They only know that their own child has been wronged, and too often, won't shut up about it. Sad fact of life. More and more these days, it seems as if it's the grandparents who indirectly are the parties in these cases. It's great if you have their emotional or financial support, but do make sure they are up to speed on what helps and what hurts.</p> <p><a href="http://www.thelizlibrary.org/therapeutic-jurisprudence/custody-evaluator-testing/index.html"><img border="3" hspace="12" alt="Dealing with forensic psychologists and discovery of test data in court" vspace="6" align="right" src="http://www.thelizlibrary.org/child-centered-divorce/psychological-tests-in-court.gif" width="179" height="82" /></a><b>Mistake 13. Not learning the difference between telling people what to think and articulating the facts in a way that will induce them to come to their own conclusions that accord with yours.</b> If you're in custody litigation or any court case, you will be testifying as well as telling others such as your lawyer the facts of the case. Credible witnesses talk about what they saw and heard. People tend to be much more convinced by their own conclusions drawn from descriptions of what happened than by conclusory statements such as "he's abusive". When neutral people are told what to think, their minds start weighing and silently arguing with your conclusions. By contrast, when they are given facts, they may ask for more information, but they don't feel the same need to mentally interpose their judgment against yours for the sake of balance. Good testimony is when you paint a picture for the other person by describing what you saw, heard, felt, tasted or smelled. Bad testimony is telling others your opinions, whether formed from your personal observations or from what other people have told you.</p> <p><b>Mistake 14. Choosing a lawyer because he or she tells you what you want to hear.</b> (Usually, the lawyer who gives you this kind of sell job actually is letting you mislead yourself by using vague language -- but the written retainer agreement may "sound" very different, e.g. "no guaranteed results".) Also be wary of the lawyer who sets fees unrealistically low (a risk that the lawyer will not be motivated), or in the celebrity stratosphere (a risk that your case may be made unduly complicated, churned with <a href="http://www.thelizlibrary.org/therapeutic-jurisprudence/time-to-end-it.html">crony referrals</a> and unproductive shenanigans.) Conversely, you do not want to hire a lawyer who tries to impose on you the lawyer's ideas of what your goals should be, or what is in the best interests of your children. This is not the same as a realistic assessment of your case, or asking questions to elicit why you hold the position you hold. Listen carefully to what the lawyer says. Ask "why". A lot. When you interview a lawyer, you should be able to articulate a reasonable outcome that you would like to achieve, and, although some will disagree with me, I think that the lawyer is going to be more creative, certainly more convincing, if he or she cares about the outcome -- beyond "winning" -- and is in actual ideological agreement with you. Consider the lawyer's own personal background. Ask about it. The lawyer also should be able to explain to you how realistic or difficult or expensive or not it may be to achieve your goals, and your options. Your lawyer is not there to give you emotional support, or to terrorize and punish your ex. The lawyer is there to work for you, to strive to get as close as possible to your reasonable goals while also attempting to limit the amount of pain and cost for all concerned without compromising those goals.</p> <p><a href="http://www.thelizlibrary.org/therapeutic-jurisprudence/TheDetectives.html"><img border="0" hspace="24" alt="therapeutic jurisprudence and forensic psychology research" vspace="12" align="right" src="http://www.thelizlibrary.org/therapeutic-jurisprudence/the-detectives.gif" width="150" height="61" /></a><b>Mistake 15. Failing to set long-term goals, and not keeping the end-game in sight.</b> Don't allow your case to get waylaid and off on money-wasting, time-wasting, or counterproductive tangents. Disputes over relatively unimportant issues. Squabbling over minor financial matters. Visitation timing minutiae. Discovery delays. Getting sucked into the bog of a custody evaluation. Remember where you want the case to end up, and how you want your family situation to look in the short term and long term. Keep the lawyer on track by asking how this or that suggestion or strategy or legal maneuver may help move you toward your goals.</p> <p>-- <a href="http://www.florida-attorneys-at-law.com/">liz</a></p> <p>[This article was discussed May 5, 2012, on <a href="http://www.lisamacci.com/">The Justice Hour radio show</a> hosted by family lawyer Lisa Macci; and subsequently supplemented with additional "mistakes". <b>To listen, download (<a href="http://www.lisamacci.com/downloads/tapes/KatesMay2012.wma">wma</a>) or (<a href="http://www.lisamacci.com/downloads/tapes/KatesMay2012.mp3">mp3</a>) file.</b> Re the above (Mistake #5) regarding the over-consultation of therapists, see the <a href="http://www.lisamacci.com/thejusticehour/archives.html">archives</a> and listen to the May 22, 2012 show with Harvard psychologist Paula Caplan on DSM corruption and the APA.]</p> <p><a name="research"></a></p> <p><b></b></p> <p><b>RESEARCH AND CITATIONS </b></p> <li><a href="http://www.thelizlibrary.org/liz/005.htm">Joint Custody Research: The Road to Hell is Paved with Good Intentions</a> </li> <li>Or maybe not. <a href="http://www.thelizlibrary.org/liz/those-jointcustody-studies.html">Joint Custody Studies (multiple research citations)</a> </li> <li><a href="http://www.thelizlibrary.org/liz/chap4.doc">What the Experts Say about "Shared Parenting"</a> </li> <li><a href="http://www.thelizlibrary.org/liz/017.htm">Myths and Facts about Fatherhood: What the Research REALLY Says</a> </li> <li><a href="http://www.thelizlibrary.org/liz/018.htm">Myths and Facts about Motherhood: What the Research REALLY Says</a> </li> <li><a href="http://www.thelizlibrary.org/child-centered-divorce/mother-absence.html">Myths and Facts about Stepmothers and Mother Absence: What the Research REALLY Says</a> </li> <li><a href="http://www.thelizlibrary.org/liz/BARRY5.htm">Misplaced Blame and Simplistic Solutions</a> by Margaret Martin Barry </li> <li><a href="http://www.thelizlibrary.org/liz/dalton.html">Protecting Battered Parents and Their Children in the Family Court System</a> by Clare Dalton </li> <li><a href="http://www.thelizlibrary.org/liz/hardcastle-joint-custody.html">Judge Gerald W. Hardcastle on joint custody and judicial decisionmaking</a> </li> <li><a href="http://www.scu.edu/SCU/Centers/Ethics/publications/other/lawreview/attachment101.html">Attachment 101 for Attorneys: Implications for Infant Placement Decisions</a> by Willemsen and Marcel </li> <li><a href="http://www.thelizlibrary.org/liz/nawl.pdf">The Case Against Joint Custody (Ontario Women's Justice Network)</a> </li> <li><a href="http://www.thelizlibrary.org/liz/014.htm">The "Responsible Fatherhood" movement</a> by liz </li> <li><a href="http://www.thelizlibrary.org/liz/right-of-first-refusal.html">Right of First Refusal in Parenting Plans</a> </li> <li><a href="http://www.thelizlibrary.org/therapeutic-jurisprudence/custody-evaluator-testing/index.html">Custody Evaluators and Discovery of Test Data</a> </li> <li><a href="http://www.thelizlibrary.org/liz/DucotearticleJuly2002.pdf">Richard Ducote, Esq, on Abolishing Guardians ad Litem</a> </li> <li><a href="http://www.thelizlibrary.org/liz/DoreArticle4-061.pdf">Margaret Dore, Esq. on the Case for Abolishing Custody Evaluators</a> </li> <li><a href="http://www.thelizlibrary.org/therapeutic-jurisprudence/time-to-end-it.html">Liz on the Lawyer Ethical Problems with Therapeutic Jurisprudence</a> </li> <li><a href="http://www.thelizlibrary.org/liz/child-custody-evaluations.html">Re-evaluating the Evaluators: Custody Evaluation Guidelines</a> </li> <li><a href="http://www.thelizlibrary.org/liz/custody-evaluator-quotes.html">Child Custody Evaluators: In Their Own Words</a> </li> <li><a href="http://www.thelizlibrary.org/therapeutic-jurisprudence/index.html">Therapeutic Jurisprudence Index</a> <p><b>RESEARCH RELEVANT TO CHILD CUSTODY ISSUES</b></p> <p><a href="http://justice.posterous.com/"><img border="0" alt="Dead children. Justice's Posterous" align="right" src="http://www.thelizlibrary.org/liz/justices.gif" width="300" height="100" /></a></p> </li> <li><a href="http://www.thelizlibrary.org/liz/those-jointcustody-studies.html">Research: Joint Custody Studies</a> </li> <li><a href="http://www.thelizlibrary.org/liz/joint-custody-does-not-work.html">Research: Joint Custody Just Does Not Work</a> </li> <li><a href="http://www.thelizlibrary.org/liz/017.htm">Myths and Facts about Fatherhood</a>  What the Research Really Says </li> <li><a href="http://www.thelizlibrary.org/liz/018.htm">Myths and Facts about Motherhood</a> What the Research Really Says </li> <li><a href="http://www.thelizlibrary.org/liz/mother-absence.html">Myths and Facts about Stepmothers and Mother Absence</a> </li> <li><a href="http://www.thelizlibrary.org/liz/chap4.doc">Child Custody Research: What the Experts Say</a> Scholarly Review <p><b>"RULE OF LAW" vs."RULE OF MAN"</b></p> <p><a href="http://www.thelizlibrary.org/child-centered-divorce/child-centered-divorce.html"><img border="3" hspace="12" alt="The Child-Centered Divorce" vspace="6" align="right" src="http://www.thelizlibrary.org/child-centered-divorce/child-centered-therapeutic-jurisprudence.gif" width="179" height="82" /></a>A common theme underlying nearly all the problems in the family courts is the sloppy float away from the "rule of law" to "rule of man". The "rule of man" describes such things as dictatorships, decision-making by whim, discretion without oversight, vague standards that cannot predictably be anticipated or applied, faux-expert recommendation-making and opining such as with mental health professional parenting evaluations, and the panoply of therapeutic jurisprudence interventions such as parenting coordination and special mastering. All of these abrogate due process, and the fundamental principles on which our system of jurisprudence was founded. The ideas have been pushed by the mental health lobbies and by individuals who either don't understand or don't care about some higher priorities.</p> <p><strong>"Rule of man" is a concept that we ditched with the formation of this country in favor of "rule of law". Our founding fathers recognized that there is no way to regulate or oversee individuals given too much discretion or dictatorial authority.</strong> With regard to the family courts, I keep hearing and reading what are essentially inane pleas to fix the various misguided ADR programs via "guidelines" (aspirational only, and with immunity from sanction for misfeasance), and for "trainings", and for getting rid of those who are "incompetent" -- all of which suggestions exhibit an astonishing lack of appreciation for the stupidity inherent in these extra-judicial ideas -- ideas which Thomas Paine and our founding fathers would have abhorred (see, e.g.<i> Common Sense</i>).<strong> Dictatorship cannot be permitted not because there couldn't (theoretically) be some wise and beneficent dictators who would be better and more efficient than the messy system of due process and checks and balances we idealize, but because under that dictatorial system we inevitably and primarily will suffer the </strong><a href="http://www.thelizlibrary.org/liz/child-custody-evaluations.html"><strong>fools, the tyrants, and the corrupt</strong></a>. And that's without addressing the panoply of other constitutional defects. Besides, no scientifically sound research actually establishes "harm" from the adversarial system -- or benefit to families' well-being from applied therapeutic jurisprudence. These ideas were invented in mental health trade promotion groups as lobbying talking points. (If you doubt this, feel free to contact me for more information.) Yikes. What are we doing. To the extent we've been sold a bill of goods, swampland, snake oil and the voo doo of "expertise" by the mental health professions, at least until relatively recently, the stuff wasn't harming our legal system. Now it is. Wake up, and wise up.</p> <p>What we do need are some realistic changes in the substantive laws addressing divorce and child custody. What we don't need is a revolution in procedural rules and the overthrowing of individuals' constitutional rights.</p> <p>For my list of rants, see <a href="http://www.thelizlibrary.org/parenting-coordination/index.html">the index</a> to the section of the website on parenting coordination.</p> <p></p> <p></p> </li> Claudine Dombrowskihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00174108218219442634noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6075225070962028659.post-67973188602694696032012-07-31T08:07:00.001-07:002012-07-31T08:07:57.074-07:0012 years ago today 7-31-2000, Rikki Dombrowski was taken from her mother Claudine Dombrowski and given to convicted batterer and Criminal HAL RICHARDSON, Topeka, KS Case No. 96-D-217<h3> </h3> <p>Topeka, Kansas <a href="http://public.shawneecourt.org/doe/search.jsp?caseNumber=96d217&first=&middle=&last=&mob=&yob=&location=internet" target="_blank">Case No. 96-D-217</a> Third Judicial District, Shawnee County, Kansas</p> <p> </p> <p><strong>MAHNATTAN FREE PRESS: </strong><a href="http://www.kansas.net/~freepress/7-12-01-8.html" target="_blank"><strong>COURTS CONTINUE TO ABUSE BATTERED MOTHER</strong></a> </p> <blockquote> <p>MANHATTAN, KS - To some this could be considered beautiful. Solid mahogany is beautiful when given a high finish and it does have a high finish. It is about four to four and a half feet long, a foot and a half high; with shinny brass handles at the foot and head. A child's coffin, in this home has been turned into a coffee table. <a href="http://www.kansas.net/~freepress/7-12-01-8.html" target="_blank">Continue Reading ></a><a href="http://www.kansas.net/~freepress/7-12-01-8.html" target="_blank"><img src="http://www.kansas.net/~freepress/coffin.jpg" /></a></p> </blockquote> <p> </p> <p><a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pastfG1wyUs" target="_blank">Claudine & Rikki Dombrowski-- before Family Court Mafia gave custody to the Abuser--moon shadow</a></p> <p> <div style="padding-bottom: 0px; margin: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; display: inline; float: none; padding-top: 0px" id="scid:5737277B-5D6D-4f48-ABFC-DD9C333F4C5D:13e0bf35-e1aa-4513-aca3-0cb91a82936f" class="wlWriterEditableSmartContent"><div id="aca1cfd2-8915-4295-9cd8-2b73ca7f0e55" style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px; display: inline;"><div><a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pastfG1wyUs" target="_new"><img src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg1Z_ylYFFdXeY8F3f_M6EvrHVSQFFsH8rPeKzPuJqqJ6rhX4qFRyEjD__K_nBMa4D_coQlXM8w9p5c0Fguz9t5zs6iyfL5SdGrSgCwfe5K-5_BSBU2xVICIjjIvF2c2OxyEGT9TRKv2kU/?imgmax=800" style="border-style: none" galleryimg="no" onload="var downlevelDiv = document.getElementById('aca1cfd2-8915-4295-9cd8-2b73ca7f0e55'); downlevelDiv.innerHTML = "<div><object width=\"598\" height=\"449\"><param name=\"movie\" value=\"http://www.youtube.com/v/pastfG1wyUs&hl=en\"><\/param><embed src=\"http://www.youtube.com/v/pastfG1wyUs&hl=en\" type=\"application/x-shockwave-flash\" width=\"598\" height=\"449\"><\/embed><\/object><\/div>";" alt=""></a></div></div></div> </p> <p><strong>HELL HAS A SPECIAL PLACE FOR ALL ABUSERS and ENABLERS</strong> (aka child traffickers) that have and are continuing the  abuse by <a href="http://halleckgrichardson.blogspot.com/2011/02/hal-richardson-shwanee-county-court.html">Hal Richardson</a>. With the help of the <a href="http://www.facebook.com/l.php?u=http%3A%2F%2Fshawneecountycourthouse.blogspot.com%2F&h=jAQBZ1Hln">local</a> Court Whores, <a href="http://mjilldykes.blogspot.com/2010/10/un-ethical-gal-jill-dykes-posts-images.html">M. Jill Dykes</a>, <a href="http://renemnetherton.blogspot.com/p/rene-m-netherton-gal-everyones-favorite.html">Rene M. Netherton</a>, Judge <a href="http://judgedaviddebenham.blogspot.com/2011/01/rikki-dombrowski-run-like-wind.html">David Debenham</a>, <a href="http://donaldrhoffman.blogspot.com/2011/07/what-litigation-abuse-looks-like-it.html">Don</a> and <a href="http://jasonphoffman.blogspot.com/2011/01/m-jill-dykes-jason-p-hoffman-rene-m.html">Jason</a> Hoffman</p> <p><strong>Twelve years ago</strong> today Rikki Dombrowski was taken from her mother <a href="http://www.google.com/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=web&cd=1&ved=0CGoQFjAA&url=http%3A%2F%2Fimaginepublicity.com%2F2011%2F09%2F18%2Fwounded-warrior-claudine-dombrowski-and-activist-barry-goldstein-join-the-susan-murphy-milano-show-times-up%2F&ei=EPAXUIiUCs6L8gHivIHQCQ&usg=AFQjCNGuzM2b-6dnZOzL8-yt8MLka96Guw&sig2=9FdJUdlTaCJnmg3LoAlMPQ" target="_blank">Claudine Dombrowski</a> and given to a<strong> convicted batterer</strong> on a ‘snail mail’  from crooked <a href="http://www.google.com/#hl=en&cp=41&gs_id=c&xhr=t&q=Judge+Richard+Anderson.+He+made+a+%E2%80%98deal%E2%80%99&qe=SnVkZ2UgUmljaGFyZCBBbmRlcnNvbi4gSGUgbWFkZSBhIBhkZWFsGSA&qesig=pRS7Qcq2K6nYHCdBc8yH_w&pkc=AFgZ2tkflpEKRh2rl9K8MYbvTMbD3eUXZ97mPKTXyIiQtEPPqDeCKrhOe5V6vsZ9tMPAbapaBofymFYCsftEGje35Wz1o5TP-Q&pf=p&sclient=psy&site=&source=hp&pbx=1&oq=Judge+Richard+Anderson.+He+made+a+%E2%80%98deal%E2%80%99+&aq=f&aqi=&aql=&gs_sm=&gs_upl=&bav=on.2,or.r_gc.r_pw.&fp=d31248080af7dd23&biw=1440&bih=765">Judge Richard Anderson. He made a ‘deal’</a> and without motion from either party, without hearing he simply on his own ‘switched custody’ from Mother to <a href="http://halleckgrichardson.blogspot.com/2011/02/hal-richardson-shwanee-county-court.html">ABUSER HAL RICHARDSON.</a></p> <p>Mother <a href="http://www.google.com/#hl=en&cp=19&gs_id=r&xhr=t&q=Claudine+Dombrowski&qe=Q2xhdWRpbmUgRG9tYnJvd3NraQ&qesig=a0YlY1SBU5WwuISrZr0EzQ&pkc=AFgZ2tkflpEKRh2rl9K8MYbvTMbD3eUXZ97mPKTXyIiQtEPPqDeCKrhOe5V6vsZ9tMPAbapaBofymFYCsftEGje35Wz1o5TP-Q&pf=p&sclient=psy&source=hp&pbx=1&oq=Claudine+Dombrowski&aq=0p&aqi=p-p2g-v3&aql=&gs_sm=&gs_upl=&bav=on.2,or.r_gc.r_pw.&fp=d31248080af7dd23&biw=1440&bih=765">Claudine Dombrowski</a> has had little to no contact with her daughter since this illegal ‘action’ and ruling was made. The Judges following after this decision could have at anytime corrected a very wrong very unethical very damaging ruling.</p> <p>Instead, they continued <a href="http://parentingnewsnetwork.com/?p=1153">‘litigation abuse’</a> of a battered mother and forced her only child- HER daughter to live with out her mother and in constant fear.</p> <p><a href="http://www.scribd.com/doc/43805172"><font size="2">View this document on Scribd</font></a></p> <p> </p> <p><a href="http://www.scribd.com/doc/43805172/2000-July-31-Custody-Switch-Judge-Richard-Anderson-Gives-FULL-custody-to-CRIMINAL-HAL-RICHARDSON">2000 July 31– Custody Switch-Judge Richard Anderson Gives FULL custody to CRIMINAL HAL RICHARDSON </a></p> <p> <object id="doc_20707" name="doc_20707" height="600" width="100%" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" data="http://d1.scribdassets.com/ScribdViewer.swf" style="outline:none;" > <param name="movie" value="http://d1.scribdassets.com/ScribdViewer.swf"> <param name="wmode" value="opaque"> <param name="bgcolor" value="#ffffff"> <param name="allowFullScreen" value="true"> <param name="allowScriptAccess" value="always"> <param name="FlashVars" value="document_id=43805172&access_key=key-18j7hcjx5kgmiopq3ylk&page=1&viewMode=list"> <embed id="doc_20707" name="doc_20707" src="http://d1.scribdassets.com/ScribdViewer.swf?document_id=43805172&access_key=key-18j7hcjx5kgmiopq3ylk&page=1&viewMode=list" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowscriptaccess="always" allowfullscreen="true" height="600" width="100%" wmode="opaque" bgcolor="#ffffff"></embed> </object></p> <p>HAL RICHARDSON – COURT CRIMINAL RECORDS OF; VIOLENCE, BATTERY ON LAW ENFORCEMENT OFFICER, BATTERY AGAINST CLAUDINE DOMBROWSKI, DRUGS, ALCOHOL, OBSTRUCTION OF JUSTICE, BAR FIGHTS ETC…</p> <blockquote> <p>WHAT KIND A EVIL BASTARD WOULD HURT HIS CHILD SO BADLY BY TAKING HER MOTHER AWAY FROM HER? RIKKI DOMBROWSKI THE WORLD IS APPALLED, KANSAS IS SICK. THIS MAN WILL KNOW JUSTICE ONE DAY—GOD WILL JUDGE ALL WHO HELPED TO KEEP YOU SEPERATED FROM YOUR LOVING MOTHER.</p> </blockquote> <p>GOD’S JUDGEMENT DAY—AND TOPEKA KANSAS WILL BURN</p> <blockquote> <p><b><a href="http://www.shawneecourt.org/doe/search.jsp?caseNumber=95LA014502&location=">95LA014502</a>-RICHARDSON,HAL,,1P <br /><a href="http://www.shawneecourt.org/doe/search.jsp?caseNumber=96D+000217&location=">96D 000217</a>-RICHARDSON,HAL,,1P <br /><a href="http://www.shawneecourt.org/doe/search.jsp?caseNumber=96D+000217&location=">96D 000217</a>-RICHARDSON,HAL,, <a href="http://www.shawneecourt.org/doe/alias.jsp?ssc=0000340832&sysId=DM&location=">(aka)</a>1OR <br /><a href="http://www.shawneecourt.org/doe/search.jsp?caseNumber=96D+000217&location=">96D 000217</a>-RICHARDSON,HAL,, <a href="http://www.shawneecourt.org/doe/alias.jsp?ssc=0000340832&sysId=DM&location=">(aka)</a>2OE <br /><a href="http://www.shawneecourt.org/doe/search.jsp?caseNumber=95D+000419&location=">95D 000419</a>-RICHARDSON,HAL,,1P <br /><a href="http://www.shawneecourt.org/doe/search.jsp?caseNumber=95D+000419&location=">95D 000419</a>-RICHARDSON,HAL,,1OR <br /><a href="http://www.shawneecourt.org/doe/search.jsp?caseNumber=97LA009121&location=">97LA009121</a>-RICHARDSON,HAL,,1D <br /><a href="http://www.shawneecourt.org/doe/search.jsp?caseNumber=98LA006122&location=">98LA006122</a>-RICHARDSON,HAL,,1D <br /><a href="http://www.shawneecourt.org/doe/search.jsp?caseNumber=92CV000432&location=">92CV000432</a>-RICHARDSON,HAL,,1P <br /><a href="http://www.shawneecourt.org/doe/search.jsp?caseNumber=96CV000937&location=">96CV000937</a>-RICHARDSON,HAL,,1P <br /><a href="http://www.shawneecourt.org/doe/search.jsp?caseNumber=92LA000089&location=">92LA000089</a>-RICHARDSON,HAL,,1D <br /><a href="http://www.shawneecourt.org/doe/search.jsp?caseNumber=96LA012692&location=">96LA012692</a>-RICHARDSON,HAL,,1D <br /><a href="http://www.shawneecourt.org/doe/search.jsp?caseNumber=97LA017898&location=">97LA017898</a>-RICHARDSON,HAL,,1D <br /><a href="http://www.shawneecourt.org/doe/search.jsp?caseNumber=97U+000055&location=">97U 000055</a>-RICHARDSON,HAL,,D/B/A/ TOPEKA VINYL TOP,1D <br /><a href="http://www.shawneecourt.org/doe/search.jsp?caseNumber=90LA007629&location=">90LA007629</a>-RICHARDSON,HAL,,DBA GATEWAY FUNDRAISING,1D <br /><a href="http://www.shawneecourt.org/doe/search.jsp?caseNumber=97LA018158&location=">97LA018158</a>-RICHARDSON,HAL,,DBA MINUTEMAN SOLAR FILM,1D <br /><a href="http://www.shawneecourt.org/doe/search.jsp?caseNumber=96LA003402&location=">96LA003402</a>-RICHARDSON,HAL,,DBA TOPEKA VINYL TOP CENTER,1D <br /><a href="http://www.shawneecourt.org/doe/search.jsp?caseNumber=98U+000141&location=">98U 000141</a>-RICHARDSON,HAL,,DBA TOPEKA VINYL TOP CENTER,1D <br /><a href="http://www.shawneecourt.org/doe/search.jsp?caseNumber=04SC000200&location=">04SC000200</a>-RICHARDSON,HAL,,III,1D <br /><a href="http://www.shawneecourt.org/doe/search.jsp?caseNumber=03C+000086&location=">03C 000086</a>-RICHARDSON,HAL,,JR TRACT 84,184D <br /><a href="http://www.shawneecourt.org/doe/search.jsp?caseNumber=95U+000500&location=">95U 000500</a>-RICHARDSON,HAL,,JR,1D <br /><a href="http://www.shawneecourt.org/doe/search.jsp?caseNumber=03L+010117&location=">03L 010117</a>-RICHARDSON,HAL,,JR,1D <br /><a href="http://www.shawneecourt.org/doe/search.jsp?caseNumber=05L+001833&location=">05L 001833</a>-RICHARDSON,HAL,,JR,1D <br /><a href="http://www.shawneecourt.org/doe/search.jsp?caseNumber=95SC000448&location=">95SC000448</a>-RICHARDSON,HAL,,JR,1D <br /><a href="http://www.shawneecourt.org/doe/search.jsp?caseNumber=95LN000161&location=">95LN000161</a>-RICHARDSON,HAL,,JR,1OP <br /><a href="http://www.shawneecourt.org/doe/search.jsp?caseNumber=05C+001464&location=">05C 001464</a>-RICHARDSON,HAL,,JR,TRACT 76, <a href="http://www.shawneecourt.org/doe/alias.jsp?ssc=0002113707&sysId=CV&location=">(aka)</a>133D <br /><a href="http://www.shawneecourt.org/doe/search.jsp?caseNumber=94SC000355&location=">94SC000355</a>-RICHARDSON,HAL,,OWNER OF MINUTEMAN SOLAR FILM,1D <br /><a href="http://www.shawneecourt.org/doe/search.jsp?caseNumber=89CR+01537&location=">89CR 01537</a>-RICHARDSON,HAL,G,, <a href="http://www.shawneecourt.org/doe/alias.jsp?ssc=0000028083&sysId=CR&location=">(aka)</a>1D <br /><a href="http://www.shawneecourt.org/doe/search.jsp?caseNumber=90CR+01308&location=">90CR 01308</a>-RICHARDSON,HAL,G, <a href="http://www.shawneecourt.org/doe/alias.jsp?ssc=0000032000&sysId=CR&location=">(aka)</a>1D <br /><a href="http://www.shawneecourt.org/doe/search.jsp?caseNumber=96LA019246&location=">96LA019246</a>-RICHARDSON,HAL,G,JR,1D <br /><a href="http://www.shawneecourt.org/doe/search.jsp?caseNumber=96LA000348&location=">96LA000348</a>-RICHARDSON,HAL,G,JR,1D <br /><a 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Affidavit for Domestic Violence (Conviction) Case No. 94-CR…</a></h6> <p><a href="http://www.scribd.com/1997-Closed-Camera-Inspection-of-30-Day-Drug-Alchohol-Hal-Richardson-Aug-1/d/42982707"></a></p> <p><b><img src="http://imgv2-4.scribdassets.com/img/word_document/42982707/72x93/0e48ed984f/1290020922" />3 p.</b></p> <h6><a href="http://www.scribd.com/1997-Closed-Camera-Inspection-of-30-Day-Drug-Alchohol-Hal-Richardson-Aug-1/d/42982707">1997 Closed Camera Inspection of 30 Day Drug Alchohol Hal Richardson Aug_1</a></h6> Claudine Dombrowskihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00174108218219442634noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6075225070962028659.post-20853969181943750262012-07-27T08:58:00.001-07:002012-07-27T08:58:55.960-07:00Bias Against Abused Mothers in Child Custody Cases: Report New study finds systemic problems in parental capacity assessments discriminate against women.<h4> </h4> <p><a href="http://thetyee.ca/News/2012/07/24/Child-Custody-Report/" target="_blank">New study finds systemic problems</a> in parental capacity assessments discriminate against women.</p> <p><a href="http://thetyee.ca/News/2012/07/24/Child-Custody-Report/" target="_blank"><img alt="Mother holding child" src="http://thetyee.cachefly.net/News/2012/07/24/mother-child.jpg" width="300" /></a></p> <p>Increasingly, women who claim spousal abuse are labeled ‘alienating’. Photo: <a href="http://www.shutterstock.com/pic-29383909/stock-photo-mother-holding-crying-baby-tear-falling-isolated-on-white.html?src=csl_recent_image-1">Shutterstock</a> .</p> <p>When a woman flees an abusive relationship, we expect the justice system will protect her and her children.</p> <p>But a new report finds in some British Columbian child custody cases allegations of spousal abuse are used to paint the mother as mentally ill or an "alienating" parent, and instead recommend visitation, or even custody, for the abusive parent.</p> <p>"<a href="http://www.westcoastleaf.org/userfiles/file/Troubling%20Assessments%20e-report%202012.pdf">Troubling Assessments: Custody and Access Reports and their Equality Implications for BC Women</a> " is a new report released today by West Coast LEAF, a women's legal education and advocacy organization. The report looks at what are known under the Family Relations Act as <a href="http://www.bclaws.ca/EPLibraries/bclaws_new/document/ID/freeside/00_96128_01#section15">Section 15</a> reports: parental capacity assessments conducted during child custody and access cases.</p> <p>Often a useful tool for getting a third-party, outsider's view of parenting abilities, the report found they could also be biased against and dangerous for vulnerable women with abusive ex-partners.</p> <p>While there are specific guidelines to follow for family counsellors and social workers regarding family violence and the use of these reports, psychologists in B.C. have no such criteria. In addition, judges often take assessors' advice at face value, and limited access to legal aid in B.C. prevents many women from challenging assessments they view as biased.</p> <p>"West Coast LEAF believes that women's equality is not served by the regime governing custody and access reports as it currently stands," reads the report.</p> <p><ins><ins></ins></ins></p> <p>"A rights-respecting system of family law -- one that promotes best outcomes for children and families -- must invest in women's equality. Addressing these concerns and implementing reforms will bring us one step closer to this critical goal."</p> <p><strong>'Alienating mothers'</strong></p> <p>Women have been contacting West Coast LEAF for years hoping they could help them with bad Section 15 reports. In the last two years the organization began researching the issue.</p> <p>They interviewed judges, lawyers, psychologists and social workers, and held forums with women who've undergone Section 15 assessments as part of their own child custody battles. The result is this report.</p> <p>The report doesn’t deal in numbers -- either the number of women affected by bad assessments or the cost of the changes to the family law system they request. But Kasari Govender, West Coast LEAF executive director, said the issue isn't the numbers but the fact the assessments are so easily misused.</p> <p>"The key is the systemic concerns we have: the lack of training for some assessors on the dynamics of violence, specifically violence against women and violence within intimate relationships, (and) cultural diversity and judging parental ability across cultural divides and the problems that can arise there."</p> <p>Assessments are often used at the request of one parent in the hopes of discrediting the other, although judges often request them too. In British Columbia there are no common accepted guidelines or professional qualifications for conducting these assessments. However BC Supreme Court usually requires a psychologist conduct the assessments, while the lower courts use family justice counsellors.</p> <p>Family justice counsellors and social workers must adhere to specific professional guidelines for completing Section 15 assessments, including taking family violence into account. But there are no such guidelines or specifications for psychologists.</p> <p>Allan Wade, a therapist and internationally renowned expert on inter-personal violence, said he's seen a range of Section 15 assessments, from the very good to very bad.</p> <p>"I've seen a number of cases over the years where the reports are so prejudiced and so incompetent that they're extremely harmful," he told The Tyee.</p> <p>For example, Wade said he's seeing an increase in assessors labelling mothers who allege spousal abuse as "alienating."</p> <p>"There are women in B.C. who want to report abuse to the authorities who are told by their lawyers 'Don't report the abuse. If you do, you'll lose your kids,' because they'll be called alienating mothers," said Wade, who is quoted in the West Coast LEAF report.</p> <p>While some reports show their biases -- one example given to The Tyee was an assessor who continually makes negative remarks about parents who live in subsidized housing -- Wade said the bigger issue is the use of psychological personality tests for parents and children.</p> <p>For example, when tests such as the Minnesota Multiphasic Personality Inventory (MMPI-2) are given to people under chronic stress, like victims of abuse or individuals in chronic pain, Wade said research has shown results are skewed.</p> <p>"Unless the person giving the test understands that and accounts for that in their interpretation, they're at risk of wrongly attributing a mental illness to the victim, and I've seen that happen in a number of cases," he said.</p> <p>"Many of the assessment devices that are used routinely in psychology are not particularly suited to addressing problems with violence."</p> <p><strong>Lost in translation</strong></p> <p>Psychological tests and Section 15 assessments also discriminate against women from different cultural backgrounds or for whom English is not their first language. The report found some psychologists refuse to offer psychological tests in languages other than English over fears it would skew the results. Translators are sometimes used instead to translate the questions and answers for the women.</p> <p>The report alleges mothers have been judged harshly for their differing parenting styles, citing a mother who read her daughter stories in Farsi, and a South-Asian mother who couldn't afford a two-bedroom apartment, so she shared a bed with her young child. Normal practices in their home country, but used to paint them as bad parents in Canada.</p> <p>There is little recourse for women who don't want to be assessed or want to challenge an assessment. Wade said informed consent is the right of parents, male or female, who are subject to a parental capacity assessment. But that right isn't recognized in B.C.</p> <p>"In one case a woman consulted me because she was having a Section 15 report done, and she wanted to know what she should know in advance," he recalled.</p> <p>"(I) provided her with a list of questions and she tried to ask the professional, and the person said 'Look, I don't have to answer your questions, I have a court order.' Then she had every reason to believe she wouldn't be safe because of the professional presentation of the (assessor)."</p> <p>Access to lawyers to challenge assessments can also be difficult. In B.C. a single mother with one child must make less than $2,050 per month <a href="http://www.lss.bc.ca/legal_aid/doIQualifyRepresentation.php">to qualify</a> for legal aid. But a salary of $25,000 doesn’t leave enough discretionary spending to hire a lawyer to fight the report, either. Thus the report calls for increases to the limits for legal aid, too.</p> <p>But it shouldn't just be up to lawyers to fight against individual reports, said forensic social worker Tracey Young, who is also quoted in the report. There should be province-wide oversight of reports to ensure parents -- both male and female -- are treated fairly by these assessments.</p> <p>"There really is nobody monitoring or keeping track of this," said Young, who worked in child welfare from 2002 to 2009.</p> <p>"I think that was one of the really important parts that came out of the report, is I think that there's not consistency across the board, there's no set of practice guidelines for whichever clinicians are doing this."</p> <p><strong>Psychologists underrepresented in report</strong></p> <p>While West Coast LEAF maintains the report is meant to highlight problems with the justice system overall, there is plenty of criticism for the lack of guidelines for psychologists. Although they sent out questionnaires to 15 psychologists randomly selected from the B.C. Psychological Association's website, only three responded.</p> <p>Attempts to reach the B.C. College of Psychologists were difficult, too, with both sides saying miscommunication led to the college not participating in the report. The report's release was subsequently delayed by one week to provide the college time to review the findings.</p> <p>But in a statement emailed to The Tyee, a spokesperson for the college said ultimately the two organizations respectfully agreed to disagree on the findings.</p> <p>"The report does not comprehensively examine the existing nature and the quality of the education and training required of registered psychologists in British Columbia, the professional standards relevant to the preparation of Section 15 reports by registered psychologists, and the accessibility and efficacy of the College complaints process," read the statement.</p> <p>"In addition, while the report provides insight into the experiences of some participants in custody and access proceedings, it does not provide a systematic analysis of the issues raised."</p> <p>Both parties have agreed to keep lines of communication open and vowed to continue working on solving the issues outlined in the report.</p> <p>In the meantime, the days of the Family Relations Act are numbered. With the new Family Law Act replacing the previous legislation over the next six months to a year, it's an ideal time to make changes to the laws surrounding parental assessments.</p> <p>The <a href="http://www.leg.bc.ca/39th4th/1st_read/gov16-1.htm#section211">new section</a> outlining rules for parental capacity assessments, Section 211, isn't much different than Section 15. But there's still time to make changes, and in an emailed statement to The Tyee, B.C. Attorney General Shirley Bond said she would take the report's recommendations into consideration.</p> <p>"As with any report that we receive, we will take the time to review their findings," read the statement.</p> <p>"We will take the report’s recommendations under consideration as we move forward with implementation of the new Family Law Act."</p> <p>Govender is hopeful government will adopt the report's recommendations regardless of the time or financial costs to government.</p> <p>"I think it's really significant not to get caught up in looking at changes in family law in only the short-term costs, because we know that where better outcomes happen for children and for families, that that will ultimately save the system significant amounts of money," says Govender. </p> Claudine Dombrowskihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00174108218219442634noreply@blogger.com