Love for her Daughter

Topeka Kansas: Failure to Protect Violates Statutes

2011-09-23T08:01:00.001-05:00

Topeka Kansas: Failure to Protect Violates Statutes

The hour heated up in the Zeus Radio Studio starting with a discussion about the city of Topeka , KS decision to stop prosecuting domestic violence cases with my suggestion that the District Attorney obtain permits and go into the cemetery business. The city of Topeka is throwing victims' lives to the wolves disguised in sheep's clothing, more commonly known as the violent offenders.

The city is hiding behind the budget because frankly Kansas does not see intimate partner violence a crime.

The Shawnee County press release: September 15, 2011

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

Contact: Dakota Loomis • 785.438.9449

Shawnee County DA’s Office and City of Topeka Working to Resolve Misdemeanor Case Filings

__________________________________________

Released in Cooperation with David Bevens · City of Topeka · City Communications Manager · 785.368.1642

Shawnee County District Attorney Chad Taylor and Interim City Manager Dan Stanley met today to discuss the prosecution of misdemeanor cases occurring within Topeka city limits. The meeting centered on how best to preserve public safety given recent budget cuts sustained by the District Attorney’s Office. Both the District Attorney’s Office and the City of Topeka are hopeful that an amicable agreement will be reached shortly that will be in the best interest of all Topekans. Discussions will continue over the course of the next few days and will focus on crafting a mutually agreed upon resolution that will ensure the efficient prosecution of all city misdemeanors.

# # #

Translation if your dog bites someone you will be prosecuted. If you spouse or significant other threatens or causes significant bodily injury, you are out of luck!

According to the National Coalition against Domestic Violence, current data, there are16,800 homicides (reported)attributed to intimate partner homicide per year and $2.2 million in medically treated injuries costing $37 billion per year!

______________________________________

Is Topeka Kansas in violation of their very own State Statues?

22-2307 : Domestic violence calls; written policies to be adopted by law enforcement agencies; contents. (a) All law enforcement agencies in this state shall adopt written policies regarding domestic violence calls as provided in subsection (b). These policies shall be made available to all officers of such agency.(b) Such written policies shall include, but not be limited to, the following:
(1) A statement directing that the officers shall make an arrest when they have probable cause to believe that a crime is being committed or has been committed;
(2) a statement defining domestic violence;
(3) a statement describing the dispatchers' responsibilities;
(4) a statement describing the responding officers' responsibilities and procedures to follow when responding to a domestic violence call and the suspect is at the scene;
(5) a statement regarding procedures when the suspect has left the scene of the crime;
(6) procedures for both misdemeanor and felony cases;
(7) procedures for law enforcement officers to follow when handling domestic violence calls involving court orders, including protection from abuse orders, restraining orders and a protective order issued by a court of any state or Indian tribe;
(8) a statement that the law enforcement agency shall provide the following information to victims, in writing:
(A) Availability of emergency and medical telephone numbers, if needed;
(B) the law enforcement agency's report number;
(C) the address and telephone number of the prosecutor's office the victim should contact to obtain information about victims' rights pursuant to K.S.A. 74-7333 and 74-7335 and amendments thereto;
(D) the name and address of the crime victims' compensation board and information about possible compensation benefits;
(E) advise the victim that the details of the crime may be made public;
(F) advise the victim of such victims' rights under K.S.A. 74-7333 and 74-7335 and amendments thereto; and
(G) advise the victim of known available resources which may assist the victim; and
(9) whether an arrest is made or not, a standard offense report shall be completed on all such incidents and sent to the Kansas bureau of investigation.
History: L. 1991, ch. 93, § 1; L. 1996, ch. 208, § 3; July 1.

Below is the show I urge everyone to listen. Can a class action suit be filed in the State of Kansas for failure per the current statutes? It is worth investigating? In the coming months we will gather a team of legal experts to visit and review at the Federal level and the State of Kansas's "failure to protect."

Attorney and Author Barry Goldstein and National Advocate and Mothers Without Custody Expert Claudine Dombrowski

Sep 22, 2011

To listen to Show CLICK HERE --------> Susan Murphy Milano: TIME'S UP!! 9-22-2011

Download Podcast - Susan Murphy Milano: TIME'S UP!! 9-22-2011
Right mouse click and choose "save as" or "save link as" to download a podcast mp3 file to your computer.

A victims first scream is help;

A victims second scream is justice

****

Susan Murphy Milano is a staff member of the Institute for Relational Harm Reduction and Public Pathology Education . She is a specialist with intimate partner violence cases and prevention strategies and high risk cases and available for personal consultations through the Institute. She is also part of the team at Management Resources Limited of New York.
Susan is the author of "Time's Up: A Guide on How to Leave and Survive Abusive and Stalking Relationships,"Moving out, Moving on, and Defending Out Lives. Susan is the host ofThe Susan Murphy Milano Show, "Time's Up!" . She is a regular contributor to the nationally syndicated "The Roth Show " with Dr Laurie Roth and a co-host on Crime Wire .
If you would like to schedule Susan Murphy Milano for interviews, please contact: ImaginePublicity PO BOX 14946 Surfside Beach, SC 29587 Phone: 843.808.0859 email- contact@imaginepublicity.com

No Way Out But One : Fund Raising Update by Garland Waller (Please spread widely)

2011-06-27T08:40:00.001-05:00

Dear Friends: Click here....No Way Out But One for update

Fundraising Update from Garland Waller on Vimeo.

Click here to donate even just $5.00 http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/2038674816/no-way-out-but-one-a-story-of-love-and-justice/pledge/new?clicked_reward=false&logged_in=false&p=0&v=u

We have good news, bad news and more good news. The real good news it that post-production of the full-length version of No Way Out But One is going great. We have received the never before seen FBI files, and we are finishing up our final interviews. This is really going to be a powerful story about one remarkable mother’s efforts to keep her children safe, and the harrowing experience that Child and Family Court has become for so many protective parents and children.

The bad news is that we are coming up on the deadline for contributions to Kickstarter and we have a long way to go. But the other good news is that if we can get a substantial number of modest $5 individual contributions – yes honestly, just $5 will do it – someone will kick in a major grant to help us reach the final goal of $20,000 to complete and distribute the film.

We are deeply indebted to the women and men who have already given generously because we are getting there, but this one particular donor wants to see that there really is a GROUNDSWELL OF SUPPORT. It’s all in the numbers.

If you have already given, thank you and if not, you can still help soooo much. Just post this, send this, get this word out.

Ask friends to compare it to a skipping a latte.... or just give $5 because by adding $5, so many can help reach $20,000 for a good cause. The issue is so important. We, in this group, already know that. The issue of family court injustice affects so many people’s lives.

We are totally dedicated to the project. But we must have this funding to complete all the work we need to do.

So, yes, I am begging, please post this request on FACEBOOK, Tweet it, send it out to your groups – all your groups. It’s a numbers game. Help us win!

Tell your friends, all they have to do is click here....

No Way Out But One

Thank you.

Garland

No Way Out But One

CHAPTER TWO Grandma’s Pearls of Wisdom

2011-05-31T12:31:00.003-05:00

CHAPTER TWO

Grandma’s Pearls of Wisdom

May 18, 2011

It seems that this day there is no skirting this one. My mother, Rikki’s grandmother. Last night I attended the Kansas Blue Ribbon Commission for judiciary overhaul. I so hate doing these things. The most of the crowd there were CPS people. Daddy’s who wanted to strip and punish mommy more—a very religious ‘grandmother perhaps even great grandmother’. I offered only a few suggestions—get rid of therapeutic jurisprudence, and consequences from the derelict judges—who are criminal themselves. E.g. passing a law in 2008 HB XXXX that states Judges must follow the law, law.--- Only to have that same judge again break that law—law. Then, instead of consequence, he retires to Washburn University, to teach law. Yeah, can you say insanity? That’s called our Justice System. “just-us”

My heart, feeling low this day, perhaps the rain, perhaps just the time. I began thinking about my mom and in 2007 the motion I filed for Rikki to see her granny one last time alive, as her health and terminal illness had advanced, granny was seeing her grandchildren one last time before she became bed ridden and died.

This is a painful subject for me, as I have a lot of guilt about my mother. I should have been there for her, I was not. She told me to stay here and fight for her granddaughter. I did. But no victory. And mom died alone, and in pain. I was not even notified of her death until 5 hours after she died. Time enough for the so called care takers to prop her dead body in her chair and literally rob her of everything. There was nothing left in her house except a few mice. They even stole her oxygen bottles her electric wheelchair.

So, I come out here, to my special place, one without phone, without internet (except my mobile) to be free, to do what I usually do out here—normal stuff, and no think, healing time. But apparently I am to write about granny as the following poem was open and looking at me from a Bradford exchange book- ( mom used to always order stuff from Bradford exchange—it was her trademark—one that she passed onto myself—and one that Rikki and I both always loved about granny.)

As I sit watching Iron Jawed Angels, I type in the poem that met me at the door. (fresh water pearl necklace accompanies poem—or other way around)

Grandma’s Pearls of Wisdom

I’ve travelled paths you’ve yet to walk

Learned lessons old and new

And now this wisdom of my life

I am blessed to share with you

Let kindness spread like sunshine

Embrace those who are sad

Respect their dignity, give them joy

And leave them feeling glad

Forgive those who might hurt you

And though you have your pride

Listen closely to their viewpoint

Try to see the other side

Walk softly when you are angry

Try not to take offense

Invoke your since of humor

Laughter’s power is immense!

Express what you are feeling

Your beliefs you should uphold

Don’t shy away from what is right

Be courageous be bold

Keep hope right in your pocket

It will guide you day by day

Take it out when it is needed

When it’s near, you’ll find a way

Remember friends and family

Of which you are a precious part

Love deeply and love truly

Give freely from your heart

The world is far from perfect

There’s conflict and there’s strife

But you still can make a difference

By how you live your life

And so I’m very blessed to know

The wonders you will do

Because you are my granddaughter

And I believe in you

Wow. That is my mom to the letter. In fact I feel her coursing through my veins now. I know that my mother has told Rikki this very same thing. She always believed in her granddaughter. There’s was a special bond. I have to in my heart believe that it still is.

Grandmother never was able to see Rikki that late fall in 2007. The Courts totally ignored the motion for granny to see her—as they:

1. Knew it would hurt all three generations beyond words and it did.

2. Rikki and granny’s love for each other was dangerous to the ‘abusers’ and would invoke a strength and hope in Rikki that must at all and any cost be stopped as Rikki’s silence and her misinformation – is and was their complete power to maintain control—and they did- they do.

Not even in my supervised visitation with armed guards—with granny in wheelchair and with oxygen. They refused to let Rikki and granny have that one last time—but they did allow the dog. Granny was taking care of Rikki’s dog- since the custody switch. They allowed the dog to go to supervised visitation, but not granny.

When, my mother died October 28^th, 2008, I had just finished with another rally/march to end Domestic Violence here in Topeka, Kansas. Jana Mackey the KS-NOW lobbyist had just been murdered by her boyfriend, the community was still reeling from her murder then his suicide, that it was an exhausting march for me. Jana’s mother and father the following year began to actively campaign to end violence. But this year was as I feel I always am, alone in the struggle. Something I know to be true of all survivors-- all true advocates to stop the violence.

I had gotten home from the march the day before my mother died. It was wet and rainy and so very cold. I am unable to walk well, my bones and joints with osteoarthritis and from the many breaks rheumatoid arthrisitis as well.

I was so very tired, I recall I was not allowed at this time (as many times throughout Rikki’s child hood) to have absolutely any contact with her. The following morning I was informed of my mother’s death.

Both were gone. Rikki and granny, my rock, my mother- dead.

Then began the motions, to allow Rikki to at least go to her grandma’s funeral. Daddy’s Motions to disallow and to further gain a stronghold in the ultimate power and control of Rikki and I. We had an emergency hearing on November 4th, 2008. It was as to be expected, an abuser will always kick you hardest when you are down, I knew this going in. It was like the flood gates of hell opened up in that court room. I felt my mom more that time than I have ever since. Of course, it was not allowed. Rikki and I were not allowed to attend granny’s funeral. I had to go alone.

I had to identify my mother’s body over the internet. My mom planned for everything, except she forgot to sign her own cremation papers. I had to do that as well and send via electronically—I was unable to get to Texas to do this. In the electronic age, it was all done via the internet, and facsimile.

Once, this was taken care of had to arrange for the transport of not just her ashes- but those of her husband as well—he had died just a few months before, mom had him cremated sitting on her fireplace mantle. She wanted to bring him back to Kansas for his funeral. We brought them both back to Kansas and their funeral was held together. Finally the day of her funeral, November 9^th, 2008. It was my mother’s birthday she would have been age 61. I never could remember her birthday. Now I will never forget it. I did not even know who was president until after the funeral, a week or more later— as my devastation was complete. Obama had won, so I had found out. Not that I cared one way or the other.

Memory remains fuzzy as to time, the following year after the death of my mother is more than blurry. It is my hope that I can began to heal from this as well as everything else. Another good friend of mine had told me when mom died to—take time out to grieve her passing—I didn’t. Not that denial was intentional, I was set to fast forward – seemed like time was running out. I guess that now looking back it had already ran out. I was just in too much shock and grief to acknowledge. I was set to auto pilot.

Trying to stay alive from the abuser Hal Richardson and his cronies—I have long since made several enemies in the judiciary that wish silently and not so silently of my death and or more pain. Rene M Netherton and M. Jill Dykes the current GAL aka Guardian ad litem or better known as Court Appointed Child Abusers”, to name but two.

I was at this time also being harassed by my so called friends—and neighbor—just more non humans- who see a situation and take advantage of it. In fact had it not been for a complete stranger—one neighbor a Vietnam veteran—crazier than I—I would not have been able to go to my mom’s funeral. You see my trusted friends/ neighbor had been a shade tree mechanic, they destroyed my car, stole from me,-- anyhow, this Vietnam vet who I had never met—or even talked to before—was pushing his trash out at some time I must have been outside, he said something to me, I burst into tears--- telling the whole story of my mom’s death… no way to get to Texas let alone her funeral in western Kansas.

The day before the funeral, he pulls up in a dark blue Saturn—don’t recall the model but the color and make. He had rented the car for me under his name, I had no identity, I a ghost to avoid being tracked down.. even on the state address confidentiality program. Any ways, this stranger, a person who later became my end world and humanity—talks bud, provided a rental car for me to go to my mom’s funeral.

I drove down the night before her funeral. I stayed in a motel of the not so pleasing—but it was hard to find a room, not because my mom had sold out the small town with her death – something else was going on. I recall twitter had recently made its debut, in fact I was ‘AngelFury’ on twitter, I bêta tested all new tech stuff--- I remember tweeting this:

“It’s not what is engraved upon a marble stone of how you led your life—but instead what is engraved on the human heart’ (pernicious?) it would have been November 8^th, 2008—I buried mom the next day.

That is how I felt; I had a whole page of these inspiring quotes. I held them close to my heart throughout the funeral and weeks if not months following in a book bound in brown leather called ‘the secret’. Yeah, I like that philosophy. I even gave one to my dear daughter.- will have to dig it out I am sure that all these quotes are still in that book. Along with the following battered mothers custody conference January 2009 where my dead mom—what little insurance there was donated 5 rooms for mothers for the conference. As did her obituary as to donations were to be sent.

<PUT OBIT HERE>

I had 3 sets of suits—I could not decide which to wear at her funeral—mom had bought them for me the Christmas before—for court, for public speaking, for media, for conferences. They were and still are high dollar ass kicking—class act suits with flare, color and style—I was the best dressed in Shawnee shit fucking county—every time I went to hell court—I would never win in court by their rules—but I always shined bright, better and with class, self respect and dignity. Thank you mom, (she, even against her own very rebellious mind advised me to not wear red) but red is my color—the color of the blood spilled, the color of absolute disrespect for the mortal gods who wear black robes—the man gods called judges.

My red suit remains my favorite suit.

For mom’s funeral, I wore the same conservative pinstripe black and white suit/skirt, low black heels I wore in court that fateful day November 4, 2008. In my mother’s honor, I did in court all the right things without selling my soul, Rikki’s or my mothers. I really do not even remember the funeral. I only remember driving back with a carload of her stuff that was not stolen, some blankets etc, in a rental car that a Vietnam veteran had rented for me. Back to Topeka to unleash in mind was my only goal—Complete exposure of this case, for my mother. I would never stop, ever until justice prevailed. I burned on this, I lived on the adrenaline of this, I could barely spell my name—but hung onto this single simple fact that they had done pissed me off and my mom was now dead and in her after life—there would be hell to pay—momma was strong and in her death—mountains would indeed move for the incredible insane injustice—the spitting upon her grave – if you will, yes this was the time, and justice would fall upon all those rightly so.

In that December 2008, mom had been in her grave less than a month--- as my mom always did – she would pre order shit to be delivered at Christmas – birth days—etc… She said because she was a senile old bat-- When came a knock at my door. It was UPS or something, delivering to me a package…. I signed for it walked back into the abandoned house I had lived in for several years – for my safety- I opened the box and BAM…!! There was a note from my dead mom.

“For your work, change the world, save my granddaughter’’

I opened the box... a very high dollar top of the line lap top entertainment center—32 and 64 bit system—I am writing on it now.

I crumbled, I had to scan it and send it out to other via the internet—moms note (not hand written) but typed as she had instructed.—as who in the fuck would believe this? I didn’t… I had to scan that note and send it out—I knew I had suffered a great loss—the greatest. And as a psych nurse, I knew all the trademarks of collapse. I had to show this to others—just to know that I was not insane—imagining or even hallucinating. Momma was powerful in her life, who the fuck knew all she could do—free from her mortal body, and free of pain, free to be the wind.

Chapter One A Little Girl

2011-05-31T12:31:00.001-05:00

Chapter One

A Little Girl

When I was young, I literally had the world by a string. Obviously I had youth, was smart, funny and pretty. I was athletic, cocky and a tom boy that not even boys could hold a candle too. I was a perfect pain in the ass for any parent. Defiant, strong willed, opinionated, questioned everything, especially authority and determined to conquer any and all challenges that came my way. I was a Dombrowski. Everything I did, I did well, and life was a challenge of prizes all mine for the taking. Now this is not to say that life as a young girl was not difficult as it was, a country girl, it did however make the victories in my life so much grander. I would venture to say, that I was also a nightmare child for any ‘normal’ parent, thank God my parents were not ‘normal’.

I was the oldest of four children born to my mother, Betty Sales-Stumpf-Dombrowski. She was eighteen years old when she gave birth to me. My father was from Belgium, a legal immigrant with a visa who had just travelled to the United States to join the American military. In the 1960’s the world admired the U.S. and my father being born in the concentration camps of Dachau when liberated by the US in 1942, well—he as a young man of age 18 like all who come to America have dreams and held the US in the highest of regards. He was sponsored by a family from Beloit, Kansas to learn the English language and work at a co-op as a feed sacker- his goal to join the American military. He met my mom instead.

The apple does not fall far from the tree, like my mother, it was easy to see how my father fell so in love with my mother. I imagine the purest love between the two. And it was. Two 18 year old kids in the 60’s the decade of peace and love, camping at the Kansas lakes (my mother a native Kansan) my father just learning English-French was/is his primary language. I even found the lake that they both so often frequented. They fished and camped at every chance they could get at Lake Kannapolis in western Kansas.

I was born 9 months later after one of their camping trips, in 1965. I was a wanted child—imagine that, they actually tried to get pregnant; they loved each other that much. Then they had me….life B.C. – my mom lovingly used to say BC stood for life “Before Claudine”- she said I could take any way I wanted- good or indifferent, but that life would never be the same after you met me.

My father wanted a girl; he even had my named picked before I was born. I asked him one day why he had named me Claudine- he replied “I wanted you to have a totally French name’- well so here I am. Claudine—the last name Dombrowski really a derivative from the Ukraine in fact Romania where my grandmother was before her imprisonment in the concentration camps during WWII. A Gypsy of Roma, and in my imagination Vlad the impaler aka Dracula, maybe this is where I inherited my love for horror movies and books? Likely not, my mom was a avid fan of horror as I am and as is my daughter, so it’s a maternal thing. Interesting though none the less.

Dombrowski original spelling is Dombrovsky – Yes, Russian.

A note here: my mother’s father—was in the 2^nd wave of Normandy invasion, He was in the US Army. I find it quite ironic in that my grandfather helped to liberate my own father when he was a child. Had it not been for that, my father may not have survived; hence, I would not be either. When my father came here from Europe and when he and my mother were married, my grandfather gave his daughter away at the wedding to a man who was born in a concentration camp that he helped to liberate. No wonder my father had such a high regard for the US. As did my WWII grandfather CLARK C. Sheldon, God rest his soul, January 18^th, 1998.

My mother was also very athletic; she was a swimmer and a tennis player. My father, well he swam the English Channel. I later learned as an adult that – that is pretty cool thing. So, I guess you could say I was destined to be as such, athletic, swimming is my love, and of course a pain in the ass as I was treated as a princess “PACHA” French for ‘ruler of the heart’, my nick name my father had given me as a baby and the same attitude I carried throughout my youth. See their union was not a farmer John and Betsy the milkmaid simplicity so I guess international and time through history and back around is a better description.

By the time I was age 16, my grandfather-the WWII one had taught me to ride my own motor cycle. I went to my 1^st Sturgis riding with WWII vets on my own bike, with honor. I was not a typical biker girl—I was a driver in control of my own destiny, grandpa taught me how to not be, but how to be—never get drunk, but secrets to drinking asshole under the table, and I dressed accordingly to the rules of the road.

In fact my mother also rode a bike—it was her bike that I learned on, later changed that poor Honda 360 into a dirt bike, had been stopped as a kid in Hayes Kansas, by a cop in VW rabbit –(I kid you not—I could have out run that dude but I was young and well his sirens were not rabbit style) for underage driving and no Motor cycle Drivers License, mom did not know any of this, she worked nights at the hospital and my brother little Joe and I, well we were more than ornery kids on a hot summer in a small town, she was sleeping and I wanted to keep it that way shhhhh. J

At the age of 15, my whole world changed. I was an emancipated minor. See, I told you I was hell on wheels- not that I was really hell--- I just was bored to easily with peer group age oriented stuff. I was never a ‘bad’ person, always extremely compassionate, I found I had no patience for the non human ignorant and now a days would be called political bullshit. I used to think I was an alien, sent to earth for some punishment from my home planet against humanity. lol

So, I got all my Drivers Licenses’ still have my Motor Cycle license, It was ‘strongly recommended’ that I no longer attend high school- ( apparently I was not appropriate for the sheep following classes) I then started college –( which later in family court would be used against me as failure to complete HS) where I began to pursue a degree in Nursing. Ok, so I was a bit immature for college so I partied for two years, waited tables at a truck stop night shift, had a blast had my own house, paid my own bills, had my own car, motor cycle—then I took a bunch of phys Ed classes for a year, 60 credit hours—you had to have 30 if you were a HS drop out-- and at age 18 joined the army.

Nursing or medical has always been a part of my life. My mother as a young mother herself worked two jobs and paid her way through nursing, she was a PA, CCRN, coronary care specialist who worked experimental medicine in Anaheim, CA before her death. I had no choice really than to go into medicine. Mom would say that I if I wanted to be anything I had to be a nurse 1^st, so I could afford to pay for whatever else I wanted to be. Mom was very wise.

So at age 18, I was an army combat medic. And still having the time of my life. Not old enough to drink legally, but on the base at Ft. Sam Houston in San Antonio, TX. my barracks was atop the hill of the PX.. I legally could drink on base. We had so much fun. Then we would run 10 miles the next morning—AIT.. (known as Advanced Individual Training) and if you fell out of a run – bye, bye party time with your buds. You could stop and puke—that was cool but don’t fall out ever. I never did.

My battalion was a mix of air born rangers, green berets and was ran by a female CO-(who hated her own sex) there were about 500 men and 60 women. This was a combat slot, combat medic. And like the tom boy I am…. was thinking ok, medical but helicopters oh yeah!! I was in heaven. A huey chopper sounds and felt like a Harley on a ride to Sturgis with gramps and his WWII gang. I even learned to repel out of those choppers. About 6 years later they came out with the black hawk, I recall them saying how they would make it for en re ambulance style, I don’t think they ever really did use black hawk for this, I was pretty much out of the military by this time.

I was in and out of the military for what my DD-214 says: 10 years and some months—long ago lost it.

During a time I was not in—I was age 23 at this time I had gone to beauty school—and owned my first business. The hair port—which I later sold for profit after 5 years, bought a fancy fifth wheel hitch hiker with hydraulic sliding dining room and bedroom—designed by Fleetwood—plush carpet white oak cabinets. I then lived on the beach in Corpus Christie, till I went broke and came back to Kansas, I became a MHT- mental health tech at Topeka State hospital, found my passion where I could apply nursing.

I went active duty army again in 1993-1994—civilian contract. I stayed in Kansas did emporia state university for my nursing; the military paid for it all and paid me a salary. I signed 6 years to the army, and did one weekend a month while on active duty civilian contract. I was pregnant with Rikki during this time, CHAMPUS even paid for my literal million dollar baby. Rikki, she was over a million dollars in medical due to all the violence I endured while pregnant with her.. I was age 30 when Rikki was born.

Mothers Day Nightmare - Leaving The War Zone

2011-05-11T10:03:00.001-05:00

Leaving The War Zone

http://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=a.10150149814865229.333339.769640228&l=0127776f65

Mothers Day Nightmare

May 10^th, 2011

The night before last night, it was mother’s day no less. I had a terrible dream. My daughter had died, and I was not informed, like everything else in her life –and in the dream-her death, I frantically was searching the computer –where, how and when and why—when would the funeral be --where? I found it, like I do on her school track stuff—I saw her from a distance at two meets this year—frantically searching.

Once I found where the funeral was via the internet, online obituaries, I went. I was met at the door by hostile forces—like I am now currently met whenever I try to attend something that my daughter—may or may not be in. In the dream, nothing changed. I was denied to see my daughter. To be a part of her life at all—and now her death.

In the dream, I went to her dad’s to get some pictures of her life—I have none for you see it has been 11 years since I was allowed any photographs of my dear daughter. Including school photos. As well as a denial to all school and medical records. In the dream for some dumb reason I thought I may at least obtain some photos of my daughter in her life of the past 11 years – I was wrong. Nothing had changed-just like my reality- I am denied.

Mothers day this year was especially hard on me. As they all have been this past 17 years. My own dear mom died, my daughter all but—except in the dream. I stayed home in bed watching end world stuff on FX—storms, tornadoes, meteors—all those low grade but non reality shows—to keep my mind off both my mom and my daughter. Secretly in my heart, I had hoped for a cyber foot print from at least my daughter. It never came.

Here we are two days after the nightmare.-the only dream I have ever had of my daughter. I do not know why, but I have never dreamed of her—perhaps the torment is too great and my mind denies me this too. I crave to have dreams about my daughter and about my mom. I miss them. My heart, all I ever loved dead and or gone.

That is why the nightmare above so unnerved me. Finally a dream about my daughter. Not what I had in mind. Easy to explain though, as it is what life is now. Some people with children could call it ‘empty nest’ I call it just gone. Hence I feel 17 years of hope and ‘it will all work out’ –has come and passed.

Nothing worked out. Hope does not float—except perhaps to keep me going through all the years of rikkis child hood. But now that too is gone. Just like my mom.

I am tired of the movement- drained in fact. There is nothing left of me, to even give to myself. So many moms new in the battle—messages of ‘you inspire me’, messages of ‘help me.’ Messages of ‘this the 1^st mothers day without my child’—birthday, holiday, sun rise and sunset, weeks into months, then years, and I have no words left in me to say they only get worst. The tears that so many cry will never go away. The pain like a knife in my soul so real so jagged that surely like the ‘1^st mothers day’ and the 17^th one later, I knew I would just die. I haven’t. the tears have turned to tears of blood and become even more heavy.

So, I have thought about all this the past few days. To take care of me, whatever me is left. To finally let go and go forward with life. I have a pool set up, a gazebo- well in Kansas the winds are as high as the temps- gazebo idea has yet to work out quite like I thought it would.

I am here now, painting a room, mowing the grass- it is peaceful here. No one around except the trees, the wind, the birds, the sun and my thoughts. Sometimes like last year I can even feel my mom. Today though, I feel noting but emptiness. Thinking, about my cat Gus the closest family I have, then thinking god, what life? Why look forward to the next 20 years-? I’m old now, my health has followed suit. What do I do? How do I heal myself?

That is it. The real issues. What is left of me needs to heal from the trauma—no one could ever heal but to allow at least the scar tissue to form.

I am trying, but again I feel only emptiness. Why do I have 24 ft pool? My daughter will never swim in it—my mom wont. That part of my life, Rikki and I both grew up in the pool- is gone. Oh sure I love the pool, it does offer peace even by myself, but this year no hope for Rikki. No connection with my mom yet. But definitely feel the body pains of age and my own physical issues and hydrotherapy was long ago ordered for all the broken bones, and arthritis- of late – even more, so swimming is the only thing that is not painful, in fact it feels like heaven.

I have heard that some parents have to literally divorce the child from their own hearts and mind to survive. Let it go- act as though there never was. Maybe that is what I need to try to do. The memory is tearing me apart—as it did in the beginning of abuser litigation—17 years ago—it continues now to the end.

Oh sure, in some small place in my heart she may come back—but only if her jailer is gone—and I do mean as in dead. As so many other child survivors have told me—the abuser literally had to A. die or B. go to jail—either way they were not ever free of the torment as long as the presence of complete evil was anywhere near, and they don’t just of free will decide to do that. Its all about control, to them there is no life without it.

Thing is-- we all know only the good die young- he will outlive me. As fast as my health is going—he will be around years after I am gone. And Rikki still knowing nothing about her mother—her maternal family. So I have decided to try to write to her about things that I would want to know about my mom—especially if I had never seen her. As is the case with rikki.

Well, so much for divorcing her out of mind and soul… maybe I could write it as letter or something, 3^rd party perhaps. But I do at least need to write it, as I need to—I love her too much to not. A very dear friend of mine Susan Murphy Milano once said to me—‘you can’t miss what you never had’- but I do. I know I gave birth to a beautiful little girl who about died before she was even born due to all the beatings inflicted by her loving father- and captor.

I know we had 7 years of life of freedom—although they were court hell. Monthly hearings sometimes even weekly in the family court, to include two KS State Appeals, two petitions for review at KS supreme court and even an international law suit. But we were together, minus his long visits’. We saw each other, we laughed, we played, we cried, we talked. It was perfect in an imperfect world. She, wise beyond her years and for good reason. The only child hood she did know—I was at least able to give her that and be a part of that for her, she so deserved to just be a kid. And she was-- until she was taken from me and given to the abuser at the tender age of 7 never to see her mom again, in any meaningful way.

I am still seeking freedom, in this land of the non free- held special for a sadistic criminal to continue his reign of terror. Specially advocated through the family court mafia- the profit- of blood.

Before you think that I am all gloom and doom-although the past 17 years has been like a torturous death day in and day out- I am learning me again. A person who loved to read, loved life-more so now after so much darkness, I embrace every living thing, every tree that blows in the wind. As I know how very precious and how so very beautiful the world is.

Dombrowski Drawings Tears and Bruises – I Miss Mom

2011-04-25T10:56:00.001-05:00

Claudine Dombrowski--Insanity? Nope. Family Court in Kansas

2011-04-15T10:58:00.001-05:00

http://www.helpmomsprotect.com/id12.html

Help Moms Protect

Help MOMS Protect---Claudine Dombrowski

Open Letter

High Profile Mothers

***Claudine Dombrowski

Please carefully view these pictures. Notice the bruises on her arms above her wrists on both arms. Do they look like this was a mutual fight or are those marks of trying to defend herself against the brutality inflicted on her?

Insanity? Nope. Family court in Kansas

Imagine that your home was broken into, vandalized and burglarized one night. You were roughed up and tied up while he ransacked your home. Fortunately, he left you shaken and hurt, but not seriously injured such as to require hospitalization. You were successfully able to identify him and his vehicle as he sped away.
Upon your call to the police, the offender is apprehended with the goods in his possession and brought to court to stand trial for his crimes against you.
You arrive in court and the first thing the judge asks you is if you are willing to go to mediation with the burglar. When you refuse, the judge labels you ‘uncooperative’ and ‘hostile’ to the burglar's continued relationship with you. Even though the burglar was caught red-handed with your goods, and you were an eye witness to the crime, the judge now decides that he can't possibly decide the case without first appointing a social worker termed a "burglary evaluator"
to assess yours and the burglar's relationship.

When the social worker/evaluator can not determine what is best for your relationship or your stolen goods, they ask the judge to have both you and the burglar psychologically evaluated, because you seem "anxious", "angry" and "uncooperative" with the burglar. The court-appointed psychologist, who has no experience in being the victim of violent crime and has not studied the effects of such trauma, also determines that you are uncooperative, hostile, anxious, and you
have a negative opinion of the burglar that can't be healthy. After all, the burglar had nothing but good things to say about you, your home and your belongings during his evaluation.

The psychologist recommends that you be restricted from access to your belongings until you can accept the burglar's rightful relationship to continued access to your home and personal effects. He further recommends you attend weekly conjoint therapy with the burglar to work on being more cooperative with him in the future.
All at your expense of course.

The judge decides to wait a year or so to see how you work through your relationship with the burglar before he can decide upon the burglary conviction. He chastises you that you had better really work at the relationship or he may just grant the burglar's request to maintain sole ownership of your property. None of these "experts" can be sued civilly for their negligence and incompetence because they have judicial or quasi-judicial immunity.
Insanity? Nope. Family court in Kansas.

Domestic violence victims walk into family court to ask a judge to protect their children from a known abuser. Instead, they face the above-described nightmare that can span years and put them into financial ruin, mental and emotional exhaustion, not to mention directly back into the path of the abuser. Judges pressure them to mediate, assign a custody evaluator who pressures them to accept 50/50 joint physical and legal custody with theirs and their children's abuser.
They and their children are put through psychological evaluations by persons with little to no training in domestic violence, and some judges force co-parenting therapy and reunification therapy upon mother and child with their perpetrators. If they can not fit into the mold of cooperative "co-parenting" and the children continue to be reluctant to visit with the man that abused them, they face losing custody to him.

We have spent millions of dollars printing brochures and making public service announcements to victims of domestic violence encouraging them to leave violent relationships and telling them of the harmful effects on their children.

But when they do get the courage to leave, the same system tells them they are wrong to try to protect their children once they have divorced their abuser, and that they should now fully and freely support unsupervised visitation with the same dangerous person. Contrary to popular belief, children of batterers can be at just as much risk psychologically, sexually, and even physically after the couple splits up as they were when the family was still together. In fact, many children experience the most damaging victimization from the abuser at this point.

Most people assume that a fit mother never loses custody. If only that were true. The American Judges Association reports that "Studies show that batterers have been able to convince authorities that the victim is unfit or undeserving of sole custody in approximately 70% of challenged cases." Unfortunately, the state of Kansas’s current laws also says that none of these people can be held accountable, either.
And so we go on, handing down family violence from one generation to the
next...

KMFCJ-founded by Claudine Dombrowski,a Protective Parent and survivor of Domestic Violence and systemic abuse. The goals of KMFCJ is to publish informed news releases, links and commentaries relating to protective parents and their children who continue to be victimized by the abuser and or the court system.
www.AngelFury.org

Kansas Mothers For Custodial Justice BLOG|Breaking the Silence: Children's Stories-Abusers getting custody

KANSAS

CLAUDINE DOMBROWSKI CASE, Shawnee County, Kansas. Claudine lost custody of her baby daughter to the man who did this, thanks to Judge James P. Buchele, who refused to permit adequate testimony at trial, shortening it to benefit his docket, and also ordered Claudine to move back to Topeka to live near the man who did this, for the sake of their "co-parenting." WHAT?! He is a man with multiple criminal convictions for violent behavior (Battery, Attempted Battery, Battery of a Law Enforcement Officer, Obstruction of Legal Process, Possession of Marijuana and violation of Open Container law), a man who has beaten and raped Claudine multiple times before and after her divorce from him, a man who has threatened to kill her and her child.
Worse, Judge Buchele also ordered Claudine not to call the police any more without the permission of her case manager. When Judge James Buchele retired, Judge Richard D. Andersonaffirmed Buchele's previous orders, including the illegal prohibition on Claudine's being able to call the police.
Guardian ad litem Scott McKenzie deserves a substantial portion of the credit for this travesty. I ask, how in hell can this happen in the United States of America?

The following is from Stopfamilyviolence.org Please visit there site.

Claudine Dombrowski - Kansas

Claudine was a psychiatric LPN. Now she is disabled and though a cane is medically indicated, she continues to be mobile on her own. The father owns his own business in Topeka. The abuse started when she was four months pregnant when she found out he was married to another woman. The child was already 11 months old before they were married in late 1995. Four months after marrying, the father filed for divorce in March 1996. In May 1996, mother asked for permission to move with the child to another city in Kansas because of the closing of a hospital where she worked. She had obtained employment in the other city and it would help her escape from his unremitting violence. Permission to move was granted. Four days later, father filed to change custody of the child to him.

During the course of the litigation, he admitted hitting Claudine and that it was a reason for her to leave the home but claimed it was not the reason she left every time. He admitted he told her to leave, pushed her out of the home, and paid no child support. He admitted to twisting her leg and scratching her face. According to her, he beat her 2 - 3 times a week. He pointed and cocked a shot gun at her while she was feeding the baby. He cut up her military uniform. He beat her when the baby dirtied the house. She was kicked out, locked out and would leave 3-4 times a week to escape the violence. Often she was gone for 2-3 weeks to maintain her safety and that of the child. Though she had a perfectly valid reason to leave and was in fact protecting the child, court personnel later used that to claim she would hide the child and therefore he should have custody.

In one incident, he hit her in the head so severely she required 14 internal stitches and 14 external stitches. When the court questioned the parties about this on the stand, the judge was far more worried about where it happened and who was telling the truth than the admitted and verifiable fact that he did hit her in the head with an object that left that much damage. Whether he hit her in the head with a big stick in his driveway or he hit her in the head with a tire iron in her apartment – he hit her in the head resulting in severe injury. The judge however lectured both parties about lying. See Exhibit 1 for photos of the petitioner after beatings by the child’s father.

While the father admitted the abuse, he claimed it was mutual combat. However not only did she have a protection order against him, but the man has eight criminal convictions - three convictions for domestic violence against her, a conviction for a bar fight, a conviction for assaulting a police officer, a conviction for obstruction of justice, one for possession of marijuana and one for driving under the influence. Pursuant to his various convictions, he was ordered to attend alcohol treatment – he didn’t. He was ordered to a psychiatric evaluation – he didn’t go. He was ordered to anger management classes but was asked to leave because of his inappropriate behavior. Domestic violence professionals know that anger management is not a suggested treatment modality for domestic violence perpetrators.

Court personnel not only were blind to the violence, they were completely ignorant of safety issues for the mother and child. Dr. Bernie Nobo, a licensed social worker, testified that it was a volatile situation. He actually had to stop the father from assaulting the mother in a meeting. Still he said there was no danger to the child but suggested she might hide to protect herself. In fact, that would be a very sensible thing to do. He diagnosed her as primarily depressed and the father as adjustment disorder with mixed emotional features (depression or anxiety). Not only is depression a reasonable response to the situation, but as a social worker, he is not qualified to make such diagnosis. Nobo did say her parenting was fine and he recommended supervised visitation to father.

The court services officer knew of the domestic violence and in fact listed it as the biggest concern. But rather than deal with the perpetrator, she suggested that the child should be put into foster care – thereby punishing the child who would lose a perfectly good loving and protective mother and would punish the mother for being a victim of abuse. The officer claimed the mother was a risk to run though she admitted she had never had any trouble contacting her. The officer was more concerned that the father have access to the child than the safety of the child or the mother.

Kansas statutes require joint custody unless there is a reason for sole and the GAL recommended custody to father because he lived near the court while mother had moved out of town (with the court’s permission) and he wanted to keep this child near the other three step-children from other marriages of the father. The GAL never talked to the mother or child, to the day care or the child’s physician nor did he do a home study. The GAL said the violence was so far fetched he didn’t believe it though he only knew of one conviction for DUI and never talked to the battered women’s shelter. Astonishingly, the GAL recommended the mother go to anger management classes.

On April 17, 1997 during a settlement conference, the mother was stunned by her own attorney suggesting she agree to a joint custody arrangement with a man she knew to be extremely dangerous. Her lawyer and the judge threatened the mother that he would grant sole custody to the father because allegedly she would not work together with him. This of course completely discounts the impossibility of working with a man as violent as this perpetrator. Though admitting that the violence lessened when she moved away, the judge said he would give shared custody only if she moved back to Topeka where the father lived and where the violence occurred. Forcing her to resettle in Topeka near the perpetrator, a routine practice of family courts, is the state forcing her directly into danger. It is a violation of the fundamental rights of life, safety and to be free from torture and other maltreatment. Essentially the court required the mother to give up her right to life and safety for custody of child. She did. Only to lose custody as well. She agreed to the settlement only to change attorneys and file a motion to set aside four days later.

In 1998, the child's doctor reported the child had very poor hygiene when staying with father. The day care provider reported a change in her behavior after being with the father. She became either withdrawn or aggressive. A nurse requested an investigation of psychological abuse because of his treatment of the child.

On 31 July 2000, without any motion from either party and without a hearing, the judge simply issued an order that the mother had to relocate to Topeka if she wanted any possibility of obtaining custody. She did so but then in August, the judge ordered the child to remain with the father. In December 2000, supervised visitation was ordered for mother because she had allegedly returned the child late to the fathers over Christmas. They suspended all contact for several months and then she was allowed two hours a week supervised. The bizarre behavior of the courts was evident from as early as 1998 when they granted a divorce twice as evidenced by their own records – April 17 and October 28, 1998.

At the time of this filing, the mother had supervised visits once a week after having had no contact for 10 months based on an ex parte order without an evidentiary hearing issued 3 February 2004. At time of this filing, the mother had last seen the child on 15 April 2007 for one hour.

Over these 11 years of litigation, the judge was changed several times. One judge limited each side to five witnesses at trial and then continued to call them liars when they could not prove what they had said or disprove what the other had said because they were prohibited from calling witnesses. While the judge chastised the father for game playing in the court, he then berated the mother for not coming to agreement with the father. He could see how unreasonable the father was and the judge was not subject to violence from the man but yet he blamed the mother for not reaching an agreement. He said any child in this situation would grow up damaged but then blamed the mother rather than the father who was the one committing the violence. The judged focused on the mother’s move to escape the violence rather than the harm of the violence itself. The court excluded evidence of his extensive criminal record, medical records and other records of violence. In addition to mother, other witnesses knew of the violence and that the child witnessed it. But still the court saw no danger to the child.

In spite of an order of protection against the father and his eight criminal convictions, three against her, one judge said it was mutual violence and besides she provoked it. He said there was no evidence that the father mistreated the children and ordered joint custody and both parties to anger management. She was ordered not to call law enforcement about the father without getting permission of the case manager. In other words, he could assault her freely and she was not allowed to even call the police. She was told to stop gathering evidence against the father. In March 2005, she was ordered not to file any more motions in the court without permission from the case manager – she had filed a motion to remove that case manager. In other words, she was even denied access to the court.

ex parte order without an evidentiary hearing issued 3 February 2004. At time of this filing, the mother had last seen the child on 15 April 2007 for one hour.

The complete failure of the court to protect the victim continued after father received custody. When she complained that the father forced her to have sex if she wanted to see the child, the case manager said that it was just part of co-parenting so deal with it.

She appealed twice to the Supreme Court of Kansas. In the appeal, she alleged not just for herself but that the policies and procedures of the Kansas courts denied the right to a full and fair hearing, denied equal protection and due process, and violated fundamental rights. She first filed in 1997, the appellate court affirmed the lower court in 1998 and the Supreme Court rejected review in 1999. She appealed again in 1999 and again the appellate court affirmed the lower court in 2000.

In July 2002, mother again regained unsupervised visitation.

On 25 August 2003, Claudine was attacked with a hammer and her arm broken by Kathleen Sales. Sales later admitted she was paid by the father who assured her no charges would be filed. They weren’t.

On 3 February 2004, false allegations were made against mother that she sought to have harm done to the father. The mother objected to the order and asked for an evidentiary hearing. The request was never even heard. By March 2005, mother had only supervised visitation that has remained to this day.

In March 2002, Dr. Dale did an evaluation for unsupervised visits with mother and recommendation for therapy. The evaluation cost $5,000 and father admitted violence and the mother was found not to be any danger to the father or child. She was however ordered to shut down her web site that she had constructed. On the website she expressed her opinion and her facts about the case and the danger the child was being put into by the court. In a second order later, she was ordered to remove the child’s photo from another website. After this evaluation, she had unsupervised visitation from May 2002 until 3 February 2004.

Repeatedly when father files motions, they are heard with negative consequences for mother and child based on the flimsiest of evidence or none at all. But when mother files motions, they are never even heard. A home study ordered into the father’s home in February 2006 was never done. On 14 April 2006, the court held a conference in chambers and refused to allow the mother to attend. The court changed the orders from a home study of father to a study of mother to assess her risk to the child. The evaluation found no risk and was positive for mother. Still supervised visitation was not changed.

In a hearing on 10 April 2007, the mother has asked yet again that the child be protected from abuse and at least she have unsupervised visitation. Again the court refused. The child spoke out in 2003 and three CPS reports have been filed but in all three, they claimed that the mother coached the child who is now 12 and certainly able to speak for herself and punished both mother and child by restricting visitation time further. The lesson is clear – don’t report abuse.

The latest in Claudine's own words except we remove the child's name per court order.

The written testimony that you have was filed at the inter American commission human rights known as Dombrowski v us 2007 For the Policy and procedure of Family/Juvenile Courts routinely placing battered mothers children with abuser and pedophiles. The Court’s record is complete, as well as a simple Google search of my name for any more information and court records on this case alone are available as they are to massive to even begin to present.

My name is Claudine Dombrowski, I am a US Army Veteran. I was a psychiatric nurse for thirteen years with the state of Kansas and the VA. Until December 2000 when I was placed on 100% physical disability related to violence inflicted by the batterer.

In May of 1996 I was given permission to relocate to western Kansas to avoid the unremitting violence that I and my daughter suffered at the hands of the batterer, this was after I had been beaten with a crow bar, by an admitted and convicted batterer.

In July 200o without any motion from any party the Judge simply on his own issued a 11 page Order by ‘snail mail’ giving complete custody of my 6 year old daughter to a man known to have a violent drug and alcohol addiction past.

In a hearing on 10 April 2007, the mother has asked yet again that the child be protected from abuse and at least she have unsupervised visitation. Again the court refused. The child spoke out in 2003 and three CPS reports have been filed but in all three, they claimed that the mother coached the child who is now 12 and certainlyable to speak for herself and punished both mother and child by restricting visitation time further. The lesson is clear – don’t report abuse.

In May 2007, I was enrolled automatically into the states Address confidentiality program Safe at home- a program administered by the secretary of state for victims of Domestic Violence-thereby protecting at least my address from the Abuser and the Courts by proxy.

In June 2007 the courts denied my daughter to see her grandmother for the last time (in supervised vists) related to her terminal illness- Grandmother had made her last trip to Kansas with child’s dog to say good bye to all her grandchildren- all except child ; however they did allow the dog to visit child.

November 4^th 2008 The courts denied child to go to her grandmothers funeral. And further gave the batterer complete control in allowing mother to see child under the strict supervised visitation that had been implemented this past 11 years.

October 2009 Claudine spoke on a local television station regarding Domestic Violence. The next day, she was held in contempt of the court and her rights to see her daughter have been suspended.

I have never been shown to be a threat or harm to my daughter- yet for the last 11 years I have not been able to see her past the confines of extremely structured supervised visits at best when I have been allowed to see her. There are numerous psychiatric reports on the courts file that state that I am not a threat or harm to my daughter quite contrary to that of the well documented violence and substance abuse of the perpetrator.

Then points to add in: to the written testimony are the illegal 2000 custody switch after a 6 year litigation.

Keeping in mind that the this man had 8 criminal convictions of violence

· 2000 custody switch

· My mother was denied to see her granddaughter for her last visit as her health would preclude any future visits- my child in 2007- they did let the dog however

· In fall 2008 my mother died Rikki was not allowed to go to funeral

· Last week attys called DC iachr

· Abusers has 8 criminal convictions et el

· Ten years in SUPERVISED visits

Current order of the Courts and my sentence for contempt Dec 16^th reads.

11/13/2009

MISC. Petitioner in person and by Don Hoffman. Respondent in person and by Robert E. Duncan, II. G.A.L., Jill Dykes, in person. Court Reporter: Digital Div. 13. Matter comes before Court on Respondent's motion for unsupervised visitation and Petitioner's motion for contempt. Parties have agreed that motion for contempt will be deferred pending Petitioner's locating and removing all referenced items to the minor child on the internet. Matter to be reset if disagreement between the parties about removal of items referring to minor child and her likeness from internet. Court interview minor child - no record per agreement of the parties. Court suspends parenting time of Respondent due to Respondent's continued use of her website and the internet to publish photographs of minor child and statements reference minor child. Court will entertain motion to reinstate parenting time once Respondent deletes all photographs and likenesses of minor child, any reference to minor child on her website and the internet, agree not to discuss Court proceedings with minor child and not to discuss divorce with minor child. Review set for December 16, 2009, at 10:00 a.m. T. Duncan to do JE. DBD

Click for court documents

Click for Breaking the Silence

Men’s Murderous Revenge

2011-04-13T10:10:00.001-05:00

It’s Not Angst Over Custody: Fathers Kill Their Children to Punish Their Ex-Partners

Men’s Murderous Revenge. It’s not angst over custody: fathers kill their children to punish their ex-partners. SEE: 175 Killer Dads: Fathers who ended their children's lives in situations involving child custody, visitation, and/or child support (USA)

Since Arthur Freeman was found guilty of murdering his four-year-old daughter, Darcey, much of the media focus has been on the distress of fathers going through separation and custody disputes. There has been a call for more support for fathers. See Federal Fatherhood Funding.

However, we must ask ourselves whether we are losing sight of the victims and, more importantly, whether this is the best approach to preventing these deaths from occurring in the future.

While the community understandably struggles to comprehend a parent killing a child, our research shows that these are not inexplicable tragedies. There is a particular type of filicide (the killing of children by parents) that occurs in the context of the separation of the parents.

In these ”spousal revenge” cases – as recognised by the Freeman jury – fathers kill their children to punish their ex-partners. There is usually no prior violence against the children. In fact, they appear to love their children. The act of killing is directed towards harming the child’s mother. The motive is revenge.

In the case of Freeman and Robert Farquharson (found guilty of three counts of murder of his sons Bailey, Tyler and Jai, aged two to 10, who drowned in a dam near Winchelsea), both fathers indicated that they wished to punish their ex-partner. Shortly before killing Darcey, Freeman told his ex-wife to say goodbye to her children and that she would never see them again – clearly to make her suffer. Farquharson told a friend that he would make his ex-wife suffer by taking what mattered to her most – her children.

Contrary to some claims, these cases are not about fathers losing access to their children. The reality is that in both cases, the fathers had access to their children and, in both cases, killed them during it. There is no logic to the thinking that if a person is distressed about not spending enough time with their kids they would decide to kill them.

If, however, they are consumed with anger and hatred towards their ex-partner and wish to hurt them, then it is, tragically, a very effective means to do so.

The killing of the children in such cases should be recognised as a form of violence against the mother. We need to explore the relationship between the parents in order to understand the killing of children. In particular, the father’s attitudes and behaviour towards the mother before, and after, separation must be examined. VicHealth has clearly identified the underlying causes of violence against women as including belief in rigid gender roles and a masculine sense of entitlement.

What we really need to challenge is the sense of entitlement that some men have over their families, an entitlement that leads them to believe that their partner has no right to leave them and no right to form a new relationship, and that punishing her is justified because of the suffering they themselves experience.

The current focus of commentary suggests that men are victims of the family law system. The mothers seem to be implicitly blamed for the distress their partners experienced when they left them.

Let’s be clear: the first and foremost victims here are the children whose lives are taken. The mothers, whose children have died in perhaps the worst way imaginable, are also the victims, as are remaining siblings and other family members. Darcey Freeman’s mother, Peta Barnes, had expressed concerns about the safety of her children before Darcey’s death. She also expressed concerns about Arthur Freeman’s ”anger management issues” and mood swings. It is important that such concerns are heard and responded to appropriately by a broad range of professionals coming into contact with separating parents, as well as by family and friends.

The family law process must make children’s safety its absolute priority. Importantly, the federal government has a family law bill before Parliament that prioritises the safety of children in family law matters.

The Domestic Violence Resource Centre Victoriaacknowledges that separation and family breakdown can be incredibly difficult for parents. Parents should be assisted to deal with separation and encouraged to take responsibility for their behaviour. As a community, we need to focus on building positive and respectful relationships.

We support the call for greater services and support. We ask that these services be equipped to identify and respond to risks to the safety and wellbeing of children and their parents. We need to ensure there is accurate and reliable screening and risk assessment for all forms of family violence. These cases demonstrate that the risk of harm to children is closely linked to risks of harm to the mother.

Cases such as Freeman’s have a profound impact on the community and we are right to search for answers. Unfortunately, there has been very little research on parents who kill their children in the past decade in Australia. If we are to find ways to prevent these deaths, we need a far better understanding of why and how they occur.

Dr Debbie Kirkwood is a researcher at the Domestic Violence Resource Centre Victoria and is writing a paper on filicide in the context of parental separation.

My mom, Caroline Marie Rice, was arrested on Monday. This was the third time she had been arrested…I watched the arrest, trying to hold back my tears.

2011-04-10T19:34:00.001-05:00

Open to possibility http://opentopossibility.blogspot.com/

Click on this link to donate money to help get my mom out of jail and to get her false charges removed

Click here to donate on PayPal to the Rice Children Foundation

The Oak Tree

2011-03-17T16:14:00.001-05:00

by Johnny Ray Ryder Jr

A mighty wind blew night and day

It stole the oak tree's leaves away

Then snapped its boughs and pulled its bark

Until the oak was tired and stark.

But still the oak tree held its ground

While other trees fell all around

The weary wind gave up and spoke.

How can you still be standing Oak?

The oak tree said, I know that you

Can break each branch of mine in two

Carry every leaf away

Shake my limbs, and make me sway.

But I have roots stretched in the earth

Growing stronger since my birth

You'll never touch them, for you see

They are the deepest part of me.

Until today, I wasn't sure

Of just how much I could endure

But now I've found, with thanks to you

I'm stronger than I ever knew.

Sham in Shawnee County (Topeka, Kansas) Claudine Dombrowski and her daughter Rikki.

2011-02-20T16:39:00.001-06:00

Sham in Shawnee County (Topeka, Kansas)

Sham in Shawnee County (Topeka, Kansas) The last time I did court watch for protective mother CLAUDINE DOMBROWSKI, I called my subsequent posting on the experience "Showdown in Shawnee County." See the post here:

http://dastardlydads.blogspot.com/2010/02/showdown-in-shawnee-county-we-finally.html

I can't even call the hearing held on October 19, 2010 a showdown. It was just a sham.

Let's do a little review. Claudine is a battered mother who lost custody of her only daughter in an ex parte hearing in 2004. (Ex parte means the mother wasn't even represented at the hearing.) Since then, she has had very little visitation. The hearing in January 2010 (see post above) was supposed to fix that. And finally, Claudine was awarded two hours of unsupervised visitation on Sunday and telephone contact twice a week. We figured it was a start.

Well, this was not to be. And not because of anything Claudine did.

As Claudine testified, visitation went well. She taught her now teenage daughter to drive. They shopped. They went to Barnes and Noble. They talked about girl stuff. Boy stuff. Just like any other mother and daughter. In fact, Claudine was able to enjoy her first mother's day with her daughter in ten years. There were no negative interactions. In fact, it looked like some serious healing was going on.

And in that lays the problem. You see, abusers and their enablers don't like healing. They find that supremely threatening to their power and control. So of course, the process must be stopped lest their domination of the child and the overall "situation" be compromised.

So in May 2010, all visitation stopped at Dad HAL RICHARDSON's personal discretion--which he admitted during his own testimony. He made the unilateral decision that he would no longer take his daughter to the law enforcement center for visitation (presumably at her "request"--but more on that later.) He made sure that during the times of designated phone contact, the phone was never answered as it was set on fax. (Dad admitted under oath that the phone does go to fax mode when not answered--though he denied "inhibiting" phone access, which is not surprising. But then, how did Mom know to testify that the phone was set on fax when she called? Oh those little details....) But of course, Dad didn't exactly encourage or welcome contact either--that much was evident. In fact, it was pretty clear to me that he was extremely negative about Claudine, and doing his best to crush any contact between her and her daughter.

But like many abusers, he projected his own motives onto the child, now a teenager. SHE was the one who was "uncomfortable." She was the one who was "afraid." Afraid of what? Physical abuse, sexual violence? No, there was no evidence of that beyond vague innuendos about "fighting" that allegedly occurred in the distant past (These innuendos weren't even brought up in January. Must be a new game plan.)

Apparently we are supposed to believe that this teenage girl is "afraid" because Mom allegedly doesn't "follow the rules." What rules? Apparently the court's rules regarding discussion of this case.

All this was echoed by Guardian ad Litem JILL DYKES. And once again, just as in January, Ms. Dykes didn't even feign professional neutrality in this case, as she literally sat at Daddy's elbow the whole time.

Are you kidding me? The typical teenager would blow off a parent's attempt to discuss court matters--ASSUMING any such discussion took place, which Claudine denies. They certainly wouldn't be "afraid" of such a discussion. Annoyed perhaps. But not "afraid" or traumatized. This is just classic projection. That this teenager is such a hothouse flower that she is somehow irreparably injured by any possible or potential references to her parents' legal issues, which I'm sure she already knows all about anyway. Nonsense.

I would humbly suggest that it is Hall Richardson and his enablers who are "afraid" of any possible open or frank discussion of this case. Or any contact between this mother and daughter. And their little "feelings" shouldn't play any part of this.

Under Kansas law, visitation isn't shut off because somebody is "uncomfortable" for vague and specious reasons. If that were the case, then controlling and manipulative parents would be cutting off access for whatever reason they dreamed up that day.

Unfortunately, given the dynamics of domestic violence, children who are in the control of abusers often find it necessary to parrot what the abusers want for their own survival. Which makes if very difficult for this child to speak up and articulate what she wants--except in private to her own mother.

And frankly, this ordeal shows a complete double standard. Were this a custodial mother blocking visitation for such vague and specious reasons, she would no doubt be labeled as an "alienator" with "parental alienation syndrome" (PAS). And the situation would be addressed immediately--either visitation would be enforced by the courts or the mother would lose custody all together. But I digress.

So no visitation from May to the present. But this actually was a minor issue as far as the court was concerned.

No, once again our major concern was Claudine's political activity. The players in Shawnee County are very upset with how well known this case has become (my last blog posting on this case had readers as far away as Australia.) And they are blaming Claudine for all of it, even though when pushed, Judge DAVID DEBENHEIM fiercely denied that he was trying to "stomp" on Claudine's first amendment rights. (Huh. Could have fooled me.)

But even in cases where OTHER bloggers like Nancy Carroll at Rights for Mothers had discussed this case (http://rightsformothers.com/), Claudine was blamed. In fact, the opposing attorney submitted into evidence printouts from NANCY's blog to show that Claudine was out of compliance with their gag order. Message to the Hoffmans: Nancy is not Claudine. I'm not Claudine either, for that matter. And you can't shut us up.

And honestly, did the Hoffmans really have to embarass their employee like that? They trotted out a young and painfully ignorant employee of theirs to "testify" about Claudine's "alleged" facebook and twitter activities. This fresh-faced young woman--no more than a high school graduate with a few "computer" classes--earnestly told us that every posting and link on somebody's facebook page had to personally "approved" and/or "posted" by that person. Yes, dear friends. She did say that. And meant it too, so far as I can tell. I won't give her name, though it's in my notes. I refuse to further humilate her. But honestly, your great aunt Rose probably knows more about facebook than this girl.

So the significance of this was what? There are supposedly "references" to her case on Claudine's facebook page! Oh the horror! And you know what? This blog may very well end up with a link on Claudine's facebook page, too--through an automatic feed mechanism. It will go straight to facebook--even when Claudine is sleeping or brushing her teeth. Or sitting in court. Because you know what? Claudine is a well networked activist with probably hundreds of facebook friends working on issues related to child abuse, domestic violence, human rights, and family court reform. Many of us have discussed this case before. Just as we have discussed many other cases like this one, where the courts have backed up the abuser and shut out or ignored the protective mother. And for your information, you'll find articles and links about those cases as well.

And all this policing of Claudine's personal and political activities on the internet is particularly hypocritical when you consider the following: Attorney JASON B. HOFFMAN and GAL JILL DYKES had no qualms about violating professional ethical boundaries and becoming facebook "friends" with this child! (I saw the screen shots.) Mom can't even post a photo of her daughter per court order, but these folks feel free to do as they like. Not that the judge was interested in this matter at all. Big surprise there.

And this is the crux of the matter. What the court in Shawnee County REALLY doesn't like is that--as they put it--this lady "has a cause." Or she has "become a cause." They don't like the "venom" (i.e. the truth) that has come out about this case, and the attention it has received nationally and even internationally. They don't even like Claudine's facial expressions! (Yes, the judge made a point of addressing this. "You are your own worst enemy!" he thundered at Claudine--apparently over some grimace or frown that I didn't see.)

So make sure you never show anything but a happy face in front of Judge Debenham, even when you are possibly losing all contact with your only child!

Claudine is supposed to hear later this afternoon what the court's decision is--after her daughter will presumably be allowed to speak her mind with the judge. But of course, she can't really speak her mind--not as long as she's a minor and dependent on her father.

We are not optimistic as to the outcome.

But you know what? In a little over two years, this girl ages out of the system's control over her life. Perhaps then, real change will come about. Abusers and their enablers often win the battles. But they seldom win the war. That puts off any real healing in this case for another two years.

But at least it's something to hope for.

Continue reading at NowPublic.com: Sham in Shawnee County (Topeka, Kansas) | NowPublic News Coverage http://my.nowpublic.com/world/sham-shawnee-county-topeka-kansas#ixzz1EXbxjvG1

Sen. Scott Brown, a perplexing connection -- ‘The message coming through is when males complain of abuse it's real and different from females who are crazy liars.’

2011-02-20T16:02:00.001-06:00

http://www.boston.com/bostonglobe/editorial_opinion/oped/articles/2011/02/20/for_brown_a_perplexing_connection/

JOAN VENNOCHI

For Brown, a perplexing connection

In light of his sexual abuse revelation, why did he back Jeff Perry?

SENATOR SCOTT Brown’s revelations about a childhood that included sexual assault by a summer camp counselor are genuinely sympathy-inducing.

But, they also make you wonder: in light of this searing experience when he was 10, how could Brown endorse Jeff Perry, the Republican congressional candidate, who, in 1991, allegedly stood by as a 14-year-old girl was sexually assaulted by a fellow police officer?

The victim, Lisa Allen, came forward during the race that Perry ultimately lost and said that Perry “had to hear my screaming and crying. Instead of helping me, Jeff Perry denied anything happened.’’

It’s an eerie echo of the personal trauma Brown reveals in his book, “Against All Odds.’’ As he tells “60 Minutes’’ correspondent Lesley Stahl, he never went to police or any authority — and told no one, not even his mother — because his abuser told him: “If you tell anybody, you know, I’ll kill you. I will make sure that no one believes you.’’

Adds Brown in the interview that will be aired tonight: “When people find people like me at that young vulnerable age, who are basically lost, the thing that they have over you is, they make you believe that no one will believe you.’’

Despite his own horrific experience, Brown still chose to believe Perry over Allen; or, if he didn’t believe him, he still backed him for an important political position. Given that Brown is the father of two daughters, his loyalty to Perry was always curious. The revelations in his book make it even odder. In response, Brown said there is “no correlation’’ between his story and Allen’s and it is “really inappropriate’’ to link them.

Brown’s candor about his own past won instant praise from victims of child sex abuse and their advocates. It sends a powerful message to others who suffered abuse, they said.

Five years ago, Brown was among supporters of a state bill that extended the period of time in which a victim of sex abuse could file charges against a perpetrator. He called sexual abuse the “number one public safety issue affecting us here in the Commonwealth,’’ according to the State House News Service. He also cosponsored a federal bill that would limit the ability of those convicted of sex abuse from working in a variety of settings. When Brown was running for US Senate, he and Democratic opponent Martha Coakley said they would ask Cardinal Sean P. O’Malley to release the names of all priests in the archdiocese who were credibly accused of sexual abuse. (Only one legislator, former state senator Marian Walsh, called for Cardinal Bernard F. Law to be prosecuted when the clergy abuse scandal rocked the Boston Archdiocese.)

Brown’s book is perfectly timed, from both marketing and political standpoints.

His dramatic disclosures overshadow those of Governor Deval Patrick, whose new book, “A Reason to Believe,’’ addresses race issues and his wife’s depression. And Brown’s book puts the Massachusetts senator back in the spotlight just as talk about the 2012 Senate race starts heating up.

Brown’s tough childhood was a general part of the narrative when he won the Senate seat held for decades by Ted Kennedy. But his pickup and semi-nude Cosmopolitan photo spread got most of the attention.

In his book, which goes on sale tomorrow, he also reveals that it took two photo shoots to get the famous 1982 centerfold. The first time, “I looked pale and I wasn’t physically toned; I probably needed to lose 10 pounds,’’ he wrote. When he returned after a crash diet of three cans of tuna a day, “I was bronzed and toned.’’

Even Brown’s glamour shot has an “everyman’’ story behind it, leading to this question for Massachusetts Democrats: can anyone beat Brown?

Democrats still find it hard to accept that Kennedy’s seat went to a Republican who brilliantly rechristened it “the people’s seat.’’

Now, Brown will be collecting new accolades for bravery. Given Patrick’s tome, it’s hard to tag him as uniquely opportunistic.

Million Mom March Mother's Day 2011 in Washington DC

2011-02-15T19:47:00.001-06:00

http://www.facebook.com/pages/Million-Mom-March-Mothers-Day-2011-in-Washington-DC/153380204718360?sk=info

1st Annual 2011

Location

1600 Pennsylvania Avenue

20500

About

Mothers, Expecting Mothers, Future Mothers UNITE

Description

Mothers across the nation are losing rights to abusive men in custody situations. Mothers that have no criminal, drug or violent history have been stalked in family courts across taking their children from them. We are going to converge on DC and make sure Obama does NOT fly over our protest as he did Mother's Day 2010.

General Information

AMPP is a social movement seeking justice and accountability within the family court system which includes DHHS/CPS, psychologists and other so called experts.

We as mothers demand CITIZENSHIP and our Rights to our Children. We demand that our children not be used as pawns by our abuser in a custody dispute. We demand that Mothers and Children be equally protected against court ordered visitation with an abuser. We demand that Mothers and Children be given the same rights, privileges and voice that the abuser gets in family courts!
We demand that our President take action now as can no longer afford to be silent and we won’t. We demand the same "rights and freedoms" to which all humans are entitled. Behind the closed doors of the dirty little secret of the family court system, thousands of women each year lose child custody to violent men who beat and abuse Mothers and Children. Family courts are not family-friendly and betray the best interests of the child. Until Mothers and Childrens voices are heard we will never shut up, give up or go away! (read less)

Mission

1st Annual Million Mom March!
WE NEED ALL MOTHERS TO STAND UP FOR THEIR VOICE TO BE HEARD BY OUR GOVERNMENT! WE ARE MAD AS HELL AND WE ARE NOT GOING TO TAKE IT ANYMORE!

CONTACT:

http://americanmotherspoliticalparty.org/

COME ON!!!

Custody Battle: Father Charged in stabbing deaths of his tow young sons

2011-02-12T17:21:00.001-06:00

By George Mathis and Tim Eberly

The Atlanta Journal-Constitution

http://www.ajc.com/news/gwinnett/father-charged-with-murder-836349.html

The father of two young boys stabbed to death in their home also stabbed himself and tried to blame the murders on the current boyfriend of the boys' mother, Gwinnett police said Saturday.

Enlarge photo

Gwinnett County jailElvis Noe Garcia-Nelasco, 23, is charged with murder in the stabbing death of his two children.

More Gwinnett news »

On Saturday, Elvis Noe Garcia-Nelasco, 23, was taken into custody and charged with murder in the Wednesday deaths of Bradley Garcia, 3, and Edward Garcia, 1.

Antonio Cardenas-Rico, 28, initially faced murder charges, but had them dropped once police attention shifted to Garcia-Nelasco. However, Cardenas-Rico remained inGwinnett County jail on drug charges. Both men are believed to be in the country illegally.

On Wednesday, police answered a 911 call at 1110 Bridle Path Drive in the Huntington Falls subdivision near Lawrenceville and found the badly wounded boys in a basement. A third boy, Bradley's twin, 3, was in critical condition, and was airlifted to Children's Healthcare of Atlanta. He remains in critical condition.

Garcia-Nelasco and his former girlfriend were fighting over custody of their three sons, according to police reports obtained Friday by The Atlanta Journal-Constitution.

The man, who had not legally established paternity, said he wouldn't return the sons to their mother because of his drug activity concerns involving her and her current boyfriend, Cardenas-Rico.

On Feb. 2, Garcia-Nelasco had approached Gwinnett Countypolice and filed a complaint that indicated Cardenas-Rico had threatened his life.

Following the stabbings, Garcia-Nelasco ran across the street and, referring to Cardenas-Rico, screamed at his neighbor, "He killed my children!" Suffering from stab wounds himself, Garcia-Nelasco was transported by ambulance to Gwinnett Medical Center.

The neighbor, Lewon Thomas, said Garcia-Nelasco entered his garage "with a hole in his chest," and talked to a 911 operator on a cellphone.

"He wanted me to go back and see what happened," said Thomas, who went to the house accompanied by another neighbor. "It was horrific."

When reached by phone Saturday, Thomas said he was "shocked" to learn that the man who came to him for help has now been charged with murder.

"Oh wow," he said. "That is so sad."

Thomas added that the news was "just disappointing." He said he never would have guessed that Garcia-Nelasco was lying to him about what happened.

"There was no indication whatsoever," he said. "That was the farthest thing from my thoughts."

It’s All About the Power and Control, I Mean the Kids Part 1 (of Likely 3)

2011-02-08T17:03:00.001-06:00

It’s All About the Power and Control, I Mean the Kids

Everyday we all hear about or read about divorcing couples fighting over who gets the kids. Fighting over their own children like they are some sort of property to be traded back and forth. There are many people that believe ALL mothers should always have custody with very little to no visitation for fathers; and likewise there are those out there that believe the opposite, ALL fathers should get custody and mothers should get little to no visitation.

Personally I don’t see how so many people can see this issue in such black and white terms. Not ALL mothers are good parents and not ALL fathers are good parents. For the most part the daily news will show us that most child abuse and child murders are committed by fathers, and yes, occasionally by mothers. This still doesn’t prove that ALL fathers are bad or good or that ALL mothers are bad or good.

In the last few years I have learned more about the Father’s Rights Movement, and I can say that I’m more than a little shocked at what I’ve learned. The Father’s Rights Advocates would have everyone believe that they are just concerned for fathers as a whole having shared or joint custody. They would have us believe that their number one concern is actually the children in divorces and custody cases. On the surface if one doesn’t dig too much that sounds wonderful.

However, when looked at further it is easily seen what the real agenda is for the Father’s Rights Movement. The further abuse and victimization of their ex-wives and children. Before I go any further here, I’d like to point out that I fully believe that good fathers have

sought out the assistance of the Father’s Rights Movement and one of two things happens... they either leave, frustrated and still alone in their plight OR they become enmeshed in the bitterness which abounds.

What I see out of Father’s Rights Advocates around the internet appears to be mostly just a bunch of men (and a few women that will do anything to get the attention or have a little power for themselves) who have been abusive in one way or another to the mother of their children and now feel that comfy rug of power and control being ripped from under their feet.

What better way to continue to abuse and control your victim when they walk away than to take possession of their children?

One main reason that I’ve formed the opinion that I have of the Father’s Rights Movement is because only abusers would look at the news we see of fathers murdering and abusing their kids and deny that it happens, or make excuses for it happening. The strict adherence to the ‘ALL fathers should have custody’ line that they feed everyone is the basis of my opinion that the majority of those in the movement are abusers grasping at keeping the power and control they had.

Here is an example, mind you... this is only one search, but there are many like this.

VISITOR ANALYSIS

Referrer
http://www.google.com/m?q=do wifes come back after losing custody?&start=20&sa=N

Search Engine Phrase
do wifes come back after losing custody?

Search Engine Name
Google

Search Engine Host
www.google.com

Host Name
74-82-64-35.rdns.blackberry.net

IP Address
74.82.64.35 [Label IP Address]

Country
United States

Why would someone look for this? Other than because they are contemplating attempting to gain custody through the Family Court just to get their ex-wife back under their power. This doesn’t sound like a man who loves his kids and wants the best for them, this sounds like a man who loves control and will use whatever means available to him to maintain or re-gain his power and control.

I never meant for this to be this long, so I will wrap this up by saying... not ALL men should have access to their children regardless of what the FR Advocates say. Likewise, I can admit that not ALL women that give birth are the best parent choice either. The natural equipment that we are born with which enables us to create life does NOT dictate how a person will be as a parent.

Since it is obvious that I have much more to say about this... there will be other posts on this subject.

It’s All About the Power and Control, I Mean the Kids - Part Two

2011-02-08T15:38:00.001-06:00

“Better to write for yourself and have no public, than to write for the public and have no self.” ~ Cyril Connolly (1903-1974)

It’s All About the Power and Control, I Mean the Kids - Part Two

Ok, so with that thought in mind I move on to part two of this topic, and oh yes there will be a part three... just don’t you worry.

As I was saying in part one, the people who make up the Father’s Rights Movement may not have started out where they have ended up. They originally may have been honestly good fathers and what they have morphed into is the result of many abusers jumping onboard and running away with the movement.

Along these lines the men in the FR Movement have touted and tried to throw in the face of all women (feminists, non-feminists, mothers and every one really) a quote from Gloria Steinem... attempting to ‘prove’ that even SHE sees their side of it, that fathers need to be equal in parenting... FR’s go on with that thought regardless of whether or not the father is abusive.

The quote I’m referring to is: “Women can't be equal outside the home until men are equal in it.”

As far as I can find Gloria Steinem actually said this sentence twice, once in an interview published in the NY Daily News and once in an article she wrote which was published in the Opinion Section of the LA Times. The LA Times article is no longer available but I found the article copied here, so that I can still reference it.

In both cases the FR Movement refuses to take the quote in the context of what she was actually saying. Taking shit out of context is one of my biggest pet peeves and in this case shows how totally twisted they have actually gotten it.

In the interview, which was for the occasion of her 75th birthday, she was speaking in a general sense of women’s equality. What she actually said was:

“We’ve demonstrated that women can do what men do, but not yet that men can do what women do. That’s why most women have two jobs — one inside the home and one outside it — which is impossible. The truth is that women can’t be equal outside the home until men are equal in it.”

In the article she wrote for the LA Times she was speaking about Sarah Palin running for VP. What she actually said was:

Being a hope-a-holic, however, I can see two long-term bipartisan gains from this contest.

Republicans may learn they can't appeal to right-wing patriarchs and most women at the same time. A loss in November could cause the centrist majority of Republicans to take back their party, which was the first to support the Equal Rights Amendment and should be the last to want to invite government into the wombs of women.

And American women, who suffer more because of having two full-time jobs than from any other single injustice, finally have support on a national stage from male leaders who know that women can't be equal outside the home until men are equal in it. Barack Obama and Joe Biden are campaigning on their belief that men should be, can be and want to be at home for their children.

She wasn’t saying that men should be equal in the home, thus supporting fathers being caregivers to young children then turning around and abusing them because they are not equipped to handle it. What she is saying is that women have TWO jobs, which are impossible to juggle from a man’s point of view... but that women do it everyday.

Yes, she does state that Obama and Biden were campaigning on their belief that men should, can and want to be home for their kids. She did NOT say she supports that... she specifically used the words “their belief”.

So, Father’s Rights Activists.... I ask you this, where exactly does Gloria Steinem say you should be allowed to stay home and not work while your children’s mom does and pays you child support to abuse your kids? I must have missed that.

I still stick to my opinion that most of those in the FR Movement are abusers trying to cram their ideological patriarchal power and control down everyone else’s throats.

SAY NO - UNiTE to Stop Violence Against Mothers And Their Children

2011-02-08T09:00:00.001-06:00

Please go to link below sign in and SAY NO-UNiTE To End Violence Against Women AND THEIR CHILDREN.

Stop Violence Against Mothers And Their Children

As many are aware, there is a silent genocide occurring against women. This is part of a major reason why women all over the world are united to end violence against women. What many do not know or connect is that a lot of women experiencing violence perpetrated against them are also mothers. Many ads on stopping violence against women portray women without children as a means to get the message across clearly; but they fail to represent the large proportion of mothers in this situation.

Experts in intimate partner violence have noted that there is a high correlation between abuse and pregnancy. Some scholars state that this is because they are envious of the relationship between the mother and the child. Using violence, coercion and control is often part of the effort to destroy these bonds. The problem then exacerbates when a mother tries to leave--often not to save herself but to save the child. Leaving is one of the most dangerous times for all women enduring intimate partner violence, and, accompanied with an inadequate system, the odds are stacked against her. With a community plagued by stereotypes on child custody cases, closed courtrooms and loopholes in laws compounded by pop-psychology, we have a situation where most mothers in this predicament are torn away from the children they tried to protect. In the 1980s, Dr Richard Gardner coined the term, “Parent Alienation Syndrome”. This term remained a term only, because most of the scientific community rejected it. His literature promoted ideas that victims of abuse were mentally ill and deliberately raised concerns about the abuse as an act of hate. Dr Richard Gardner also testified in a homicide case where a mother was shot 13 times. Gardner claimed that her “alienating behavior” drove him to kill her. Although the scientific community rejected Parent Alienation Syndrome, the legal community embraced it. Carefully removing the word "syndrome", the belief set remained. Whilst his work began in US, he traveled around the world promoting these ideas to court professionals and others who had a direct influence on child custody case outcomes. Some organizations that offer training for judges even held workshops on “maternal gate-keeping”, which trivialized the experiences of women and children leaving intimate partner violence. Whilst Dr. Gardner passed away several years ago, his doctrine lives on and others have polished up his work to continue its grave influence upon the legal community.

Mothers are often subjected to degrading treatment within the courtrooms where they are forced to deny their experiences and their need to survive and protect--or they will face jail. All legal avenues within this culture are blocked. This is why we have a battered mothers custody conference where mothers, professionals and young people unite to end violence against women and children through the system. It is why I traveled all the way from Australia to be there this year amongst others who have also traveled from other parts of the globe to attend. It is a global issue that affects many. This year, Holly Ann Collins, the first American to receive asylum in Netherlands, spoke about her ordeal. Revered by many as a brave mother who, against all odds, was able to save herself and her children. She was listed and hunted by US as an abductor even though they knew why she ran. She arrived at the airport with a suitcase of evidence which led to her being granted asylum. She was hard on herself because she did not do it sooner. Whilst leaving with the children under these circumstances should be seen as the best thing to do, there is no legal avenue to do so. Some laws and treaties appear from the surface to have some consideration of women and children experiencing violence, but the processes, culture, economics and ambiguity of the situation stifle opportunities to do so. Holly Ann Collins' outcome is a rare one. We need better laws that protect mothers and children from violence without punishment or further victimization.

SPONSORED by UN MOTHERS

CONTACT INFORMATION

Name: UN Mothers

Title: Advocate

Email: smith@ssl-mail.com

OTHER PARTNERS

American Mothers Political Party

Australian Mothers Political Party

Battered Mothers Custody Conference

VIOLENCE AGAINST WOMEN: YOUR HEALTH IS AFFECTED

2011-02-07T08:14:00.001-06:00

VIOLENCE AGAINST WOMEN: YOUR HEALTH IS AFFECTED

A report out by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services on the Women’s Health website details the effects of violence on women. Here is an excerpt of the report…an excerpt I found particularly interesting because it discusses women that abuse children. This is enlightening to discover this:

Impact on children

Violence against women can also impact children. About 50 percent of men who assault their wives also physically abuse their children. Also, women who are abused are more likely to abuse their children. And children can be injured during violence between their parents. Studies show children who witness or experience violence at home may have long-term physical, emotional, and social problems. They are also more likely to experience or commit violence in the future. Protect your children by getting help for yourself.

Common physical injuries and health problems from violence include:
• Increased risk of sexually transmitted infections (STIs) and HIV, which can lead to pelvic inflammatory disease and a higher risk of cervical cancer
• Unwanted pregnancies, or rapid, repeat pregnancies
• Miscarriages and other reproductive problems
• Vaginal bleeding or pelvic pain
• Injuries such as bruises, cuts, broken bones, or internal damage
• Back or neck pain
• Chronic pain syndrome
• Trouble sleeping and nightmares
• High blood pressure or chest pain
• Arthritis
• High stress and lowered immune system
• Central nervous system problems, such as headaches, seizures, or nerve damage
• Respiratory problems, such as asthma and shortness of breath
• Digestive problems, such as stomach ulcers and nausea

To download a copy of the report, which discusses a wide range of overall health effects for being a victim of domestic violence, please click here.

Topeka Kansas Courts Have Continued Abuse Of Claudine Dombrowski and her Daughter Rikki Dombrowski

2011-02-04T09:48:00.001-06:00

This is an truly incredible story that should never have happened in America.
Parts of the Kansas Judicial system should be disciplined for how it has victimized Ms. Dombrowski, who was an abused mom.

KS Appellate -- KS Supreme Court Briefs in reference to the Documented Violence of Hal Richardson and the Kansas Courts.

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Testimony by Claudine Dombrowski at the hearing of the Kansas Joint Committee on Children's Issues on Nov 30, 2009 in Topeka

Podcast Powered By Podbean

Rest of article from the Kansas Watch Dog here:
http://kansas.watchdog.org/2010/compelling-stories-about-problems-with-placement-and-removal-of-children/

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Dombrowski v. United States, #66407 – Petitioner

INTERNATIONAL AMERICAN COMMISSION ON HUMAN RIGHTS Entire Petition here: http://www.stopfamilyviolence.org/pages/308

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Shawnee County Case Docket.

http://www.shawneecourt.org/doe/search.jsp?caseNumber=96d217&first=&middle=&last=&mob=&yob=&location=internet

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10^th Federal Court District

(This will be re filed and updated to 2011)

Dombrowski v. Richardson et al

Filed: May 11, 2009 as 2:2009cv02250

Plaintiff: Claudine Dombrowski

Defendants: Hal Richardson and Shawnee County District Court

Presiding Judge: District Judge John W. Lungstrum

Referring Judge: Magistrate Judge David J. Waxse

Cause Of Action: Diversity-Personal Injury

Court: Tenth Circuit > Kansas > District Court

Type: Civil Rights > Plaintiff

Plaintiff:	Claudine Dombrowski
Defendants:	Hal Richardson and Shawnee County District Court

Case Number:	2:2009cv02250
Filed:	May 11, 2009

Court:	Kansas District Court
Office:	Kansas City Office
County:	Shawnee
Presiding Judge:	District Judge John W. Lungstrum
Referring Judge:	Magistrate Judge David J. Waxse

Nature of Suit:	Civil Rights - Other Civil Rights
Cause:	28:1332 Diversity-Personal Injury
Jurisdiction:	Diversity
Jury Demanded By:	Plaintiff

=======

Claudine Dombrowski: An abused mom victimized again by the Kansas Courts

Posted in Children, Kansas Government by kansaswatchdog on December 4th, 2009

Claudine Dombrowski: An abused mom victimized again by the Kansas Courts

Read details in written statement.

This is an truly incredible story that should never have happened in America.

Parts of the Kansas Judicial system should be disciplined for how it has victimized Ms. Dombrowski, who was an abused mom.

Instead of quotes from the audio, please consult these pages that document Dombrowski’s long and difficult battle to protect her daughter:

Claudine Dombrowski Photos of Abuse

As you view these photos keep in mind that the court awarded FULL CUSTODY of their daughter to the “man” who did this to Claudine.

Courts Have Continued Abuse of Manhattan Women, Manhattan Free Press, July 12, 2001.
Manhattan resident fights custody battle for daughter, Kansas State Collegian, July 26, 2001.

State Rep Bill Otto: “No crime? You haven’t been guilty of anything? This is a court order that says you can’t go to any school functions?”

“I was under court order till 2004 to not even call the police after I was being beaten because … I was not ‘co-parenting’”

Dombrowski: “These friends of the court make recommendations to the judge. The parents … don’t have a right to see these documents. They do this behind closed doors.”

Otto: (To Secretary Jordan): “You have no rights as a parent …?”

Secretary Don Jordan: “This would be something extreme … I’m not familiar with the situation.”

Otto: “Can a judge do that? … Is that legal… ?”

Jordan: “Under the right circumstances … I hesitate to speculate.”

Sen. Roger Reitz: “This is something that only … the judicial system can really answer … It would be helpful … to have someone … representing the judicial system … to give us some ideas how this could happen.”

Dombrowski: “When you are a victim of domestic violence, and suddenly there’s a child involved, the typical …. power of control is that ‘I’ll take your children from you’. They will and they can the way the laws are setup.” …

“I was told that I’m not to talk to my daughter about the violence. That’s why I don’t see her. That’s why I see her supervised. He was criminally convicted. “

“When women try to get away from people who hurt them … I heard somebody say it’s really hard to believe you won’t call the police … I tell people not to contact the police, because as soon as you walk into court with a DV (domestic violence) and children, you’re already cutting your throat. You will lose your children. That’s the way it is right now.”

“… on the 16th of this month I’ll probably go to jail for breaking the gag order and talking about [being the victim of] violence as it relates to my case.”

Reitz: “… someone ought to be able to deal with this in a way that would address her problem. It doesn’t seem like we’ve done the right thing with regards to this little niche of the law.”

Dombrowski: “The criminal convictions are completely tossed aside and they don’t have any bearing on the family court … The eight criminal convictions that my ex had before getting custody of my daughter were completely dropped [in family court]“

Chair Kiegerl: “I cannot believe that abuse is totally ignored. I cannot believe you can prohibit a person from speaking about their own case.”

“The one thing [where] … I disagree with you is abuse should always be reported.”

State Rep Peggy Mast (R-Emporia): “Domestic violence is a control issue. Sexual abuse is a control issue. Is there any correlation between domestic violence and sexual abuse? Why is that not something that is considered when we take someone to [family] court that has a history of domestic violence?”

Dombrowski: “Yes. That is something I’ve asked myself for 16 years. … It comes back to the family court that has a veil of immunity. … They don’t fully understand the impact of the violence. What battered women have … if they report the abuse, then they’re failing to protect their child … if they don’t report the abuse, they’re still failing to protect their child. So, both ways, they’re going to lose their children …”

For anybody who abuses their wife … [from] a 1996 presidential task force … there is a 70% increase that those children will be abused and/or sexually abused after there’s been battery with the mother.

Sen. Oletha Faust-Goudea: “In 2004 …. I talked with the homicide department in Sedgwick County…. During that time there had been 21 homicides in Sedgwick County and 18 were due to domestic violence …”

“A lot of women do make those phone calls and unfortunately, sometimes it ends in their death.” …

“I want to apologize to you for being treated like a pedophile … not being able to go to a music concert.”

“I commend you for what you’re doing.”

Dombrowski: “I have not talked to my daughter in 10 years [except] for the confines of supervised visits. I’m not allowed to talk to her about anything. All she knows is what her dad has told her.”

See this video: Abused Mom Wants Unsupervised Visits with Daughter

Listen to Claudine Dombrowski:

Podcast Powered By Podbean

COURTS CONTINUE ABUSE OF BATTERED MOTHER

http://www.kansas.net/~freepress/7-12-01-8.html

By Jon A. Brake

Manhattan Free Press

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.

To Claudine Dombrowski it is not beautiful, that is her daughter, six-year-old Rikki on the couch behind the threatening coffee table. If a coffin coffee table is not enough, a hunting rifle hangs on the wall above the couch.

Claudine, a Manhattan resident, was divorced from Hal Richardson in Shawnee County District Count in 1997. She had been a repeat victim of Domestic Violence and a repeat victim of the State Court System.

What does the Court System think of the coffin coffee table? In a letter to Shawnee County District Court Division Two Judge Richard D. Anderson, Harry Moore, with the Court Services stated: "When I was at the house, I did not recognize anything which in my experience resembled a child's coffin. After looking at the picture and speaking with Mr. Richardson, I have come to find out that it is indeed a coffin and that it was an antique which he purchased in Mexico several years ago and uses as a coffee or end table of sorts."

What about the rifle? Mr. Moore said, "There is also a secured hunting weapon hanging on Mr. Richardson's wall. The thing which is striking about this specific issue is that it contains a remarkable leap of logic. For instance, I am the owner of a 7.9 mm Mauser rifle which was the standard issue firearm for the German soldier in World War II. This weapon was procured by my father who served in Europe during the war. This weapon also hangs on the wall in my rec room. Does my ownership and display of this firearm lead one to the conclusion that I am a Nazi?"

The question Mr. Moore failed to answer is: "Is it a leap of logic for an abused woman to see the child's coffin and the rifle as more than furniture? Is there a message to the mother? The Shawnee District Court has missed many messages when it comes to the violence in this case.

When reading Court documents it is clear that attorneys have intentionally muddied the waters. It was a nasty divorce, those things happen. Eight or more attorneys, three different Judges and several Court Service workers have filed motion after motion. In the end a Judge wants to compel a dysfunctional family to be normal. It can't be done.

Halleck (Hal) Richardson and Claudine Dombrowski lived together for several months before they were married on November 22, 1995. Divorce papers were filed four month later. By this time records show Hal Richardson had abused Claudine and he had Domestic Battery and Criminal Damage to property convictions.

Hal had seven other convictions before 1995. The convictions were for Battery, Attempted Battery, Battery of a Law Enforcement Officer, Obstruction of Legal Process, Possession of Marijuana and an Open Container conviction.

Most of the Probation Conditions were never followed up on by court officials. After the Domestic Battery conviction, Hal was ordered to attend an "Alternatives to Battering Program" put on by the Battered Women Task Force in Topeka. A few of the comments made on Hal's report were: "Client rude and disrespectful to female co-facilitator as evidenced by his combative stance, his repeated interruptions, his sexist language and his refusal to accept any responsibility."

Another report stated: "Client very disruptive during group, this was evidenced by the fact that he interrupted the facilitator repeatedly by making rude comments, laughing and telling inappropriate sexist jokes."

And finally: "Called PO (probation officer) and client to tell them that he had graduated as far as I was concerned. He only has 17 sessions, but is causing too much trouble with his mouth. Terminated, with cause. Will not be accepted back."

The divorce proceedings were extended for eighteen months. Throughout the proceedings Claudine's attorneys filed numerous reports claiming violations of the restraining order and requesting an order to sever contact between Hal, Claudine and daughter Rikki.

The first involved an incident that both parties agreed in court happened, they just could not agree what happened. Claudine said she was hit in the head with a crow bar and Hal said it was a piece of wood. What ever he hit her with it took 24 stitches to close the head wounds.

At a hearing on June 17, 1996 Shawnee County District Court Judge Jan W. Leuenberger signed order giving custody of Rikki to Claudine and authorizing her to move to the Great Bend area so that "Ms. Dombrowski could avoid the history of physical and verbal abuse she had suffered from Mr. Richardson."

Hal was given supervised visitation.

As in many divorce cases the Judge on November 5, 1996 appointed Mr. Scott McKenzie, Attorney at Law, to serve as Guardian ad Litem to appear on behalf of Rikki. Mr. McKenzie was very experienced in juvenile court proceedings with more than 1,000 cases but this was only his sixth Guardian ad Litem. Under Mr. McKenzie direction visitation terms were worked out to where Claudine would keep Rikki for three weeks and then Hal would have her for a week.

Before the Divorce Trial started a new Judge took over. Judge James P. Buchele replaced Judge Leuenberger.

It is about this time the Court and Court appointed case workers attitude changed. Judge Buchele saw that fifty people were being called as witnesses for the trial. He placed a limit of five for each side. This can be done but it can cause problems. Court documents state: "These limits made it difficult or impossible for Ms. Dombrowski to bring in all of the witnesses to corroborate here clams." During the trial the Judge would not allow hearsay evidence but the proper witness was not there to testify.

At trial Mr. McKenzie indicated, "after reading the police reports of the violence, and the doctor's reports, he was not able to validate any of the truth of any of the accusations of violence made by Ms. Dombrowski."

When asked about Mr. Richardson's criminal history Mr. McKenzie recalled only a single offense for driving under the influence of alcohol, and was unaware of the misdemeanor convictions including the domestic violence battery against Claudine. He was unaware of a misdemeanor battery for a bar fight and the battery of a law enforcement officer.

Records of the Battered Women's Task Force had never been reviewed by Mr. McKenzie. Even thou Claudine had received support from the facility. In a report to the court Mr. McKenzie had recommended anger management therapy for Claudine but not for Hal.

In Judge Buchele's Orders after the trial he made it clear that he wanted more from this couple than what was possible. Here is what he wrote: "Mutual parental involvement with this child has been made worse by Ms. Dombrowski's unilateral decision to move to Larned, Kansas in May of 1996. The distance between Topeka and Larned makes it virtually impossible for an individual treater to work with the family; for Mr. Richardson to have regular and frequent contact with this child; to establish any reasonable dialogue between the parents toward resolving their conflicts. The move from Topeka to Larned, due to the proximity of the parties, has lessened the physical violence. It has, however, done violence to the relationship of Rikki and her father. If long distance visitation is continued, in the Court's view, will take its toll not only on Rikki but each of the parties. The Court specifically finds that separation of the child from either parent for long periods of time is harmful for a child of about three years of age."

He then went on to require Claudine to move back to the Topeka area.

And then Judge Buchele made a judgment that some Manhattan attorneys say is not legal. Judge Buchele ordered: "Further, respondent (Claudine) is directed to not call law enforcement authorities to investigate the petitioner (Hal) without first consulting with the case manager."

On December 14, 2000 after returning her daughter to her fathers home Claudine alleges that she was battered and raped by Hal. Under order not to call law enforcement authorities and with bleeding that would not stop, she drove to St. Marys, Kansas to get treatment. Claudine knew that if she had gone to a Topeka Hospital they would have called the police.

In St. Marys hospital officials did contact the Pottawatomie Sheriff and a report was made. She was advised that because the alleged event occurred in Shawnee County she would have to file there. Claudine said that because of the battery and rape she picked up Rikki the next day and did not return her. The Shawnee County Sheriff's Department was called and took Rikki back to Topeka. The court gave Hal custody and orders for her to attend Topeka schools.

As it stands now, Rikki is with her father in Topeka. Claudine gets two one-hour visits per week. The child will go to school in Topeka unless a new motion, which will be filed this week, is granted. The motion will request that Claudine be given custody and Rikki be allowed to attend school in Manhattan.

This case has received national attention by the National Organization for Women; the Judicial Initiative Commission Hearing by the Citizens for Good Judges and it was told to the Kansas Justice Commission in 1997.

A new Judge will be hearing the motion. Judge Richard D. Anderson took over the case on the retirement of Judge Buchele. But, unless Claudine receiveds help from Kansas citizens, the abuse will continue. In July of 2000 Judge Anderson reaffirmed all of Judge Buchele's previous orders. Evan the order to not call law enforcement authorities

Webmaster Note: You can contact Judge Richard D. Anderson at (785) 233-8200 ext. 4350

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Americans For Prosperity and Kansas Judges

http://www.patrioticthunder.com/localissues.html

The lady (Claudine Dombrowski)

in this picture was violently beaten by

Hal Richardson, the father of her baby and ex-husband. Now Hal Richardson isn't exactly going to win any father awards this year for this, and his criminal record keeps growing (Battery, Attempted Battery, Battery of a Law Enforcement Officer, Obstruction of Legal Process, Possession of Marijuana and violation of Open Container law.)

Shawnee County Judge James P. Buchele refused to permit testimony in this case because his docket was full. If that wasn't bad enough, Claudine was ordered by this Judge to move back to Shawnee County so Hal Richardson could be closer to her daughter and ordered her not to call the police when dealing with her husband, all calls had to go through her case manager first. Allegations of death threats, rape and the killing of her daughter were what the Judge was not letting get into testimony. Outrage, to say the least, read the harrowing account of a lawyers outrage in this matter here.

Okay, enough already, that last story is just wretched.

First off, ask yourself this question, do judges make bad decisions? Of course they do, just like anyone who makes a choice does. To be fair, judges make all kinds of decisions everyday that can effect you and I detrimentally as the reason your seeing the Judge. The problem isn't the Judges, it really lies with the criminal justice system in itself. Is it a perfect system, of course not, not everyone is going to agree on the outcome. However, the Judges need to police each other. Now we know, there is a state agency for that, but seriously, how many District Judges have been removed in Kansas from the Bench? One, and it was so long ago Kansas records can't even remember what he was removed for. Now if a Judge does make a bad decision as clearly stated in the cases above, should he/she be able to correct that decision, or are they to high and mighty to correct their injustice after they have had some time to reflect? Some would say that's what the court of appeals are for, but why, come on, why does it have to even go to something like that?

Common sense says if you rape a little girl or beat the hell out of your wife you shall get punished for that in a severe matter. However, the law states otherwise, and the list of outrage goes on.

More Here

legal briefs here: KS Appellate -- KS Supreme Court Briefs

Mothers of Lost Children Rally at the Whitehouse February 13th, 14th, 2011 - SAVE THE DATES

2011-02-02T06:48:00.001-06:00

SAVE THE DATES

Sunday February 13, 2011

Mothers of Lost Children will hold a vigil at the

White House, 1600 Pennsylvania Ave NW,

Washington DC from 2:00 to 4:00 pm.

Monday February 14, 2011

We will hold a press conference and rally at the

U. S. Department of Health and Human

Services, 200 Independence Ave SW from

11:00 am to noon, then march to the U.S.

Senate to ask again for Congressional Hearings.

More information: cppa001@aol.com

American Mothers Political Party

SAVE THE DATES

Sunday February 13, 2011

Mothers of Lost Children will hold a vigil at the

White House, 1600 Pennsylvania Ave NW,

Washington DC from 2:00 to 4:00 pm.

Monday February 14, 2011

We will hold a press conference and rally at the

U. S. Department of Health and Human

Services, 200 Independence Ave SW from

11:00 am to noon, then march to the U.S.

Senate to ask again for Congressional Hearings.

More information: cppa001@aol.com

American Mothers Political Party

Family Court Mafia: AMPP Mothers Are Coming For You!

2011-01-28T23:44:00.001-06:00

We are mad as hell and we aren't going to take it any more!!

http://AmericanMothersPoliticalParty.org/

AMPP—Back from the 8th Annual Battered Mothers Custody Conference 2011.This is the year of the child.

Until Mothers and children’s voices are heard—We will NEVER shut up- We will never Give up—And we will NEVER Go AWAY

Court Whores – Your Days are Numbered!

www.BatteredMothersCustodyConference.org

Rikki Dombrowski: Don’t Give Up – Love, Hope and Empowerment—The Sham in Shawnee County (Topeka, Kansas)

2011-01-28T17:25:00.001-06:00

Your Mother Claudine Dombrowski Loves you and she is here for you when you can finally break free. She has not given up, she will not shut up and she will not go away!

“Granny died and her grand-daughter was not allowed to attend her funeral.”

“This tribute video was made– for three generations lost—destroyed by the Family Courts.”

“Granny, Mom and Rikki three hearts united across the universe and above and beyond the Shawnee County Courthouse MAFIA.”

Rikki Dombrowski– Run Like The Wind http://rightsformothers.com/2010/08/2…
"DANGEROUS" CLAUDINE DOMBROWSKI ATTENDS DOMESTIC VIOLENCE RALLY: DOES SHE FACE JUDICIAL RETALIATION AGAIN http://rightsformothers.com/2010/10/2…

Hope Love Power and enlightenment

Rikki, Granny, Mom ,apos;Dont give up apos; Love power ... - Google Video - Motore di ricerca video Truveo - Watch more Videos at Vodpod.

I am a thousand winds that blow,

I am the diamond glints on snow,

I am the sun on ripened grain,

I am the gentle autumn rain.

When you awaken in the morning’s hush,

I am the swift uplifting rush

Of quiet birds in circled flight.

I am the soft stars that shine at night.

Do not stand at my grave and weep

I am not there; I do not sleep.

Do not stand at my grave and cry,

I am not there; I did not die.

by, Mary Elizabeth Frye

Sham in Shawnee County (Topeka, Kansas)

http://www.nowpublic.com/world/sham-shawnee-county-topeka-kansas

Sham in Shawnee County (Topeka, Kansas) The last time I did court watch for protective mother CLAUDINE DOMBROWSKI, I called my subsequent posting on the experience "Showdown in Shawnee County." See the post here:

http://dastardlydads.blogspot.com/2010/02/showdown-in-shawnee-county-we-finally.html

I can't even call the hearing held on October 19, 2010 a showdown. It was just a sham.

Let's do a little review. Claudine is a battered mother who lost custody of her only daughter in an ex parte hearing in 2004. (Ex parte means the mother wasn't even represented at the hearing.) Since then, she has had very little visitation. The hearing in January 2010 (see post above) was supposed to fix that. And finally, Claudine was awarded two hours of unsupervised visitation on Sunday and telephone contact twice a week. We figured it was a start.

Well, this was not to be. And not because of anything Claudine did.

As Claudine testified, visitation went well. She taught her now teenage daughter to drive. They shopped. They went to Barnes and Noble. They talked about girl stuff. Boy stuff. Just like any other mother and daughter. In fact, Claudine was able to enjoy her first mother's day with her daughter in ten years. There were no negative interactions. In fact, it looked like some serious healing was going on.

And in that lays the problem. You see, abusers and their enablers don't like healing. They find that supremely threatening to their power and control. So of course, the process must be stopped lest their domination of the child and the overall "situation" be compromised.

So in May 2010, all visitation stopped at Dad HAL RICHARDSON's personal discretion--which he admitted during his own testimony. He made the unilateral decision that he would no longer take his daughter to the law enforcement center for visitation (presumably at her "request"--but more on that later.) He made sure that during the times of designated phone contact, the phone was never answered as it was set on fax. (67 Direct Contempt's Dad admitted under oath that the phone does go to fax mode when not answered--though he denied "inhibiting" phone access, which is not surprising. But then, how did Mom know to testify that the phone was set on fax when she called? Oh those little details....) But of course, Dad didn't exactly encourage or welcome contact either--that much was evident. In fact, it was pretty clear to me that he was extremely negative about Claudine, and doing his best to crush any contact between her and her daughter.

But like many abusers, he projected his own motives onto the child, now a teenager. SHE was the one who was "uncomfortable." She was the one who was "afraid." Afraid of what? Physical abuse, sexual violence? No, there was no evidence of that beyond vague innuendos about "fighting" that allegedly occurred in the distant past (These innuendos weren't even brought up in January. Must be a new game plan.)

Apparently we are supposed to believe that this teenage girl is "afraid" because Mom allegedly doesn't "follow the rules." What rules? Apparently the court's rules regarding discussion of this case.

Are you kidding me? The typical teenager would blow off a parent's attempt to discuss court matters--ASSUMING any such discussion took place, which Claudine denies. They certainly wouldn't be "afraid" of such a discussion. Annoyed perhaps. But not "afraid" or traumatized. This is just classic projection. That this teenager is such a hothouse flower that she is somehow irreparably injured by any possible or potential references to her parents' legal issues, which I'm sure she already knows all about anyway. Nonsense.

Under Kansas law, visitation isn't shut off because somebody is "uncomfortable" for vague and specious reasons. If that were the case, then controlling and manipulative parents would be cutting off access for whatever reason they dreamed up that day.

Unfortunately, given the dynamics of domestic violence, children who are in the control of abusers often find it necessary to parrot what the abusers want for their own survival. Which makes if very difficult for this child to speak up and articulate what she wants--except in private to her own mother.

And frankly, this ordeal shows a complete double standard. Were this a custodial mother blocking visitation for such vague and specious reasons, she would no doubt be labeled as an "alienator" with "parental alienation syndrome" (PAS). And the situation would be addressed immediately--either visitation would be enforced by the courts or the mother would lose custody all together. But I digress.

So no visitation from May to the present. But this actually was a minor issue as far as the court was concerned.

No, once again our major concern was Claudine's political activity. The players in Shawnee County are very upset with how well known this case has become (my last blog posting on this case had readers as far away as Australia.) And they are blaming Claudine for all of it, even though when pushed, Judge DAVID DEBENHEIM fiercely denied that he was trying to "stomp" on Claudine's first amendment rights. (Huh. Could have fooled me.)

But even in cases where OTHER bloggers like Nancy Carroll at Rights for Mothers had discussed this case (http://rightsformothers.com/), Claudine was blamed. In fact, the opposing attorney submitted into evidence printouts from NANCY's blog to show that Claudine was out of compliance with their gag order. Message to the Hoffmans: Nancy is not Claudine. I'm not Claudine either, for that matter. And you can't shut us up.

And honestly, did the Hoffmans really have to embarrass their employee like that? They trotted out a young and painfully ignorant employee of theirs to "testify" about Claudine's "alleged" facebook and twitter activities. This fresh-faced young woman--no more than a high school graduate with a few "computer" classes--earnestly told us that every posting and link on somebody's facebook page had to personally "approved" and/or "posted" by that person. Yes, dear friends. She did say that. And meant it too, so far as I can tell. I won't give her name, though it's in my notes. I refuse to further humilate her. But honestly, your great aunt Rose probably knows more about facebook than this girl.

So the significance of this was what? There are supposedly "references" to her case on Claudine's facebook page! Oh the horror! And you know what? This blog may very well end up with a link on Claudine's facebook page, too--through an automatic feed mechanism. It will go straight to facebook--even when Claudine is sleeping or brushing her teeth. Or sitting in court. Because you know what? Claudine is a well networked activist with probably hundreds of facebook friends working on issues related to child abuse, domestic violence, human rights, and family court reform. Many of us have discussed this case before. Just as we have discussed many other cases like this one, where the courts have backed up the abuser and shut out or ignored the protective mother. And for your information, you'll find articles and links about those cases as well.

And all this policing of Claudine's personal and political activities on the internet is particularly hypocritical when you consider the following: Attorney JASON P. HOFFMAN and GAL JILL DYKES had no qualms about violating professional ethical boundaries and becoming facebook "friends" with this child! (I saw the screen shots.) Mom can't even post a photo of her daughter per court order, but these folks feel free to do as they like. Not that the judge was interested in this matter at all. Big surprise there.

And this is the crux of the matter. What the court in Shawnee County REALLY doesn't like is that--as they put it--this lady "has a cause." Or she has "become a cause." They don't like the "venom" (i.e. the truth) that has come out about this case, and the attention it has received nationally and even internationally. They don't even like Claudine's facial expressions! (Yes, the judge made a point of addressing this. "You are your own worst enemy!" he thundered at Claudine--apparently over some grimace or frown that I didn't see.)

So make sure you never show anything but a happy face in front of Judge Debenham, even when you are possibly losing all contact with your only child!

We are not optimistic as to the outcome.

But you know what? In a little over two years, this girl ages out of the system's control over her life. Perhaps then, real change will come about.

Abusers and their enablers often win the battles. But they seldom win the war. That puts off any real healing in this case for another two years.

But at least it's something to hope for.

Continue reading at NowPublic.com: Sham in Shawnee County (Topeka, Kansas) | NowPublic News Coverage http://www.nowpublic.com/world/sham-shawnee-county-topeka-kansas#ixzz1CN6yB4FW

Claudine Dombrowski and the love for her Daughter Rikki Dombrowski – Fly High Fly Free--- they can not chain the wind, no matter how hard they try.

Parental Alienation: It Is About "A Uterus, Divorce Papers and Bruises"

2011-01-27T15:47:00.001-06:00

Cathy Meyer of the Huffington Post – a pro abuser and pro pedophile used the title

Parental Alienation: It's About More Than "A Uterus, Divorce Papers and Bruises"

to once again Diminish Domestic Violence, protect the abusers, and pom-mom ra-ra for the psycho quacks like Dr. Richard Warshak who make a profit pushing this dangerous child and mother killing yet highly profitable ‘theory’ —

Sadly after the few articles that are factual in content get published as with below article – and Cathy Meyer -- in response to – article as titled above--as is the trend with mainstream media. http://huff.to/dXUDKG -- Huff post really goes all out to protect these abusers, pedophiles and killers. HuffPo should be disgraced—but they are not.

So Cathy Meyer and HuffPo --here’s to you and your inept journalistic skills—fortunately there are other and better bloggers.

Parental Alienation and Domestic Violence

by Joan Dawson

“I hope there’s more cases just like this, where people don’t want to let their spouses see their kids…I hope it happens more and more, until the law finally says you know what? There needs to be something done so these parents can be with their kids.”

These were the words fired by Randall Todd Moore as he denied having “not one ounce of remorse” for kidnapping, sexually assaulting and killing his ex-wife.

But was his ex-wife ‘alienating’ the kids, as Moore alleged, or trying to protect them from danger?

This case is clear, but as those working in domestic violence and child abuse realize, all too often clarity comes at a price.

Parental alienation (PA, or PAS for Parental Alienation Syndrome), a topic pro-PA psychologist Richard Warshak recently covered on Huffington Post, alleges a parent poisons the mind of a child to fear or hate the other parent. The defamation results in a damaged relationship or estrangement.

Those opposing parental alienation admit parents can bad-mouth the other parent either deliberately or inadvertently; however, factors such as poor parenting skills or personality on the part of the mother or father and stages of normal development or reactions to divorce on the part of the child can also cause alienating behaviors.

Dr. Paul Fink, President of the Leadership Council on Child Abuse and Interpersonal Violence, and a former President of the American Psychiatric Association states, “Science tells us that the most likely reason that a child becomes estranged from a parent is that parent’s own behavior. Labels, such as PAS, serve to deflect attention away from those behaviors.”

More dangerously, parental alienation can mask domestic violence, child abuse and child sexual abuse. What is the difference between fearful or uncooperative battered women and alienating,” vindictive” mothers? If parents try to withhold access to children, are they alienators or protectors? If they try to provide evidence of abuse – interviews with psychologists, medical examinations or discussions with the child – are they gathering proof or further alienating the ex? What is the difference between alienated children and abused children?

The behaviors can be indistinguishable.

Indeed, it’s not just domestic violence survivors’ advocates who witness the problem with PA. The American Bar Association, American Prosecutors Research Institute, National District Attorneys Association, and the National Council of Juvenile and Family Court Judges all denounce the use of parental alienation in the courtroom. The National District Attorneys Association says on their Web site, “PAS is an unproven theory that can threaten the integrity of the criminal justice system and the safety of abused children.”

That hasn’t stopped courts from using PAS, resulting in accusations against individuals, mostly women, of maliciously denying access to children.

Katie Tagle, for instance, sought a restraining order on Jan. 21, 2010 against her ex-boyfriend Stephen Garcia to stop him from having unsupervised visitation with their nine-month-old child.

She told the judge Garcia threatened to kill the infant. The court transcript records Judge Robert Lemkau as saying, “One of you is lying,” and later, “Mr. Garcia claims its total fabrication on your part.” Garcia also referred to it as “little stunts and games” that she used to deny him access to his son.

Even when she tries to produce evidence of the threats, he says, “Well, ma’am, there’s a real dispute about whether that’s even true or not.” And finally, “My suspicion is that you’re lying” (said twice). He denied her the order (as did two other judges). Garcia took their son that day and drove off into the mountains. Ten days later, they were both found dead.
The transcript is here: http://www.scribd.com/doc/26434649/tagle-garcia-court-transcript-dent-protection-to-baby-now-bay-is-DEAD

This case clearly demonstrates another issue women have in courts: credibility. It’s easier to believe a woman is lying than to believe a man can abuse or kill a woman or child. In reality, in family court, denying abuse is more common than fabricating tales of abuse. Most allegations are made in good faith (see the American Bar Association’s 10 Custody Myths and How to Counter Them). And most denials are made by perpetrators, perpetrators skillful at manipulation – even of professionals.

Indeed, we must not forget family court is the place for couples with high conflict and abuse. The overwhelming majority (up to 90%) of couples create their own parenting plans. Those that cannot, go to family court.

Judges, though, have been known to downplay even well-documented cases of abuse and to give more weight to parental alienation than to abuse allegations. In the case of Jennifer Collins, for example, the judge told her mother to “get over” the abuse as at least two years had passed, according to Collins’ Web site. The judge reversed the custody decision because her mom’s fear was “interfering in his relationship with us.” Jennifer’s mother Holly took her two children and fled to the Netherlands, where they were granted asylum. (See also the Courageous Kids Network of children who were court-ordered into relationships with abusive parents.)

58,000 children a year go into sole or joint custody arrangements or unsupervised visitation with physically or sexually abusive parents, according to an estimate by the Leadership Council on Child Abuse and Interpersonal Violence. That’s over 1,000 children a week the courts place in harm’s way.

Giving custody to the supposedly alienated parent is one way to “solve” the problem of parental alienation. Jailing the mother is another.

Tiffany Barney and Joyce Murphy are two women who’ve been jailed; their cases were covered in the media. Both alleged child sexual abuse and neither were believed. Barney fought for five years, at times losing custody or having limited supervised visitation. Murphy was called “toxic” to her daughter and deemed the cause of the child fearing her father. She fled with her daughter. When found, she was jailed for felony abduction and later granted limited visitation. It wasn’t until three more girls came forward with molestation charges that her ex was finally the one jailed.

A few other cases making headlines include: Court Punishes Woman in Alienation Case; WI: Judge Jails Mother over Daughter’s Refusal to Visit Father and Judge Dismisses Abuse Allegations.

To sum it up, any behavior that does not promote access to children can be classified as parental alienation and punished with jail time or limits on/loss of custody. With this threat, parents are less likely to report abuse and more likely to share custody with an abuser.

It should also be noted that when violent partners make good on their threats to take the kids away, it’s referred to as domestic violence by proxy -a continuation of domestic violence – rather than PA or PAS. Some battered women who’ve lost custody use PA or PAS to describe their particular situation. This both minimizes the nature and scope of abuse women face and promotes the use of a dangerous weapon (PA/PAS) that can be used against them in court.

I wouldn’t hand an angry man a gun, nor would I readily hand over a legal strategy to potential pedophiles, abusers or killers. Yet that is exactly what PA/PAS is doing.

For more information, visit:

The Leadership Council on Child Abuse and Interpersonal Violence

Stop Family Violence

Center for Judicial Excellence

TONIGHT!! American Mothers Political Party Show- 5 PM CST, 6 PM EST -- CALL IN (347) 205-9977

2011-01-27T13:04:00.001-06:00

http://www.blogtalkradio.com/americanmotherspoliticalparty/2011/01/27/still-standing

Call-in Number: (347) 205-9977

Watch more Videos at Vodpod.

AMPP is a social movement seeking justice and accountability within the family court system which includes DHHS/CPS, psychologists and other so called experts.

We as mothers demand CITIZENSHIP and our Rights to our Children.
We demand that our children not be used as pawns by our abuser in a custody dispute.
We demand that Mothers and Children be equally protected against court ordered visitation with an abuser.
We demand that Mothers and Children be given the same rights, privileges and voice that the abuser gets in family courts!
We demand that our President take action now as can no longer afford to be silent and we won’t.
We demand the same "rights and freedoms" to which all humans are entitled.

Behind the closed doors of the dirty little secret of the family court system, thousands of women each year lose child custody to violent men who beat and abuse Mothers and Children.

Family courts are not family-friendly and betray the best interests of the child.

Until Mothers and Children's voices are heard we will never shut up, give up or go away!

Jennifer and Holly Collins Update: We found the visitation supervisor - Jim Seas!

2011-01-23T16:13:00.001-06:00

We found the visitation supervisor - Jim Seas!

Hello Everyone, I am so excited to tell you that we found him! We found the visitation supervisor from Katahdin Inc!
His name is James E. Seas from Minneapolis Minnesota.
In all fairness I want to give Mr. Seas a chance to explain his side of the story.

Maybe he was misdirected from someone from the family court & he was just doing his job.
I want to thank everyone for you help. I can’t believe how fast this moved.
At least I am one step closer to getting answers.
~Jennifer

Joan Dawson: Parental alienation and domestic violence

2011-01-20T16:07:00.001-06:00

Joan Dawson

Posted: January 20, 2011 02:36 PM

Parental alienation and domestic violence

"I hope there's more cases just like this, where people don't want to let their spouses see their kids...I hope it happens more and more, until the law finally says you know what? There needs to be something done so these parents can be with their kids."

These were the words fired by Randall Todd Moore as he denied having "not one ounce of remorse" for kidnapping, sexually assaulting and killing his ex-wife.

But was his ex-wife 'alienating' the kids, as Moore alleged, or trying to protect them from danger?

This case is clear, but as those working in domestic violence and child abuse realize, all too often clarity comes at a price.

Dr. Paul Fink, President of the Leadership Council on Child Abuse and Interpersonal Violence, and a former President of the American Psychiatric Association states, "Science tells us that the most likely reason that a child becomes estranged from a parent is that parent's own behavior. Labels, such as PAS, serve to deflect attention away from those behaviors."

More dangerously, parental alienation can mask domestic violence, child abuse and child sexual abuse. What is the difference between fearful or uncooperative battered women and alienating," vindictive" mothers? If parents try to withhold access to children, are they alienators or protectors? If they try to provide evidence of abuse - interviews with psychologists, medical examinations or discussions with the child - are they gathering proof or further alienating the ex? What is the difference between alienated children and abused children?

The behaviors can be indistinguishable.

Indeed, it's not just domestic violence survivors' advocates who witness the problem with PA. The American Bar Association, American Prosecutors Research Institute, National District Attorneys Association, and the National Council of Juvenile and Family Court Judges all denounce the use of parental alienation in the courtroom. The National District Attorneys Association says on their Web site, "PAS is an unproven theory that can threaten the integrity of the criminal justice system and the safety of abused children."

That hasn't stopped courts from using PAS, resulting in accusations against individuals, mostly women, of maliciously denying access to children.

Katie Tagle, for instance, sought a restraining order on Jan. 21, 2010 against her ex-boyfriend Stephen Garcia to stop him from having unsupervised visitation with their nine-month-old child.

She told the judge Garcia threatened to kill the infant. The court transcript records Judge Robert Lemkau as saying, "One of you is lying," and later, "Mr. Garcia claims its total fabrication on your part." Garcia also referred to it as "little stunts and games" that she used to deny him access to his son.

Even when she tries to produce evidence of the threats, he says, "Well, ma'am, there's a real dispute about whether that's even true or not." And finally, "My suspicion is that you're lying" (said twice). He denied her the order (as did two other judges). Garcia took their son that day and drove off into the mountains. Ten days later, they were both found dead.
The transcript is here: http://www.scribd.com/doc/26434649/tagle-garcia-court-transcript-dent-protection-to-baby-now-bay-is-DEAD

This case clearly demonstrates another issue women have in courts: credibility. It's easier to believe a woman is lying than to believe a man can abuse or kill a woman or child. In reality, in family court, denying abuse is more common than fabricating tales of abuse. Most allegations are made in good faith (see the American Bar Association's 10 Custody Myths and How to Counter Them). And most denials are made by perpetrators, perpetrators skillful at manipulation - even of professionals.

Judges, though, have been known to downplay even well-documented cases of abuse and to give more weight to parental alienation than to abuse allegations. In the case of Jennifer Collins, for example, the judge told her mother to "get over" the abuse as at least two years had passed, according to Collins' Web site. The judge reversed the custody decision because her mom's fear was "interfering in his relationship with us." Jennifer's mother Holly took her two children and fled to the Netherlands, where they were granted asylum. (See also the Courageous Kids Network of children who were court-ordered into relationships with abusive parents.)

58,000 children a year go into sole or joint custody arrangements or unsupervised visitation with physically or sexually abusive parents, according to an estimate by the Leadership Council on Child Abuse and Interpersonal Violence. That's over 1,000 children a week the courts place in harm's way.

Giving custody to the supposedly alienated parent is one way to "solve" the problem of parental alienation. Jailing the mother is another.

Tiffany Barney and Joyce Murphy are two women who've been jailed; their cases were covered in the media. Both alleged child sexual abuse and neither were believed. Barney fought for five years, at times losing custody or having limited supervised visitation. Murphy was called "toxic" to her daughter and deemed the cause of the child fearing her father. She fled with her daughter. When found, she was jailed for felony abduction and later granted limited visitation. It wasn't until three more girls came forward with molestation charges that her ex was finally the one jailed.

A few other cases making headlines include: Court Punishes Woman in Alienation Case; WI: Judge Jails Mother over Daughter's Refusal to Visit Father and Judge Dismisses Abuse Allegations.

It should also be noted that when violent partners make good on their threats to take the kids away, it's referred to as domestic violence by proxy -a continuation of domestic violence - rather than PA or PAS. Some battered women who've lost custody use PA or PAS to describe their particular situation. This both minimizes the nature and scope of abuse women face and promotes the use of a dangerous weapon (PA/PAS) that can be used against them in court.

I wouldn't hand an angry man a agun, nor would I readily hand over a legal strategy to potential pedophiles, abusers or killers. Yet that is exactly what PA/PAS is doing.

For more information, visit:

The Leadership Council on Child Abuse and Interpersonal Violence

Stop Family Violence

Center for Judicial Excellence

CHILD CUSTODY SCAM: THE CALIFORNIA STATE AUDITOR RELEASES REPORT ON SACRAMENTO AND MARIN SUPERIOR COURTS

2011-01-20T13:11:00.001-06:00

Courtesy RightsForMothers

Ha! Both of these courts are busted! It didn’t work trying to shed documents as fast as they could and stall allowing the auditors into their files! Thank you to all the California activists that worked hard to get this audit started and completed.

To download the report “Sacramento and Marin Superior Courts” by the California State Auditor, please click here. Here is the synopsis of the report:

Date: January 20, 2011
Report: 2009-109

The California State Auditor released the following report today:

Sacramento and Marin Superior Courts

Both Courts Need to Ensure That Family Court Appointees Have Necessary Qualifications, Improve Administrative Policies and Procedures, and Comply With Laws and Rules

BACKGROUND Every superior court in each of California’s 58 counties has jurisdiction over family law matters typically within their family courts. Judges assigned to the family courts decide various family law matters, such as the dissolution of marriages, and where child custody or a determination of the legal relationship between natural or adoptive parents and a child is at issue, the family court may issue an order for child custody and visitation. At the Sacramento family court, where more than 92,500 family law cases were filed during the four-year period we reviewed, its staff conducted mediations and certain evaluations that the family court ordered and the court appointed private mediators, evaluators, and minor’s counsel. In contrast, the Marin family court, which opened 2,352 cases that involved child custody and visitation during the same four-year period, had staff who performed only child custody and visitation mediations and it appoints private evaluators and minor’s counsel to contested child custody and visitation cases. The Family Code requires family courts to design all child custody and visitation orders to reflect what is in the best interest of the child.

KEY FINDINGS Our audit of the Sacramento and Marin County Superior Courts’ processes for identifying, assessing, and evaluating court appointees in child custody disputes during the four-year period—from April 1, 2006 through March 31, 2010—revealed the following:

• The Sacramento County Superior Court could not demonstrate that its staff performing mediations and evaluations and the private mediators, evaluators, and minor’s counsel it appoints are qualified or trained.

•The Marin County Superior Court could not demonstrate that the mediators always met the minimum qualifications or training requirements and that its private evaluators were qualified and met certain training requirements. Further, the family court did not ensure that minor’s counsel were qualified before making appointments.

• Although both family courts have a process for reviewing and resolving complaints about their mediators or evaluators, neither court kept logs of complaints received. In addition, both family courts did not consistently follow processes for dealing with complaints about their mediators.

• Even though courts may pay for minor’s counsel when it determines that the parties cannot pay, both courts need to improve their processes. The Sacramento family court did not always make the legally required determination about the parties’ ability to pay and the Marin Superior Court did not have a policy outlining the costs it reimburses.

KEY RECOMMENDATIONS We make numerous recommendations to the Sacramento and Marin County Superior and Family Courts to ensure that the individuals who provide mediation and evaluation services and who act as minor’s counsel in cases before these family courts are qualified and trained. Further, we recommend that both the Sacramento and Marin family courts track all complaints properly and review them promptly and keep a log of complaints they receive. Moreover, both family courts need to improve their policies and rules for receiving, reviewing, and resolving complaints. We also recommend that the Sacramento Superior Court improve billing procedures and for determining and reviewing parties’ ability to pay appointing minor’s counsel costs.

And what was the court’s response to this report? Read here:

Agency Comments

The Sacramento Superior Court stated that it was largely in agreement with the report’s recommendations and has already begun the process of implementing the great majority of them. The court also stated that it is taking other recommendations under consideration, but some of them will likely prove difficult to implement due to a lack of resources.

The Marin Superior Court stated that it believed many of the findings and recommendations were focused primarily on ministerial tasks. Further, the court expressed an opinion that eight of the 13 recommendations are suggested changes to existing practices that are not governed by laws, rules of court, or any other directives. The court stated that, although it intends to implement the recommended changes and has either already implemented a new process or is engaged in developing a new rule or protocol, it questions whether some of the recommendations actually enhance internal controls and accountability.

Here’s hoping that anyone with cases in these two courts can use this report to correct horrible actions that have happened to them.

Join us Tonight 1-20-2011 @5pm CST American Mothers Political Party BTRShow Call-in Number: (347) 205-9977

2011-01-20T12:50:00.001-06:00

http://www.blogtalkradio.com/americanmotherspoliticalparty/2011/01/20/still-standing

Call-in Number: (347) 205-9977

Upcoming Show: 1/20/2011 5:00 PM CST 6 PM EST

Host Name:
American Mothers Political Party

http://vodpod.com/watch/1533683-evolution-of-propaganda?u=ampp&c=ampp

AMPP is a social movement seeking justice and accountability within the family court system which includes DHHS/CPS, psychologists and other so called experts.

We as mothers demand CITIZENSHIP and our Rights to our Children.
We demand that our children not be used as pawns by our abuser in a custody dispute.
We demand that Mothers and Children be equally protected against court ordered visitation with an abuser.
We demand that Mothers and Children be given the same rights, privileges and voice that the abuser gets in family courts!
We demand that our President take action now as can no longer afford to be silent and we won’t.
We demand the same "rights and freedoms" to which all humans are entitled.

Behind the closed doors of the dirty little secret of the family court system, thousands of women each year lose child custody to violent men who beat and abuse Mothers and Children.

Family courts are not family-friendly and betray the best interests of the child.

Until Mothers and Children's voices are heard

we will never shut up, give up or go away!

ROBIN YEAMANS: DUE PROCESS, EQUAL PROTECTION, AND TAKING CUSTODY SCAMS TO THE FEDERAL COURTS

2011-01-20T07:52:00.001-06:00

Interviews from the 2011 Battered Mothers Custody Conference

Robin Yeamans is one of three California attorneys certified as a specialist in both family and appellate law. Her website at www.divorcecal.com features videos that help people without attorneys. In this video, she answers Anne Grant’s questions about due process, equal protection, and taking custody scams to the federal courts.

http://www.ustream.tv/channel/battered-mothers-custody-conference

Referees, Umpires, or any other paid professionals

2011-01-18T18:14:00.001-06:00

·http://familycourtmatters.wordpress.com/?s=fathers+rights

Referees, Umpires, or any other paid professionals, should go to the Association that is promoting the terms “high-conflict” to describe assault and battery, and “mental health” to characterize unruly (not submissive enough) mothers, as has happened probably since time began. All such truly committed court professionals should (and many will) go to an “AFCC” conference. That would be in Florida, June, 2011. At this conference, now that fatherhood-based grants are entrenched in the CFCCs around the country, the topic will be — in a cruel twist of a Title by Tina Turner, who got OUT of that, and became the true star she always was with no more IKE– “what’s Gender Got to DO with it?”

Look up AFCC What’s Gender Got to Do with it?

(etc.)

The rest of you should all, please, go to work, because I assure you, your income-withholdings are helping support some of these,

through any number of federal funding streams, monitored by the gatekeepers, to make sure none particularly gets all the way through (except maybe a slow trickle, in a few places, that leaked through) to the actual people named on the face of the grant program. Even the Arizona massacre that happened duing the first conference, of a U.S. Rep, Federal Judge, 9 year old girl, others — is not likely to even slow down this processes, or change these procedures. Oh yeah– Arizona is a nice place for the AFCC, I believe there’s a chatper there, to help spread some love around and train court professionals. Not to brag, but I found an OHIO based task force (fatherhood commission stuff) flying out to Phoenix to attend classes by some AFCC participants and presenters to learn how to fix families, right (submit comment if you want me to look up the link. It dates back to early 2000s).

Families are getting massacred regularly, and as shocked as I am about a judge and a U.S. Rep, and outraged, I am also outraged that it provokes more outrage, on nationwide press, than the regular,relentless deaths that come from families run through this gauntlet and farmed out in the family law gulag.

Such as diverting TANF funds to collect child support (a program in place since 1996). If that’s what you think the OCSE is doing with some of these grants to the states, I have some land under the Brooklyn Bridge to sell you.

A sample of how a man in the TEXAS ATTORNEY’S OFFICE, CHILD SUPPORT DIV, views some of these grants, paraphrased well (and I added a comment) by Randijames;com:

http://www.randijames.com/2009/07/michael-hayes-wants-to-build-family.html

You got to respect a person who — when women affected aren’t supposedly listening in– comes right out and shoots straight from the hip — this is not abut collecting child support, but about a good deal more, per the blog:

Michael Hayes Wants to Build “Family-Centered” Child Support

I must continue to emphasize that the Office of Child Support Enforcement (OSCE) is no longer about collecting child support. It is about meddling in your family business and exercising government control over families (which begins with the “birth certificate” and “marriage licenses”), with emphasis on removing control from women as childbearers and autonomous beings. This money is NOT going to raise the children–it is going into million-dollar research at the hand of ~~psychology~~pseudoscience and court litigation.

Well, who is Michael Hayes?

I’m glad you asked.

(emphasis mine)

Michael Hayes is the Deputy for Family Initiatives in the Child Support Division of the Texas Office of the Attorney General. His extensive experience includes the development of policy, partnerships, and projects that support family stability, paternity establishment, father involvement, and child support program improvement. Before his current post, he helped create and was director of the Texas Fragile Families Initiative, a statewide project involving community-based, faith-based, and public agencies to support fragile families.

Fragile Families is one of the many phrases starting in “F” that seem to just roll off the tongue and bring out true eloquence (immediately before, during, and after some FR grants become available) that seem to end up with the word “mother” and especially if single, becoming an archaic usage, and women getting “F . . . . ‘ed” by the courts if they don’t get oFFed by their exes, or poverty, first. This, CitySlickers, is how Families get redesigned and Moms become “long-distance” and “noncustodial,” often enough. Essentially, this means, with the gradual elimination of the word “mother” and with it the FUNCTIONS of mother, including protection where necessary, they are being used as brood mares. (Forgive, please, my poor attempts at cowboy analogies in honor of Mr. Hayes fromTexas,… but it helps my blood pressure to release some sarcasm when reading this rhetoric. ) — but doesn’t it strike you odd that someone would go from a Fragile Families Initiative (look it up yourself, it’s a fatherhood grant) into Child Support Services, at a “Deputy” level? where’s the gold medalllion for this posse?

If people get this pattern, they can get a LOT. The blog post puts the charts in, you’ve seen similar ones here, on my blog. Just read what they wrote, then watch who they hang with, and what happens. Randijames.Com, quoting Mr. Michael Hayes

I also want to acknowledge the value that OCSE Section 1115 and SIP grants have had forthe evolution of child support, both in Texas and around the country. Through Section 1115 grants, our Family Initiatives Section in Texas has been able to pursue the projects I’ve talked about, since these grants may be used to fund certain activities not normally allowed under FFP rules. The creativity and innovation that those grant programs have fostered play a big part in child support’s continued growth and vision. We take pride in how we’ve been able to keep the work going after the grant funding expires by using careful collaboration and coordination. For example, we found we could provide additional services to parents by linking Access and Visitation partners to our child support offices. Once the parents meet with us about the support order, they are escorted to the AV staff so they can develop a parenting plan. We could not have moved as thoughtfully or as quickly without that support.

Thank you, Michael Hayes, for making this so easy for us! I don’t even have to explain it anymore.

And THAT — and not so much PAS theory, my fine-feathered, female friends — is likely how you lost custody, or have now to pay to see your kids. Audio-Visual/ Access-Visitation, A/V, Access-Visitation. Not TOO hard to remember, is it

GRANTS TO STATES FOR ACCESS AND VISITATION PROGRAMS(this is the official, government, site describing these)

SEC. 469B. [42 US.C. 669b]

a. IN GENERAL—The Administration for Children and Families shall make grants under this section toenable States to establish and administer programs** to “support and facilitate “**noncustodial parents’ access to and visitation of their children, by means of activities including mediation (both voluntary and mandatory), counseling, education, development of parenting plans, visitation enforcement (including monitoring, supervision and neutral dropoff and pickup), and development of guidelines for visitation and alternative custody arrangements (etc.)

{{**support and facilitate– it HAS to read like that, “order” is not within the federal government’s jurisdiction to. This is just short of — and the mediators, supervisors, etc. understand this clearly, I”m sure.., what their role is. This role is not, of course, broadcast to custodial mothers coming before them at any stage of the game.}}

{{AND if many, or some , of those programs, judges and attorneys involved in this system, nay, even in open cases that get cases referred to these programs for “services”, just happen to have been on the Board of Directors — or, heck, have been a judge, or an attorney’s brainchild to start with (can you say Kids’ Turn? in SF Bay Area, now internationally minded, at least a few countries, and several states), and promoted heavily in (see #3, above) certain types of conferences as the model curriculum, etc.)-who are we to protest these many coincidences?}}

{{“Both voluntary and mandatory” and “support and facilitate” carry a little different tone, don’t you think? It’s MANDATORY, but these programs are only three in a “supporting and facilitating” capacity. At public expense. To help reduce welfare Moms and child support arrears.}} Child support arrears ARE getting reduced, at least in many cases I’ve seen, including my own — by the means of an electronic eraser. Their stats look better, my kids lose out on child support, which I was trying to help collect, as the same agency (national level) that was charged to help collect child support, failed to do so locally.}}

Annual Funding

· $10 million in federal funds is divided among the states annually based on a funding formula contained in the statute.

That’s since 1996, folks. Have I got your attention yet, and is it THAT much harder to remember “A/V” in connection with “DV” for “domestic violence,”which is what these grants help cover up in the custody venue?

Maybe $10M/year (for 14 years, so far) is peanuts, in the larger picture — but what is it doing to the court process? Or reduce the familywipeouts after domestic disputes, etc.? Besides which, recruiting Dads and failing to tell moms one is doing this just ain’t honest. Besides which, grant usages isn’t tracked fully, and there has been evidence of custody-switching scams (i.e., steering cases to certain court personneL) in many cases. This is a PUBLIC issue, along with the huge superstructure of DV cancelling out FR grants because it appears they are maybe splitting the proceeds, and keeping parents in the dark, except some of us who got mad enough to pursue answers (and we don’t show up in public and shoot bullets).

Who administers this?

Federal Administration

The Office of Child Support Enforcement — part of the Administration for Children and Families at the Department of Health and Human Services — has responsibility for administering the Access and Visitation Grant Program.

OK, so there you are. The FEDERALIZING of what otherwise would be state-level, county-level, and district-level legal procedures played out in front of judges who have sworn to uphold the state, at least, constitution, or so one might hope.

. Liz Richards of VA (D.C. area) has been collecting evidence on this since around 1993, and it’s critical to how the system works. Needless to say, she is not invited to present at any of the above conferences. Just because a site doesn’t have a link to YouTube of Blog Talk Radio, or Facebook, twitter, etc. — think it doesn’t have relevant information? This is mostly WORDS (remember those?)

And some women who attempted to present some of this material at the end of BMCC were filibustered out of it, which at least left a witness, I hope, to the audience of the gamesmanship. A mother who’d flown in from Australia was talking about on-line safety, and was not allowed to finish even her short, well-organized powerpoint, including about on-line safety for women. She got about 7 minutes. The previous presenter, a man, whose name was on some of the books were on the table outside, was an hour over schedule, and no one interrupted.

Meanwhile, and possibly at public expense? Mr Hayes, of Texas, is going to fly North to Minnesota to promote the same stuff, I’m sure…He’s all about fathers, and someone who is favorable to fathers is of course needed to really “tow the line” in collecting past-due child support, to help custodial mothers who need it to help raise their children in safety, and with food, and not begging for it, or working a third shift.

Here’s more from the RandiJames.com commentary on this, from the TEXAS perspective (don’t forget to check out some charts she posts up there, too, with $$ figures on them).

Another great part about our work in the Family Initiatives Section is the way we use research to develop theoretical models for project development, and then take that theoretical model and design the intervention, track and evaluate implementation of the intervention, and then use what we learn to inform the next generation of programs and policy.

And so we conclude with how the Department of Health and Human Services (DHHS), Administration of Children and Families (ACF) fuels their own research and sets propaganda in action through the creation of public policy.

That’s exactly what they are bragging about. Too bad more MOms aren’t trained to look up this stuff.

SO, TO SUMMARIZE REGARDING THE 1, 2, 3 conferences:

Someone has to wave a red flag around to make sure the bull keeps charging the flag, and is not distracted and actually reaches a matador or an on-looker in the crowd. That red flag in this case has any number of paychological terminologies, or pet phrases on it, to distract, as we say, the bulls, and appease the crowds, who come in for the spectacle. If you’re living in the US and paying taxes, you are part of the spectators.

Battered Mothers’ Custody Conference badgers Mothers to Buy Books and Join! Organizations promoting these books.

Maybe not badgered, just relentlessly marketed to. … The name of the conference should be adjusted to reflect “Good Cop/Bad Cop Press Releases.” The Good cops had control of the microphone, pointed to the bad judges, custody decisions, evaluators, etc. (from whom they derive their livelihood) as the Bad Cops, cough up your stories (women were, literally, asked to send theirs in to help Mr. Bancroft with the next literary masterpiece based on something that had inspired him), and dollars (what’s left of them) and (if I may switch from gangster movies to The Wizard of Oz) “pay no attention to that man — and the word applies, overall — behind the curtain.”

Another mother who attended the first conference, commenting obliquely upon it, I”m sure, and a book being sold for $100 to mothers, which it is declared will fix our broken dreams, and change the scope of family law practice, because it “explains” why judges “don’t understand” domestic violence. And $ 100 was a discount.

VENI, VIDI, Vomiti. (It was shameless; I was there…)

I would write a more stringent post, but am overburdened, like many of us, and sickened at the whole scene, particularly the marketing of other Moms’ stories. Reminds me of The Amazing Cells of Henrietta Lack. I think Moms are starting to catch out that their ongoing troubles (caused by court professionals in many cases) are a new target market — because Fatherhood and Domestic Violence niches are taken.

How gullible do these people with Esq.,Ph.D., and M.S.W behind their names think we are? ???

I recommend, NEXT year, attend the conference that’s NOT in your designated area of concern, and find out what’s being said.

The Minnestoa Fatherhood site has a new phraseology you should learn: “Women in the Fatherhood Movement.” This is abbreviated WIFI, which I think is catchy and current — don’t you?

They, too, got a grant from HHS to blog about how great everyone is, and the real way to stop DV is to get families re-united (with Dads in there). The word ‘mother” rarely appears in the handout, even though some of these specially-selected women of color and highly-placed (in the fatherhood movement) are indeed Mothers (at least one, I read), their lives and lifestyles have LITTLE in common with the hellish things happening, across the board to women in the court systems. and in high-profile cases many times involving very wealthy, white males — such as I blogged on in Nassau County, NY, recently. These women are Executive Directors, leaders, professionals, and one is even married to a pioneer in the fatherhood movement.

And YOUR tax dollars (or, at least a single HHS contract identified so far), like Bush paying Maggie Gallagher $20K to push his marriage movement long ago– are helping pay for the glitz. I hope I caught THIS one out the gate — the organization (nonprofit) is so new, dating to 2008, it hasn’t even got its data up on Guidestar.org yet.

http://womeninfatherhood.org/main/

In December 2005, the Annie E. Casey Foundation convened a meeting of men and women working in responsible fatherhood to assess the influence women were having in the field. After extensive consultations with experts in the field, the group found a high level of need for a collective effort of women*** to provide a unique and necessary voice for:

· Effective advocacy and support of Responsible Fatherhood in program and policy;

· Fatherhood awareness, education, legislation, & policy initiatives, which benefit from the input of mothers and other women;

· Effective programs designed to involve fathers–the perspective of mothers and their advocates is essential to their success.

This led to the formation of Women In Fatherhood—A diverse* group of women dedicated to advancing the responsible fatherhood field through public awareness and education, policy advocacy, research, and collaboration.

* there is a token white woman, or three? but look at the bios and I don’t see one family court scapegoat noncustodial mother. I don’t see one person who has identified experiencinug domestic violence, or dealing with child molestation in the family, or a broke person, or a mother whose wages are being garnished to pay her ex-abuers (for example, see “rightsformothers.com” blog, which represents that voice). There is one who identified as having experienced divorce (at what level, not shown). Are there atheists on the group? Jews? Are there feminists?

Well, then how diverse is it? The photo is refreshingly different, but photos are photos, and show faces, and smiles. Look at the backgrounds.

“collective” — they chose and assembled certain kinds of experts, and excluded others. Hence “collective.” Kind of like national Fatherhood Initiative started with “a few prominent thinkers,” and the website actually did say that, last I checked. A FEW prominent “thinkers.”

Well, what about some obscure, underground” thinkers? for a change?

** No doubt because the heavy-handed male dominance of the father’s rights groups, plus some blogger dads like Glenn Sacks who took their free (Stay-at home?) time to go after, say young adult survivors of domestic violence and fleeing to escape it, such as Jennifer Collins. Or others. They needed some articulate, poised, and not about to cause a ruckus in the movement FEMALES to front the MALE agenda, which the fatherhood movement is. In other words, they correctly realized, the image was tarnished and needed a facelift.

Annie E. Casey foundation convened. Well, two (that I noticed) of hte Boards of Directors — and that’s a well-rounded one, plenty on the Board — had connections already with Annie E. Casey, who funds lots of fatherhood stuff. I’m really puzzled why the need more. Look yourself, although I don’t have the timing of it yet

Suicide: How Father's Rights Groups Drive Men Over the Edge

2011-01-18T17:50:00.001-06:00

Suicide: How Father's Rights Groups Drive Men Over the Edge

Psychology tells us that if you want to get a good opinion on that Toyota Camry you've been thinking about, do NOT ask someone who has just recently purchased one. Why? Because of confirmation bias.

What does this have to do with father's rights groups? Give me a minute and let me work through this ;P

Most support groups seek to validate the victim's experience and console those who are in pain. When men seek the assistance of these father's rights groups, many of them haven't a clue what they are stepping into. The men that make up the most vocal minority of these groups feel that they've been unfairly taken advantage of by their ex-wives/ex-girlfriends and shitted on by the family court system. This isn't so much of a support group as it is a terrorist organization. Their solutions include, but are not limited to, flooding, intimidating, bullying, and threatening anyone who speaks or writes against their mistaken beliefs. They hype each other up with pissing matches on whose ex was the biggest bitch. Nothing is their own fault.

What some of the men in these father's rights group fail to reveal is that they weren't really dicked by the court system or their exes--they either failed miserably in their relationships (and somehow it wasn't apparent to them) and/or, they didn't participate (perhaps even acquiescing) in any court "battle" but rather made assumptions based off of what their other male counterparts (who have also "lost") have fed them.

These father's rights groups should come with warning labels to the men who fall prey to them. Any half-decent man may seek answers to some basic questions only to be mind-fucked into a hate campaign against his current or ex-partner. He then goes into a downward spiral beginning with trying to play games with his ex instead of confronting the situation honestly and trying to figure out peaceful solutions.

Let's review this e-mail circulating through the father's rights groups right now, notice the title:

(emphasis mine)

----- Original Message -----

From: Jeremy Swanson

To: swanson@storm. ca

Sent: 12/26/2009 6:16:54 PM

Subject: Read this (Another Dad dead by suicide. Another child fatherless)

Fathers' and Children's Equality (FACE)

Jeff Golden

It grieves me deeply to report this:

About two weeks ago, I received a call from Chris Wise of Hammonton NJ. He had been referred to us by an attorney-friend of ours who gave him my cell phone number. He told me he and his girlfriend had an almost two month old son. Both parents are in their early 30s, they lived together in his house throughout the pregnancy, he is disabled and not working, and his mother and brother also live in his house. The girlfriend and her mother were telling him they were going to take away the baby, never let him see the baby again, and take away from him everything he has.

(notice the connection)

There's nothing unusual about threats like that. We handle them all the time. Personally, I don't like to give too much information on a first call. What I tell about fathers' rights is probably exactly the opposite of what they have always believed and what they will be told by police, lawyers, court personnel, DYFS, etc. I prefer people to come to a meeting where a whole room-full of people will reassure them that what we say is true.

(doesn't this sound like when one of your friends starts selling Amway and they "need" you to come to the meeting to find out more...and then you get there and everyone is so friendly and excited...almost cult-like???)

I asked Chris if anyone had been to court yet for anything. They had not. I explained to Chris that at their first time in court, one of the parents will leave with less parental rights than s/he came in with, but until they go to court both parents had equal rights. I asked where the baby was right then. Chris said the mother was about to return to work from maternity leave, and she had made arrangements to move in with some strange older woman she will be working with. I suggested that won't last long because this stranger won't like a crying infant interfering with her household routine. I asked why the mother didn't go to her parents' home. She couldn't. Her parents are divorced. Her mother and step-father live in a little one bedroom apartment, they both smoke, and they have dogs. She had no contact with her real father until quite recently, and he also did not have proper accommodations for a new-born.

I reminded Chris of the adage "possession is nine tenths of the law," and told him that whoever had possession of the baby on that day they first go to court will have a very good chance of keeping him. "But," said Chris, "I don't want to take the baby away from his mother." Of course not ... you WANT her to have liberal visitation. But remember, she already told you that if she gets custody she doesn't want you to ever see the child again. Are you capable of taking care of the baby and doing everything that child needs? "Yes." Who do you want to have custody?

(notice the initial resistance from Chris)

I asked Chris if he thought it would be possible for him to get possession of the baby without breaching the peace. He very confidently answered "Sure!" I asked how he could be so sure of that, and where and how would he do it? He said the mother was bringing the baby back to his house that evening, and they were all going to sleep in his house that night! Under these circumstances I couldn't make Chris wait for our next meeting; he needed help NOW!

(notice the urgency...kinda like a snake oil salesman)

I told Chris there were two things he needed to know: First we discussed the domestic violence law. I emailed him a copy of the statute, listing all the acts that are considered to be domestic violence in New Jersey. I pointed out that whoever gets a domestic violence restraining order against the other can also automatically get custody, and that "domestic violence" does not necessarily have to have anything to do with violence. I told him if he is holding the baby and won't release him to her, and she commits an act of domestic violence to get him away from you, especially with your mother and brother as witnesses or if she leaves marks on you, you can get a restraining order against her and get custody of the child.

(a lot of premeditation)

Second, what happens if there is no domestic violence, but she calls the police and says "He won't give me my baby?" When the police arrive, the first thing they will do is ask to see the custody order. When they find there is no order, both of you will have equal rights. Still, to smooth things out, the police might say to you something like "Why don't you just be a nice guy and give her the baby? You can go down to family court and straighten it all out." JUST SAY NO! Remember, possession is nine tenths of the law, and when you go into family court that first time YOU want to have possession.

Chris called me the next morning. It was a very cold day -- low 20s. The mother was getting ready to take the baby out. She wasn't going to her co-worker's house. She was going to some other friend's house where she and the baby would sleep on air-mattresses on the floor until she could get into her friend's house. She wouldn't identify the friend or where she would be. I reminded Chris to get possession of the baby without breaching the peace, and what to say if and when the police arrived.

Chris DID get possession without breaching the peace. Mom was lying on the bed with the baby. Chris said "Let me just kiss him goodbye," took the baby from her and would not let go of him. Mom called the police. Chris called the police too. "The mother wants to take the baby out somewhere in the cold where they're going to sleep on an air mattress." Two police officers arrived, one male and one female. The male officer spoke with the mother in the bedroom and the female officer spoke with Chris. They asked about a custody order and found there was none. The officers told both parents they could not force the father to give the baby to the mother! The mother said she would leave, but she wanted to come back for her personal property.The female officer recommended to Chris that he not allow the mother back into his house. Instead he should pack up all of her stuff and leave it on the porch for her.

Chris called me later to let me know what happened. GREAT, I said, now YOU have possession of the baby! "No," he said, "something else happened too. Before she left, while the police were here, she asked to have a private conversation with me. We went into the bedroom together. She said she wanted to take the baby to her father's house,and I said OK. She and the baby are gone." Well, I said, we'll either have to get possession again, or it will just be a little more difficult for you on that first day in family court.

We had a FACE meeting on Monday evening. I sent Chris a meeting schedule, asked him to come to this meeting, and gave him directions. I called him again Monday to remind him, and left a phone message. He didn't show up.

That's it, I thought. I scared another one away. I've said it before, but now I'm really NEVER again going to give a lot of advice on the phone. Regardless of urgency, they've got to come to a meeting first.

Chris's mother left a message on my phone this morning. "Mr. Golden, I don't quite know how to say this, but I didn't want to leave you hanging. Christopher took his own life." I couldn't believe what I was hearing. I had to replay it a few times, then I called her.

On Monday, Chris left the house to go to a doctor appointment and then go to family court. He called his mother later and told her he was in Atlantic City, about 15 minutes away from both. That was the last she heard from him. On Wednesday she got a call from the Port Authority police. Chris' truck was found at the Ben Franklin bridge. They had video of him entering a parking area at the base of the bridge. They don't know how long he was there. He left his wallet, cell phone and keys in his truck, along with a note, and then he apparently went up on the bridge. They also had video of someone going over the side of the bridge.

Why did this happen? Chris' custody situation wasn't too bad ... yet. He had let defeat get snatched from the jaws of victory in his first skirmish, but, I told him, that would just make things a little more difficult. I never met him face-to-face, but Chris was a very soft-spoken guy. At times during our conversations, I thought he was hyperventilating. His child's mother was herself an adult child of Parental Alienation Syndrome who was not allowed a parent-child relationship with her own father, and was now being coached by her PAS-inflicting mother.Maybe he just didn't want to face the conflict that he knew was coming. Now fatherlessness will go one generation further in that family.

(how could he diagnose the child's mother and grandmother? he must be friends with Warshak, Rand, or Bone)

There is one thing I regret never having had an opportunity to discuss with Chris. He wasn't far enough into the process yet to understand it. As one FACE member was known to say: "If things ever get so bad that you consider taking your own life, don't let it be a total waste. Take a judge or a lawyer with you."

Jeff Golden

Fathers' and Children's Equality (FACE)

Cinnaminson NJ

I cannot find any record of this suicide on the www. The more that I think about it, doesn't it sound like one of those serious, emotionally compelling e-mail forwards you get from your associates? Well, I happen to do my part and look up those forwards and I have found that 90% of them are on Snopes.com as untrue. Whether or not this is true isn't even important.

What is important is how the father's righters try to shift the blame for this. Chris committed suicide. If it were to be anyone else's fault (other than his own), it would lie with the person who gave him all this "advice." In fact, if I were the mother of Chris, I would sue the hell out of Jeff Golden. Chris didn't know how his situation would turn out, and neither did Jeff Golden. Chris could have done well by using common sense and talking to, or appealing to his wife; but instead, Jeff Golden wanted him to engage in a powerplay with a war mentality.

Check out this further commentary on the e-mail:

(emphasis mine)

----- Forwarded Message ----

From: Shatteredmen

To: Shatteredmen@yahoogroups.com; MensIssuesOnline@yahoogroups.com; female-male@yahoogroups.com; Fathers_are_Parents_too@yahoogroups.com; abusedguys@yahoogroups.com

Sent: Sun, 27 December, 2009 5:38:25 PM

Subject: [Shatteredmen] FW: Read this (Another Dad dead by suicide. Another child fatherless)

I received this in an e-mail today. I do have to say that I totally disagree with the last statement... "If things ever get so bad that you consider taking your own life, don't let it be a total waste. Take a judge or a lawyer with you." It contend it would be far better to become....A Formidable Enemy

http://shatterdmen. com/Enemy. htm

I also believe that many of the "murder/suicides" we see may often be a result of situations like this but instead of taking a lawyer or judge with them, they take the one that they believe caused the problem.

This is all a waste...a waste of precious human lives due to a radical agenda that is well hell bent on destroying families.

http://shatterdmen. com/Bitter. htm

When our society finally (if ever) realizes that children need BOTH parents, maybe then we will not have to see reports such as this. Meanwhile according to most of society, children are "her children" until it comes time to get the support check. When the right of either parent to have an active and equal part in their children's lives is as important as that child support check, then and only then will we see an improvement not only in a major reduction of these suicides, but we will see a major reduction in all the results of fatherless or motherless homes

http://shatterdmen. com/Fathers% 20who%20needs% 20them.htm

ken</KEN4THELAMB@YAHOO.COM>

</KEN4THELAMB@YAHOO.COM>Blame it on everything, minus the ones doing the killing. Chris was disabled and stressed (unemployed, living with several people in the household) and on top of that suicidal...a very difficult combination for parenting. But somehow, father's righters seem to think that the answer to all of fathers' problems, is 50/50 child custody. Part of the Australian father's rights groups platform is the supposed correlation between men "suiciding" and those who are divorcing and have "lost custody."

It just so happens that many of the murder-suicides that continue to happen, involve families with joint custody. So, how can joint custody be the solution? Furthermore, do we want our children around suicidal people? I don't think so.

If Chris is real I sympathize with his loved ones. Sometimes I wonder if it would be best if men solicited the advice of a good woman, instead of selling their souls to the devil. Chris was driven over the edge by a father's rights group member who gave him an unfair, limited vantage point. I wonder how many other men they have killed.

Fathers have Rights, Children’s Rights, Fathers kill custody battle fathers abuse and kill families, Parental Alienation Syndrome (PAS) Stuart Showalter Neo Nazi-Fathers Rights Advocate-Abusers Rights Advocate Glenn Sacks-Abusers Advocate,Right Wing Terrorist- Fathers Rights. Warren Farrell, Mike J Murphy, Jeremy Swanson, Mark K Godbey, Donald Tenn, Stan Rains, Richard A. Gardner coined the term, Parental Alienation Syndrome

We'd Like To Give Fathers Their Rights Back, But First We Need to Figure Out Who Took Them Away

2011-01-18T17:31:00.001-06:00

We'd Like To Give Fathers Their Rights Back, But First We Need to Figure Out Who Took Them Away

I am always so excited when Barbara Kay has an article published. She is so truthful and factual in her support of father's rights. Let's take a look:

We have British Columbia's first review of family law in B.C. since the Family Relations Act came into force more than thirty years ago. Their July "White Paper on Family Relations Act Reform" (accepting submissions until Oct. 8) contains progressive draft legislation and policy proposals: It recommends stepping away from courts and the adversarial model in order to "adopt a conflict prevention approach to family law disputes" and urges making "children's best interests the only consideration in parenting disputes."

Damn this is really groundbreaking. I am totally impressed that it took 30 years to come forward with this information. I mean, who knew that children's best interests should be so exclusively focused on?

Next up is the Green Party's unequivocal adoption of a policy of equal parenting at their August convention. By my reckoning that means every single federal party is on board with the idea that both parents have the right to maintain a strong, loving bond with their children, established through credible sociological research as necessitating 40% of the time with children beyond infancy.

Fathers Aren't Necessary: Finally Getting Off the Patriarchal Bullshit Bandwagon

2011-01-18T17:30:00.001-06:00

Fathers Aren't Necessary: Finally Getting Off the Patriarchal Bullshit Bandwagon

Not many people will argue against the necessity of having a father in one's life. We have been so ingrained to accept this as a fact that to challenge this assertion would seem absurd. Everyone from from religious persons to psychologists will tell you how important a father is in a child's development. But they have been lying. It has been a social control mechanism. Ohh, but get ready for the backlash...men don't like being told that they aren't important, and the women who support these notions, love to support these men (meaning, they, the women, will be angry, too)!

Yesterday's article on CNN entitled, Kids of lesbians have fewer behavioral problems, study suggests, is sure to have "them" screaming mad:

A nearly 25-year study concluded that children raised in lesbian households were psychologically well-adjusted and had fewer behavioral problems than their peers.

The study, published Monday in the journal Pediatrics, followed 78 lesbian couples who conceived through sperm donations and assessed their children's well-being through a series of questionnaires and interviews...

Children from lesbian families rated higher in social, academic and total competence. They also showed lower rates in social, rule-breaking, aggressive problem behavior.

Ouch! Kinda tramples on the male ego...at least those in the fathers' rights camps...the ones that think single mother households are such a nasty infection, feminism is evil, and welfare lets women birth unlimited babies while replacing/eliminating the man. *eye roll*

But as I said, there are women who will be upset as well:

Wendy Wright, president of the Concerned Women for America, a group that supports biblical values, questioned the legitimacy of the findings from a study funded by gay advocacy groups.

"That proves the prejudice and bias of the study," she said. "This study was clearly designed to come out with one outcome -- to attempt to sway people that children are not detrimentally affected in a homosexual household."

Wright questioned the objectivity of Gartrell's research, saying the author can "cherry pick people who are involved and the info they release."

"In essence, this study claims to purport that children do better when raised by lesbians," she said...

Studies have shown that children thrive having both a mother and a father, Wright said.

"You have to be a little suspicious of any study that says children being raised by same-sex couples do better or have superior outcomes to children raised with a mother and father," she said. "It just defies common sense and reality."

Well, Wendy, unfortunately, we'd have to pull a hell of a lot of studies off the market for bias related to funding. In fact, we should probably stop letting the government give out grant monies for all these "fatherhood demonstration" projects...and while we are at it, pull money from religious groups as well. To which studies are you referring, Wendy? What were theirfunding sources? And why shouldn't we be suspicious of studies regarding heterosexual, married persons? Not applying equal skepticism just defies commons sense and reality. If you really want to know about funding and bias, see the Let's Get Honest blog.

And we also have a recent article entitled, Are Fathers Necessary?, which begins by talking about Barack Obama, who we already know to have some serious psychological issues regarding fatherhood (see Obama and His Fathercentricism):

There’s only one problem: none of this is proven. In the February issue of the Journal of Marriage and Family, Judith Stacey, a professor of sociology at New York University, and Timothy Biblarz, a demographer from the University of Southern California, consolidated the available data on the role of gender in child rearing. As Stacey and Biblarz point out, our ideas of what dads do and provide are based primarily on contrasts between married-couple parents and single-female parents: an apples-to-oranges exercise that conflates gender, sexual orientation, marital status, and biogenetic relationships in ways that a true comparison of parent gender—one that compared married gay-male couples or married lesbian couples to married heterosexuals, or single fathers to single mothers—would not. Most of the data fail to distinguish between a father and the income a father provides, or between the presence of a father and the presence of a second parent, regardless of gender.

So, the conclusion, once again, is that gender is irrelevant. Children do well when they have the emotional and financial support of whomever raises them (which still happens to be mothers, you know. I mean, this could change if men continued to increase their roles, beginning in infancy, but with women still being the ones bearing the pregnancy, and having the lactating breasts, it can be so damn hard to break this!) Damn, is this so hard to understand? How much more money must be spent covering this same shit?

I have a dream too --- That mothers and children can be free from Torture

2011-01-17T08:10:00.001-06:00

A special note from Claudine Dombrowski American Mothers Political Party Australian Mothers Political Party

“I have a dream as well--- That mothers and children can be free from Torture -- that No More women and children are killed--That intimate violence be treated as it is, homeland terrorism -- “

“That the federally funded genocide called Fatherhood Initiatives -- be ended, and mothers, the natural guardian, be allowed to raise her own children.”

“I love you my daughter Rikki Dombrowski one of many forced to live in a cage, in silence, in pain without her mother-- without freedom, without voice. Run like the wind Baby---Fly High, Fly Free.”

That the four horsemen begin a reign of “Justice”—on the corrupt human/child traffickers in Topeka, 3rd Judicial District, Shawnee County, Kansas Courts, Judge David Debenham, M. Jill Dykes GAL, ABUSER HAL RICHARDSON, Donald Hoffman, Jason P. Hoffman, David C. Rodeheffer, Safe Visit, Odyssey, Kira Haney, Rene Netherton.

www.AngelFury.org | www.KS-FCRC.com | www.KansansForJudicialAccountability.com | www.AmericanMothersPoliticalParty.org

“He who passively accepts evil is as much involved in it as he who helps to perpetrate it. He who accepts evil without protesting against it is really cooperating with it.”
Martin Luther King, Jr.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gZLvSnr6s50

The Manhattan Free Press On Line

By this time records show Hal Richardson had abused Claudine and he had Domestic ... of physical and verbal abuse she had suffered from Mr. Richardson." Hal ...
www.kansas.net/~freepress/7-12-01-8.html

http://www.scribd.com/AnotherAnonymom

4 Documents

Court GOSSIP File

·· Documents:4

1. 2004 June 4th Court Service Officer Report (again all info from DAD dads friends and dads word- poor

2. 2006 March Hoffmans 'Friend' Submits Report for dad and girlfriend (never meeting mom)

3. 2004 March 31 Loyd Swartz to Judge Emails

4. 2004 May14 Letter to From Girl Scouts on 'Request' by Dad.

See all 4 documents

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10 Documents

Legal Email

· Documents:10

1. 2006 Aug Letter to Judge Johnson

2. 2006 email legal mhp court ag email

3. Hearing Finally Set0 From the Sept 27th, 2006 30 Days Couirt Order

4. Mary Bickford School Sec. Attachments to Letter Request Hearing Dec 2004

5. my reps dorthy and sandy

See all 10 documents

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2 Documents

CINC to keep child from Abuser

· Documents:2

1. 1999 march 23rd CINC (details child sexual, abuse and neglect) pediatrician medical records indicat

2. 5-21-1999 CINC Barton County to Keep Minor Child Safe From Abusive Father Dom Brow Ski

See all 2 documents

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13 Documents

Safe Visit-- Odyssey SUPERVISED VISITATION Reports, memos et el

http://www.projectappleseed.org/safevisit.html Children's Rights Council Supervised Network aka Fathers Rights Initatives

· Documents:13

1. 9-9-2001 Leonard Robinson Atty Letter to Dom Brow Ski and the DA en Re RAPE

2. 2005 March 1 Safe Visit

3. 2005 March 1 Safe Visit1

4. 2005 August 22 - Judge Wilson Report Safe Visit

5. safevisitrequestjune7,200 5

See all 13 documents

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29 Documents

Letters to Judges CSO, CMs, GAL's

· Documents:29

1. 1999 Judges Minutes

2. 1999 Letter From King to Hoffman

3. 2006 Aug Letter to Judge Johnson

4. 9-9-2001 Leonard Robinson Atty Letter to Dom Brow Ski and the DA en Re RAPE

5. Dec 6, 2004 Plea for Hearing

See all 29 documents

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5 Documents

Media

· Documents:5

1. 2009 april -6th shawnee county courts mom guilty contempt and further ordered to remove public recor

2. Somewhere Over the Rainbow, Where's a Pair of Ruby Slippers when you need them

3. showdown in shawnee count1

4. 12-4-1997 KC Star Tony Rizzo-KS Justice Commission -Dombrowski

5. Fall 2001 KS Now -Custody Case From Hell- Claudine Dom Brow Ski

See all 5 documents

3 Documents

Correspondence, AG, Reps, Congress, Federal

1. Jackie Williams Email 2oo7

2. 1995-Feb 21 D.A. Affidavit for Domestic Violence (Conviction) Case No. 94-CR-836 Hal Richardson- Do

3. 1-20-1998 KS AG Letters and Appointment to Comittee-Claudine Dom Brow Ski

See all 3 documents

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18 Documents

ORDERS

· Documents:18

1. 1999 dad order to pay cs-- but never did

2. 1999 Order Child Support-Richardson

3. 2000 Aug 28 Motion For New Trial Denied --R.King

4. 2000 Dec 29 EXPARTE' Order Suspend Parenting Time with Mom

5. 2000 July 31-- Custody Switch-Judge Richard Anderson Gives FULL custody to CRIMINAL HAL RICHARDSON

See all 18 documents

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25 Documents

CSO, Court Memos Emails, letters not on the court record

· Documents:25

1. 1999 Judges Minutes

2. 1999 Letter From King to Hoffman

3. Dec 6, 2004 Plea for Hearing

4. 7-24-2001 Judge 8-30-2001 CM- Memos

5. 2001 Sept. 5 Judge Marla Luckert to Judge Anderson--'Interception of Emails to Judge From Website

See all 25 documents

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38 Documents

Motions

· Documents:38

1. 1999 CS Worksheet

2. 1999 May Motion - Hoffman Files Advance Hearingto Case Manager

3. 1999 Motion by Richardson for Change of Custody From Mom Dombrowski

4. 1999 October 05 Objection Case Manager R. King

5. 2000 April 17--- Motion to Change Custody to Richardson from Dombrowski (mom)

See all 38 documents

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9 Documents

District Attorney Affidavits- Correspondebce

· Documents:9

1. 1990 sarp records 3 1990_1

2. 9-9-2001 Leonard Robinson Atty Letter to Dom Brow Ski and the DA en Re RAPE

3. 9-9-2001 Leonard Robinson Atty Letter to Dom Brow Ski and the DA en Re RAPE

4. 1995 DV 95CR836 Mary Kelly PSI Not Good Candiate for Probation_1

5. 1995 DV 95CR836 Mary Kelly PSI Not Good Candiate for Probation_2

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5 Documents

Criminal Record HAL RICHARDSON

· Documents:5

1. 1990 sarp records 3 1990_1

2. 9-9-2001 Leonard Robinson Atty Letter to Dom Brow Ski and the DA en Re RAPE

3. 1995 DV 95CR836 Mary Kelly PSI Not Good Candiate for Probation_1

4. 1995 DV 95CR836 Mary Kelly PSI Not Good Candiate for Probation_2

5. 95cr 00836 dv against dombrowski conviction

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2 Documents

Battered Womens Task Force Records

· Documents:2

1. 1997 Closed Camera Inspection of 30 Day Drug Alchohol Hal Richardson Aug_1

2. 1995 - 1996 Battered Womens Task Force-Records of Claudine Dombrowski case no

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4 Documents

Medical Records of Abuse

· Documents:4

1. 9-9-2001 Leonard Robinson Atty Letter to Dom Brow Ski and the DA en Re RAPE

2. Rape 2001 Medical Records_1

3. 1996 Dr. Joel Nance Psych Eval. Judicial Notice Taken by Courts Claudine Dom Brow Ski

4. 1994-1996 Medical records of Abuse claudine dombrowski

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12 Documents

KS Appellate -- KS Supreme Court Briefs

· Documents:12

1. 2000 Aug 7 Court of Appeals Response to 1999 Appellate Brief

2. 2000 Aug 8 Appealls Affirms

3. 11-8-1999 supreme court of kansas, appellant petition for review (rebecca king)

4. 12-14-1999 kansas court of appeals brief of appellant dombrowski case 96d217 apeals judge buchele, j

5. 11-20-1997 kansas supreme court petition for review dombrowski v richardson case 96d217

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34 Documents

Psych Reports, Guardian ad Litem, Custody Eval, Co-parenting therapy et el

· Documents:34

1. 2007 Oct_1

2. 2003 Sept CM Order Frm Bruns to Llyod Swartz

3. 1997 closed camera inspection of 30 day drug alchohol hal richardson aug_1

4. 1997 Closed Camera Inspection of 30 Day Drug Alchohol Hal Richardson Aug_1

5. 2007 Oct.7 Disiplinary Complaint GAL -M_1

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13 Documents

Transcripts

· Documents:13

1. 2007 April 4 Hearing Transcript Richardson Dombrowski

2. 2008 Nov 4- Transcript Hearing Judge Debenham- Denting Child to Attend Granny's Funeral

3. transcriptofproceedings12 -16-08

4. 2008 Dec. 16- Transcript of Hearing 'Parenting Time' Judge Debenam- Dom Brow Ski -Denied--Again

5. 6-8-2000 transcript as an order by judge richard anderson

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TIMES UP!! Throw the Book at Abusers: Using DOMESTIC VIOLENCE ABUSE and CHILD CUSTODY in Your Case

2011-01-14T10:18:00.001-06:00

Throw the Book at Abusers: Using DOMESTIC VIOLENCE ABUSE and CHILD CUSTODY in Your Case

By Barry Goldstein

As this article is about to be published, Joan Zorza, Nancy Erickson and I are getting ready to make a presentation to the Battered Mothers Custody Conference about how protective mothers can use our book to improve their case. We hope to provide suggestions that will lead to better outcomes than we have been seeing in the custody courts.

Integrating Research into your Case

We often do not hear about a case until it turns bad by which point a lot has happened to undermine the protective mother's position. When a mother has a chance to present the best possible case from the start, what would we want her to do?. Perhaps the first obstacle and the first opportunity is to try to convince the court to avoid the standard practices that work poorly for children and instead look to the specialized body of up-to-date research that was unavailable when many of the standard or should I say substandard practices were first developed.

At the start of the case, let the judge know it is a domestic violence case. Point out that there is a lot of recent information and research about domestic violence custody cases and your case occurs at a time when court systems are transitioning from traditional practices that have been shown to work badly for children to improved practices based on the specialized body of scientific research now available. Ask the court to be open to using best practices as established by this research as the children in the case deserve the use of practices shown to work best for children.

At the start of the case, ask the court if everyone can agree that the first priority should be the safety of the children and the second priority to create arrangements that give the children the best chance to reach their potential. It is hard to imagine a better demonstration of the best interest of the child, but routinely courts consider other factors that are far less important to children. Courts have statutes or case law that define factors that must be considered, but none of the laws would prevent courts from making these two factors that most affect children the highest priority. By raising this issue early, protective mothers focus attention on important issues instead of the false and misleading issues abusers often use to confuse the courts.

Courts usually don't give litigants much time to discuss the case during early appearances, but these statements can be made during initial appearances, motions and in bench conferences. The myth that women frequently make false allegations of abuse to gain an advantage in litigation is a common problem and it may be right to address it early in the proceeding. The mom or her attorney can mention the myth, the correct information that such deliberately false allegations occur only one or two percent of the time and the problem courts have had in responding to valid domestic violence allegations because of a widespread belief in this myth. The court should be informed of the recent Department of Justice study led by Dr. Daniel Saunders of the University of Michigan that found professionals with inadequate training in domestic violence are more likely to believe this myth and make recommendations that are harmful to children. The court can be asked to avoid appointing professionals who believe in this myth and encourage court professionals to review the up-to-date research that proves mothers rarely make false allegations.

One of the major problems in domestic violence cases is the failure of court professionals to recognize domestic violence because they don't know what to look for. Chapter 13 of the book written by Judge Mike Brigner describes false assumptions untrained professionals often make. They believe if a woman goes back to her abuser, fails to pursue her request for a protective order or doesn't have medical or police records to corroborate an allegation of abuse, the charges must be false. In reality these are normal actions of battered women who do this for safety and other good reasons particularly when they are still living with the abuser. Court professionals should avoid discrediting allegations of domestic violence based on information that is not probative.

The other major problem courts have in recognizing domestic violence is they often fail to understand the significance of much of the available evidence that supports the mother's allegations of domestic violence. Court professionals are often looking only at evidence of physical abuse because they don't understand the reasons why abusers commit domestic violence. Domestic violence involve tactics abusive men use to maintain control over their partner and enforce what they believe is their privilege to make the major decisions in the relationship. It is not a crime of passion, but rather abusers use a cost-benefit analysis in determining when and whether to abuse his partner. This is why abusers are able to control their temper if he perceives his partner did something disrespectful when they are in public and instead waits until there are no witnesses before punishing her.

At the start of a case, protective mothers and their attorneys should put together information demonstrating the pattern of her partner's abuse. This would include abusive practices including physical, verbal, emotional, financial and legal tactics. It would also include controlling tactics like isolating her from friends and family, monitoring her behavior, false allegations of cheating, rules she has to follow and attempts to prevent professionals from helping her. The pattern would also include evidence about his motivation. Court professionals are often taught to view contested custody cases as "high conflict" by which they mean each parent is acting out their anger at the former partner to such an extreme as to hurt the children. In reality most contested custody cases are domestic violence cases which cannot be settled because of the father's abuse. Abuser groups encourage fathers who had little involvement with the children during the relationship to seek custody when she leaves in order to pressure her to return, punish her for leaving and avoid child support. Accordingly evidence of motivation would include his lack of interest in the children, poor parenting skills, use of visitation and the court case to gain access to his victim and attempt to resume their relationship. The alleged abuser's attempts to send the children to stay with a third party when the mother is available to take care of them should be used to demonstrate his goal is to hurt the mother. Sexist behavior is important evidence of motivation because sexism is the cause of domestic violence. This pattern can be used at court conferences, in motions as well as trials and appeals to help the court understand the pattern of abuse. The pattern can also be used in informal discussions with court professionals like GALs or evaluators to help them recognize the father's domestic violence.

Judges and other court professionals are often hostile or at least overly skeptical of abuse allegations. They are often more open to considering information about primary attachment even if they don't understand the full implications. At the same time, protective moms dealing with devastating issues of domestic violence and child abuse and defending against abuser tactics of demonizing the victim often fail to raise the issue of primary attachment.

Primary attachment refers to the person usually the mother who does most of the child care in the first couple of years of the baby's life. This has important consequences for the well being of the child. Primary attachment is sometimes confused with continuity, but subsequent changes in the child care arrangement, including court orders giving custody of the child to the non-primary attachment figure do not change primary attachment. Primary attachment is forever and a child deprived of regular contact with her primary attachment figure is more likely to suffer depression, low-self-esteem, commit suicide when older and other harmful effects. Unless the primary attachment figure is unsafe, how could it possibly be right to place a child at such risk? Safety issues would be a parent who is a drug addict, beats the child or some similar risk and certainly would not be just making negative statements about the other parent.

Although abusers sometimes lie or exaggerate their role in child care, in many cases they don't challenge the fact the mother provided most of the child care when the child was an infant. Other times the parties' work schedules or the father's lack of familiarity with the child's development and daily activities can be used to confirm the mother as the primary attachment figure. Once this is established, it is fair to ask why a father who claims to love the child would want to separate the child from his primary attachment figure. Information about the importance of primary attachment can be provided by the attorney during court appearances and through an expert witness at trial.

For many years, and to some extent today, if a mother complains about the father's domestic violence and sought to limit his contact, the judge would ask some version of did he also assault the children. If the answer was no, the court treated the abuser as if he was just as qualified as the mother for custody and visitation. This mistaken practice was supposed to stop after every state passed laws to take domestic violence more seriously in custody and visitation cases based on research that demonstrated the harm to children of witnessing domestic violence.

Our book contains an important chapter by Claire Crooks, Peter Jaffe and Nicholas Bala about the effects of domestic violence on children and how this information should be used in fashioning custody and visitation arrangements. In discussions during court conferences and through expert testimony at trial, courts should be informed that children who witness domestic violence (see it, hear it, see the mother's injuries, feel her fear) are more likely when they grow up to engage in serious dysfunctional behaviors like substance abuse, self-mutilation, teen pregnancy, school drop-out, prostitution, crime and for boys to abuse future partners and girls to be abused by future partners. The chapter also discusses the fact that children have developmental goals in each age category and witnessing domestic violence interferes with their ability to reach these goals. When children fail to reach developmental goals this interferes with achieving future development. In young children, being present for domestic violence can affect the hardwiring of their brain with harmful consequences for the rest of the child's life.

The severe consequences of domestic violence to children have led the writers of this chapter and most other reputable experts to recommend custody to the non-abusive or less abusive parent and supervised visitation, at least initially to the abuser. Claire Crooks, Peter Jaffe and Nicholas Bala provide a detailed discussion about best practices for future visitation with the abuser. Importantly, they recommend that the burden should be on the abuser to change his behavior and demonstrate safety instead of what many courts do which is to force the mother and children to accommodate the abuser. They recommend the abusive father complete a batterer program, accept full responsibility for his abuse and not try to minimize or blame others for his abuse. The abuser must promise never to abuse anyone again and acknowledge the harm he has caused his ex-partner and children. The court would then weigh these factors in determining whether to resume unsupervised visitation with the understanding that if he commits any further abuse his visitation will end.

These experts avoid common mistakes often committed by court professionals. The end of the relationship does not also end the danger presented by the abuser. For many women this is the most dangerous time particularly when he realizes that this time she is not coming back. Over 70% of domestic violence homicides by men are committed after she has left. In other words it is not the crime of passion many unqualified professionals assume. Every year abusive fathers involved in contested custody cases kill over one hundred children often with the unwitting assistance of the courts who fail to recognize the danger. Abusive fathers often act out their belief she had no right to leave him by going after custody, not as most court professionals believe, our of love for the children, but to pressure her to return or punish her for leaving. This is what most contested custody cases are about which courts mistakenly view as "high conflict" cases.

Significantly, domestic violence is not caused by the actions of the victim, but rather the belief system and sense of privilege of the abuser. The end of the relationship does not change his beliefs so that if he receives custody or unsupervised visitation, the children are likely to witness his abuse of future partners. This will compound the harm caused by his earlier abuse. Many inadequately trained professionals mistake the lack of physical abuse after separation as an indication he is no longer dangerous. In reality the change reflects limited access to his victim. We often see him continue his attempt to control through abusive litigation strategies and other forms of abuse, and protective mothers and their attorneys need to help the courts see how his abuse continues.

One of the common mistakes caused by viewing domestic violence cases through the "high conflict" lens is that courts seek to pressure victims to interact and cooperate with her abuser. Court professionals have been misled to believe that children would benefit from such cooperation. This works great for abusers who sought custody in order to gain access to his victim but is harmful to battered mothers and their children. If a father is to receive unsupervised visitation in such cases, genuine experts, like the contributors of the chapter, recommend parallel parenting. The court creates a very specific visitation arrangement which should not be changed by the parties. Each parent makes the rules during the time the children are with that parent. This limits the need for any communication to rare emergencies and has been shown to work better for children.

Mental Health Professionals

Mental health professionals were brought into custody courts to provide expertise in domestic violence cases at a time when there was a widespread belief that domestic violence was caused by mental health issues, substance abuse and the behavior of the victim. Although these assumptions proved wrong and most evaluators and other mental health professionals have little or no expertise in domestic violence and are unfamiliar with the scientific research now available, courts have continued to rely on their "expertise." The research cited in our book and elsewhere demonstrates that the involvement of mental health professionals in domestic violence cases causes more harm than benefit. Judge Marjorie Fields wrote in her chapter that she refused to appoint them and was never reversed for making custody decisions without relying on mental health professionals.

Courts often automatically seek to appoint evaluators without fully considering the purpose or benefit. Since they often come to cases with biases against protective mothers, the moms should seek to prevent such appointments or limit their role to areas in which they actually have expertise. I appreciate many judges may be reluctant to try a contested custody case without a "neutral" professional, but it is worth making a record opposing such an appointment and if necessary trying to limit their role to topics for which they have expertise. Alternatively, mothers can ask for the appointment of someone with expertise in domestic violence or at least a willingness to consult with a domestic violence expert. Ask the judge or other professional seeking such an appointment how such an appointment would help the court make its decision. If there is an actual mental health issue such as credible concerns about a parent's mental health, the appointment should limit the role to questions about the mental health condition and how it would affect parenting. None of the tests psychologists use can help determine issues like parenting ability or domestic violence and unless they are the rare evaluator with domestic violence expertise and familiarity with the specialized body of research, they really have nothing to contribute to the fundamental issue before the court. A litigant will have more credibility challenging an evaluator if she does so before there is an unfavorable report.

Robin Yeamans wrote a chapter for the book that is helpful for challenging evaluation reports and particularly conclusions based on reliance on psychological tests. The tests routinely used for custody evaluations were not created for the populations seen in custody court. The evaluators rarely tell the courts that the results are based on probability so the findings may not apply to the particular parties the court must judge. Under the best of circumstances, these tests have a probable accuracy of between 55-65%. Under common situations for which evaluations are sought such as domestic violence or a stressful custody dispute, the percentages are significantly lower. Some of these tests have a demonstrated gender bias so that the same answer is treated an negative for the mother but neutral for the father. The reliance of questionable psychological exams, inability to recognize domestic violence and other questionable practices frequently result in evaluations that pathologize protective mothers.

This information can be used in objecting to the appointment of evaluators and for cross-examination if they are appointed over objection. The book provides a substantial amount of up-to-date scientific research that can be used to question the evaluator and challenge the standard methods which are far from best practices. Evaluators can be asked if they are familiar with the authoritative research that is available. If they are the attorney can demonstrate that the evaluator failed to use the practices recommended by the research and if the evaluator is unfamiliar with this research it should be grounds to disqualify or at least challenge their credibility. Protective mothers will frequently find that the bad practices criticized by the experts who wrote the book are the same approaches used by the evaluators. Joan Zorza, Judge Marjorie Fields and others explain why a family systems approach is inappropriate in domestic violence cases, but most evaluators use this approach because they do not understand domestic violence.

The research in the book can be used not only to challenge the bad information provided to the court, but to provide the court with the accurate information it needs. The mother can use her own expert witness to discuss the scientific research available and how it would apply to the case. If the mother cannot afford an expert witness she may be able to ask a domestic violence advocate to serve as her expert witness. This would emphasize an important point we want to make that domestic violence advocates are the real experts about domestic violence and the only profession working full time on domestic violence issues. Many communities have developed a practice whereby child protective agencies work together with the local domestic violence organization. They train each other's staffs and when the child protective agency has a case that might involve domestic violence, they consult with a domestic violence advocate. These programs have resulted in a better ability to recognize domestic violence and provide solutions that work best for children. Accordingly, the use of domestic violence advocates and experts should be considered best practices. To put it another way, relying on mental health professionals without consultation with domestic violence experts should be considered malpractice.

Parental Alienation Syndrome (PAS), sometimes called parental alienation or just alienation in order to avoid a discredited term is a major cause of mistaken decisions in custody courts. Dr. Paul Fink, former president of the American Psychiatric Association wrote a chapter in the book about PAS. In his chapter he included several quotes from Richard Gardner, who concocted PAS based not on any research but on his own experience and biases. These quotes are to the effect that sex between children and adults can be beneficial. I believe many of the judges who permitted the use of PAS or its progeny are unaware of these quotes and would not wish to be associated with such offensive ideas. Nancy Erickson wrote a chapter the helps protective moms counter PAS allegations.

After the Case Has Gone Bad

I believe that if the court system were using the up-to-date scientific research available to help them handle domestic violence custody cases instead of myths, stereotypes and biases that so often dominate these cases the horrendous outcomes we constantly see would be rare. Until the courts start using best practices, however we will continue to need to respond to decisions that are tragically wrong.

Many judges smugly state that if you don't like their decision the remedy is to appeal. Of course many mothers don't have the resources for appeals and often trial courts place obstacles in the way of appeals. Poor legal work or cowardly attorneys who failed to make a record of the important evidence and issues in the case often prevents any meaningful review of the decision.

If a protective mother is able to appeal, the research in the book can be particularly helpful in framing the issues. The brief can put together all the evidence that constituted the pattern of abuse. This will include tons of evidence for which the trial court failed to understand the significance. The research in the book can be cited in an appellate brief and is particularly appropriate in an amicus brief that seeks to help the appeals court understand the societal harm caused by the discredited practices routinely relied on by trial judges. In most cases the mothers will be able to contrast the assumptions, biases and unscientific approaches used by "neutral" professionals with the accurate research provided in our book and many other sources. If the assumptions are unstated the brief can discuss them based on the context and failure to provide a proper basis for the conclusions.

The worst cases, often referred to as Custody-Visitation Scandal Cases because the outcomes are so extreme and are contrary to the evidence and the well being of children involve decisions giving custody to the abuser and supervised or no visitation to a safe, protective mother who is the primary attachment figure for the child. Cases with these extreme outcomes are virtually always wrongly decided.

One of my favorite parts of the book is a quote in Joan Zorza's chapter 14 page 26. I know the page by heart because I use it so often. "Until judges and other professionals receive the specific training they need to recognize these patterns (and as noted previously, many have such strong preconceived notions that they will not learn anything from even the best training), they must consult with genuine DV experts, particularly DV advocates. Otherwise, as shown in many parts of this book, courts often make mistakes that place the lives and safety of protective mothers and their children in jeopardy. IN THIS CONTEXT, IT IS IMPORTANT FOR COURTS THAT RULE AGAINST ALLEGED VICTIMS OF DV TO BE OPEN TO THE POSSIBILITY THAT THEY MADE A MISTAKE. COURTS SHOULD BE RELUCTANT TO TAKE PUNITIVE OR RETALIATORY ACTIONS AGAINST MOTHERS WHO CONTINUE TO BELIEVE THEIR PARTNERS ABUSED THEM." This quote also applies to allegations of child sexual abuse for which courts often deny valid allegations and then punish mothers severely for trying to protect their children.

The best time to use this quote would be when the abuser first seeks such restrictions or the judge indicates consideration of these extreme remedies because once the decision is made courts can become defensive trying to justify their mistakes. Nevertheless I would encourage protective moms to use this quote in asking courts to modify extreme restrictions particularly when the court created the restrictions without being aware of the quote or the research in the book.

Decisions on custody and visitation can always be challenged based upon a substantial change of circumstances. When a mother cannot afford to appeal or the time for appeal has expired, this may be her only avenue to change the bad decision. In most cases the decisions were the product of the use of outdated and discredited practices and the lack of information about the up-to-date scientific research now available. I believe the availability of this information is itself a change of circumstance that justifies a reconsideration of the evidence based on the information in the book and other good sources. Mothers should be able to pick out many examples of practices and assumptions misused by court professionals that led to the mistaken decision which the research shows are practices that work poorly for children.

An even stronger argument for a change of circumstance can be made when subsequent events after the decision can be combined with the new research to create an even clearer case of changed circumstances. In many of these cases, whether or not stated directly, courts give abusive fathers custody based on the prediction that they are more likely to foster a relationship between the mother and children. The prediction of domestic violence experts would be just the opposite because they understand the father was seeking custody as a way to control the mother and punish her for leaving. THE BATTERER AS PARENT says that all batterers engage in harmful parenting practices that include undermining the children's relationship with the mother. Accordingly when the father wins custody and proceeds to interfere with the relationship either by seeking court orders or his unilateral actions, this behavior confirms the predictions of domestic violence experts and discredits the predictions that led to the decision. Our book says it is common for abusive fathers to interfere with the mothers' relationships once they get custody. The courts' handling of this common issue is another example of gender bias. If the original decision supported the mother and resulted in interference with the father's relationship, the court would severely punish the mother and yet rarely does anything in response to far more objectionable behavior by the father. The mother can raise this issue by asking the court what it would do if a mother had committed the interference this father is doing.

I am not sure how this strategy of using the research to claim a change of circumstance will work. Certainly it is allowed in other areas of the law as when advances in DNA technology lead to a reconsideration of criminal convictions. I suspect it will work in some cases and not others. It is possible that even if the court rejects the initial petition it may lead to a later relaxation of visitation in which the court provides a different justification for promoting the relationship between mother and children so as not to acknowledge its prior mistakes. As this information is presented in more courts and the professionals become familiar with the research, we hope it will lead to better decisions for all protective mothers and their children.

Barry Goldstein is a nationally recognized domestic violence expert, speaker, writer and consultant. He is the co-editor with Mo Therese Hannah of DOMESTIC VIOLENCE, ABUSE and CHILD CUSTODY. Barry can be reached by email at their web site www.Domesticviolenceabuseandchildcustody.com

Rates At Which Batterers Receive Custody

2011-01-14T10:15:00.001-06:00

by Joan Meier, Esq.

One statement in Breaking the Silence: Children’s Voices that has provoked controversy was my statement that “the studies are showing” that up to 2/3 of accused or adjudicated batterers receive joint or sole custody in court. While no empirical study can definitively determine a universal statistical rate, the key point is that the research consistently shows that accused and adjudicated batterers receive joint or sole custody disturbingly often. This confirms the anecdotal experience of domestic violence attorneys and victims around the country. The following research supports this perspective.

I. A History of Domestic Violence is Common among Contested Custody Cases.

The remarkably consistent research on this issue is compiled in my previously-issued statement , Research Indicating that the majority of cases that go to court as ‘high conflict’ contested custody cases have a history of domestic violence (Nov. 9, 2005).

One good example is a study cited by Janet Johnston, a leading researcher of parental alienation, which found that, among custody litigants referred to mediation, “[p]hysical aggression had occurred between 75% and 70% of the parents . . . even though the couples had been separated. . . [for an average of 30-42 months]”. Furthermore, [i]n 35% of the first sample and 48% of the second, [the violence] was denoted as severe and involved battering and threatening to use or using a weapon.”
- Janet R. Johnston, “High-Conflict Divorce,” The Future of Children, Vol. 4, No. 1, Spring 1994, 165-182) citing Depner et al., “Building a uniform statistical reporting system: A snapshot of California Family Court Services,“ Family and ConciliationCourts Review (1992) 30: 185-206

II. Domestic Violence Perpetrators are More Likely to Contest Custody than Non- Abusers.

The American Psychological Association’s Presidential Task Force on Violence in the Family, the leading review of the research as of 1996, found that men who abuse their partners contest custody at least twice as often as non-abusing fathers. They are even more likely to contest custody if the children are boys.
- American Psychological Association Presidential Task Force on Violence in the Family (1996) at p. 40.

III. Accused and Adjudicated Batterers Receive Joint or Sole Custody Surprisingly Often.

The research on this has only emerged in the past few years and most studies have been small and local. Nonetheless, they document disturbing trends, which surprised even me when I first discovered them.

A. Multiple studies have documented gender bias against women in custody litigation.

Contrary to the conventional wisdom that women are favored in custody litigation, both the experiences of battered women and the empirical research are showing that women who allege abuse are deeply disfavored in custody courts.

The Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court Gender Bias Task Force was one of the first states to document the gender bias against women in family courts. This court-initiated study expressly found that “our research contradicted [the] perception” that ”there is a bias in favor of women in these decisions.” Moreover, it found that “in determining custody and visitation, many judges and family service officers do not consider violence toward women relevant.” The Court’s study further found that “the courts are demanding more of mothers than fathers in custody disputes” and that “many courts put the needs of noncustodial fathers above those of custodial mothers and children.”
- Gender Bias Study of the Court System in Massachusetts, 24 New Eng.L.Rev. 745, 747, 825, 846 (1990)

More recently, and since the evolution and widespread adoption of “parental alienation syndrome,” a multi-year, four-phase study using qualitative and quantitative social science research methodologies by the Wellesley Centers for Women found “a consistent pattern of human rights abuses” by family courts, including failure to protect battered women and children from abuse, discriminating against and inflicting degrading treatment on battered women, and denying battered women due process. Histories of abuse of mother and children were routinely ignored or discounted.
- Wellesley Centers for Women Battered Mothers’ Testimony Project, Battered Mothers Speak Out: A Human Rights Report on Domestic Violence and Child Custody in the Massachusetts Family Courts (Nov. 2002)(hereafter “BMTP”), Executive Summary at 2.

A comparable study by the Arizona Coalition Against Domestic Violence found that most of the women surveyed felt the history of abuse was not taken seriously and that they were ignored, disrespected and discriminated against by court personnel.
- Arizona Coalition Against Domestic Violence, Battered Mothers’ Testimony Project: A Human Rights Approach to Child Custody and Domestic Violence (June 2003), pp. 47, 49, 6.

A study of the Domestic Relations Division of Philadelphia Family Court conducted by the Philadephia Women’s Law Project in cooperation with the court, found that litigants are often denied due process, and that applicable legal standards are “not always observed, particularly in the consideration of abuse in custody proceedings, leaving families at risk.”
- Tracy, Fromson & Miller, Justice in the Domestic Relations Division of Philadelphia Family Court: A Report to the Community, DOMESTIC VIOLENCE REPORT, Vol. 8, No. 6 (Aug/Sept. 2003), p. 94.

B. Studies show Accused and Adjudicated Batterers Receiving Sole or Joint Custody Surprisingly Often.

My own survey of the case law in 2001 identified 38 appellate state court decisions concerning custody and domestic violence. To my astonishment, 36 of the 38 trial courts had awarded joint or sole custody to alleged and adjudicated batterers. Two-thirds of these decisions were reversed on appeal.
- Meier, Domestic Violence, Child Custody, and Child Protection: Understanding Judicial Resistance and Imagining the Solutions, A.U. J. Gender, Soc. Pol. & the Law, 11:2 (2003), 657-731, p. 662, n. 19, and Appendix.

These cases included a case in which the perpetrator had been repeatedly convicted of domestic assault; in which a father was given sole custody of a16-month old despite his undisputed choking of the mother resulting in her hospitalization and his arrest; in which the father had broken the mother’s collarbone; had committed “occasional incidents of violence”; and had committed two admitted assaults. More such instances can be found in Meier, supra.

The American Judges Association has found that approximately 70% of batterers succeed in convincing authorities that the victim is unfit for or undeserving of sole custody. Another way of saying this is that 70% of batterers obtain sole or joint custody.
- American Judges Association, “Domestic Violence and the Courtroom: Understanding the Problem . . . Knowing the Victim” http://aja.ncsc.dni.us/domviol/page5.html (at “Forms of Emotional Battering. . . Threats to Harm or Take Away Children”)

A survey of battered women by the Arizona Coalition Against Domestic Violence found that courts awarded joint or sole custody to the alleged batterers 56-74% of the time (depending on the county). Many of these cases involved documented child abuse or adult abuse.
- Arizona Coalition Against Domestic Violence, Battered Mothers’ Testimony Project: A Human Rights Approach to Child Custody and Domestic Violence (June 2003), pp. 33-34, 47-49

A study of 300 cases over a 10-year period in which the mother sought to protect the child from sexual abuse, found that 70% resulted in unsupervised visitation or shared custody; in 20% of the cases the mothers completely lost custody, and many of these lost all visitation rights.
- Neustein & Goetting (1999), “Judicial Responses to the Protective Parent’s Complaint of Child Sexual Abuse,” Journal of Child Sexual Abuse 8 (4): 103-122.

The Wellesley Battered Mothers’ Testimony Project found that 15 out of 40 cases resulted in sole or joint physical custody to the fathers, all of whom had abused both the mother and the children.
- BMTP, supra at Appendix A.

The Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court Gender Bias Task Force found that 94% of fathers who actively sought custody received sole or joint custody, regardless of whether there was a history of abuse. While fathers received primary physical custody 29% of the time, mothers received primary physical custody in only 7% of the contested cases. The Study also cited other research which similarly found that fathers who sought custody received primary physical custody 2/3 of the time, with mothers receiving it less than ¼ of the time; and another study which found that fathers seeking custody received joint or sole custody 79% of the time, with mothers receiving sole custody in only 15% of those cases (compared to fathers’ sole custody in 41% of the cases).
- Gender Bias Study at 831-832 and citing Middlesex Divorce Research Group relitigation study and Phear et al., 1983.

While the Massachusetts study and those it cited were not able to identify what proportion of the contesting fathers were batterers, the studies cited in my other Statement indicate consistently that 75% of cases have a history of domestic violence, with a substantial proportion of severe violence. Hence, it is likely that a substantial proportion of the fathers receiving joint or primary physical custody in this study had committed domestic violence.
- Meier Statement, Research Indicating that the Majority of Cases that go to Court as ‘High Conflict’ Contested Custody Cases have a History of Domestic Violence (Nov. 9, 2005).

Battered Mothers Gain Fair Attorney Client Terms at Conference (Albany, New York)

2011-01-14T09:27:00.001-06:00

Battered Mothers Gain Fair Attorney Client Terms at Conference

Attorney, legislator and author Karen Winter opened the 8th Battered Mothers Custody Conference in Albany, New York reviewing attorney billing practices.

Attorney, legislator and author Karen Winner opened the 8th Battered Mothers Custody Conference in Albany, New York with her presentation, “How to Think Like a Lawyer on Legal Billing Issues”, on Friday afternoon January 7, 2011. Winner is well known for her report on family law abuses in Marin County, California which was published during 2000. She developed a Statement of Rights & Responsibilities for use between attorneys and their clients in 1993. The Statement of Rights & Responsibilities was subsequently incorporated into New York State law and was utilized as a model by many other states as well.

Good Attorneys Respect Client Rights

The hallmark of a good attorney is one that establishes expectations at the outset of the business relationship and understands that mutual respect is essential. Winner’s Statement of Rights & Responsibilities for clients include: appropriate, respectful treatment; avoidance of a conflict of interest; competency; fair billing practices; an expectation to be kept informed of the status of your case; a right to privacy; ethical conduct, and; an equal opportunity for representation. If the state you live in has not incorporated a similar Statement of Rights & Responsibilities, be aware the statement can be incorporated by copy into a retainer agreement negotiated with an attorney.

Good Attorneys Zealously Represent Client Interests

The attorney client relationship is a precarious balance of sharing the most intimate details of life with someone who is in business to make a living from dispatching heartache as effectively as possible. Conflicts of interest occur as a result of personal relationships, spousal or business relationships that are frequently not revealed by attorneys. Cronyism can play a part as well. Some small towns’ “business as usual” legal practices frequently include improper ex parte communication or enmeshment of business opportunities.

Some attorneys project that social graces and professionalism require a personal need to “play nice” with other attorneys. They may also choose to placate the judge by avoiding unpopular points of view, thereby putting their need for social acceptance ahead of their obligation to zealously represent their clients’ best interests. It isn't unusual to hear, “That's the way it's done here...” Just like any medical diagnosis, in a crisis, your legal diagnosis merits a second opinion. If you live in a small town where there are only a few attorneys, you can make a request for an “objective memorandum” on the issues you are trying to resolve.

Good Attorneys Have Fair Billing Practices

In many states, attorneys are required to bill within sixty days or forfeit their fees. If you have never been billed by your attorney, you are not legally obligated to pay the bill. However, in the interest of fairness, it isn’t unreasonable to balance how many tasks your attorney has performed for you without charging you. A client should consider several issues before they ‘nickel and dime’ each line item on the attorney’s invoice. Did the attorney forget to bill for an appearance or a letter to your benefit in the past? Is the business relationship generally fair? If so, it may be better to let an oversight slide. It's appropriate to ask your attorney to define appropriate benchmarks for your case to help you fairly gauge their performance and to allow for a reasonable anticipation of the length of time and expense related to your legal issues.

If you entered into an attorney client relationship while you were overwhelmed by the circumstances that led to your asking for representation, once you catch your breath, you can go back and request that your attorney renegotiate the terms of their retainer. If your case transitions, for instance, from a custody case to a child support modification, these separate legal actions are appropriate opportunities to address the incorporation of the Statement of Rights & Responsibilities. A retainer should reflect the scope of work that is actually being performed.

Good Attorneys Arbitrate Billing Disputes

If a client finds addressing financial issues emotionally traumatic or too difficult to understand, it's perfectly reasonable to request that a trusted family member or friend temporarily assist while addressing billing issues. Attorneys are required to maintain contemporaneous records to justify their billing practices. If you're addressing an error in billing, your attorney should be willing to rectify it. If you are being billed for administrative and clerical tasks at the attorney's hourly rate, it's time to address billing practices.

If you come to an impasse with your attorney about their billing practices, request arbitration. In New York State, an attorney who does not provide arbitration papers to a client objecting to a bill, may be subject to forfeiting their fees. In many cases attorneys are required to present their bills to the court for approval of fees. They must be reasonable, itemized, as well as substantiated. If they are not, then a judge has the right to reject the billing or reduce it to more reasonable fees.

Good Attorneys Protect Battered Mothers

Understanding and preserving client rights and responsibilities is particularly important to battered mothers. The controversial nature of obtaining fair, equitable and protective provisions from the courts is a more difficult task for victims of domestic violence. The laws of evidence are not consistently applied within the family courts as they are in other areas of the law. A family law judge is allowed to dictate many aspects of a divorce or custody action without challenge, and are given immunity if they are mistaken.

The discretion of judges, custody evaluators and other legal participants is much more subjective and it is not subject to the same scrutiny by appellate courts. An attorney that is not diligently representing the interests of a battered mother, while draining her financial resources, can deliver negative consequences that last for generations to her children.

To include a copy of Section 1210.1 of the Joint Rules of the Apellate Division (22NYCRR§1210.1):

You are entitled to be treated with courtesy and consideration at all times by your lawyer and the other lawyers and personnel in your lawyer's office.

You are entitled to an attorney capable of handling your legal matter competently and diligently, in accordance with the highest standards of the profession. If you are not satisfied with how your matter is being handled, you have the right to withdraw from the attorney-client relationship at any time (court approval may be required in some matters and your attorney may have a claim against you for the value of services rendered to you up to the point of discharge).

You are entitled to your lawyer's independent professional judgment and undivided loyalty uncompromised by conflicts of interest.

You are entitled to be charged a reasonable fee and to have your lawyer explain at the outset how the fee will be computed and the manner and frequency of billing. You are entitled to request and receive a written itemized bill from your attorney at reasonable intervals. You may refuse to enter into any fee arrangement that you find unsatisfactory. In the event of a fee dispute, you may have the right to seek arbitration; your attorney will provide you with the necessary information regarding arbitration in the event of a fee dispute, or upon your request.

You are entitled to have your questions and concerns addressed in a prompt manner and to have your telephone calls returned promptly.
You are entitled to be kept informed as to the status of your matter and to request and receive copies of papers. You are entitled to sufficient information to allow you to participate meaningfully in the development of your matter.
You are entitled to have your legitimate objectives respected by your attorney including whether or not to settle your matter (court approval of a settlement is required in some matters).
You have the right to privacy in your dealings with your lawyer and to have your secrets and confidences preserved to the extent permitted by law.
You are entitled to have your attorney conduct himself or herself ethically in accordance with the Code of Professional Responsibility.
You may not be refused representation on the basis of race, creed, color, religion, sex, sexual orientation, age, national origin or disability.

Battered Mothers: No Longer Silenced!! Eighth Annual Battered Mother's Custody Conference

2011-01-14T09:11:00.001-06:00

Battered Mothers: No longer silenced.

The Battered Mother's Custody Conference focuses on legal and human rights issues surrounding divorce and custody cases for victims of domestic violence.

The Eighth Battered Mother’s Custody Conference: held in Albany, New York January 7 through January 9, 2011. The conference was founded by Mo Therese Hannah, Ph.D. of Albany, New York and Liliane Heller Miller of Charlotte, North Carolina in 2003. Dr. Hannah’s most recent publication was as co-editor of “Domestic Violence, Abuse, and Child Custody: Legal Strategies and Policy Issues” with Barry Goldstein, which was published in 2010.

The conference brings a laser focus to the little known phenomenon of battered mothers losing custody of their children to their abusers in divorce and custody cases. The conference focuses on both domestic and international aspects of the issue; scholarly research; and legal and human rights cases related to domestic violence and child custody cases. Members bring international advocates together once a year. Twenty-eight advocates are scheduled to make presentations at this year's conference.

In a society that sees itself as progressive, and a champion of the needs of the disenfranchised; domestic violence continues to cover the United States in a cloak of disgrace. Many individuals are led to believe that if a victim of domestic violence seeks the aid of police, social service agencies, or sincerely pursues leaving a dangerous marriage through divorce, that the end of her nightmare is close at hand. However, once inside the judicial system, asking for help becomes a myth, as victims of domestic violence do not fare well.

According to attorney Joan Meir in a 2005 article published on “Stop Family Violence Now” (Meier), within U. S. divorce and custody cases, contested cases by abusers result in fully seventy percent (70%) of abusers receiving custody of the couple’s children. Trends like these as well as an increase in petitions protesting the violation of human rights to the Inter America Human Rights Commission, tell a different story.

Ironically, the U.S. was once seen as a safe harbor and respite from injustice in other parts of the world. The U.S. was petitioned as the grantor of political asylum to world citizens suffering from unfair political and legal persecution. Yet, the tide began to turn when the first U. S. citizen was granted asylum from the United States by The Netherlands in 1994.

Holly Ann Collins appealed for protection from an abusive ex-spouse and the right to raise her three children in The Netherlands. Scheduled to appear this weekend, Ms. Collins and her son Zachary Collins will discuss their experience. Now grown, Ms. Collins’ children serve as advocates for the plight of children caught in the middle by the court systems. Her daughter Jennifer Collins founded CA3, “Children Against Court Appointed Child Abuse” in 2008.

Even in cases where the murder of a couple’s children was the ultimate tragic result, injustice has proven extremely difficult to remedy within U.S. Courts for mothers plagued by domestic violence. In 2005 the U.S. Supreme Court ruled in Town of Castle Rock, Colorado v. Jessica Gonzales, that the state of Colorado was not obligated to enforce the restraining order that was issued to protect Jessica Gonzales' family from her ex-husband, Simon Gonzales. The murder of her three daughters at the hands of their father was battled out in U. S. courts for five years.

Gonzales made ten requests over a ten hour period of time asking police to enforce her restraining order against Simon Gonzales, but they repeatedly put her off. Ultimately her ex-husband opened fire into the police station with an assault weapon, was killed, and her daughters were found dead in his bullet riddled car in front of the police station.

With both protection and justice denied by her own country, Ms. Lanahan (formerly Gonzales) filed a complaint with the Inter America Human Rights Commission protesting the violation of her human rights. The case, Jessica Ruth Gonzales v. USA, was accepted for argument by the IAHRC in 2007.

Subsequently at least ten more victims of domestic violence have filed petitions protesting the violation of their human rights against the United States with the IAHRC.

Their cases known as (Dombrowski et el v US 2007) are currently pending acceptance.

While the United States never ratified the signed agreement making it accountable to the IAHRC for human rights offenses, hope remains that if justice will not motivate the U. S. government to take protective action on behalf of battered mothers and their children, shame will.

Meier, Joan. “Rates at Which Batters Receive Custody”. Stop Family Violence, a Project of the Tides Center. NewYork, NY. November 30, 2005. stopfamilyviolence.org

Author Lundy Bancroft Teaches Battered Mothers to Fight Back – BMCC, Albany NY

2011-01-14T09:02:00.001-06:00

Leading author and therapist Lundy Bancroft teaches battered mothers to fight back at the 8th Battered Mothers Custody Conference in Albany, New York 1/7/11

The 8th Battered Mother’s Custody Conference featured author and activist Lundy Bancroft, who has for more than a decade addressed the issues of battered mothers who lost custody to their abusers in family courts. Well known as the founder of the Battered Mothers Testimony Project in Massachusetts, Bancroft is also the author of three books on the dynamics and subsequent effects of domestic violence. He was the winner of the 2004 Pro Humanitate Award from the North American Resource Center for Child Welfare, for his book, “The Batterer as Parent”.

Battered Mothers Fight Myths

The past seven Battered Mother’s Custody Conferences validated and quantified an emergent judicial and human rights crisis in our family courts. Judges are delivering abused children to the very abusers that their protective mothers painstakingly escaped. For the first time in the conference’s history, Bancroft introduced fighting back against this injustice as the theme for this year’s conference meetings and speakers.

The prevailing myth is that once out of an abusive marriage, the mother is now safe from her abuser. But the truth is that 75% of women who are injured or murdered by their abusers suffer the attack within the first thirty days of escaping the relationship[1]. Despite the divorce, many women endure ongoing torment by their former spouse and abuser because they are permanently connected through their common children.

An abuser stalking, threatening, and torturing the mother, and abusing their children in order to hurt her, are very common realities. The courts perceive repeated requests for protection as strategic chicanery and often fail to validate an ongoing threat to the mother.

Paradoxically, many battered mothers are in the unenviable position of being challenged by Child Protective Services to ‘leave their abusive marriage to protect their children’, despite the statistical odds of their own demise, and the unlikelihood that law enforcement will provide or enforce protective orders. Once embroiled in the family court systems, the battered mothers are marginalized and accused of lying to gain unfair advantage over abusive fathers.

No amount of presenting the actual facts and figures seems to gain these protective mothers and their children safe harbor. Judges and other legal participants routinely place children with their abusers. There are both domestic and international human rights implications to this issue with more than 1,000 families a week now facing this crisis; Bancroft’s expertise is needed more than ever[2].

Battered Mothers Fight Courts

The first shock a protective mother must overcome is the reality that the justice system does not exist within the family court system. On television, in our classrooms, and in the news, the myth that our legal system is fair and just is promulgated. Many protective mothers discover that the truth is that the rules which apply in a criminal court or in business related civil cases are not applied in family courts. Rules of evidence and consequences for challenging the status quo are harsh and unpredictable. Judges have unilateral discretion to define what happens, how it happens and whether she is even allowed to tell anyone else about the court’s orders.

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A protective mother stripped of her children, is also stripped of her right to parent; her right of free speech; her right of protection; and her right to protest these injustices. Our Bill of Rights is frequently ignored, and the judicial system affords immunity for the legal participants including Judges, Child Custody Evaluators, Child Protective Services, and Law Enforcement Agencies. If they misjudge, and the battered mother or her children die, then no one is accountable. Do you risk contempt of a court order in an attempt to protect your children?

Battered Mothers Fight Child Abuse

Often the abuser begins to deliberately alienate the protective mother from her children, telling the children that she abandoned them, did not want to mother them, lies about his abuse, or fails to parent them effectively. The child begins to doubt their own ability to perceive reality. They may feel a forced sense of loyalty to their abuser. If the children do not follow his lead and mistreat their mother, what are the physical and emotional consequences they suffer at the hands of the abusers?

Bancroft advises protective mothers and their support systems to remember that the purpose of the fight is to keep as close to your children as possible. Keep things calm, remind them that you love them. Rather than debate which parent is “right” in a never ending battle for the right to exist without the abuser’s influence – ask your child, “What do YOU think?” Maintain the child’s ability to read the situation, assess it and come to an independent conclusion. When the abuser misrepresents a mother’s feelings or actions, correct the lie, and encourage the child to rely on their own personal experience with their mother.

Battered Mothers Fight Isolation

Many Americans erroneously believe family court dynamics are identical to other courts’ standard of evidence in the United States. Therefore they come to the conclusion that a mother who loses custody in civil proceedings must have done something to deserve the loss. The stigma of losing one’s child is an isolating experience. The battered mother finds the experience so painful that she abandons any attempt to explain what happened to her.

To overcome the stigma, the battered mother may attend conferences like the annual Battered Mother’s Custody Conference; join Facebook Causes; and support websites related to healing from and fighting domestic violence; connect with other people with like experiences; and research what is happening in other parts of the country. Books like those published by authors Lundy Bancroft, Mo Therese Hannah, Barry Goldstein, Amy Neuman, Michael Lesher, Wendy Murphy, Karin Huffer and others can provide specific legal, emotional and political strategies to effect change.

Battered Mothers Fight Human Rights Injustices

Political initiatives are reflected in the progress of landmark legal cases in human rights; follow the outcome of cases such as Jessica Ruth Gonzales v. USA, as well as other international cases concerning domestic violence under consideration by the Inter America Human Rights Commission. The U. S. Supreme Court upheld the Castle Rock, Colorado Police Department’s refusal to enforce a protective order against Simon Gonzales that resulted in the murder of their three children. Gonzales (now Lanahan) is protesting the violation of her human rights.

As the first U. S. Citizen to receive political asylum from The Netherlands, Holly Collins and her three children fled the United States in 1994 to be free of domestic violence when they could not obtain protection from family courts. Ms. Collins plans to return to live in the U. S., just as her youngest child reaches adulthood. How our country responds to the knowledge that a mother was forced to flee her own country for protection will be an important barometer of progress.

[1] Indiana Law School Protective Order Project, “What is Domestic Violence?” Website. Referenced January 12, 2011. http://www.law.indiana.edu/pop/domestic_violence/

[2] Silberg, Joyanna, “How Many Children Are Court -Ordered Into Unsupervised Contact With an Abusive Parent After Divorce?”, The Leadership Council on Child Abuse & Interpersonal Violence, Press Release. September, 22, 2008, http://www.leadershipcouncil.org/1/med/PR3.html, referenced January 12, 2011

How Narcissists/Batterers Abuse Children During Divorce

2011-01-14T09:00:00.001-06:00

Narcissistic Parents Emotionally Abuse Children. -

Narcissists often use children as pawns during and after divorce. Learn to identify this emotional abuse of children caught in the middle.

The emotional abuse by a narcissist is pervasive and insidious. It impacts not only the narcissist’s spouse but his or her children as well. Once divorce proceedings begin, the narcissist’s abuse will likely escalate. Narcissists will use any means possible to gain control of the situation or to make themselves look better. Children become perfect pawns for narcissistic parents to use against their spouses. Identifying how narcissistic parents abuse their children is the first step to devising strategies to minimize abuse and help children cope.

Using Children as Pawns in Divorce

Narcissistic parents will often seek custody of children during a divorce even if previously they were not involved parents. It’s important to them to appear to be the better parent. Also, if they have custody of the children, it gives them another way to continue to control and abuse their spouse.

If narcissists don’t get custody of the children, after divorce, they may use visitation as a means of control and harassment. They may ask for many changes to visitation schedules to accommodate optional work, social and vacation events. Most often these requests will be to not to have the children when they are scheduled to. Narcissists may refuse to accommodate the spouse’s requests even when the requests are made for the benefit of the children.

Narcissists may also be late in picking up the children for visitation or not picking them up at all. They may make last minute changes and expect to be accommodated. When they are not, they will cite this as an example of how unreasonable their spouse is. Narcissists may also take advantage of third parties such as school, daycare or friends and family who don’t know the agreements made with the other parent. It’s important to note that all of these tactics by the narcissist have nothing to do with the best interest of the children. It’s simply a way for the narcissist to play games and have control.

Emotional Abuse by a Narcissistic Parent

Narcissists will use people in whatever way in necessary to get what they want. This world view also applies to their children. They will abuse their children regardless whether they stay married to the other parent or not. During and after divorce, a narcissist’s emotional abuse of his or her children may seem more direct or blatant. Quite often, this is simply another tactic employed by narcissists to further control their former spouse. Unfortunately, the children pay the price for the narcissist’s games.

Narcissists are masters of lying. They will lie to their children and distort reality the same as they do to everyone else. Often, narcissists will sacrifice their children’s well-being in an attempt to save face. This leaves the children feeling confused and unsure of their own reality and judgment. Narcissists will ask their children to lie for them, keep secrets and to spy on the other parent.

Narcissistic parents do not respect their children’s desires. They may make promises to the children in order to gain compliance from the child, then refuse to honor the promises. Children may miss out on birthday parties, sporting events or other activities important to them in order to accommodate the narcissistic parent’s wishes. The children soon learn that what they want is not important when with the narcissistic parent.

Coping with a Narcissistic Parent

It’s important to understand that it’s impossible to control a narcissist’s behavior. Neither the narcissist’s spouse nor children are responsible for his or her behavior. Narcissists are who they are. The best the other parent can do for their children and themselves is to separate themselves as much as possible from the narcissist.

First and foremost, former spouses of narcissists need to seek professional support for themselves and their children. It’s important that both children and spouses of narcissists have someone outside the situation to support and validate their feelings and reality while trying to cope with a crazy-making narcissist.

Spouses also need to hire a lawyer who understands narcissism and how to best deal with it in court. It’s often best for abused spouses to seek full custody of the children. They should, however, be prepared to offer reasonable visitation. In addition, spouses of narcissists will do well to put as many negotiation points about the children as they can think of in the divorce decree. These include visitation, pick-up times, phone calls, school activities and vacations. It may seem excessive or restraining but in the long run these written agreements will often be easier than constantly renegotiating with an unreliable and emotionally abusive former spouse.

Divorce is never easy on children. Coping with a narcissistic parent makes a stressful situation even more difficult. Learning to identify the games narcissists play can help parents to minimize the emotional abuse children suffer at the hands of a narcissistic parent.

Sources:

Bancroft, Lundy. When Dad Hurts Mom: Helping Your Children Heal the Wounds of Witnessing Abuse. New York: Berkley Books, 2004.

Hotchkiss, Sandy. Why is is Always About You? The Seven Deadly Sins of Narcissism. New York: Free Press, 2002.

Skerritt, Richard. Surviving the Storm: Strategies and Realities for Divorcing a Narcissist. Kennett Square, PA: Dalkeith Press, 2009.

LIVE STREAM FOR THE The 8th Annual Battered Mothers Custody Conference

2011-01-07T17:56:00.001-06:00

http://www.ustream.tv/channel/battered-mothers-custody-conference

The 8th Annual Battered Mothers Custody Conference

Total views: 7CONFERENCE AGENDA

Friday, January 7th, 2011

4:00 – 5:30 p.m. Special pre-conference workshop: Karen Winner, Esq. How to Think Like a Lawyer on Legal Billing Issues

• Registration begins at 4:00 p.m.

• Exhibitors, book sales, and Silent (Chinese) Auction beginning at 5 p.m.

6:00 Opening greetings by the National Coalition Against Domestic Violence and other BMCC co-sponsors; song by Tynia Canada

6:30 – 8:00 Lundy Bancroft

8:00 – 9:00 p.m. Meet and Greet with Coffee, Tea, and Cookies

9:00 - Special Friday Night Workshop: Meditation with Rev. Anne Curtin

Saturday, January 8th, Morning Session

8:30 Plenary I: Attorney and Author Wendy Murphy, J.D. : Landmark Massachusetts ruling: Ensuring the Rights of Disabled Victims in Judicial Proceedings.

9:15 – 10:15 Introductions by Barry Nolan Plenary II: Protective Mother Holly Collins and her son Zachary Collins with Attorney Alan Rosenfeld, J.D.

10:15 – 10:30 Break

10:30 – 11:30 Barry Goldstein, J.D., Joan Zorza, J.D. and Nancy Erickson, J.D. Panel on the book: Domestic Violence, Child Custody, and Abuse: Legal Practices and Policy Issues

11:30 – 12:15 Psychologist and Expert Joy Silberg, Ph.D.: Perspective of a Psychologist on the Front Lines

12:15 – 12:30 Break

Saturday, January 8th, Afternoon Session

12: 30 – 1:30 Saturday Working Luncheon: Professor and Producer Garland Waller: Screening and Discussion of No Way Out But One (working title): An Independent Documentary on Holly Collins - The First Woman to Be Granted Political Asylum on Grounds of Domestic Violence

1:45 – 3:30 Panel: Karin Huffer, Ph.D., Renee Beeker, Wendy Murphy, J.D., & Robin Yeamans, J.D.: Groundbreakers Present A New Trajectory: Managing Family Court Cases

3:45 – 4:45 Concurrent Workshop Session I

1. Renee Beeker & Paul Holdorf: The National Family Court Watch Project

The National Family Court Watch Project believes that large-scale data will reveal national trends and ignite a call for change in the family court system. The project is a conversation springboard and uses the technique of "quiet observer" to get a sense of what's happening inside family courts. We report those findings publicly through a new conduit and work with judges and the public to find solutions. We will be sharing latest data update as well as information about the increasing involvement from professionals and educators as we expand this effort around the country.

2. Joy Silberg: Using Expert Witness Testimony in Family Court Child Abuse Cases

This presentation will review some of the effective ways to use expert witness testimony in family court child abuse cases. The roles for an expert in these cases can include criticizing existing custody evaluations, reviewing symptoms and disclosures of the child, or being court appointed to do a child protection evaluation. The presenter will emphasize how to avoid pitfalls and what points to emphasize when helping a judge look at the information from a new perspective.

Saturday, January 8th, Afternoon Session

Concurrent Workshop Session I (cont.)

3. Massachusetts Protective Mothers for Custodial Justice, Inc. RESPECT FOR ADVOCACY-- PART II of “The Basics” RESPECT FOR ADVOCACY (PART II of “The Basics”)

I. Advocacy Basics

Working with Battered Mothers: Active Listening, Getting to the Matter, Getting to the HELP!

Supporting Battered Mothers: Resources, Abilities

Using Systems that Support Battered Women, Using Supports for Battered Mothers: What They Offer, What They Can’t & Why We All Need Each Other

II. Advocacy as Activism

• When to Resist, When To Comply & Whose Call That Is

• Unity: Defining our “Same Page”

Eliminating the Extraneous

Defending What We Fought For In the New War for our Children

4. Karin Huffer, Crystal Morgan-Huffer, & Jason Huffer: Silenced No More - Self Protection in the High Tech Age: You are Not Paranoid--Just Hypervigilant and Smart

Thirty self-protective actions you must take to ensure your safety and self protection in this high tech age. Domestic Violence victims suffer from Post Traumatic Stress Disorder and if they are stalked, intruded upon, and left unprotected they suffer legal abuse syndrome. Learn to safeguard yourself in and out of court proceedings. Privacy protection, the Americans with Disabilities Amendments Act, and Violence Against Women Act provide more protection than you may think.

5. Barry Goldstein, J.D.: How to Use the Book "Domestic Violence, Child Abuse, and

Custody." Earlier in the day, Joan Zorza, Nancy Erickson and Barry Goldstein will discuss how to use the research in the book to help your case. The workshop will be a more interactive session in which protective mothers can ask questions about how to use the book in their individual cases.

5:00 – 6:00 p.m. Concurrent Workshop Session 2

1. Erica Olsen: Violence Against Women in the Digital Age

Do you know how easy it is for some abusers to track their victim's every move, to monitor everything they do on a computer, in their cars, or on certain phones? Like many criminals, perpetrators of stalking and domestic violence are often ahead of the curve on the use of technology. Through the Internet, high-tech global positioning systems (GPS), cell-phones and handheld computers, abusers use technology to further harm and control their victims. Understanding technology misuse is crucial to both supporting victims and holding offenders accountable. Drawing from survivor experiences and through videos and demonstrations, this training will illustrate the safety risks of phone, GPS, camera, Internet, and computer technologies.

2. Karen Borders: High Risk vs. High Conflict Family Law Matters, Identifying the Differences

This workshop will discuss Family Violence Risk Assessments which address high-conflict risk cases, which get labeled as high conflict cases and rarely get the proper assessment, leaving the risk to children and to abuse victims. While the goal remains to serve the best interest of the children, it is critical to prove or disprove any allegations before determining best interest of the children. This new risk based approach is well rooted in evidence-based practices and truly addresses the best interest of the children while keeping safety as the priority. Courts throughout the United States are recognizing this multi-disciplinary team approach and methods of assessment in handling these volatile matters.

3. Nancy S. Erickson, J.D., LL.M., M.A. (Forensic Psychology): On Custody Evaluations

We will address as many of the following questions as time permits: Why are Custody Evaluations (CEs) ordered by courts? Have custody courts always used evaluators? Are they helpful to courts? Which mental health professionals (MHPs) are authorized to conduct them? How can I tell which MHPs are good evaluators? What rules, if any, are they bound to follow? What are the financial and other costs of CEs? How can I avoid an order for a CE? How can I prepare for one if necessary? How can I fight a bad one -- including one that uses against protective parents junk science like Parental Alienation Syndrome (PAS)? What other psychological theories should I watch out for? What psychological “tests” are often used? Are they valid and reliable? How can I fight a bad CE in court? How can I report an incompetent or biased evaluator?

4. Dara Carlin & Dr. Joyce Braak: Advocacy with an Open Case

Professional advocacy is one thing but when you're a mom with an open family court case, you're dealing with an entirely different ball of wax; a mistake for you doesn't mean a disciplinary reprimand - it could cost you your kids. This workshop will identify factors to bear in mind as you fight for your children (and your life!) with consideration for strategies that have worked (and failed). More than simply giving a presentation, I hope to encourage an exchange of experiences that will generate a list of ideas that we can disseminate to all conference participants. Mom Bloggers, especially - please come!

Saturday, January 8th, Evening Session

6:00 – 7:30 p.m. Screening of the documentary Power and Control: Domestic Violence in America in the main conference ballroom (take-out dinner available on site at hotel restaurant)

7:30 pm Ben Atherton Zeman: Voices of Men Redux [Warning note: Includes graphic images of violence.]

9:00 Special Saturday Night After-Hours Session: Strength in Numbers: Sharing stories, sharing strategies, and organizing at the local level. Organized by Nancy Erickson, J.D., Janice Levenson (Protective Mothers Alliance), Renee Beeker (National Family Court Watch), and Paul Holdorf, J.D.

We are calling all protective mothers to meet and organize at their local levels. We will discuss general objectives and report on progress made in 2010 for protective moms (PMs). We will then break up into small groups based on residence (or location of the court involved, whichever is more important): county, part of the state, state, or other geographic area. In the small groups, facilitated by PMs, we will find out what are the worst problems for protective moms in that geographic area, what are the resources for PMs, and what we think can be done to help PMs. Each group will report back to the larger group, and we will plan our strategies for 2011.

Sunday, January 9th Morning Session

8:30 Plenary 2: Attorney Toby Kleinman: Our children are at risk, and their health is endangered: How can we hold the court accountable to protect them?

9:30 Plenary 3: Attorney Michael Lesher: Facing family court dangers: CPS, law guardians, experts -- Oh, my!

10:30 – 10:45 Break

10:45 – 12:30 Panel: Join Up! Leaders of the protective mothers’ movement share what they’ve been doing—and ask you to join them

• Janice Levinson/Lundy Bancroft, Protective Mothers Alliance

• Kathleen Russell, Center for Judicial Excellence

• Holly Collins

• Dara Carlin

• Ayanna Najuma, Inspirational Spirit of the Phoenix

• American Mothers Political Party

-Nancy Carroll: www.RightsForMothers.com

-Claudine Dombrowski: www.angelfury.com

-Lorraine Tipton: www.mamaliberty.wordpress.com

-Melanie Smith: Australian Shared Parenting Law Debate

-Randi James- www.RandiJames.com

• Kathy Lee Scholp & Jay Sutter: H.eroes O.n L.ine DE.fense N.etwork

12:45 – 2:00 Sunday luncheon-- Q & A and Community Dialogue

2:00 Close ( show less )

Videos

Highlights

Protecting Kids: Rethinking the Hague Convention

2011-01-05T06:43:00.001-06:00

Especially since in the USA and other Countries where ABUSERS get CUSTODY of the Children. A Battered mother can never escape the abuser—Dead or alive. Run mommy run!
136 Killer Dads: Fathers who ended their children's lives in ...Nov 10, 2010 ... 136 Killer Dads: Fathers who ended their children's lives in situations involving child custody, visitation, and/or child support (USA) .

An ethnic Chin refugee with her sons in New Delhi

Tengku Bahar / AFP / Getty Images

In 1980, an international treaty was designed to return children who had been abducted by a parent who moved to another country. Back then, the people drafting the treaty thought the typical abductor would be a noncustodial father skipping town with the kids, leaving mom with little recourse to try to get her children back. So what happens, three decades later, when research indicates that 68% of the abducting parents in cases under this treaty are mothers — and that many of them are fleeing abusive spouses?

The Convention on the Civil Aspects of International Child Abduction, dubbed the Hague Convention after the place where it was finalized, has been adopted by 82 countries, which are expected to help return abducted children to their habitual residence within six weeks of a parent filing a petition. But Jeffrey Edleson and Taryn Lindhorst, lead researchers on a new study of Hague Convention cases, argue that the treaty is often used against women seeking safety for themselves — and for their children — from violent husbands. "We always thought that child abduction is a bad thing," says Edleson, a professor of social work at the University of Minnesota. "But in some cases, mothers are taking children to protect them from greater harm."(Read about countless Chinese children who have been kidnapped and sold to strangers.)

Building on a previous study by Nigel Lowe, a law professor at Britain's Cardiff University, that found more than two-thirds of alleged abductors in Hague cases filed worldwide were women, Edleson and Lindhorst looked at the more than 300 Hague Convention decisions that were published in U.S. courts between 1993 and 2008. Their new study, which was funded by the National Institute of Justice and will be published next year by Northeastern University Press, analyzed the 47 published U.S. Hague Convention court decisions involving allegations of domestic violence and included interviews with 22 battered mothers who responded to Hague petitions in U.S. courts. The majority of those women had their children ordered to return to another country.

The result in several cases was that the children — and their mothers, who generally accompanied them — faced renewed physical abuse upon their return, researchers found in interviews with the mothers. "Judges want to trust our treaty partners will provide protection for our children and mothers," says Merle Weiner, a law professor at the University of Oregon and one of the nation's leading scholars on the Hague Convention. "But sometimes that protection is not real. Sometimes the batterer is so dangerous that only geographical distance can make a difference."(Read about the abduction of Elizabeth Smart in her own words.)

To raise awareness of the issue, Edleson has organized a Dec. 10 event, timed to coincide with Human Rights Day, in Minneapolis, where actresses will read battered mothers' testimonies from Hague Convention cases. The readings will be interspersed with conversations between lawyers, legal scholars and social scientists on domestic violence and the Convention, which contains provisions that allow judges to refrain from returning a child if doing so puts him or her at "grave risk" of "physical or psychological harm." But too often, scholars and lawyers say, judges are not sufficiently steeped in the law to know that they have discretion to accept this as an applicable defense. Additionally, since the treaty's goal is to have children returned to their habitual residence within six weeks of a parent filing a Hague Convention petition, lawyers may not have enough time to assemble evidence that domestic violence occurred in the other country.

"I don't think the treaty is wrong," Edleson says. "It was put in place for the right reasons." But he and other experts say it's time to update how the Hague Convention is being implemented, to make it easier for battered mothers to argue that their kids should not be returned to a country where their violent husbands live. The U.S. could also act independently and add a similar provision to the International Child Abduction Remedies Act that Congress passed in 1988. "We've only recently realized that the great majority of taking parents are mothers," Edleson says. "It's important we make these adjustments so that the Convention fits this new reality."

"Children Taken By the Family Courts" Quilt Project

2010-12-30T20:05:00.001-06:00

Battered Women, Abused Children, and Child Custody: A National Crisis

The Battered Mothers Custody Conference

Visit www.batteredmotherscustodyconference.org for additional information,hotel reservations, and conference registration.

"Children Taken By the Family Courts" Quilt Project

The Conference has hosted a community quilt entitled "Children Taken by the Family Courts" since 2007. A short news clip showing the quilt at the 2009 conference is available online at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S_qh-jX9qGk .

The quilt is modeled after the AIDS quilt that was started in 1987 and that has since grown tremendously, gaining wide publicity for the cause of combating AIDS and HIV infection.

We are asking mothers who have lost physical custody of their children through family or divorce court proceedings to create a 1.5’ by 3’ fabric panel to commemorate their child(ren). Panels can be made before the conference and brought or mailed for inclusion in the quilt (see address below). We will be providing some sewing materials and other necessities so that mothers can work on their panels during the weekend of the conference. Mothers do NOT need to attend the conference in order to have their panel included in the quilt. Complete instructions for creating and mailing panels are below.

Please display the following on the front of your panel:

The first name(s) and last initial(s) of the child(ren) of whom you lost custody as a result of family or divorce court proceedings.

The child(ren)’s date of birth and the county and state of the court system through which you lost custody.

The month and year you lost custody of your child(ren).

Any drawings, artwork, or items that make the panel meaningful to you.

On the back of your finished (backed and hemmed) panel, in an inconspicuous place (one that does not show through to the front) please write YOUR name, phone number, and e-mail address. Please also safety-pin a note to the panel with this information.

Write a statement

Please also take the time to write a statement about your child(ren) and briefly describe how you lost custody. Please include your name, e-mail address and phone number on this statement.

INSTRUCTIONS FOR MAKING PANELS

Your design can be vertical or horizontal, but the finished, hemmed panel should be 1.5 feet by 3 feet (45 cm x 90 cm).

The fabric can be traditional quilting material found at any fabric or craft store, or can be made up of scraps pieced together to meet the size requirements.

Batting for the panels is not necessary, but backing made of sturdy fabric is needed to help keep panels clean when they are laid out on the ground. It also helps retain the shape of the fabric.

When you cut your 2 pieces of fabric (panel front and the backing), leave an extra 2 inches on each side for a hem. Please sew your panel and backing pieces together, seams inside (like you are making a pillow), or hem them so that there are no raw seams on the outside. Hand sewing is fine if you don’t have access to a sewing machine. Please just do whatever you are able to do.

You may use most techniques and or embellishments, as long as they are secured well, including but not limited to: appliqué, piecing, embroidery, fabric markers, fabric paints, stenciling, beading, ribbons, sequins, or buttons (see descriptions below). Remember that the quilt will be folded and unfolded every time it is displayed, so durability is crucial. Since glue deteriorates with time, it is best to sew things to the panel.

Appliqué: Sew fabric, letters and small mementos onto the background fabric. Do not rely on glue - it won't last.

Paint: Brush on textile paint or color-fast dye, or use an indelible ink pen. Please don't use "puffy" paint; it's too sticky.

Stencils: Trace your design onto the fabric with a pencil, lift the stencil, then use a brush to apply textile paint or indelible markers.

Collage: Make sure that whatever materials you add to the panel won't tear the fabric (avoid glass and sequins for this reason), and be sure to avoid very bulky objects.

Sending in your panel:

If you will be attending the Battered Mothers Custody Conference, you can work on your panel over the weekend of the conference. Some guidance and materials will be provided; you also are encouraged to bring materials with you.

If you will not be attending the conference, please ship your finished panel (make sure to use adequate protective waterproof packing material) to:

BMCC V

26 Purtell Avenue

Latham, New York 12110

Contact: mhannah413@aol.com

Thank you!

Love for her Daughter

Topeka Kansas: Failure to Protect Violates Statutes

Shawnee County DA’s Office and City of Topeka Working to Resolve Misdemeanor Case Filings

No Way Out But One : Fund Raising Update by Garland Waller (Please spread widely)

CHAPTER TWO Grandma’s Pearls of Wisdom

Chapter One A Little Girl

Mothers Day Nightmare - Leaving The War Zone

Leaving The War Zone

Dombrowski Drawings Tears and Bruises – I Miss Mom

Claudine Dombrowski--Insanity? Nope. Family Court in Kansas

Men’s Murderous Revenge

My mom, Caroline Marie Rice, was arrested on Monday. This was the third time she had been arrested…I watched the arrest, trying to hold back my tears.

The Oak Tree

Sham in Shawnee County (Topeka, Kansas) Claudine Dombrowski and her daughter Rikki.

Sen. Scott Brown, a perplexing connection -- ‘The message coming through is when males complain of abuse it's real and different from females who are crazy liars.’

For Brown, a perplexing connection

In light of his sexual abuse revelation, why did he back Jeff Perry?

Million Mom March Mother's Day 2011 in Washington DC

Custody Battle: Father Charged in stabbing deaths of his tow young sons

It’s All About the Power and Control, I Mean the Kids Part 1 (of Likely 3)

It’s All About the Power and Control, I Mean the Kids - Part Two

SAY NO - UNiTE to Stop Violence Against Mothers And Their Children

VIOLENCE AGAINST WOMEN: YOUR HEALTH IS AFFECTED

Topeka Kansas Courts Have Continued Abuse Of Claudine Dombrowski and her Daughter Rikki Dombrowski

Testimony by Claudine Dombrowski at the hearing of the Kansas Joint Committee on Children's Issues on Nov 30, 2009 in Topeka

Dombrowski v. United States, #66407 – Petitioner

INTERNATIONAL AMERICAN COMMISSION ON HUMAN RIGHTS Entire Petition here: http://www.stopfamilyviolence.org/pages/308

Shawnee County Case Docket.

10th Federal Court District

Read details in written statement.

This is an truly incredible story that should never have happened in America.

Parts of the Kansas Judicial system should be disciplined for how it has victimized Ms. Dombrowski, who was an abused mom.

Instead of quotes from the audio, please consult these pages that document Dombrowski’s long and difficult battle to protect her daughter:

Courts Have Continued Abuse of Manhattan Women, Manhattan Free Press, July 12, 2001.

Manhattan resident fights custody battle for daughter, Kansas State Collegian, July 26, 2001.

State Rep Bill Otto: “No crime? You haven’t been guilty of anything? This is a court order that says you can’t go to any school functions?”

“I was under court order till 2004 to not even call the police after I was being beaten because … I was not ‘co-parenting’”

Dombrowski: “These friends of the court make recommendations to the judge. The parents … don’t have a right to see these documents. They do this behind closed doors.”

Otto: (To Secretary Jordan): “You have no rights as a parent …?”

Secretary Don Jordan: “This would be something extreme … I’m not familiar with the situation.”

Otto: “Can a judge do that? … Is that legal… ?”

Jordan: “Under the right circumstances … I hesitate to speculate.”

Sen. Roger Reitz: “This is something that only … the judicial system can really answer … It would be helpful … to have someone … representing the judicial system … to give us some ideas how this could happen.”

Dombrowski: “When you are a victim of domestic violence, and suddenly there’s a child involved, the typical …. power of control is that ‘I’ll take your children from you’. They will and they can the way the laws are setup.” …

“I was told that I’m not to talk to my daughter about the violence. That’s why I don’t see her. That’s why I see her supervised. He was criminally convicted. “

“… on the 16th of this month I’ll probably go to jail for breaking the gag order and talking about [being the victim of] violence as it relates to my case.”

Reitz: “… someone ought to be able to deal with this in a way that would address her problem. It doesn’t seem like we’ve done the right thing with regards to this little niche of the law.”

Dombrowski: “The criminal convictions are completely tossed aside and they don’t have any bearing on the family court … The eight criminal convictions that my ex had before getting custody of my daughter were completely dropped [in family court]“

Chair Kiegerl: “I cannot believe that abuse is totally ignored. I cannot believe you can prohibit a person from speaking about their own case.”

“The one thing [where] … I disagree with you is abuse should always be reported.”

For anybody who abuses their wife … [from] a 1996 presidential task force … there is a 70% increase that those children will be abused and/or sexually abused after there’s been battery with the mother.

Sen. Oletha Faust-Goudea: “In 2004 …. I talked with the homicide department in Sedgwick County…. During that time there had been 21 homicides in Sedgwick County and 18 were due to domestic violence …”

“A lot of women do make those phone calls and unfortunately, sometimes it ends in their death.” …

“I want to apologize to you for being treated like a pedophile … not being able to go to a music concert.”

“I commend you for what you’re doing.”

Dombrowski: “I have not talked to my daughter in 10 years [except] for the confines of supervised visits. I’m not allowed to talk to her about anything. All she knows is what her dad has told her.”

See this video: Abused Mom Wants Unsupervised Visits with Daughter

Listen to Claudine Dombrowski:

COURTS CONTINUE ABUSE OF BATTERED MOTHER

Americans For Prosperity and Kansas Judges

The lady (Claudine Dombrowski)

in this picture was violently beaten by

Okay, enough already, that last story is just wretched.

Common sense says if you rape a little girl or beat the hell out of your wife you shall get punished for that in a severe matter. However, the law states otherwise, and the list of outrage goes on.

legal briefs here: KS Appellate -- KS Supreme Court Briefs

Mothers of Lost Children Rally at the Whitehouse February 13th, 14th, 2011 - SAVE THE DATES

Family Court Mafia: AMPP Mothers Are Coming For You!

Rikki Dombrowski: Don’t Give Up – Love, Hope and Empowerment—The Sham in Shawnee County (Topeka, Kansas)

Parental Alienation: It Is About "A Uterus, Divorce Papers and Bruises"

Parental Alienation: It's About More Than "A Uterus, Divorce Papers and Bruises"

TONIGHT!! American Mothers Political Party Show- 5 PM CST, 6 PM EST -- CALL IN (347) 205-9977

Jennifer and Holly Collins Update: We found the visitation supervisor - Jim Seas!

Joan Dawson: Parental alienation and domestic violence

CHILD CUSTODY SCAM: THE CALIFORNIA STATE AUDITOR RELEASES REPORT ON SACRAMENTO AND MARIN SUPERIOR COURTS

The California State Auditor released the following report today:

Sacramento and Marin Superior Courts

Both Courts Need to Ensure That Family Court Appointees Have Necessary Qualifications, Improve Administrative Policies and Procedures, and Comply With Laws and Rules

Join us Tonight 1-20-2011 @5pm CST American Mothers Political Party BTRShow Call-in Number: (347) 205-9977

Call-in Number: (347) 205-9977

we will never shut up, give up or go away!

10^th Federal Court District