New Study: Fathers do kill their kids just to hurt the moms

The article below covers a new study that gives us some data to refer to when stating what we have all known to be true for a few years:  Fathers who kill their kids do it out of revenge to the mom … usually for leaving them.  We have never argued that moms do NOT kill their kids, but have said that fewer of them do so and that they do so for different reasons than fathers that kill their children.  Finally someone completed a study on this and the below article gives the results.

 

Child killer study finds diverse motives for men and women

February 4, 2012

Read more: http://www.theage.com.au/national/child-killer-study-finds-diverse-motives-for-men-and-women-20120203-1qxnz.html#ixzz1pCerEfRP

HE BECAME known as the Facebook killer because it was on the social networking site that he broadcast his intention to kill his daughter: ''Bout 2 kill ma kid,'' wrote Ramazan Acar shortly before he murdered two-year-old Yazmina in Melbourne in November 2010 by stabbing her repeatedly. But it was less the medium than the motive that defined his crime.

Soon after that message, he posted another intended for his ex-partner, Rachelle D'Argent: ''Pay bk u slut.''

A new study of child murders,

Killer Dad Defended in Comments .... UGH

This is an old article... but I wanted to share it... as just another example of a Killer Father!  The commenter's defending this man are unbelievable!  I’m glad there were several that spoke up and said that there is NO excuse for killing an innocent child.  I must note... the court had ended the joint parenting and had given the mother sole custody... so for once the court gets it right and this bad dad kills the kid anyway.  My heart goes out to the mom and her family!!

SOMERSET, Calif. -- Authorities say the bodies of a missing 2-year-old Sacramento girl and her father have been found in the man's vehicle in a rural area of El Dorado County.

FBI Special Agent John Cauthen told the Associated Press the bodies of Madeline Samaan-Fay and 49-year-old Mourad "Moni" Samaan were discovered in his green Toyota 4Runner.

The vehicle was found on private property behind a chained and locked gate.

A California HIghway Patrol helicopter spotted the vehicle. Investigators from the El Dorado County Sheriff's Department were the first to confirm two bodies inside.

"To have the case end up like this, it's tough," said El Dorado County Sheriff''s spokesman Bryan Golmitz.

Cauthen says the cause and time of the deaths is not immediately known. Investigators from the El Dorado County Sheriff's Department and the FBI are working on this case. Investigators are expected at the scene throughout the weekend, said Cauthen..

The FBI issued an Amber Alert Friday for the toddler. She was last seen Aug. 7 with her father in a Sacramento grocery store.

Samaan was served the day before with a notice that the girl's mother was awarded full custody of their daughter, ending what had been a joint custody arrangement, Cauthen said.

He then failed to return the child to her mother as expected.

Samaan had not been charged with a crime.

The mother didn't report the girl missing until Tuesday, the Associated Press reported.

Read more: http://www.kcra.com/news/28859602/detail.html#ixzz1a2SXIgZ3

Related articles

• Killer dad defended as "exceptional" father and "true victim (Sacramento, California) (dastardlydads.blogspot.com)

When No One Listens

This is EXACTLY what happens when no one listens to abuse victims!!  Educate yourself and others... I’m not feeling sorry for the abusers that this teen boy killed, I feel sorry for the boy.  For what HE had to endure before he finally broke and had to take matters into his own hands because NO ONE LISTENED all those years ago!!

From Dastardly Dads:

The mom lost custody of this boy nine years ago, right after she divorced the father. Her description of the marriage paints a distinct picture of a controlling abuser: Isolated her at home, wouldn't "allow" her to see friends. Strict "disciplinarian" who was "severe" with her and the child (i.e. physically violent). Unfortunately, Mom blames what she calls a severe depression for why she lost custody. In reality, feelings of hopelessness and despair are normal and predictable among abuse survivors--especially when the abuser goes on to take their children away from the mother and cut off all contact (must have total control, you know). And none of this can take place unless the courts aid and abet the abuser. But the article doesn't go into that....
And now the son is accused of killing his father, CHRISTIAN LIEWALD.
Who are the people who wouldn't listen to this mother? Let's name names, shall we?
http://www.wsoctv.com/news/29319392/detail.html
Homicide suspect's mother says warning signs were there
Posted: 4:51 pm EDT September 27, 2011
Updated: 6:20 pm EDT September 27, 2011
CHARLOTTE, N.C. -- The mother of a teenager charged with killing his father and stepmother says she could see trouble coming, even when he was a child.
Shelby Hodges told Eyewitness News that she has not seen her son, Matthew Liewald, for nine years, since she and her husband Christian Liewald divorced.
Early Monday morning police said Matthew shot and killed Christian Liewald and his wife Cassie at their home south of Pineville, and Hodges said she knew when she saw the story on the news that her son might have been involved.
"I saw it. I recognized the street name. I told my husband, I said, 'It's Matthew,'" Hodges said.
She held a picture of Matthew when he was a toddler and spoke about the boy's father, who had been severe with her and his son.
"(Christian) isolated me when I lived with him, when I was married to him. I wasn't allowed to see my friends," Hodges said.
She said Liewald took the same strict approach to discipline with Matthew, and when the couple divorced she lost custody of the boy because she was severely depressed.
She said that she was concerned when she heard that Christian Liewald and his wife Cassie had taken Matthew out of school and that his intense parenting may have pushed the teen over the edge.
"I think he snapped. I think he just had more abuse than he could handle, and I just hope that now someone will listen to me," she said.
"This is a mother's nightmare. If people had listened to me when I was begging them to help me, it wouldn't have gotten this far."

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

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

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 - UN Mothers

 

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

        

Related articles

• Joan Dawson: Parental Alienation and Domestic Violence (rightsformothers.com)
• Parental Alienation: A Rational Approach (stopfamilyviolence.org)
• DASTARDLY DADS FROM THE ARCHIVES (Greenville, New York - 1998) (dastardlydads.blogspot.com)
• Massachusetts Can't Look at DCF Files in Child Custody Cases (randijames.com)
• Child Sexual Abuse & Parental Alienation Syndrome Allegations (rightsformothers.com)

Danah Boyd: How Censoring Craigslist Helps Pimps, Child Traffickers and Other Abusive Scumbags

Very well put!

Danah Boyd Senior researcher, Microsoft Research

Posted: September 6, 2010 08:14 PM

 

How Censoring Craigslist Helps Pimps, Child Traffickers and Other Abusive Scumbags

For the last 12 years, I've dedicated immense amounts of time, money and energy to end violence against women and children. As a victim of violence myself, I'm deeply committed to destroying any institution or individual leveraging the sex-power matrix that results in child trafficking, nonconsensual prostitution, domestic violence and other abuses. If I believed that censoring Craigslist would achieve these goals, I'd be the first in line to watch them fall. But from the bottom of my soul and the depths of my intellect, I believe that the current efforts to censor Craigslist's "adult services" achieves the absolute opposite. Rather than helping those who are abused, it fundamentally helps pimps, human traffickers and others who profit off of abusing others.

On Friday, under tremendous pressure from US attorneys general and public advocacy groups, Craigslist shut down its "Adult Services" section. There is little doubt that this space has been used by people engaged in all sorts of illicit activities, many of which result in harmful abuses. But the debate that has ensued has centered on the wrong axis, pitting protecting the abused against freedom of speech. What's implied in public discourse is that protecting potential victims requires censorship; thus, anti-censorship advocates are up in arms attacking regulators for trying to curtail First Amendment rights. While I am certainly a proponent of free speech online, I find it utterly depressing that these groups fail to see how this is actually an issue of transparency, not free speech. And how this does more to hurt potential victims than help.

If you've ever met someone who is victimized through trafficking or prostitution, you'll hear a pretty harrowing story about what it means to be invisible and powerless, feeling like no one cares and no one's listening. Human trafficking and most forms of abusive prostitution exist in a black market, with corrupt intermediaries making connections and offering "protection" to those who they abuse for profit. The abused often have no recourse, either because their movements are heavily regulated (as with those trafficked) or because they're violating the law themselves (as with prostitutes).

The Internet has changed the dynamics of prostitution and trafficking, making it easier for prostitutes and traffickers to connect with clients without too many layers of intermediaries. As a result, the Internet has become an intermediary, often without the knowledge of those internet service providers (ISPs) who are the conduits. This is what makes people believe that they should go after ISPs like Craigslist. Faulty logic suggests that if Craigslist is effectively a digital pimp who's profiting off of online traffic, why shouldn't it be prosecuted as such?

The problem with this logic is that it fails to account for three important differences: 1) most ISPs have a fundamental business -- if not moral -- interest in helping protect people; 2) the visibility of illicit activities online makes it much easier to get at, and help, those who are being victimized; and 3) a one-stop-shop is more helpful for law enforcement than for criminals. In short, Craigslist is not a pimp, but a public perch from which law enforcement can watch without being seen.

1. Internet Services Providers have a fundamental business interest in helping people.

When Internet companies profit off of online traffic, they need their clients to value them and the services they provide. If companies can't be trusted -- especially when money is exchanging hands -- they lose business. This is especially true for companies that support peer-to-peer exchange of money and goods. This is what motivates services like eBay and Amazon to make it very easy for customers to get refunded when ripped off. Craigslist has made its name and business on helping people connect around services, and while there are plenty of people who use its openness to try to abuse others, Craigslist is deeply committed to reducing fraud and abuse. It's not always successful -- no company is. And the more freedom that a company affords, the more room for abuse. But what makes Craigslist especially beloved is that it is run by people who truly want to make the world a better place and who are deeply committed to a healthy civic life.

I have always been in awe of Craig Newmark, Craigslist's founder and now a "customer service rep" with the company. He's made a pretty penny off of Craigslist, so what's he doing with it? Certainly not basking in the Caribbean sun. He's dedicated his life to public service, working with organizations like Sunlight Foundation to increase government accountability and using his resources and networks to help out countless organizations like Donors Choose, Kiva, Consumer Reports and Iraq/Afghani Vets of America. This is the villain behind Craigslist trying to pimp out abused people?

Craigslist is in a tremendous position to actually work with law enforcement, both because it's in their economic interests and because the people behind it genuinely want to do good in this world. This isn't an organization dedicated to profiting off of criminals, hosting servers in corrupt political regimes to evade responsibility. This is an organization with both the incentives and interest to actually help. And they have a long track record of doing so.

2. Visibility makes it easier to help victims.

If you live a privileged life, your exposure to prostitution may be limited to made-for-TV movies and a curious dip into the red-light district of Amsterdam. You are most likely lucky enough to never have known someone who was forced into prostitution, let alone someone who was sold by or stolen from their parents as a child. Perhaps if you live in San Francisco or Las Vegas, you know a high-end escort who has freely chosen her life and works for an agency or lives in a community where she's highly supported. Truly consensual prostitutes do exist, but the vast majority of prostitution is nonconsensual, either through force or desperation. And, no matter how many hip-hop songs try to imply otherwise, the vast majority of pimps are abusive, manipulative, corrupt, addicted bastards. To be fair, I will acknowledge that these scumbags are typically from abusive environments where they too are forced into their profession through circumstances that are unimaginable to most middle class folks. But I still don't believe that this justifies their role in continuing the cycle of abuse.

Along comes the Internet, exposing you to the underbelly of the economy, making visible the sex-power industry that makes you want to vomit. Most people see such cesspools online and imagine them to be the equivalent of a crack house opening up in their gated community. Let's try a different metaphor. Why not think of it instead as a documentary movie happening in real time where you can actually do something about it?

Visibility is one of the trickiest issues in advocacy. Anyone who's worked for a nonprofit knows that getting people to care is really, really hard. Movies are made in the hopes that people will watch them and do something about the issues present. Protests and marathons are held in the hopes of bringing awareness to a topic. But there's nothing like the awareness that can happen when it's in your own backyard. And this is why advocates spend a lot of time trying to bring issues home to people.

Visibility serves many important purposes in advocacy. Not only does it motivate people to act, but it also shines a spotlight on every person involved in the issue at hand. In the case of nonconsensual prostitution and human trafficking, this means that those who are engaged in these activities aren't so deeply underground as to be invisible. They're right there. And while they feel protected by the theoretical power of anonymity and the belief that no one can physically approach and arrest them, they're leaving traces of all sorts that make them far easier to find than most underground criminals.

3. Law enforcement can make online spaces risky for criminals.

Law enforcement is always struggling to gain access to underground networks in order to go after the bastards who abuse people for profit. Underground enforcement is really difficult, and it takes a lot of time to invade a community and build enough trust to get access to information that will hopefully lead to the dens of sin. While it always looks so easy on TV, there's nothing easy or pretty about this kind of work. The Internet has given law enforcement more data than they even know what to do with, more information about more people engaged in more horrific abuses than they've ever been able to obtain through underground work. It's far too easy to mistake more data for more crime and too many aspiring governors use the increase of data to spin the public into a frenzy about the dangers of the Internet. The increased availability of data is not the problem; it's a godsend for getting at the root of the problem and actually helping people.

When law enforcement is ready to go after a criminal network, they systematically set up a sting, trying to get as many people as possible, knowing that whoever they have underground will immediately lose access the moment they act. The Internet changes this dynamic, because it's a whole lot easier to be underground online, to invade networks and build trust, to go after people one at a time, to grab victims as they're being victimized. It's a lot easier to set up stings online, posing as buyers or sellers and luring scumbags into making the wrong move. All without compromising informants.

Working with ISPs to collect data and doing systematic online stings can make an online space more dangerous for criminals than for victims because this process erodes the trust in the intermediary, the online space. Eventually, law enforcement stings will make a space uninhabitable for criminals by making it too risky for them to try to operate there. Censoring a space may hurt the ISP but it does absolutely nothing to hurt the criminals. Making a space uninhabitable by making it risky for criminals to operate there -- and publicizing it -- is far more effective. This, by the way, is the core lesson that Giuliani's crew learned in New York. The problem with this plan is that it requires funding law enforcement.

4. Using the Internet to combat the sex-power industry

It makes me scream when I think of how many resources have been used attempting to censor Craigslist instead of leveraging it as a space for effective law enforcement. During the height of the moral panic over sexual predators on MySpace, I had the fortune of spending a lot of time with a few FBI folks and talking to a whole lot of local law enforcement. I learned a scary reality about criminal activity online. Folks in law enforcement know about a lot more criminal activity than they have the time to pursue. Sure, they focus on the big players, going after the massive collectors of child pornography who are most likely to be sex offenders than spending time on the small-time abusers. But it was the medium-time criminals that gnawed at them. They were desperate for more resources so that they could train more law enforcers, pursue more cases, and help more victims. The Internet had made it a lot easier for them to find criminals, but that didn't make their jobs any easier because they were now aware of how many more victims they were unable to help. Most law enforcement in this area are really there because they want to help people and it kills them when they can't help everyone.

There's a lot more political gain to be had demonizing profitable companies than demanding more money be spent (and thus, more taxes be raised) supporting the work that law enforcement does. Taking something that is visible and making it invisible makes a politician look good, even if it does absolutely nothing to help the victims who are harmed. It creates the illusion of safety, while signaling to pimps, traffickers, and other scumbags that their businesses are perfectly safe as long as they stay invisible. Sure, many of these scumbags have an incentive to be as visible as possible to reach as many possible clients as possible, and so they will move on and invade a new service where they can reach clients. And they'll make that ISP's life hell by putting them in the spotlight. And maybe they'll choose an offshore one that American law enforcement can do nothing about. Censorship online is nothing more than whack-a-mole, pushing the issue elsewhere or more underground.

Censoring Craigslist will do absolutely nothing to help those being victimized, but it will do a lot to help those profiting off of victimization. Censoring Craigslist will also create new jobs for pimps and other corrupt intermediaries, since it'll temporarily make it a whole lot harder for individual scumbags to find clients. This will be particularly devastating for the low-end prostitutes who were using Craigslist to escape violent pimps. Keep in mind that occasionally getting beaten up by a scary john is often a whole lot more desirable for many than the regular physical, psychological, and economic abuse they receive from their pimps. So while it'll make it temporarily harder for clients to get access to abusive services, nothing good will come out of it in the long run.

If you want to end human trafficking, if you want to combat nonconsensual prostitution, if you care about the victims of the sex-power industry, don't cheer Craigslist's censorship. This did nothing to combat the cycle of abuse. What we desperately need are more resources for law enforcement to leverage the visibility of the Internet to go after the scumbags who abuse. What we desperately need are for sites like Craigslist to be encouraged to work with law enforcement and help create channels to actually help victims. What we need are innovative citizens who leverage new opportunities to devise new ways of countering abusive industries. We need to take this moment of visibility and embrace it, leverage it to create change, leverage it to help those who are victimized and lack the infrastructure to get help. What you see online should haunt you. But it should drive you to address the core problem by finding and helping victims, not looking for new ways to blindfold yourself. Please, I beg you, don't close your eyes. We need you.

(My views on this matter do not necessarily represent the views of any institution with which I'm affiliated.)

Follow Danah Boyd on Twitter: www.twitter.com/@zephoria

Danah Boyd: How Censoring Craigslist Helps Pimps, Child Traffickers and Other Abusive Scumbags

Every Little Girl has a Dream

Women, We Will be Victorious

I found this here: http://americanmotherspoliticalparty.blogspot.com/2010/06/women-we-will-be-victorious.html

Court Sanctioned Child Abuse

I found the transcription below while doing some research about parental alienation and child abuse.  I do not know any of the individuals involved in this meeting, so I have taken the liberty of x’ing out the names to protect their identities.  This meeting was several years ago, so I doubt attempting contact for permission to use this would be fruitful.  For the same reason I am not providing a link to the original document in which this segment is located.

I chose the below to highlight that protective parents have been fighting this battle for several years.  This is not something new.  Family Courts have been sentencing young children to lives of hell for far too long and nothing seems to be being done to put a stop to this.

Ordinary, everyday, citizen’s (for the most part) are not even aware that such atrocities are taking place in the judicial buildings that we as a society pay for with our tax dollars.  Most people never realize that child are being handed over to abusive criminals; until it happens in their small sphere of being.  Then it is an outrage for a time and they resume life eventually, never to think of it again.

Protective parents don’t get that luxury, if you will, to go on about life as if their children were not ripped away from them and handed to the very person that has abused them.  Those children don’t get the luxury of going on about their lives in a safe, loving and well cared for existence.

I ask you to read the below testimony and think about it.  What would you do in this situation?  What are you going to do now that you know this is happening to children around the world?  Will this be one more piece of information that you will half-way process and go back to life as usual; not to think of again...until it happens to you or someone you know?

 

Ms. XXXX XXXX (Nemesis Network): Good afternoon.

This committee has a wondrous responsibility and a magnificent possibility to relieve the silent agony of millions of Canadians. I wish you tremendous success.

I was savagely attacked and viciously beaten by my husband. He sodomized my baby girls. He cruelly and severely abused my son. He blew up pets with rifles in front of my tiny children. He shot at my son and pets and farm animals with an air pellet gun. He attacked men, got into fights, took drugs, smoked marijuana, and entered and stole from cottages.

The Joint Chair (Senator XXXX XXXX): Is all that material in a case report? It's in the context under which we meet. Can you give us that reference?

Ms. XXXX XXXX: Yes. I have to finish the paragraph.

The Joint Chair (Senator XXXX XXXX): It's better to give the reference and then you can finish the paragraph.

Ms. XXXX XXXX: This is my case.

The Joint Chair (Senator XXXX XXXX): Have you the name of the case and the jurisdiction in which it took place?

Ms. XXXX XXXX: The judicial jurisdiction is Terrebonne. I don't have the number of the case with me.

Committee Member 1 XXXX XXXX: It's just for the record.

Ms. XXXX XXXX: The divorce judgment?

Committee Member 1 XXXX XXXX: No, your case. So-and-so versus whom?

Ms. XXXX XXX: XXXX v. XXXXX. Sorry about that.

The Joint Chair (Senator XXXX XXXX): That's fine. When you make this kind of statement, we need to know that it's on the record.

Ms. XXXX XXXX: I understand.

Committee Member 2 XXXX XXXX: Is what you have just stated on the court record?

Ms. XXXX XXXX: Some of it.

Committee Member 2 XXXX XXXX: Please limit your comments to what was on the court record.

Ms. XXXX XXXX: Okay. I will eliminate anything that is not on the court record.

I made my first call to the police in early 1979. We subsisted with a cruel terrorist. I don't know why we didn't all die. But here I am, and what I need you to understand is that my story is the story of millions of muted mothers and silent children. Because I didn't die, I have an awesome responsibility to make audible our souls' silent screams.

The majority of even minimally decent and responsible parents recognize the crucial importance of nurturing the young. It is the child abusers and wife beaters who most frequently sue for and often receive custody of or generous access to their small victims.

The most brutal abusers live in families scared to death of their terrorists. No one tells. It would be worth their lives or that of their protective parents. Often the most severe abusers become known only after the death of the protective parent and/or the children. The rest and those who report are silenced and live a noxious existence, for the destruction pervades every aspect and detail of a lifetime. This is the legacy of sanctioned abuse under our present laws.

Of course, I lost custody. My xxx tiny hurt girls were wrenched from their protective parent and sent to live with their abuser. He subsequently disappeared with them. They are registered in the Canadian registry of disappeared children.

I cannot imagine a surer way to destroy children and their mothers. I cannot imagine a greater cruelty or a more unnatural behaviour than to destroy the young of a species and the mothers who bear them. This is a tactic of war.

Protective parents who stay alive exist in society-imposed exile and poverty, trying to comprehend the incomprehensible and attempting to survive the horrendous agony of knowing what their children are enduring. It is hard for decent people—and most of us are—to imagine that a human could so choose to destroy and dehumanize their own children and their mothers. Many if not most of us naturally recoil and choose to believe more comfortable and frequently dangerous theories. The mind cannot accept what the soul cannot imagine. In our inability to confront ugly realities, we actually promote and sanction reprehensible child exploitation and abuse.

I have used an example to explain a point I want to make. Do I need to refer also...?

The Joint Chair (Senator XXXX XXXX): What point do you want to...?

Ms. XXXX XXXX: At one point, having once again managed to get an appointment with the head of the local youth protection team, the man accusingly and acidly spat at me, “You are obsessed”. At the time, I did not take it as a compliment but rather as evidence of his madness and hatred for children. Now I also see his comment as a compliment, for his statement placed me firmly in the camp of the civilized and he solidly with the savages.

Abused children and their protective parents in custody and access wars are forced to deal with the savagery of ignorance as well as the continued and escalated terrorism of the abuser. Although one cannot ensure an acceptable level of evolution in all who are in contact with children, one can mandate careful selection and appropriate ongoing training for all those who are and will be involved in deciding the fate of children in custody and access cases. Solutions are there, but one cannot begin to implement solutions unless a problem is perceived.

Inform the public with media presentations, for example, as they are doing now in the United States. There must be an immediate way to exclude those who are suffering from criminal ignorance and vested interests that have to do with exploitation and not nurture. They must be removed so as not to continue their contribution to the carnage.

Government must accelerate this evolutionary process by immediately instigating leadership in law-making and mandatory policy regulation that responds to the reality of desperate need and provides redress for those victims who never lost all hope.

Without retroactivity and accountability, the revictimization is lifelong and the perpetrators escalate and continue their reign of terror with the unwitting sanction of much of society.

Ratify the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child, signed by Canada in 1989. Mandate the selection of those who can learn with their soul's mind. Provide mandatory ongoing training and education for those who have been chosen. Create ethics codes and protocols and write them into nationwide laws. Make all laws and policies subject to scrutiny and accountability. Do all this and more retroactively and swiftly. Then Canada may begin to slow the heinous destruction and redress some incomprehensible wrongs.

Facilitate and accelerate the process by adapting programs already used in other countries. Inform the public of all changes and services available. Change existing laws and change the words. “Custody” and “access” are property law terms. The terms “best interests of children” and “friendly parent” are problematic. A protective parent, usually a mother, is most reasonably unwilling to send her traumatized children to spend weekends and more with their rapist/terrorist/abuser. Judges, lawyers, psychologists, social workers and others frequently interpret this sane reticence as unwillingness to cooperate and a desire to hurt the man, and so judges give children in custody cases to the perpetrators of terrible crimes.

Examine related laws. Privacy acts maintain the secret of abuse. Streamline and coordinate the fragmented and often fractious systems, courts and agencies. Increase and implement sanctions. Perpetrators abuse and continue because they can.

Expedite all changes. Speed is essential. Traumatized babies become lost children, tormented teens and agonized adults in the wink of an eye. Why not create a parallel system using existing resources, and the second there is even a hint of abuse this system swings into action?

Without laws there can be no justice—

The Joint Chair (Senator XXXX XXXX): Are you just about at the end?

Ms. XXXX XXXX: Yes.

Without laws there can be no justice, but if there is no justice, can we say we have laws? When the laws of society do not allow justice and even promote injustice, the law of the jungle fills the void.

It has often been suggested that if one is not able to face one's own past one will be consumed by it. This is the responsibility that Canada must immediately assume. Confront and acknowledge our reprehensible past record concerning children, for our society is already being consumed, as evidenced by the violence rumbling and erupting across our nation.

Allow Canada to join other nations and greet the next century with a modicum of morality and some hope of evolution in human rights ethics.

I welcome your questions.

The Joint Chair (Senator XXXX XXXX): Thank you very much.

Questioner: I just want to ask Ms. XXXX a question. What's very worrying in this pursuit of justice is when somebody with a story such as yours says, “Of course, he got custody”. The “of course” is something that's very upsetting. I'd like it if you could put on the record how that ends up as “of course”.

Ms. XXXX XXXX: I put the words “of course” in on purpose. Over the years it grew like Topsy. I started to receive phone calls from women, and I discovered to my horror—and it still horrifies me and always will—that my case is not, as I said at the beginning, unusual.

I'm still getting phone calls from women who have gone to court, naively, as I did, and said this is not really good for the children and myself; I want out—and they lost custody. I think it's almost automatic. We have a sort of black humour in the different conversations that sustain us, and it's like this is automatic. You're accused of wanting to hurt a nice man.

I have problems with the parental alienation syndrome. I have a lot of problems with that, and it feeds into this. I don't have a problem with the fact that what our grandmothers called brainwashing exists; it does exist that people do this. Where I have a problem is when one reads Dr. Gardner's works, when one actually reads them and analyses them, they are his theories, ideas, opinions. They grew out of Dr. Ralph Underwager's theories, opinions. There's no research. It's not scientific. In the psychologists' manual there are already syndromes listed on a continuum, and what some people call parental alienation syndrome fits into that already. It's already known.

The problem with the parental alienation syndrome is that when one reads Gardner's works, and one just has to read one book of his, he refers to mothers as causing it to the children. He does not use the word “parent”. It's very highly slanted when you actually read it and analyse it. But it's a comforting theory. It's comfortable, and it fits in with Freud's theories when he reneged on the sexual abuse part and said that these women are all hysterical. It fits into all of that, and it's comfortable and it works. And the books are available; they're sent free.

The word passes, word of mouth, if you're going for a divorce and you're from an abusive situation.... I must clarify: only abusive situations. I'm not talking about the majority of decent people here. The word is don't report it; don't report it or you'll lose everything. You'll probably lose everything anyway, but if you report sexual abuse, you will surely lose everything. That's the reality.

Questioner: Do you have any suggestions as to how we in this committee can change that and make sure that isn't the case?

Ms. XXXX XXXX: I'm not a lawyer. Maybe because I'm an educator—no, not only because of that.... People I speak with, and I mean people who have doctorates and big degrees and fancy people, which I'm not, are all saying the same thing: educate, educate, educate.

I personally believe, and I'm not alone, that most people know that sexual abuse breeds on secrecy. I think it also breeds on ignorance, like many other things. So I think one of the keys is, as I think I mentioned, mandate training and a media blitz. The United States has short advertisements now on television and radio; it's a blitz right across the country. And it's known that there is a very high statistical correlation between men who beat women and those same men who abuse their children. The correlation is very high. The States has begun this. It's been going for a while.

I think education.... Judges are supposed to know about the law and how to apply it. They don't know about child development and child abuse. The average decent person doesn't know about this. When it happens to you....

Questioner: I guess that's why there's been a suggestion to go to...maybe we wouldn't call them a mediator, but we'd call them early judicial intervention or somebody with the expertise you've referred to. That is the first stop before people get to the judge. Lots of them only want to judge; they don't actually want to do this other....

Ms. XXXX XXXX: Yes, and that's okay.

Questioner: I guess I'm worried that.... Are you seeing that even in people where the perpetrator has been in the criminal justice system, or is it only the ones where it's secret?

Ms. XXXX XXXX: The ones where it's secret. Those are frequently the worst cases.

Questioner: And where it's secret it's not safe to tell the truth because of the climate that everybody knows about.

Ms. XXXX XXXX: Exactly.

Questioner: And if this were done in a different milieu, in a clinic kind of setting rather than the judge's chambers or the courtroom, do you think maybe it would be safer for people to tell what's really going on?

Ms. XXXX XXXX: That is my personal opinion. I think Canada does have already some judges, some lawyers, some psychologists, some everything who are already informed and who are tough enough to take it. I guess “tough” is the right word, because it's not a pleasant task. It must be excruciating for you people to listen to this, but you have to. I think if you could take those people and say okay, we're going to have a separate cadre corps, and you're all lawyers and you're psychologists and everybody that's used anyway.... We have obligatory mediation in Quebec. The minute there's a hint of abuse, conjugal violence or other, a hint, you go to this parallel—

Questioner: Special place.

Ms. XXXX XXXX: —using the existing facilities and the people who are already there, except they have indicated a willingness to take training and go with it at least for a while.

In Montreal they have a special sex crimes unit. They're all crown prosecutors, everybody. It's all the same courts, the same rooms, the same buildings, the same people; but they have special training, which is ongoing, and they deal with it. It just shifts kind of to the left and works.

The Mothers Not Found in the Media- (the author/mother was silenced) « A Human Rights Issue-Custodial Justice

I found the below on A Human Rights Issue-Custodial Justice

 

Looks like she’s still silenced. The page is gone and her blog is empty. (but we have the article) Hang in there Julie- they CAN’T Silence us all!

The Mothers Not Found in the Media

by JULIE LEVINE

Mrs. Tiger Woods, Mrs. Aaron Spelling, Ms. Britney Spears, even our first lady, Mrs. Obama ….all mothers that you can read about on an almost weekly basis. The media loves to cover them and to expose them. Whether they like it or not.

The media does not cover the women who have lost custody battles to perpetrators of domestic violence. Their abusers are almost never exposed. The children in these cases are damaged, their lives stained forever. Over and over again, these children are torn from the arms of a loving parent-their mothers.

When will you read of Debbie, Rachel, Susan, Maria, and hundreds of others who have lost their children in a court system that enables such injustice? Probably never. And the silence is breaking them.

In our judicial system of today, powerful men, dominating men, are able to use the court system as a weapon. Tragically, they are able to use their children as ammunition. The media doesn’t know the women that have fallen victims to our courts. We should read about the personal enfolding of celebrity moms, professional athletes’ spouses, and other characters that are deemed of high interest to the public. Or so they say. When do we read of the other mothers?

No one wants to report on the woman whose husband repeatedly raped his 5 year old daughter. That man was then given sole custody of the young girl, as the woman could not fight the court battle laid out before her. Who would want to read of the woman whose husband broke every bone in her face, over a period of years? He was then given custody of the children who witnessed this horror.

In another case, a forensic psychologist stated that he was of the professional opinion that two boys had observed their father being psychologically and physically abusive towards their mother. Documentation regarding physical abuse of the mother was evidenced. Then the judge deciding this particular custody dispute awarded sole custody of the two boys to the father.

When this woman sought safety prior to the divorce dispute, her husband warned her that she would never see her children again. After custody was "awarded" to this male perpetrator, the mother never had a relationship with her sons again. A judge looked her in the eye and told her that just because her husband had raped and beaten her, it did not mean he couldn’t be a good father.

Not understanding any of the court’s instructions, she contacted newspapers, radio stations, and magazines. In our wonderful United States of America, there was not a single reporter that would come to her aid. No one wanted to speak of her story, her life….It was her own, never to be shared.

Until now.

It happened to me.

In our country that promises protection and justice, judges are awarding custody to men with violent histories. Women that have made their children a priority, are left childless. Many times, these women turn to the media for assistance…only to be turned away.

These are the mothers not found in the media. Reporters refuse to reply to coverage requests, as judges are never held accountable for their poor and damaging decisions. If these cases are told to the public, how are they remedied? Perhaps this is why reporters run from such stories. Rather than ignore such tragedies, it seems that finding an answer would be a much better conclusion.

In order for there to be a solution to many of these horror stories, the stories themselves must be told. Bullied and emotionally battered by judicial figureheads, the mothers not mentioned in the media must be heard. They need a voice. We need a voice.

If you are reading these words, that proves there is hope. It says things can get a little bit better. This is all being told from a mother who lost her children in a court of law to the abuser; from a mother not found in the media.

Technorati Tags: Found,author,article,Hang,Julie,Silence,LEVINE,Tiger,Woods,Aaron,Britney,lady,Obama,basis,expose,Whether,custody,violence,children,cases,Over,parent,Debbie,Rachel,Susan,Maria,system,injustice,weapon,ammunition,victims,courts,characters,woman,husband,daughter,girl,period,horror,opinion,father,Documentation,male,perpetrator,relationship,newspapers,radio,America,reporter,life,protection,justice,judges,Women,Many,times,assistance,Reporters,coverage,requests,Rather,conclusion,solution,words,abuser,athletes,spouses,magazines,histories,decisions,tragedies

The Mothers Not Found in the Media- (the author/mother was silenced) « A Human Rights Issue-Custodial Justice

Why Are Moms Punished in Court?

The below was written by Gina Kaysen Fernandes, posted on Mom Logic.  I am reposting here because I know Lorraine Tipton and have posted about her case here prior to this:  A Nightmare in Oconto County, UPDATE: Nightmare in Oconto County, UPDATE 2: A Nightmare in Oconto County

Custody Crisis: Why Moms Are Punished in Court

Tuesday, January 19, 2010

filed under: divorce logic

Talk to mothers, divorce lawyers, and child advocates and you'll hear tales of a family court system that's badly broken.

Gina Kaysen Fernandes: To an outsider, Linda Marie Sacks had the perfect life. Her husband was rich, and they lived in a huge home in Daytona Beach, FL, where she spent her days shuttling her girls to school and various activities. Linda Marie describes herself as a "squeaky clean soccer mom" who "lived my life for my children." Behind that façade, Linda Marie says she married a monster -- a man who verbally and emotionally attacked her for years and sexually abused their two young daughters.

When she finally left him and tried to take her girls with her, she encountered a new monster -- family court. Rather than protecting Linda Marie and her two young daughters from a sexual predator, a family court judge denied Linda Marie custody and put her daughters into the hands of their sexually abusive father.

Talk to mothers, divorce lawyers, and child advocates and you'll hear tales of a family court system that's badly broken. It's one that routinely punishes women for coming forward with allegations of abuse by denying them custody of their children. Instead of protecting children from abusers and predators, the court often gives sole custody to the abusive parent, say child advocates. Mothers who tell judges their children are being molested or beaten are accused of lying and are punished for trying to intervene. Some are thrown in jail for trying to keep their kids from seeing an abusive parent. Women, many of whom have few financial resources at their disposal, are often at the mercy of a court system that is not designed to handle domestic violence.

Linda Marie first suspected something was wrong in 2002 when she received a shocking phone call from a school administrator. Her 7-year-old daughter was acting out sexually, with knowledge beyond her years. A short time later, the Sunday school teacher reported overhearing Linda Marie's daughter saying, "I suck my dad's penis." She received more phone calls from school about her little girl using Barbie dolls to simulate oral sex with a boy in her class. "I was very concerned, these are alarming red flags," said Linda Marie.

She consulted family therapists who also expressed alarm and concern, but failed to report these claims to an abuse hotline. In one of the therapy sessions, the oldest daughter drew a picture that depicted her father as an erect penis on legs. Linda Marie says she once walked in on her husband wiping her daughters' vaginas in the bathroom before school, "because he told me he wanted them to be fresh." When Linda Marie confronted her husband, he ignored and dismissed the allegations.

After 11 years of marriage, Linda Marie filed for divorce in 2004. Armed with detailed documentation, she believed the judge would grant her sole custody of her two daughters for their protection. "I was sheltered. I didn't know I had stepped into a national crisis in the courts," said Linda Marie, who spent tens of thousands of dollars in a legal battle that ended in the loss of her parental rights. Linda Marie has only seen her children during supervised visits for a total of 54 hours over the past two and a half years. "I'm one of the lucky moms," she said, choking back tears. "Some bonds are severed forever. I'm thankful for my two hours a month."

Some mothers like Lorraine Tipton of Oconto Falls, WI, have served jail time as the result of contentious custody arraignments. In November, a judge sentenced Lorraine to 30 days behind bars because she didn't force her 11-year-old daughter to follow the court's order to live every other week with her abusive father. "She's terrified of going; she has night terrors and severe anxiety," said Lorraine.

Her ex, Craig Hensberger, was arrested three times for domestic violence and once for child abuse. His criminal record also includes two DUI arrests, one of which happened while driving with his daughter. The court ordered Hensberger into rehab and demanded "absolute sobriety," but his daughter claims he still drinks excessively when she visits.

Hensberger admitted in court that he still continues to drink, but the judge punished Lorraine instead for trying to protect her child. "My abuser is continuing his abuse of me and my daughter with the help of the court," said Lorraine, who spent three days locked up until her daughter made the heart-wrenching decision to return to her father's home so her mother could be released from jail. "He can't get to me physically. The only way he knows how to hurt me is to take my child away."

"What we are seeing amounts to a civil rights crisis," says attorney and legal writer Michael Lesher, who co-authored the book From Madness To Mutiny: Why Mothers Are Running from the Family Courts -- and What Can Be Done about It. Many judges and court-appointed guardians act above the law with apparent impunity, he argues.

"There's no hearing, no evidence, no notice -- they can take your child away from you," Lesher tells momlogic. If a mother raises concerns or openly discusses child abuse in court, she typically ends up being the one under investigation. "Mom is guilty until proven innocent," he says.

A family court judge with the Los Angeles Superior Court refused momlogic's request for an interview to respond to these allegations.

Unlike criminal court, family court does not rely on criminal investigators to gather evidence in an alleged child abuse case. Instead, the court appoints family advocates known as "guardian ad litem," or GAL, who are expected to investigate the abuse allegations and make their recommendation in the best interest of the child. GALs are sometimes licensed psychologists, social workers, or attorneys who are not necessarily trained in evaluating sexual abuse or domestic violence. They have the judge's ear, and their opinions can alter a child's future. There are no juries and there's no mandate for legal representation. In fact, most women end up representing themselves because they can't afford the attorney fees.

Most moms don't want to take the case to criminal court because they prefer to keep the matter private. Legal experts contend the evidence in sexual abuse cases isn't typically strong enough to hold up in criminal court to overcome the threshold of "beyond a reasonable doubt." While the bar is set much lower for proving evidence in family court, advocates argue Child Protective Services frequently doesn't want to get involved. "If there's a custody battle going on, CPS won't touch it," says Irene Weiser of the advocacy group StopFamilyViolence.org.

There's no doubt fathers play a critical role in a child's life, and in most cases, are equally loving and capable parents who deserve custody. However, studies find when a wife accuses her husband of abuse, more than half the time, she faces a counter-accusation of "parental alienation syndrome," or PAS. Although PAS is not a medically recognized disorder, divorce attorneys often successfully argue that it emerges when a parent brainwashes a child into thinking the other parent is the enemy.

The psychiatrist Richard Gardner, who first coined the phrase "parental alienation syndrome" in 1987, has written more than one hundred articles on the subject, but has offered no scientific data to support his theory. While it's not considered a certifiable medical condition, PAS is widely accepted in the legal community.

"Parental Alienation unequivocally, categorically exists, and it's a form of child abuse," says author and forensic consultant Dean Tong. While he believes more studies need to be done to validate PAS, "it does exist, anecdotally speaking," he says. As an expert witness, Tong has been called a "fathers' rights prostitute" for his work in court clashes. But he also testifies for mothers who are fighting to appeal unfavorable rulings. For Tong, it's about using forensics to find the truth. "I'm not here to protect guys who are guilty," he says.

In years past, mothers were typically considered the "protective parent" in custody decisions when courts relied on the "Tender Years Doctrine," which states that children under the age of 13 should live with their mothers. Recently, several courts have ruled that doctrine violated the Equal Protection Clause in the 14th amendment, and replaced it with the "Best Interests of the Children" doctrine. It's a huge victory for the increasingly powerful Fatherhood Movement that contends dads are systematically alienated from their children after a divorce.

Tong argues the current legal climate continues to put fathers on the receiving end of false allegations. "It's handcuffs first, speak later," said Tong, who experienced that firsthand. In 1985, Tong's ex-wife falsely accused him of sexually abusing his 3-year-old daughter. He spent time in jail and went through "a year of hell" trying to prove his innocence. While Tong was eventually cleared of any wrongdoing, he never regained custody of his kids, and remained under supervised visitation for years. Tong became a self-taught expert on the subject of family rights and abuse accusations. He has written three books, including Elusive Innocence: Survival Guide for the Falsely Accused.
"There's an assumption that maintaining a child's relationship with the father is a good idea -- even if the father is abusive," says Stop Family Violence's Weiser, who believes when the overburdened court system is unable to sort out a custody conflict, it relies on misogyny. She argues there are many judges, GALs, and evaluators who believe that women are inherently vindictive and will lie to get a leg up in a custody battle. "We see it over and over again in family court, where judges or professionals don't believe the violence is occurring," Weiser says.

"All we have is 'he said, she said.' Who's telling the truth? That's up to the judge," says Tong, who believes the justice system isn't working for either side. "The system is not doing a good job interviewing kids, we're still in the dark ages there," says Tong, who thinks there needs to be more formal education and training for the professionals, including judges who are hearing child custody cases.

According to the American Bar Association, child abuse allegations in custody disputes are rare -- occurring in only six percent of cases. The majority of those accusations are substantiated. In terms of false allegations, fathers are more likely than mothers to intentionally lie (21 percent, compared to 1.3 percent). In fact, abusive parents are more likely to seek sole custody than nonviolent ones, and are successful about 70 percent of the time.

After three years of litigation, Linda Marie Sacks says she was no match for her ex-husband's financial resources and powerful connections. "He was buying his way through the courtroom." Despite 10 calls into the abuse hotline by licensed professionals, Linda Marie's ex-husband still claimed she was making false allegations of abuse to alienate his children, and the judge believed him. Linda Marie was kicked out of her home and put on supervised visitation with her two daughters, who are now ages 10 and 12. "The judge legally kidnapped my daughters and won't give them back," she said.

In some extreme cases, a custody decision will be reversed, which is what happened to Joyce Murphy. The San Diego mother was charged with kidnapping after she took her daughter out of state, away from the girl's father, because she believed he was a child molester. The father, Henry Parson, accused Joyce of parental alienation and she lost custody. "Despite my pleas for protection to the police and the DA and the family court representatives, and even psychologists, Mr. Parson was able to convince them and the community at large that he was the victim, and I was just an angry, embittered, divorced woman," explained Joyce.

Six years later, Parson was caught in the act and pleaded guilty to six counts of child abuse, which included oral sex with a child, molestation, possessing child porn, and using a child to make porn. After Parson received a six-year prison sentence, Joyce told reporters that family court's only good decision in her case was granting her full permanent custody of her daughter after her ex-husband was jailed.

Lorraine, the Wisconsin mom who was jailed for protecting her daughter, knows her daughter's nightmare will continue for the rest of her childhood. "He's never going to stop, it's never going to end until she's 18." Linda Marie says she's putting every penny towards her legal efforts to win back custody of her daughters. "I will never stop fighting for my girls. I know one day justice will prevail."

Critics argue that not only is the family court system broken, it was never designed to deal with issues like child custody. The goal is to develop solutions that are in the best interest of the child. "Unfortunately when judges and guardians start thinking of themselves as super government, all sorts of abuses will occur," says attorney and author Lesher.

Activists are working towards making reforms through legislation. "The heartbreaking challenge is that there's not one quick fix," says Stop Family Violence's Weiser. "This is a war -- it's very ugly, it's bloody, and very bitter," concludes Tong.

Linda Marie and Children

Gina Kaysen Fernandes is an award winning documentary producer and a former TV news producer/writer. She lives in Los Angeles with her husband and son.

Custody Crisis: Why Moms Are Punished in Court | momlogic.com

“If I Killed You, I’d Get The Kids”: Women’s Survival, Child Custody, and Abuse « RightsForMothers.com

From:  http://justice4mothers.wordpress.com/2009/08/28/if-i-killed-you-id-get-the-kids-womens-survival-child-custody-and-abuse-by-men/

August 28, 2009

“If I Killed You, I’d Get The Kids”: Women’s Survival, Child Custody, and Abuse

Filed under: Child Custody, Child Custody Battle, Domestic Abuse, Domestic Relations, Domestic Violence, Family Court Reform, Family Courts, Family Rights, Human Rights, Husbands who murder wives, Intimate Partner Assault, Murdered Mothers, Parental Alienation Syndrome, parental alienation — justice4mothers @ 11:16 am

Here is an important paper by Colleen Varcoe and Lori G. Irwin titled “If I Killed You, I’d Get the Kids”: Women’s Survival and Protection Work with Child Custody and Access in the Context of Woman Abuse.” I am constantly amazed by men’s rights advocates, father’s rights folks and shared parenting people that “claims” of abuse by women in a relationship are generally false when so there so many women and children dying. They want to make it a “women’s” or “feminist” issue, when it is really a human rights issue. They try and draw the attention away from all the abusive fathers getting custody of children from moms with claims of so-called “parental alienation syndrome” and claim that it is the “radical” women’s groups that are debunking it. I find that interesting and their credibility lacking if they call the American Judge’s Association, the National Council of Juvenile and Family Court Judges, the American Medical Association, the American Psychological Association, and the National District Attorney’s Association “radical women’s groups.” They have all discredited claims of “parental alienation” and “parental alienation syndrome.”

Here is an except of Varcoe’s and Irwins’s paper:

Child custody and access was the central concern for women with children who participated in Project Violence Free (PVF), a three-year study of formal systems’ (criminal justice, social assistance, and health care) responses to abuse by intimate partners. Although we proposed to study women’s experience with these specific “systems,” the women saw their experiences as similar across services, and talked about “the system” as a monolithic entity. The overarching theme identified through analysis of interview and documentary evidence from the women was that women struggle continuously to limit the violence in their lives and to “make the system work.” We identified four critical sites in which women did most of this work.

For all the women, economic survival was a central part of their struggle. For most women, seeking protection, particularly, but not exclusively, from the justice system, was part of their experience. For women new to Canada, working with issues of immigration overshadowed their other efforts. For the women with children, issues of child custody and access dominated and shaped their experiences.

This article focuses on child custody and access as one of the sites of women’s work in dealing with intimate partner violence. It is based on interview data from the women who were mothers and focus group data from service providers who work with such women as background. The interviews revealed a pervasive tension between obligations to maintain contact between children and their fathers, and obligations to protect children from harm. The purpose of this article is to describe how women work to negotiate formal systems in relation to child custody and access in the context of woman abuse, and how aspects of such systems are problematic. Our argument is that child custody and access processes provide opportunities for abusive partners to exert power and control over their partners and children, and that these opportunities are often supported by policies and practices of service providers.

To read the rest of “If I Killed You, I’d Get the Kids”: Women’s Survival and Protection Work with Child Custody and Access in the Context of Woman Abuse” by Colleen Varcoe and Lori G. Irwin, please click here.

“If I Killed You, I’d Get The Kids”: Women’s Survival, Child Custody, and Abuse « RightsForMothers.com

When your babies start having babies themselves, please help them to be parents

This kind of story really gets to me....I don’t know the young father involved, but at his age I doubt that he is a malicious person (yet).  This to me sounds more like a case of a child trying to raise a child and not having the right tools to get that job done safely! 

Adult parents...please, please, when your kids start having kids...TALK to them about what to do when they get frustrated with the baby, or with life in general.  I am sure there have been many parents that have felt frustrated over the years because of not enough money for Christmas or Birthday’s or whatever...caring parents WANT to get things for their kids that they may not have had growing up.

But, a mature parent doesn’t see causing pain to the crying baby as way to ease that frustration.  The baby is already crying...why do something that will cause even MORE crying?

Yes, I think this young father should be punished for what he did, make no mistake about that!  But, the mature adults in his life need to step up and help him as well.  Mature adults everywhere need to step up to the plate...regardless of how well you tried to keep your babies from having babies too early...they do it...move on.

Don’t kick them out of your lives, help them.  Continue to parent your kids so that they can parent theirs!

Teen charged, accused of burning baby in bath

By Cindy Swirko
Staff writer

Published: Wednesday, December 30, 2009 at 2:02 p.m.
Last Modified: Wednesday, December 30, 2009 at 2:02 p.m.

Child abuse charges have been filed against a Gainesville teen-ager on accusations that he burned his 6-week-old baby in hot water.

The incident happened Dec. 24. The 17-year-old father and mother took the baby to Shands at the University of Florida with second-degree burns to the buttocks.

Police were called because of the nature of the injury.

"The investigation revealed that the father was frustrated that the baby was crying, and he boiled several bowls of water and placed them in the baby bath and put the baby into the hot water," Gainesville Police Lt. Mike Schibuola said. "He said he was frustrated and angry because he didn't have a job, he didn't have any money, and he had no presents for Christmas."

The baby's mother was not home when the incident happened and was not charged, Schibuola said. The father was charged with aggravated child abuse.

| Gainesville.com | The Gainesville Sun | Gainesville, FL

UPDATE: Dombrowski Case: Trial set January 8th, 2010 (The Murder of Motherhood)

 

December 18, 2009 -- Quick Publish to just update, will delve further as I can, Thank you my dear friends and family,

(To the Perpetrator and his many many attorneys and the dea Judge who is monitoring the ww for any activity relating to this case!)I will not shut up, give up and I WILL NOT GO AWAY!

Sin Denied Telling All; Reminding Others of Morals

UPDATE: Dombrowski Case:

SN. CO. Case No. 96-D-217

December 16, 2009

“ We walked into Court and Jason P Hoffman  one’ of Attorney’s for the Perpetrator  came with a two inch stack of ‘contempt’ papers (to clean up the internet)  I still do not have copy of the recent contempt’s not allowed to have  (as with GAL and FOC’s private reports) as I turn them all over to be published.

The current ‘claim’ remains – is I STILL  have ‘ alleged images’ of my daughter (now why would I want images of my child and my dead mom?) But are actually ‘court documents’ and several  media appearances’ most recently on Domestic Violence.

Not to mention that Kansas is at an all time record high in DV Fatalities in TWO DECADES with State Warnings and the Media and Senate Hearings Testimonies on the Kansas Joint Committee on Children’s Issues.”

KansasWatchDog: Video

and Audio Testimonies:

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

The bottom line is this:

1. I am NOT a threat to my daughter nor have I ever been alleged to be a threat to my daughter unlike that of the well documented HX of violence of the perpetrator.

2. Under K.S.A 60-1616:  Unless AFTER hearing- showing that I am a threat or harm to my daughter- The Courts can not deny our parenting time- (as they have this past ten years)  DV by Proxy and other Court Whores that Profit.

Like my daughters Guardian ad Litem GAL  M. Jill Dykes, Topeka Kansas Bottom dweller and blood profiteer of children. and we shant forget the ‘good judge himself’ Judge ‘death’ David Debenham Who one year ago denied my daughter the right to go to her Grandmothers funeral.

So………..

We kill off Granny, now a year later, time to finish off mom? I think not!!

The  ‘Best interest of the Perpetrators’ remains quite clear. Domestic Violence by Proxy

Domestic Violence (DV) by Proxy: Terrorist Tactics Employed by Batterers

In the below is a recent appellate court opinion where this statute was upheld and remanded back down to the lower courts, for error in denying parenting time and or ‘conditioned’ parenting time.

So, on Jan 8, 2010 ‘charge us or release us’- Habeas Corpus, find me a threat to my daughter or sever my (alleged) rights under the law. (the only piece of paper they have NOT done)

Media and testimonies to the Kansas Senate does NOT make me a Threat or danger to my child.

“ I am tired this is draining to do- so I will publish now- and update as possible.” I Love you my Mother and my daughter- “ Don’t Give up”

K.S.A. 2004 Supp. 60-1616(a), a parent has a right to reasonable parenting time unless the trial court finds, after a hearing, that the exercise of parenting time would seriously endanger the child’s physical, mental, moral, or emotional health. K.S.A. 2004 Supp. 60-1616(a) creates a rebuttable presumption that a parent is entitled to reasonable parenting time and visitation. This presumption may be rebutted if, after a hearing, the trial court finds that the exercise of parenting time would seriously endanger the child’s physical, mental, moral, or emotional health.

http://www.kscourts.org/Cases-and-Opinions/opinions/ctapp/2005/20050916/93450.htm

SYLLABUS BY THE COURT

No. 93,450

IN THE COURT OF APPEALS OF THE STATE OF KANSAS

In the Matter of the Marriage of

JANET BOULEY, f/k/a KIMBRELL,

Appellee,

and

WILLIAM DAVID KIMBRELL,

Appellant.

SYLLABUS BY THE COURT

1. Under K.S.A. 2004 Supp. 60-1616(a), a parent has a right to reasonable parenting time unless the trial court finds, after a hearing, that the exercise of parenting time would seriously endanger the child’s physical, mental, moral, or emotional health. K.S.A. 2004 Supp. 60-1616(a) creates a rebuttable presumption that a parent is entitled to reasonable parenting time and visitation. This presumption may be rebutted if, after a hearing, the trial court finds that the exercise of parenting time would seriously endanger the child’s physical, mental, moral, or emotional health.

2. The fundamental rule of statutory construction to which all other rules are subordinate is that the intent of the legislature governs if that intent can be ascertained. The legislature is presumed to have expressed its intent through the language of the statutory scheme it enacted. When a statute is plain and unambiguous, the court must give effect to the intention of the legislature as expressed rather than determine what the law should or should not be.

3. Orders which condition parenting time and visitation upon a minor child’s desires to see a parent give a minor child the authority to determine parenting time and can have the effect of denying parenting time altogether.

4. Among the factors that must be considered when determining the issue of child custody, residency, and parenting time under K.S.A. 2004 Supp. 60-1610(a)(3)(B) and K.S.A. 2004 Supp. 60-1616(a), the trial court must look at the desires of a minor child as to the child’s custody or residency. The child’s wishes as to custody, residency, and parenting time and visitation cannot be the exclusive factor relied upon by the trial court in determining parenting time.

Appeal from Douglas District Court; JEAN F. SHEPHERD, judge. Opinion filed September 16, 2005. Affirmed in part, reversed in part, and remanded with directions.

Brant M. Laue and Chadler E. Colgan, of Armstrong Teasdale LLP, of Kansas City, Missouri, for appellant.

Sherri E. Loveland, of Stevens & Brand, L.L.P., of Lawrence, for appellee.

Before MALONE, P.J., GREEN and BUSER, JJ.

GREEN, J.: William David Kimbrell (David) appeals the trial court’s decision regarding parenting time with his 16-year-old son Evan Kimbrell. The issue in this case is whether the trial court can condition a noncustodial parent’s right to parenting time with his or her minor child upon the desires of the child.

We determine that this cannot be done.

K.S.A. 2004 Supp. 60-1616(a) makes it clear that a parent has a right to reasonable parenting time with his or her minor child "unless the court finds, after a hearing, that the exercise of parenting time would seriously endanger the child’s physical, mental, moral or emotional health." Conditioning parenting time on the wishes of a minor child improperly gives the child the authority to determine a noncustodial parent’s rights to parenting time and visitation and can have the effect of completely denying the noncustodial parent’s rights to parenting time.

UPDATE: Dombrowski Case: Trial set January 8th, 2010 (The Murder of Motherhood) « A Human Rights Issue-Custodial Justice