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November 2011

MICHIGAN  

Mother says judge humiliated her for breastfeeding in court

NEWSCHANNEL 3   

11-11-11 -- **** Natalie Hegedus says it happened Tuesday at the 7th District Court in Paw Paw. She was there fighting a boating ticket that led to a bench warrant when she missed her initial court appearance. *****Hegedus says she was in court with her five-month-old son, Landen, on Tuesday, just days after he was violently ill. . . . “His temperature had spiked to 104 degrees,” said Hegedus. “We ended up in Paw Paw emergency room.” . . . Because Landen still had a fever, Hegedus says she had no choice but to bring him to court with her, and after two and a half hours of waiting, Landen woke up, needing to eat. . . . “I had a shirt that I knew would be appropriate to breastfeed him and a nursing tank top that just unsnaps,” said Hegedus. . . . Once Landen began eating, Judge Robert Hentchel called Hegedus' case. . . . “The judge asks me if I thought it was appropriate to do that in court,” said Hegedus. “My response was very gauged and I said that considering the fact that my son is sick and he's hungry and the fact that it's not illegal, I don't find it inappropriate.” . . . “And how did he respond to that?” asked Newschannel 3's Jared Werksma. . . . “Something to the lines of 'it's his court, his rules and he does,'” said Hegedus. . . . In the court transcript, Hentchel says “You think that's appropriate in here?”

KANSAS  

Kansas judge dismisses felony charges against Planned Parenthood

By Joe Lambe, The Kansas City Star  

11-10-11 -- Johnson County prosecutors on Wednesday dismissed 49 charges, including 23 felonies, that were filed as part of the nation’s first criminal case against Planned Parenthood. . . . Johnson County District Attorney Steve Howe said that all copies of key documents needed to support those charges no longer exist, including a set destroyed in 2009 by Steve Six, who then was the Kansas attorney general. . . . The Kansas Department of Health and Environment destroyed the original records in 2005. . . . Howe said he would prosecute the remaining 58 misdemeanors in the complaint Phill Kline filed in 2007, when he was the Johnson County district attorney. Those misdemeanor charges accuse Planned Parenthood of failing to test fetuses for viability and performing late-term abortions.

October 2011

Case That Reunited Mother, Daughter Spanned Three States, Two Continents

Laura Haring,New York Law Journal

10-28-11 -- One year ago, a distraught French-speaking native of the Ivory Coast walked into the offices of Sanctuary for Families begging for help in reuniting with her kidnapped 6-year-old daughter. Her request launched a complex legal saga spanning three states and two continents. . . . "I had a sinking feeling and felt a tremendous sense of urgency," said Dorchen A. Leidholdt, director of the group. "I also saw how utterly devastated the mother was and wanted very much to help her, but knew it would be hard to find a pro bono attorney." . . . Founded in 1984, Sanctuary for Families provided legal and other services to more than 11,000 victims of domestic violence and sex trafficking last year. Cases like that of the Ivorian woman have become increasingly common. . . . "We've had several cases where the victim or one of the parties is here and jurisdiction lies in another state, sometimes in a fairly remote location," Ms. Leidholdt said. "It's a function of immigration and migration, and the economy and people moving, and it means it can be very difficult to find representation for someone in a very meritorious case." . . . The woman, whose name was withheld by Sanctuary out of concern for her safety, said her daughter was born in 2004 in Charlotte, N.C. Her husband, also from the Ivory Coast, was a truck driver who was not home much but often beat her when he was.

September 2011

NEW HAMPSHIRE  

Closure for Chandler, Arizona rape victim, 14 years after crime

by Stacey Delikat, azfamily.com

09-07-11 -- Fourteen years after she was raped by a member of her church and shamed into apologizing before her entire congregation, a Chandler woman says she has justice. . . . Ernest Willis, 52, was sentenced to 30 to 50 years in prison by a New Hampshire judge for the rape and impregnation of Tina Anderson. . . . "I'm thrilled and it does bring a sense of closure to have it over with," Anderson said. . . . Anderson was just 15 years old at the time and living with her family in New Hampshire. She was a babysitter for Willis' children. . . . Authorities at the Trinity Baptist Fundamental Church found out she'd gotten pregnant, they made her stand before the entire church congregation and apologize. . . . "I was blamed, I was put in front of the church and made to apologize for a compromising situation," Anderson told 3TV in May.

Win Without a Lawyer Affordable Step-by-Step Self-Help Tutorials Show How If You Have a Lawyer - KNOW WHAT SHOULD BE DONE If You Don't Have a Lawyer - KNOW WHAT YOU MUST DO Created by an Attorney with 20+ Years Experience Winning Lawsuits Click for instant on-line access Jurisdictionary® When placing an order please use this website to link to Jurisdictionary.

August 2011

ALASKA  

Beagley gets probation for child abuse; $2,500 fine suspended

Hot Sauce Case: She's no public danger, the judge says.

By Kyle Hopkins, Anchorage Daily News 

08-30-11 -- Rather than going to jail, Jessica Beagley is going home. Rather than paying a fine, she's ordered to continue attending counseling sessions with the boy she was convicted of abusing. . . . A District Court judge sentenced the 36-year-old Anchorage mother -- seen on the "Dr. Phil" show punishing her wailing, adopted son with hot sauce and a cold shower -- on Monday to three years' probation but no immediate jail time or fines. . . . Judge David Wallace delivered Beagley the suspended sentence of 180 days in jail and a suspended $2,500 fine. . . . "You're not a danger to the public," the judge told her. "I think you committed a one-time act to get on a TV show."

ILLINOIS  

U.S. judge rejects 'bad mothering' lawsuit

By Sheena Goodyear, QMI Agency

08-29-11 -- An Illinois appeals court dismissed two Chicago siblings' $50,000 lawsuit against their mom for not sending them birthday cards, changing her name after she divorced their father, and just generally being mean. . . . Stephen Miner, 23, and Kathryn Miner, 20, launched the lawsuit against their mother, Kimberly Garrity, in 2009. One of their three lawyers was their father, and Garrity's ex-husband, Stephen A. Miner. . . . According to court documents, the pair divorced in 1995, and the kids went on to live with their father.

OREGON  

Court investigates Ore. boys living with killer

by KGW Staff & AP 

08-29-11 -- A Seattle judge has approved an investigation into the custody agreement for an Oregon mom who said she wants to keep her teenage sons away from a killer. . . . Tricia Conlon shares custody of her two boys, ages 13 and 14, with her ex-husband, Lt. Col. John P. Cushing Jr. The woman currently living with Tricia Conlon's ex-husband killed her own daughters 20 years ago. . . . Before they wed, Cushing was married to a woman named Kristine. Twenty years ago, Kristine Cushing shot and killed the couple's two daughters in their sleep. She was later found not guilty by reason of temporary insanity. . . . Now, John Cushing has reunited with Kristine and Conlon is terrified that her two boys are living in the same home with her.

Nearly 90 percent moms judge other moms: But why?

by Theresa Walsh Giarrusso, Atlanta Journal Constitution (blog)

08-22-11 -- A TODAY Moms/Parenting.com survey of 26,000 moms found what we here on the blog know to be very true: Moms judge each other constantly and about almost any minute aspect of parenting! . . . The survey found that nearly 90 percent of moms in fact admitted to judging other moms.

Other findings from the survey —
Which parenting behavior might lead you to judge:

Her kid is a brat — 66.4 percent . . . She breastfeeds a 3-year old -42.6 percent . . . She has an overweight child – 36.9 percent . . . She gives junk food – 34 percent . . . She lets kids have too much screen time 31.8 percent . . . She co-sleeps with child 23 percent . . . She works too much 19.7 percent . . . She didn’t try to breastfeed 18.1 percent

I don’t judge other moms – it’s not my business 12.6 percent . . . So why do we do it? TODAY Moms explains

NEW YORK  

No Cause for Marijuana Case, but Enough for Child Neglect

By Mosi Secret, New York Times  

08-17-11 -- The police found about 10 grams of marijuana, or about a third of an ounce, when they searched Penelope Harris’s apartment in the Bronx last year. The amount was below the legal threshold for even a misdemeanor, and prosecutors declined to charge her. But Ms. Harris, a mother whose son and niece were home when she was briefly in custody, could hardly rest easy. . . . The police had reported her arrest to the state’s child welfare hot line, and city caseworkers quickly arrived and took the children away. . . . Her son, then 10, spent more than a week in foster care. Her niece, who was 8 and living with her as a foster child, was placed in another home and not returned by the foster care agency for more than a year. Ms. Harris, 31, had to weather a lengthy child neglect inquiry, though she had no criminal record and had never before been investigated by the child welfare authorities, Ms. Harris and her lawyer said. . . . “I felt like less of a parent, like I had failed my children,” Ms. Harris said. “It tore me up.”

ILLINOIS  

Imprisoned Wheaton mom fights to keep son she abandoned

By Josh Stockinger, Daily Herald 

08-11-11 -- A woman who abandoned her newborn son under a bush in Wheaton is petitioning a court to prevent prosecutors from interfering with her plans to take custody of the boy upon her release from prison. . . . Nunu Sung, 26, pleaded guilty to obstructing justice in October in exchange for a three-year prison term and a promise the DuPage County state’s attorney’s office wouldn’t seek to terminate her parental rights. . . . But now the child’s court-appointed guardian has petitioned a juvenile court judge to prevent Sung from having further contact with the boy. Under the judge’s order, the state’s attorney’s office is responsible for prosecuting that petition. . . . The situation led Sung’s attorneys on Wednesday to pursue contempt of court allegations against prosecutors. But DuPage Judge Blanche Hill Fawell dismissed the request, saying the plea deal was made in good faith.

NEW JERSEY  

'Home Alone' Bungle Did Not Rise to Level of Child Neglect, Court Says

Michael Booth, New Jersey Law Journal  

08-08-11 -- A woman who inadvertently left her 4-year-old son in an empty house while she went out to dinner may not have been a model parent, but neither did she deserve to be pilloried on the state Child Abuse Registry, the New Jersey Supreme Court ruled on Monday. . . . "There exists a continuum between actions that are grossly negligent and those that are merely negligent," wrote Justice Virginia Long for the unanimous Court in DYFS v. T.B., A-21-10. "The parent's conduct must be evaluated in context based on the risks posed by the situation." . . . The incident occurred on March 25, 2007, a Sunday night. Between 7 and 7:30 p.m., the woman, given the pseudonym "Susan" in the opinion, and her son "John" returned to the Atlantic Highlands home they shared with her mother and stepfather, "Mary" and "Jim." Mary's car was in the driveway and she normally stayed home on Sunday nights. Susan also believed Mary would be home because she had been suffering from the flu.

WASHINGTON   

Mom Loses Custody Battle with Ex, Who Is Married to a Child Killer

By Debra Cassens Weiss, ABA Journal

08-01-11 -- An Oregon woman is appealing a child custody decision that allows a child killer to help raise her two sons. . . . Trisha Conlon of Silverton, Ore., fought to keep the boys out of her ex-husband’s home after a private investigator confirmed he was living with Kristine Cushing on Vashon Island near Seattle, the Associated Press reports. . . . Kristine Cushing was married twice to John Cushing Jr., both before and after he married Trisha Conlon. During Kristine and John’s first marriage, she killed their two daughters, ages 4 and 8, and blamed her actions on temporary insanity caused by Prozac, the story says. She was hospitalized nearly four years in a mental institution and underwent nearly a decade of psychiatric monitoring before receiving an unconditional release in 2005, when she remarried John Cushing.

July 2011

GEORGIA  

Mom spared jail in son's jaywalking death

News24   

07-27-11 -- A woman who was arrested after her 4-year-old son was struck and killed by a van as they were jaywalking across a busy street was spared a prison sentence on Tuesday following an outcry over her arrest. . . . Raquel Nelson, aged 30, was convicted by a jury earlier this month of vehicular homicide and other charges for not using a crosswalk and could have gotten three years behind bars - far more than the six months the hit-and-run driver served. . . . Instead, without explanation, Judge Kathryn Tanksley gave the suburban Atlanta mother a year's probation, ordered 40 hours of community service, and took the unusual step of offering her a new trial. Nelson's lawyer said late on Tuesday that she will take the judge up on the offer. . . . A crowd of supporters broke out in applause.

PENNSYLVANIA  

2nd Mom Sues Pa. County Claiming Newborn Taken Due to What She Ate: Poppy Seeds in Salad, This Time

By Martha Neil, ABA Journal

07-18-11 -- A second mom has sued a Pennsylvania county and a local hospital, saying that her newborn was taken from her after she tested positive for opiates due to having eaten poppy seeds in ordinary food. . . . This time, says plaintiff Eileen Ann Bower, it was poppy seeds in salad dressing she ate before the birth of her son in July 2009 that resulted in Lawrence County Children and Youth Services taking custody of the infant from her for several months, reports the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette. . . . Another mom, Elizabeth Mort, sued previously, contending that her baby girl was taken from her eating a poppy seed bagel resulted in a positive test for opiates in April 2010. She is represented by the American Civil Liberties Union in the ongoing case.

MICHIGAN  

Rape Victim Jailed by Detroit Judge for Contempt of Court Released

By Taryn Asher, WJBK | myFOXDetroit.com

07-14-11 -- "I was held against my will overnight. I was raped several times. I was beaten bad to a pulp," a rape victim told FOX 2's Taryn Asher. . . . She had already been through what most women could not imagine. She was abducted on the way to a Detroit bus stop, taken to a house where she was beaten with everything from a belt to a two-by-four and raped overnight repeatedly. . . . She escaped and called police. Investigators caught one of the suspects. . . . Wednesday, she testified against her alleged attacker in court. She claimed the defense attorney, Gabi Silver, was relentless. . . . "The defense attorney just treated me so awful and so bad. She just like kept yelling at me over and over, and the judge didn't ask her to lower her tone," said the victim.

June 2011

NORTH CAROLINA  

Woman's cancer a factor in complex custody case

Some are outraged over North Carolina judge's decision to send children to father in Arlington Heights

By Julie Deardorff, Chicago Tribune reporter

06-04-11 -- Parents diagnosed with cancer commonly fear dying before their children have grown. But an unusual child custody battle in North Carolina has raised another troubling concern: Can the illness be used against the sick parent? . . . The ongoing case, which has stirred up an emotional debate over cancer discrimination, involves Alaina Giordano, 37, a mother with breast cancer who recently lost primary custody of her 11-year-old daughter and 6-year-old son to her estranged husband. . . . Though the children now live with Giordano in Durham, the judge's ruling means they must move to the Chicago area on June 17 to live with their father in Arlington Heights. Among the factors cited in the lengthy decision, which Giordano has appealed, were concerns over her health and the uncertainty over how long she will live. Her stage 4 breast cancer has spread throughout her body, but people can live for years with the advanced disease.

May 2011

FLORIDA

One St. Lucie mom to win $20,000 makeover

By Lisa Bolivar, TCPalm

05-25-11 -- Only four contestants are vying for a $20,000 Ultimate Mom Makeover designed for St. Lucie County mothers only – but there is still time to enter the contest. . . . The competition, designed to reward a deserving mom, opened May 9 and will close its books June 6 at 5 p.m., said event promoter Jeannette Weiss of the WSR Group in Palm City. The winner will be announced at the June 10 St. Lucie Mets game. . . . The winner will receive cosmetic dentistry, facial cosmetic services, jewelry, a weekend at the Hampton Inn of Port St. Lucie West, and a night of fun at a St. Lucie Mets game, among other treats, said Dr. Ryan Askeland, of SAH Dentistry in Port St. Lucie, who is responsible for inventing the contest. . . . "We are looking forward to the opportunity to provide something to a deserving mom who always seems to be the last to do things for themselves," Askeland said. "They are the unsung heroes."

Win Without a Lawyer Affordable Step-by-Step Self-Help Tutorials Show How If You Have a Lawyer - KNOW WHAT SHOULD BE DONE If You Don't Have a Lawyer - KNOW WHAT YOU MUST DO Created by an Attorney with 20+ Years Experience Winning Lawsuits Click for instant on-line access Jurisdictionary®

NEW YORK

Sticker shock

Mad mom harassed ex

By Kieran Crowley, New York Post

05-18-11 -- Her hate campaign backfired. . . . A Long Island lawyer got custody of his two daughters after a judge ruled his estranged wife was behind a bizarre scheme that left his town plastered with stickers denouncing the attorney as a Hummer-driving deadbeat who let his kids go hungry. . . . In a scathing ruling, a Suffolk Supreme Court judge awarded Mark Musachio custody of his 11- and 13-year-old daughters, saying their mother, Annmarie, needs a shrink. . . . At one point in the 7-year court battle, Musachio's Deer Park apartment complex was covered with stickers that read: "Attorney Mark Musachio is a deadbeat dad! He drives a Hummer and his 4 kids have to eat at the food pantry."

CALIFORNIA

Botox Girl Taken From California Mom

Authorities Remove 8-Year-Old After Series Of Injections For Pageants

By Mary Papenfuss,  Newser Staff  

05-17-11 -- A California mom who admitted giving her 8-year-old daughter Botox injections has lost custody of the girl. San Francisco authorities launched an investigation last week after mom Kerry Campbell discussed the injections as part of their preparation for little girl beauty pageants on Good Morning America. "I just, like, don't think wrinkles are nice on little girls," daughter Britney said on the program, even though she admitted the shots "hurt."

NORTH CAROLINA  

Mother hopes judge will overturn custody ruling

Shae Crisson, WTVD, ABC11 

05-12-11 -- Since ABC11 Eyewitness News broke the story last week, Alaina Giordano's story has been all over the news. . . . Giordano has stage 4 breast cancer and lost custody of her two children to her ex-husband. . . . An online petition supporting her efforts has close to 18,000 signatures. The hope is that once it reaches Governor Beverly Perdue, Perdue will encourage the judge to overturn the custody ruling. . . . It's a ruling at least one family law expert says the mom has already lost. . . . "I know that my children keep me strong," Giordano said. . . . A Durham judge ordered the children should live with their father in the Chicago area. That's where he was able to land a job and find a house in a good school district, while Girodano is unemployed and facing ongoing cancer treatment. . . . Thousands of supporters on Facebook believe Giordano should not lose her children because she has cancer.

NORTH CAROLINA  

Mother loses custody of her children - because she has breast cancer

By Daily Mail Reporter  

05-09-11 -- A woman with terminal breast cancer says she has lost custody of her children because doctors do not know how long she will live. . . . A judge ruled that 37-year-old Alaina Giordano, from Durham, North Carolina, must give up both her children to her estranged husband after she was diagnosed with stage four breast cancer. . . . The decision comes after a bitter legal battle that has included allegations of cheating and other domestic problems. . . . Mrs Giordano said she is ‘devastated’ and that her children are what gives her strength. . . . The mother-of-two was first diagnosed with cancer in 2007, but her condition has worsened as it has spread on her bones. . . . After their marriage fell apart, her husband Kane Snyder, 37, sought to gain full custody of their children Sofia, 11, and Bud, 5. . . . He asked the judge that the children be moved to live with him in Chicago, where he is working as a leadership associate at Sears. . . . Durham County Family Court judge Nancy Gordon ruled that Mr Snyder should get the children after a psychiatrist recommended that they should live with him because of the ‘deteriorating condition of the mother’s health’.

NEW JERSEY

Mothers call child custody system unfair

By Zach Patberg, The Record Staff Writer  

05-07-11 -- Lori has spent the last eight years fighting the courts for custody of her two children. It began, she said, with her accusing her then-husband of abusing their 3-year-old boy and year-old girl. It ended with him gaining custody and her getting visitation rights. . . . "He drained me out," said the 47-year-old Westfield woman, who declined to give her full name for fear it would hurt her future custody chances. She can’t afford a lawyer and has to represent herself after spending more than $100,000 in legal fees over the years. . . . She was a housewife. He is a lawyer. She has little money. He has lots. . . . It is a formula that legal experts and advocates say creates a lopsided matchup in the courtroom for custody cases – one in which the mother most often loses. . . . "For the most part, the guy is the one who’s got the job and the means to afford an attorney," said John Fitzgerald, director of Northeast New Jersey Legal Services programs in Bergen, Passaic and Hudson counties. "To me, the real issue is fairness. It’s not fair if one side is represented and the other side isn’t."

MARYLAND

Operation Mother's Day yields 22 arrests

ABC2 News

05-06-11 -- The Baltimore City Sheriff's Office has arrested 22 in "Operation Mother's Day" Raid. . . . The operation is a two day warrant sweep that targeted individuals wanted on Child Support Warrants. 22 offenders were arrested on outstanding warrants during the operation and 35 warrants were closed. . . . The Baltimore City Sheriff's Office run this program annually during the week before Mother's Day. . . . Individuals arrested collectively owe $327,957.52 in child support. Many of the warrants list cash bail amounts that must be paid by the arestee prior to their release, the total bail of those arrested id in excess of $37,000.00. . . . The majority of those arrested were man, however, 5 women were taken into custody.

April 2011

MASSACHUSETTS   

Mom Who Didn’t Give Her Son Prescribed Chemo Meds Is Convicted of Attempted Murder

By Stephanie Francis Ward, ABA Journal

04-12-11 -- A Massachusetts woman who did not administer prescribed chemotherapy medications to her son, who had cancer, was convicted of attempted murder, child endangerment and assault today, by a Lawrence Superior Court jury. . . . Jeremy Fraser, who was diagnosed with non-Hodgkin's lymphoma in 2006, died in 2009. He was 9, and also had autism. According to the Associated Press, prosecutors argued that his mother, Kristen LaBrie, was resentful of being a single parent. Alternatively, LaBrie told the jury that she stopped given her child the medicine because she couldn’t handle seeing the side effects it gave him.

FLORIDA

Badly Burned in Domestic Incident, Woman Says Her New Life, In and Out of Court, Answered a Prayer

By Martha Neil, ABA Journal

04-01-11 -- Covered with burn scars on 80 percent of her body, Audrey Mabrey could easily feel sorry for herself. . . . But at 28 she considers herself "the new Audrey," whose prayer—to live and raise her children—while she was doused with gasoline and set on fire at her Florida home several years ago, was answered, the St. Petersburg Times reports. Her husband is charged with attempted murder and arson.

March 2011

Emotional Guilt, New Childcare Responsibilities and Perils of Dating Again Shake Up Lives

December 2010

TEXAS  

Is district judge prejudging teen mother?

Commentary By Rick Casey, Houston Chronicle  

12-19-10 -- I wish I could say that this was an unusual story, since it involves a 14-year-old girl having babies. . . . Nor is it rare that the girl's parents are hardly of the Father-Knows-Best school of nurturing. . . . Dad is in prison for 30 years for murder. . . . Mom is thought to be in Mexico. Child Protective Services took her children due to failure to prevent the sexual abuse of an older daughter. . . . CPS has filed a suit to terminate the parental rights of both regarding the 14-year-old, whom I will call Maria. Nobody is objecting. . . . But CPS has also sued to terminate Maria's parental rights to her two baby boys, who were born in August. And District Judge Pat Shelton, who should be neutral until he hears evidence in a trial, seems to be pushing that result. . . . Shelton issued an emergency order removing the babies from their mother based on a CPS affidavit alleging an imminent risk of "neglectful supervision and physical neglect of newborn twins." . . . The affidavit expressed "concern with the mother's developmental level" and a "concern with whether prenatal care was received during the pregnancy." . . . Shelton ordered Maria placed in one foster home immediately upon leaving the hospital and the two twins placed in another. And he ordered that Maria have no contact with her babies. . . . But it is not at all clear there was an emergency, and no evidence other than her age that Maria would be neglectful toward the babies.

TEXAS

Judge backs mom in latest custody case twist

By Craig Kapitan - Express-News

12-01-10 -- The mother of Jean Paul Lacombe, an 11-year-old in the middle of a high-profile international custody dispute, was called back to court Tuesday to answer a new allegation that she was taking steps to flee the country with her son. . . . But state District Judge Larry Noll let Berenice Diaz go home without further action, pointing out that the claim doesn't seem to make sense. . . . “The only place this lady has received any kind of protection has been here,” Noll told the attorneys for millionaire ex-husband Jean Philippe Lacombe, who wasn't in attendance. “Why would she want to go back to Mexico, where he controls the turf? I think he can buy his way in any part of Mexico he wants.” . . . The younger Lacombe became the focus of national media attention after he was recorded on security video in October 2009 wailing for help as deputy constables pulled him off his school bus in San Antonio and handed him to his father. . . . A day earlier, Jean Philippe Lacombe had presented Mexican divorce documents to local state District Judge Sol Casseb and accused his ex-wife of having kidnapped their child from Mexico. Authorities have since said the documents were outdated and misleading.

November 2010

Failures of U.S. Courts Forces Mothers to Turn to International Law

Dianne Post, Attorney, Huffington Post 

11-16-10 -- Ten mothers, one victimized child now an adult, and six organizations working in the field of child abuse and family law filed a petition on April 10, 2007, at the InterAmerican Commission on Human Rights in Washington, D.C., against the United States for the pattern and practice of courts awarding custody or unsupervised visitation to child abusers and molesters. The petitioners come from Kansas, Georgia, California, New York, Arizona, New Jersey, Ohio, Rhode Island, Illinois and Nevada. . . . Ten years earlier, on Mother's Day, May 11, 1997, a group of mothers who lost custody of their children gathered on the steps of the U. S. Capitol in Washington, D. C. Entitled "Give Us Back Our Children," the event was held to represent the increasing numbers of women who are losing custody of their children to batterers and child abusers. This event, co-sponsored by the National Coalition Against Domestic Violence, the Family Violence Prevention Fund, the House of Ruth, My Sister's Place, Rep. Diana DeGette (D-CO), Rep. Connie Morella (R-MD), and Rep. Lucille Roybal-Allard (D-CA), brought attention to the plight of women and children unfairly victimized by the legal system, and to dispel the myth that women always win custody of their children. That was 13 years ago. The situation today is even worse. The stories of these petitioners are not unique. They are the tip of the proverbial iceberg indicating a grave and growing injury to human rights.

ILLINOIS  

Hospital says elderly woman ready for discharge; daughter says no

Northwestern Memorial seeks to revoke medical power of attorney, get guardian appointed

By Deborah L. Shelton, Tribune reporter 

11-08-10 -- In a rare legal move, Northwestern Memorial Hospital on Tuesday plans to ask a judge to revoke a Chicago woman's power of attorney over her hospitalized mother in order to discharge the elderly woman. . . . The hospital says in court documents that 86-year-old Dolores Bedin, who has inoperable pancreatic cancer, has been medically ready for release since Sept. 18. Her daughter, Janet, strongly disagrees. . . . "My mother wasn't strong enough to go home, and they wanted to force it," said Bedin's daughter, a businesswoman who is in charge of merchandising for a national retail developer. "She did not want to go home." . . . In its petition, the hospital is asking that a public guardian be appointed for Dolores Bedin, arguing that her daughter is not cooperating with the hospital's efforts to discharge her mother to a lower level of care and therefore not acting in her mother's best interests.

65 Years Later, A Mother's Secret Revealed

McKay Allen | KXLY4 Reporter

11-03-10 -- Sixty-five years ago a teenage girl in small town Oklahoma gave birth to a baby boy and gave him up for adoption. In 2010, 1,500 miles away in Colfax, Wash., that mother and son reunited. . . . There are moments in life that define life and this reunion is one of those moments. The story begins in 1944, when something happened that back then you just didn’t talk about. . . . “It was just taboo, absolutely not, absolutely not,” said Fred Kiser, the baby born Jan. 1, 1945. . . . On January 1st 1944, a teenage girl gave birth to a baby boy and promptly gave that baby up for adoption. . . . “I couldn’t fault her for it, I knew the times that this was happening, it was taboo, you didn’t speak about it,” Kiser said. . . . Within weeks, that teenage girl’s family moved from Muskogee, Okla. to California. In 1946, that teenage girl got married, had two children and she never spoke about her baby to anyone. . . .  It was a secret; no one in the family knew,” daughter Carolyn Haner said.

October 2010

OREGON

A mother, 67, and daughter, 51, meet for the first time

By Saul Hubbard, The Register-Guard

10-09-10 -- Television cameras may have been rolling, photographers may have been snapping pictures and a reporter may have been scribbling notes, but the moment at the center of it all could not have felt more real.  . . . A mother and a daughter, who had never seen each other in the flesh, were reunited Friday at the Eugene Airport after 51 years apart. . . . As word spread around the airport of what was about to unfold, a crowd gathered and watched as Donna Geil, 67, of Brownsville, embraced her long-lost daughter Cricket Koch, 51, of Garland, Texas. . . . “They’re like two peas in a pod,” an onlooker said. . . . “My daughter sat next to her (Cricket) on the plane,” another spectator, her eyes filled with tears, said. “I don’t know why I’m crying, it’s just such an amazing story.” . . . Geil and Koch, their eyes also wet with tears, held each other for several minutes before Koch met two other virtual strangers: Geil’s husband, Jim, 66, and her other daughter, Kasundra Pierson, 41. Koch greeted each of them with a warm hug.

September 2010

NEW YORK  

Court Questions Alcoholic Wife's Absences,
Bars Her From Home

Andrew Keshner, New York Law Journal

09-27-10 -- A New York judge has barred a woman from the Long Island home she jointly owns with her husband, saying that she had abandoned her residence during her unexplained absences while she was struggling with alcoholism. . . . Justice Robert A. Bruno of Nassau County Supreme Court in New York, has granted exclusive occupancy to the husband pending the resolution of a divorce action, saying that the wife had relinquished her residence by staying away during two different periods between stays at alcohol treatment facilities. . . . "Based upon the lengthy periods of time the defendant was living in an alternate residence, which was not necessary for her alcohol related problems, this Court finds such a time away from the marital residence to be voluntary on the part of the defendant," Bruno wrote in JL v. AL. "As a part of the foregoing, it is not necessary for this Court to opine upon whether the time period the defendant was absent from the marital residence for alcohol related therapy is considered voluntary."

ILLINOIS

A hope that grandchildren can know their mothers

Grandmother has cared for eight kids since her daughters were imprisoned

By Serena Maria Daniels, Chicago Tribune reporter

09-26-10 -- Gloria Burton, 48, would love for five of her grandchildren to see their mother, who was convicted of murdering a man who allegedly raped one of her children as an infant. . . . "It's been really hard … I've had them so long. Now they're getting bigger and understanding what happened," Burton said in a telephone interview from her Mississippi home. . . . When Burton's daughter Laquita Calhoun was sentenced to 67 years in prison by Cook County Judge Stanley Sacks for the 2004 slaying of neighbor Alonzo Jones, it was Burton who took custody of Calhoun's five children. She also took over care of the three children of her other daughter, Katherine, who was also convicted in the murder. . . . Now, Laquita Calhoun's sentence may be reduced after an appeals judge ruled that her original sentence by Sacks failed to properly consider the "undeniably egregious nature of the provocation" that led to the 2004 slaying of Jones. . . . Instead, the judge said Calhoun deserves a sentence more in line to that of the others sentenced in the case. Katherine Calhoun received a 20-year sentence.

TEXAS  

Family Fight, Border Patrol Raid, Baby Deported

Sidebar By Adam Liptak  The New York Times

09-20-10 -- A few days before her daughter Rosa’s first birthday, Monica Castro and the girl’s father had a violent argument in the trailer they all shared near Lubbock, Tex. Ms. Castro fled, leaving her daughter behind. . . . Ms. Castro, a fourth-generation American citizen, went to the local Border Patrol station. She said she would give the agents there information about the girl’s father, a Mexican in the country illegally, in exchange for help recovering her daughter. . . . Ms. Castro lived up to her side of the deal. But the federal government ended up deporting little Rosa, an American citizen, along with her father, Omar Gallardo. Ms. Castro would not see her daughter again for three years.

TEXAS

Texas son reads kidnap story, realizes it's him

Angela K. Brown, Associated Press, San Francisco Chronicle 

09-18-10 -- Twenty-year-old Stephen Michael Palacios came across a newspaper story recently about a boy allegedly abducted by his father in 1993. Palacios, it turns out, was that boy. . . . After learning about his past, Palacios persuaded his father to turn himself in - even accompanying him to a lawyer's office this week - and will soon be reunited with the mother who desperately searched for him for 17 years. . . . "I am so excited," his mother, Dee Ann Adams, 40, told the Waco Tribune-Herald. "I'm really not even sure how I feel right now. It has been such a long time, and I had to move on. I had other kids I had to take care of. I am happy, and I am hoping we can rebuild our relationship." . . . Palacios could not be located for comment Friday. . . . He was 3 when he disappeared after a visit with his father, Stephen Palacios Jr., a high school Latin teacher and basketball coach in Waco who had been granted visitation rights after the couple's divorce. A warrant for the father's arrest was issued, and over the years detectives chased several leads. . . . As recently as 2006, investigators put a Palacios family wedding under surveillance in Waco, but the elder Palacios didn't show. Later that year, they had missing-person photos of the son mailed to 80 million homes in the United States.

OREGON  

Canadian beats state in custody battle then gets a bill

By Anita Kissée KATU News and KATU.com Staff  

09-15-10 -- The state of Oregon says a Canadian mother, whose son was placed in foster care for two years, owes the state $7,400 in retroactive child support and medical care. . . . Noah Kirkman, who is also Canadian, was 10 years old when he came to Oregon on vacation to visit his stepfather in Lane County. While there police caught him without a bike helmet and then found out his stepfather was not his legal guardian even though he married Noah’s mother and raised him. The state then put the boy into foster care. . . . For two years Lisa Kirkman fought to get her son back. She succeeded in June with the help from the Canadian government, but then the state of Oregon sent her a letter demanding payment. . . . “Actually, I laughed at first, because I was just confused and took me completely off guard,” said Kirkman. “I was confused as to what I was looking at.” . . . Kirkman’s attorney, Daniel Mol, strongly rebuked the state.

MARYLAND   

Lawyer, retail worker killed in possible domestic incidents

Cases in Columbia, Ellicott City happened within a week

By Larry Carson, The Baltimore Sun

09-14-10 -- Clare Lenore Stoudt and Thelma Wynn appeared to have little in common except their age, gender and motherhood, but the two Howard County women were killed just days apart in their homes in what police believe were likely domestic violence incidents. . . . Stoudt, 35, the mother of five children, had worked doggedly for years to graduate from college and then law school in 2008 and was a valued tax attorney at the Washington firm of Pillsbury Winthrop, Shaw and Pittman. . . . "She was a special person," said her boss, Tina Kearns. "She did not have it easy." Stoudt stood out both professionally and personally, she said. . . . "She was a very good tax lawyer" hired right out of Georgetown's law school, Kearns said. "She was universally loved and admired around here because of her unconventional [professional] route," which included years of attending college and law school at night and online. . . . Stoudt, who grew up in Southern Maryland, was found dead Saturday evening along with Reginald Van Graves, 49, the father of her three youngest children in the townhouse they all shared in Ellicott City. Two older children lived with other relatives. A legal battle over custody had begun just five days earlier, according to a Patuxent Publishing review of circuit court records.

Court Tosses Suit Claiming Beveridge & Diamond Partner Squandered Marital Money

By Debra Cassens Weiss, ABA Journal

09-14-10 -- A Maryland appeals court has handed a victory to a partner and former managing principal of Beveridge & Diamond embroiled in a battle with his ex-wife over alleged financial malfeasance during their marriage. . . . The ruling (PDF) affirms the dismissal of Nancy Lasater’s tort suit against her former husband, Beveridge & Diamond partner John Guttmann Jr. Lasater had claimed that Guttman ran up large debts during their marriage, spending money on ill-advised real estate projects, exotic merchandise, personal adventures and a huge collection of compact discs. Her suit, filed after 25 years of marriage, had claimed conversion, intentional infliction of emotional distress, breach of fiduciary duty and fraud, according to the ruling by the Maryland Court of Special Appeals.

MICHIGAN  

Woman sexually assaulted in jury room bathroom by deputy city attorney sues in federal court

John Tunison | The Grand Rapids Press

09-13-10 -- A drunken driving suspect who was sexually assaulted by former Holland Deputy City Attorney Carl Gabrielse in a courthouse jury room is now suing both Gabrielse and the city. . . . The lawsuit, filed Monday in U.S. District Court in Grand Rapids, alleges the 31-year-old Gabrielse committed assault and battery, false imprisonment and intentional infliction of emotional distress. . . . It also claims the 23-year-old victim's constitutional rights were violated.

August 2010

NEW JERSEY  

Advocates of Anti-Shariah Measures Alarmed by Judge's Ruling

By Maxim Lott, Fox News   

08-05-10 -- A New Jersey family court judge's decision not to grant a restraining order to a woman who was sexually abused by her Moroccan husband and forced repeatedly to have sex with him is sounding the alarm for advocates of laws designed to ban Shariah in America. . . . Judge Joseph Charles, in denying the restraining order to the woman after her divorce, ruled that her ex-husband felt he had behaved according to his Muslim beliefs -- and that he did not have "criminal desire to or intent to sexually assault" his wife. . . . According to the court record, the man's wife -- a Moroccan woman who had recently immigrated to the U.S. at the time of the attacks -- alleged: . . . "Defendant forced plaintiff to have sex with him while she cried. Plaintiff testified that defendant always told her "this is according to our religion. You are my wife, I c[an] do anything to you. The woman, she should submit and do anything I ask her to do."

PENNSYLVANIA  

3rd Circuit Revives Rape Victim's Civil Rights Case

Lawsuit said police were already aware of a serial rapist in the area when they nonetheless decided to press charges against the woman

Shannon P. Duffy, The Legal Intelligencer

08-04-10 -- Women's groups and victims' rights advocates are praising a federal appeals court's decision on Monday to revive a civil rights suit against police brought by a Northwest Pennsylvania woman who said she was jailed for five days on charges of making a false report after she was raped and robbed at gunpoint. . . . The ruling in Reedy v. Evanson is important, advocates said, because it rejected antiquated notions of how sexual assault victims should be viewed that were based on myths and stereotypes. . . . Police said they suspected Sara Reedy had fabricated a story of being raped and robbed while working in a Gulf gas station and convenience store in order to hide her own theft of cash. Ultimately, all charges against Reedy were dropped after a serial rapist was captured and confessed to a string of attacks, including the one on Reedy. . . . But in her civil rights suit, Reedy alleged that the charges never should have been filed, and that they stemmed from a misguided hostility by police toward her as a victim. . . . The suit said police were already aware that a serial rapist was targeting women in the area -- because another victim's account was so similar to Reedy's -- when they nonetheless decided to press charges against Reedy for allegedly fabricating her story.

July 2010

CALIFORNIA

The Battle for Vanessa: A Mom's Custody Crusade

Gina Kaysen Fernandes, Mom Logic 

07-29-10 -- A two-year-old girl at the center of a contentious custody battle involving the states of California and Ohio will stay with the only mother she has ever known, at least for now. A California Appeals Court has granted Stacey Doss temporary custody of the toddler, Vanessa, whom she has been raising in Orange County, CA and trying to adopt since birth. It's a significant victory for the single parent who is facing a difficult and lengthy court fight. . . . For the past two years, Stacey has suffered in silence keeping the details of her child's bungled adoption a private matter. Complex issues involving parental rights and adoption laws have put her daughter in a legal tug-of-war involving an army of attorneys and judges. Stacey now finds herself in the public spotlight, fighting to keep custody of Vanessa while waging her own personal crusade to reform what she believes is a broken system. "Vanessa is just the tip of the iceberg," said Stacey who has received letters and emails from hundreds of adoptive parents who've suffered similar circumstances. Stacey believes Vanessa's case can bring change. "Something is really wrong here. I'm going to stick my neck out and do something," she says.

NEW YORK  

NY Judge Who Jailed a Mom for Son Not Visiting Rapist Dad in Prison Ousted From Family Court

By Daniel Wise | New York Law Journal | New York Lawyer

07-15-10 -- Court officials yesterday moved out of Brooklyn Family Court a judge who jailed a woman who had failed to obey an order requiring that her 9-year-old son visit his father, who is serving a 27-year prison sentence in Arizona for raping three women. Other than confirming that Brooklyn Judge Robin K. Sheares is being reassigned to the Civil Court in Brooklyn, court system spokesman David Bookstaver said, "we do not discuss judicial assignments." . . . In 2007, Judge Sheares was elected to the Brooklyn Civil Court. Since 2008, she has been assigned to the Family Court. Mr. Bookstaver said her replacement will be named next week. A court employee who answered Judge Sheares' courtroom phone said she was "not available" to comment.

June 2010

NEW HAMPSHIRE

Fathers 4 Justice are on song

Daily Echo  

06-17-10 -- PARENTS from across Hampshire have lent their voices to a new song being released by campaign group Fathers 4 Justice. . . . The Anthem For Justice song is being launched by the Hampshire-based campaign organisation for Father’s Day this Sunday as an Internet download track. . . . Mothers and fathers from across the county travelled to London to record the song this week and film a video for the single, which is promoting equal rights for parents.

Start a Revolution on Father's Day

by Rebecca Hagelin, Townhall.com           

06-16-10 -- What we need when Father’s Day arrives on Sunday is nothing short of a family revolution, led by America’s fathers. . . . Ours is a broken culture — of fathers and mothers with broken vows, families with broken bonds, and children with broken hearts. . . . For every 100 babies born in America, 60 are born to a broken family. That is, they are either born out of wedlock, or to a family that will soon suffer divorce. Our teen pregnancy rate is the highest in the Western world. Our little girls are looking and behaving like sex kittens at younger and younger ages. Boys are afraid of marriage, addicted to pornography and have few or no manners. There are about 1.2 million abortions in America every year. . . . Mothers feel overwhelmed as they seek to "do it all" — earn a paycheck, nurture the children, manage the finances and keep the family together. Much of that is the fault of a radical feminist movement that perverted the battle for equal treatment into a battle for total independence from men. Many men just sat out what became a destructive force, and now all of us — men, women and children — are suffering the painful results as we realize that we really do need each other after all. . . . Imagine how our culture would be transformed if fathers refused to be bullied by angry feminists and took more of a loving role of responsibility in their own homes. What if husbands started pouring out unconditional and constant love on their wives in the same manner in which Christ pours love out for his people?

PENNSYLVANIA   

For parents, justice not served

Paperwork goes unfiled, appeals are dismissed.

By Terrie Morgan-Besecker, Law & Order Reporter,  Wilkes Barre Times-Leader

06-16-10 -- Mary Tullis was devastated last August when a Luzerne County judge terminated her rights to her son and daughter. . . . She and the children’s father, Jeff Harris, had been working to resolve the problems that led Luzerne County Children and Youth to place the children in foster care. She was confident the state Superior Court would overturn the decision on appeal. . . . She never got the chance to argue the merits of her case, however, because the assistant public defender assigned to represent her failed to file the required court papers, resulting in her appeal being dismissed outright. . . . A Times Leader investigation revealed she is not alone. . . . Since 2005, 15 of the 53 parents who challenged the termination of their parental rights or the involuntary adoption of their children have seen their appeals dismissed because the Public Defender’s Office or other court-appointed attorneys failed to follow proper court procedure, according to a review of cases filed with the state Superior Court. . . . The revelation prompted newly appointed county Chief Public Defender Al Flora Jr. to launch an investigation. He is reviewing records, including those identified by The Times Leader, to determine if anything can or should be done to seek to restore the appeals. . . . The newspaper’s review showed that in nine of the 15 cases at issue, the appeals were filed, but later dismissed because the attorneys failed to file the required legal briefs that detail the errors the trial judge allegedly committed. . . . In another six cases, the appeals were “quashed” – a legal term that refers to the dismissal of an appeal for failure to comply with some other aspect of appellate court procedure, such as filing the appeal late. . . . The lack of action by the attorneys means the parents were deprived of their right to have the Superior Court review the lower court ruling to determine if it was properly entered – a result an advocate for parental rights described as “appalling.”

NEW YORK  

Nassau County judge jails mother who falsely accused ex of sex abuse and alienated him from kids

Daniel Weaver, Albany CPS and Family Court Examiner

06-07-10 -- In a decision that will surely generate controversy and fuel gender wars and the ongoing debate over parental alienation, Nassau County Supreme Court Judge, Robert Ross, has sentenced a woman to six weekends in jail for alienating her children from their father. . . . The court went into great detail describing the mother's behavior toward her ex-husband, the defendant in Lauren R. V Ted R. The mother's behavior reached a crescendo, according to Judge Ross, when she made a false report of sexual abuse against the father to Child Protective Services. . . . The factual findings concerning the mother's behavior as stated in the decision by Judge Ross are extensive but worth reading in their entirety as they form a basis for his decision. . . . Concerning the plaintiff's (mother's) behavior, Judge Ross stated:

"Plaintiff intentionally scheduled their child's (N.'s) birthday party on a Sunday afternoon during defendant's weekend visitation, and then refused to permit defendant to attend. She demanded that N. be returned home early, in order to "prepare" for her party, but D., the other child, was enjoying the time with her father and wished to remain with him until the party began.

Mother finds kidnapped kids through Facebook

By Gordon Tokumatsu and Gil Cunha, NBCBayArea.com

06-05-10 -- A San Bernardino mother whose children were kidnapped 15 years ago was able to finally track them down using Facebook. . . . San Bernardino’s Deputy District Attorney says it’s the first time his office has handled a case like this one. But in this digital age, it may not be the last. . . . Faustino Utrera, father of two toddlers, a boy and girl, vanished with them in 1995. Their mother reported them missing and 15 years passed. "At the time, they were 2 and 3 years old. So they’re now 17 and 16," said Kurt Rowley, San Bernardino Deputy District Attorney. . . . But in those years, the Internet exploded and social networking sites revolutionized the process of tracking people down. . . . "The mother got on to Facebook and typed in one of the children’s names and hit a Facebook page," said Rowley. . . . It was her daughter, and they started corresponding. The mother even sent the teenager a family photo, dating back to before the split. But the relationship stalled. "The teenager said, 'Not interested in a relationship. We just have a happy life. Leave us alone,'" said Rowley.

NORTH CAROLINA  

Ex-con mom beats odds, gets law degree

By Ruth Sheehan – Raleigh News & Observer Staff Writer

06-02-10 -- In February 1990, Lynn Burke arrived at her public housing unit, escorted by a parole officer, to find her four young children living in squalor. Her crackhead husband had left pipes and needles in a back room. The kitchen sink was so clogged with grease, he did dishes in the tub. . . . Broken and broke after two years in prison, Burke had little reason to be optimistic about her future. Then her 7-year-old son held out something in his hand. . . . "I was thinking you might need this," he said. For two years, he'd slept with Burke's driver's license under his pillow. . . . Burke realized in that moment that her children and others in her life believed in her against all odds. . . . Their faith - and Burke's own drive - led her on a odyssey from a felony fraud conviction to representing clients for the Orange County Public Defender's Office. . . . Burke, 47, graduated last month from N.C. Central University Law School and is studying for the bar exam in July; she hopes to begin criminal defense work in the fall. Burke knows her story is rare; she wishes it weren't so. . . . "Cons are like everyone else. We want to contribute. We want our children to be proud of us," she said. "My story shouldn't be miraculous. I'm a regular person who screwed up royally. If I can do this, anyone can." . . . Burke didn't grow up in poverty. Her father was a corporate lawyer, her mother, a nurse. It was an upper middle-class upbringing in upstate New York, then Tennessee. Still, Burke said, she never learned key lessons about how much things cost, about education, about personal responsibility.

May 2010

OREGON & CANADA

Mother wins in international custody battle

By Susan Harding, KATU News and KATU.com Staff 

05-31-10 -- A Canadian mother wins an Oregon custody battle. Now, she tells us, her two years of torture are over.   . . . A Lane County judge ruled in Lisa Kirkman's favor Friday, ordering her 12-year-old son back to Canada after years of bureaucratic red tape. . . . Kirkman tells us her son should have been returned within days after he went to Oregon for vacation. Instead, that bureaucratic red tape turned those days into months and then years, Kirkman said. During the wait Kirkman engaged in a public fight to get her son back to Canada, talking to network television and lobbying lawmakers, even after Noah said he didn't want to go back. . . . Now, 12-year-old Noah Kirkman will leave a Lane County foster care to live with his grandparents in Canada. It's a victory for his mother, who we talked to in Calgary Sunday by Skype. . . . "I will be holding my breath until I actually have him home in my arms," Kirkland said.  

ALABAMA

In Ultrasound, Abortion Fight Has New Front

By Kevin Sack, NY Times

05-27-10 -- “It’s going to be cold, and some pressure, O.K.?” . . . The medical assistant guided the gelled ultrasound transducer across the pregnant woman’s belly. The patient, a 36-year-old divorced woman named Laura, stared straight ahead, away from the grainy image on the screen to her side. . . . The technician told Laura she was at 11 weeks. “Do you want to see your ultrasound?” she asked. “I’d rather not,” Laura answered promptly. . . . Laura, who asked that her last name not be used, had come to the New Woman All Women Health Care clinic in Birmingham with her mind set on having an abortion. And she felt that seeing the image of her bean-size fetus would only unleash her already hormonal emotions, without changing her mind. . . . “It just would have added to the pain of what is already a difficult decision,” she said later. . . . Over the last decade, ultrasound has quietly become a new front in the grinding state-by-state battle over abortion. With backing from anti-abortion groups, which argue that sonograms can help persuade women to preserve pregnancies, 20 states have enacted laws that encourage or require the use of ultrasound.

When Mommy goes to war (leaving the kids behind)

By Laura Browder, Washington Post (blog)

05-21-10 -- While our culture has always seemed able to cope with the idea of fathers as warriors--think of all those photographs on the front page of your local newspaper, featuring a returning soldier seeing his baby for the first time, or reuniting with older children--we may be less able to handle the idea of deploying mothers. We have learned, through watching countless war movies, that the bonds forged between (male) comrades during war can be stronger than those of family, but it may be a surprise to learn that this is true for many women as well. . . . As Marine Sgt. Jocelyn Proano, who joined the military after being expelled from high school, told me about getting her deployment orders when her daughter had just turned one year old: "That was the worst ever -- to leave my kid and everything." Yet she found her feelings for her daughter were in conflict with her military training: "The mommy mentality left me as soon as we got on that bus. All of a sudden, the Marine hit me." Sgt. Proano ended up extending her deployment so she would not have to leave her unit: "You want to be a Marine, and you can't be a mom all the time."

NEW JERSEY

Battered women call for legal aid in custody battles

By Elaine D’Aurizio, The Record, Staff Writer

05-07-10 -- Battered women who have lost custody of children to spouses pleaded for legal help at a demonstration Friday in front of the Passaic County Courthouse. . . . But their pleas come at a time when Northeast New Jersey Legal Services — in most instances the only provider of legal services for low-income people — has suffered a 20 percent loss of staff to attrition and layoffs in just the past year. And it still faces major budget cuts and staff reductions. . . . That didn’t daunt some 20 women pushing empty strollers, chanting and holding posters saying “The Court is the Cash Register”…”Why are Moms Punished?” and “Children should be seen, heard, believed and protected.” . . . It was the fourth annual Mother’s Day demonstration, organized by Sandra Ramos of Ringwood, an activist founder of shelters for battered women in Bergen and Passaic counties. Ramos said public awareness is growing, “But despite pleas to judges and legislators. no change has been forthcoming.” . . .  “If you don’t have money, you don’t get represented. Custody goes to the highest bidder.” she added. . . . A nearby demonstrator, Kelly DePaola of West Milford, agreed.

NEW JERSEY  

Comedian Wins Defamation Suit Over Mother-in-Law Jokes

By Debra Cassens Weiss, ABA Journal

05-05-10 -- A comedian has won a lawsuit filed against her claiming jokes about her mother-in-law and other members of her husband’s family were defamatory. . . . A federal judge in New Jersey ruled Friday that the jokes by stand-up comedian Sunda Croonquist were statements of opinion protected by the First Amendment, the Associated Press reports. . . . Many of Croonquist’s jokes rely on material about her life as a half-black, half-Swedish woman who married into a Jewish family, according to the opinion according to the opinion (PDF). The plaintiffs had contended Croonquist unfairly labeled them as racist.

OKLAHOMA  

Oklahoma judge temporarily halts new abortion law

Tulsa clinic, Norman doctor challenge rule on giving ultrasounds before procedure

By Nolan Clay Oklahoman  

05-04-10 -- The state has agreed not to enforce a new abortion law — criticized as one of the nation’s most restrictive — until a judge rules on a legal challenge. . . . Oklahoma County District Judge Noma Gurich signed the agreement Monday afternoon. Her action temporarily halts enforcement of the law requiring pregnant women to undergo ultrasounds right before abortions. . . . Legislative leaders said the development was expected. . . . A Tulsa medical clinic and a Norman doctor are challenging the law on constitutional grounds. The law was in effect for less than a week. . . . The law requires an abortion provider to perform an ultrasound on a pregnant woman at least an hour before the procedure so she can see the images of the fetus. The woman can avert her eyes if she wants. . . . The doctor or certified technician also must describe what is being shown, including whether the heart of the fetus or embryo is beating. Legislators required the ultrasound "in order for the woman to make an informed decision.”

April 2010

CALIFORNIA  

Judge allows parents of disabled woman to seek visitation rights on her behalf

Abbie Dorn, who can’t move or speak, hasn’t seen her 3-year-old triplets for 2½ years. They live in Los Angeles with their father.

By Maria L. La Ganga, Los Angeles Times

04-20-10 -- A Los Angeles County Superior Court judge ruled Tuesday that the parents of a woman who communicates largely by blinking have the legal right to fight on her behalf so that she can see her 3-year-old triplets. . . . Abbie Dorn 34, was left unable to move or speak because of a series of medical mishaps while giving birth to the children at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center in 2006. She now lives in South Carolina with her parents. . . . Abbie and her husband, Dan, eventually divorced in a proceeding that left decisions over custody, visitation, property and child support until later. A trial is set for May 13. . . . Dan Dorn has refused to allow Esti, Reuvi and Yossi to visit their mother, arguing that it would be detrimental at their age. He and the children still live in Los Angeles. Abbie has not seen them for 2½ years, and the children know nothing about her, according to court documents and testimony in the novel and acrimonious case.

TEXAS  

‘Child' in support case is a granddad

81-year-old mother says payments are 60 years overdue

By Mike Tolson, Houston Chronicle

04-05-10 -- Fights over children — who gets custody, how much for child support — are at the heart of any family law court on any given day. The faces change, but the stories and disputes rarely do. . . . So it is on today's docket in the Los Angeles courtroom of Judge Elia Weinbach. At least on paper. The dispute between Rosemary Douglas and Urban Joseph Grass over back child support seems familiar: She claims he never paid; he says he never knew. . . . In this case, however, the mom has a head of gray hair and has been collecting Social Security for more than a decade. The father was born in the heart of the Jazz Age, when a fellow named Coolidge resided in the White House. And the “child” in question is that only on some yellowing piece of paper. In real life he is a retired grandfather. . . . “He was ordered to do something. He didn't do it,” said the 81-year-old Douglas. “He didn't challenge it, not legally anyway. I'd always thought about this. It was never far from my mind. Finally I decided, why not? Why not try one more time?”

March 2010

CALIFORNIA  

9th Circuit Rules Against Tasered Pregnant Mom;
Dissent Hits ‘Off the Wall’ Theory

By Debra Cassens Weiss, ABA Journal

03-29-10 -- A federal appeals court has ruled 2-1 that officers who Tasered a pregnant woman three times when she refused to sign a traffic ticket have immunity from her lawsuit. . . . The ruling by the San Francisco-based 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals spurred an angry dissent by Judge Marsha Berzon, who called the majority’s theory of justification “off the wall,” the Associated Press reports. . . . The majority said Malaika Brooks was uncooperative and resisting arrest when the Seattle police officers Tasered her, using the device’s “touch mode,” which hurts less less than its “dart mode.” . . . Brooks was driving her son to school when she was stopped for speeding in a school zone, according to the facts recited in the opinion (PDF). She refused to sign the ticket because she thought it was an admission of guilt. Officers threatened to use the Taser unless Brooks got out of the car, but she refused.

PENNSYLVANIA  

Back from Maternity Leave, Lawyer Researches Pump-at-Work Laws

By Debra Cassens Weiss, ABA Journal

03-19-10 -- An associate at Fox Rothschild who returned from maternity leave was presented with a much-needed present from her secretary: a sign reading, “Do not enter-privacy please,” to hang on her door during pumping breaks. . . . Writing in the Philadelphia Inquirer, lawyer Beth Throne said not all employees are so lucky, including lawyers at other firms. “A friend of mine told me her (female) law partner routinely disregarded her closed door—and the pumping sounds that could be heard through it,” Throne writes. “My friend had no choice but to discard any expectation of privacy.”

CALIFORNIA  

Courthouse Protesters in Victorville Demand Justice

Three times, a mother says she asked for a restraining order. She was never granted one. Now, her infant son is dead.

By Mary Parks, NBC Los Angeles

03-08-10 -- Demonstrators gathered Monday outside a courthouse in Victorville, calling for a family law judge to resign. . . . They say they are outraged that judge Robert Lemkau refused to grant a restraining order against a man who later killed his son, and then himself. . . . About 100 protesters lined the sidewalk Monday, carrying signs reading, "Lemkau is a Baby Killer," "There is no Justice," and "Justice for Wyatt." They chanted, "Lemkau must go." . . . "This is indicative of the sense and ire of the community. It's outraged," said demonstrator Alan Boinus. . . . In January, Lemkau denied a motion for supervised visitation in a bitter custody dispute between Yucca Valley resident Katie Tagle; her 9-month-old son Wyatt; and the baby's father, Steven Garcia of Pinion Hills. . . . Lemkau called Tagle a "liar" in court when she tried to get a restraining order against her estranged boyfriend. Despite Tagle's warning to the judge that Garcia threatened to kill their baby, Lemkau approved visitation.. . . Ten days later, deputies found Garcia and the couple's infant son shot to death in a car in the San Bernardino Mountains in an apparent murder-suicide. Garcia had posted a suicide letter on Facebook stating, "So this is goodbye," and "I am so sorry."

OKLAHOMA  

Top Oklahoma court rejects abortion bill

Julie Bisbee, Capitol Bureau The Oklahoman

03-04-10 -- Legislation that seeks to limit a woman’s access to abortions was declared unconstitutional by the state Supreme Court. . . . In an opinion handed down Tuesday, the court said the legislation, which contains several provisions including requiring ultrasounds for women seeking abortions and limiting a woman’s access to pregnancy-ending drugs, violated the state’s constitution that says legislation is limited to one subject. . . . The state’s high court upheld a decision Oklahoma County District Judge Vicki Robertson, who said the bill was unconstitutional because it contained provisions with several different subjects.

February 2010

TENNESSEE

Born on streets, infant placed in foster home may have been killed

By Kate Howard, The Tennessean 

02-05-10 -- Cherokeewolf William Diedrich, born into poverty on the side of a dirty street, was supposed to be getting a better chance at life when he was put into foster care. . . . His then-homeless mother did not willingly give up the child, but she agreed she could use some time to get her life together before taking on the duties of motherhood. The foster parents took the newborn and they hoped to adopt him if he didn't go back to his mother. . . . When Cherokeewolf was taken off life support on Tuesday, dead at the age of 12 weeks, both their dreams died with him. . . . Kimberlee Diedrich, now living in an apartment, was left to wonder how life had been better for her son. And police turned their attention to the foster home setting after hospital X-rays indicated the baby may have been shaken - more than once. . . . The medical examiner's office has not released a cause of death, saying more tests need to be completed. No charges have been brought, but police are calling their review of the case a homicide investigation.

January 2010

Pregnant Pro Se Mom Argued Treatment Case from
Hospital Bed & Lost; Will Lawyer Win Appeal?

By Martha Neil, ABA Journal

01-26-10 -- Already the mother of two daughters, Samantha Burton had obtained prenatal care for her third pregnancy and voluntarily went to the hospital when she experienced symptoms she'd been told to look out for, in the hope of saving her baby, according to her lawyer. . . . When the 29-year-old questioned the medical advice and care she received there, however, and sought to leave, Tallahassee Memorial Hospital got a Florida judge to order her to submit to the treatment its doctors ordered, including bed rest at the facility, reports the Associated Press. Her stillborn baby was delivered by Caesarian section three days later. . . . Now, in a closely watched case that pits Burton's constitutional rights against those of her fetus, a Florida appeals court is mulling whether the state had the right to order her to submit to specific medical treatment, against her wishes and, at least arguably, without considering other viable options. Although a reversal would come too late, of course, to uphold Burton's claimed constitutional rights concerning the forced treatment at Florida Memorial Hospital, it would, she says through her lawyer, David Abrams, help prevent other women from going through a similar "horrible" experience that is still very upsetting to her, the AP reports.

No Supreme Court hearing for mom who asked to read Bible to son's class

The US Supreme Court on Tuesday refused to hear the appeal of a Pennsylvania mom who sought to read five verses of Psalms from the Bible as part of her son's 'All About Me' classroom assignment.

By Warren Richey The Christian Science Monitor Staff writer

01-19-10 -- A mother blocked from reading Bible passages during “show and tell” in her son’s kindergarten class has lost her bid to have the US Supreme Court examine the public school’s actions. . . . On Tuesday, the high court declined to take up Donna Kay Busch’s lawsuit against the Marple Newtown School District in suburban Philadelphia. The court issued its order dismissing the case without comment. . . . The action ends a four-year legal battle over whether Ms. Busch, an Evangelical Christian, should have been allowed to read five verses from the Book of Psalms to her son’s class. / Part of 'All About Me' week  . . . The reading was to be part of an in-class assignment in which the children were invited to present important aspects of their lives to their classmates. As part of this “All About Me” week-long assignment, Busch’s son, Wesley, made a poster displaying photographs of himself, his hamster, his brothers, his parents, his best friend, and a construction-paper likeness of his church.

The case is Busch v. Marple Newtown School District.

GEORGIA

Army Charges Mom Who Refused Deployment

The Associated Press, Newsmax 

01-13-10 -- The Army said Wednesday it has filed criminal charges against a single-mom soldier who refused to deploy to Afghanistan last year, arguing she had no family able to care for her infant son. . . .  Spc. Alexis Hutchinson, a 21-year-old Army cook, could face a prison sentence and a dishonorable discharge if she is convicted by a court-martial. But first, an officer will be appointed to decide if there's enough evidence to try a case against her. . . . Hutchinson's attorney, Rai Sue Sussman, said she still hopes the case can be settled without a military trial. She said the Army should consider Hutchinson's reason for not deploying overseas — that she was afraid of what would happen to her baby. . . . "There are other routes if they really want to punish her," Hutchinson's attorney, Rai Sue Sussman, said Wednesday. "I don't think the situation was serious enough to warrant a criminal matter." . . . Hutchinson of Oakland, Calif., was scheduled to deploy from Hunter Army Airfield in Savannah on Nov. 5. She skipped her unit's flight, saying the only relative she had to take care of her 10-month-old son — her mother — was overwhelmed by the task and backed out a few days before Hutchinson's departure date.

CALIFORNIA

Appeals court rules in favor of octuplet mother Nadya Suleman

Los Angeles Times

01-08-10 -- A state appeals court has ruled in favor of octuplet mother Nadya Suleman, saying a child actor's call for the appointment of an independent guardian to monitor the octuplet's finances was an "unprecedented, meritless effort by a stranger." . . .  In an opinion filed today, 4th District Court of Appeal justices directed an Orange County probate court to vacate its order for an investigation into the family's finances. . . . Paul Petersen, a child actor who is now an advocate for children in the entertainment industry, had taken Suleman to court, arguing that her children were vulnerable to exploitation and that an independent guardian should be appointed to look after their financial interests.

VERMONT

Hearing on custody case set

By Brent Curtis, Rutland Herald Staff Writer

01-08-10 -- A Rutland Family Court judge wants to hear all arguments before deciding on a motion that seeks a warrant for the arrest of a Virginia woman who failed to turn over her 7-year-old daughter to her former lesbian partner. . . . Six days after Lisa Miller and her daughter Isabella Miller failed to appear for a court-ordered custody transfer in Virginia, Judge William Cohen scheduled a Jan. 22 hearing date. . . . Asked about the time it would take to argue for what was filed as an emergency motion in the case, Jennifer Levi, an attorney representing Miller's former partner, Janet Jenkins, said she wouldn't question the judge's decision but said the sooner the motion was considered the better.

NEW York  

Billionaire’s Ex-Wife Hires New Lawyer

New York Times (blog) 

01-05-10 -- Patricia Cohen, the ex-wife of a hedge fund billionaire, Steven A. Cohen, has a new lawyer representing her in the civil racketeering lawsuit she filed against Mr. Cohen, Jenny Anderson writes in The New York Times. . . . Gaytri Kachroo has taken over the case from Paul Batista, a New York lawyer. In various federal inquiries and hearings, Ms. Kachroo represented Harry Markopolos, the whistle-blower who spent a decade trying to warn authorities, including the Securities and Exchange Commission, that Bernard L. Madoff was running an extensive Ponzi scheme. . . . Ms. Cohen approached Ms. Kachroo soon after her case was filed in mid-December in United States District Court for the Southern District of New York. “She felt her case wasn’t getting the attention it required,” said Ms. Kachroo, who is not a litigator but is a corporate lawyer with her own practice. . . . After reviewing the documents and learning of new facts that were not included in the original lawsuit, Ms. Kachroo said she decided to accept the case. “I think we have a very strong case, especially in light of the facts that we’ve uncovered,” she said. She declined to elaborate on those facts, but said they would be included in a new or amended complaint.

VERMONT vs. VIRGINIA    

Legal battle ratchets up in lesbian custody fight

By John Curran The Associated Press, Times Argus

01-05-10 -- A Vermont woman locked in a child custody battle with a former partner who has since renounced homosexuality asked a judge Monday to hold her ex in contempt and help find her and their 7-year-old daughter. . . . A lawyer for Janet Jenkins filed an emergency motion for contempt for not surrendering the couple's daughter, Isabella Miller-Jenkins, on Friday. . . . The motion seeks court sanctions and the assistance of law enforcement in locating Lisa Miller, whose last known address was Forest, Va., but whose whereabouts are now unknown. . . . "I am so worried about Isabella," Jenkins said in a written statement issued by her lawyer, Sarah Star. "I do not know where she is or whether she is okay." . . . Miller's lawyer, Mathew Staver, didn't immediately return a call seeking comment.

December 2009

NEW JERSEY  

N.J. judge rules surrogate legal mother of twins despite not being genetically related

By The Associated Press, NJ.com   

12-31-09 -- A woman who bore twins for her brother and his partner is the legal mother, despite not being genetically related to the children, a New Jersey judge has ruled. . . . The babies Angelia Robinson gave birth to were conceived in a lab using eggs from an anonymous donor and sperm from Sean Hollingsworth, the husband of Robinson's brother, Donald Robinson Hollingsworth. . . . Lawyers involved say that it's not the first case of its kind, but that it does offer a glimpse into the complications that can arise from an emerging kind of surrogate parenthood increasingly used by gay male couples. . . . Superior Court Judge Francis Schultz's ruling, made Dec. 23 in Jersey City and shared with the parties this week, relied heavily on the New Jersey State Supreme Court's 2-decade-old ruling in the nation's best-known court case over surrogate rights, the Baby M case.

ILLINOIS

Disabled mom fighting to keep her son

Can a quadriplegic woman be a good parent? Her ex-boyfriend filed a custody suit that says no.

By Sara Olkon, Chicago Tribune reporter

12-20-09 -- Kaney O'Neill knows she has limits as a mother. . . . The 31-year-old Des Plaines woman cannot walk, move her fingers independently or feel anything from the chest down. A decade ago, O'Neill was a Navy airman apprentice when she was knocked from a balcony during Hurricane Floyd, leaving her a quadriplegic. . . . When she discovered she was pregnant last December, she felt fear and joy, a journey the Tribune chronicled in August. She quickly embraced the opportunity to raise a child, feeling she had the money and family support to make up for her paralysis. . . . David Trais, her ex-boyfriend and the 49-year-old father of their now 5-month-old son, disagreed that she was up to the challenge. . . . In September, Trais sued O'Neill for full custody, charging that his former girlfriend is "not a fit and proper person" to care for their son, Aidan James O'Neill. . . . In court documents, Trais said O'Neill's disability "greatly limits her ability to care for the minor, or even wake up if the minor is distressed." . . . O'Neill counters that she always has another able-bodied adult on hand for Aidan -- be it her full-time caretaker, live-in brother or her mother. Even before she gave birth to Aidan, O'Neill said, she never went more than a few hours by herself.

TEXAS  

Texas Attorney Elizabeth Fontaine Feared Losing Daughters, So She Killed Them, Police Believe

Posted by Carlin DeGuerin Miller, CBS/AP CBS News (blog)

12-16-09 -- Orange County Sheriff’s believe that Texas attorney Elizabeth Fontaine may have been so distraught over a custody dispute that she killed her two young daughters, her mother and herself on Monday, but they are not willing to say for sure who pulled the trigger until a ballistics report returns. . . . After Fontaine didn’t return to a Southern California family court Monday afternoon, authorities were sent to the San Clemente area home where she was staying while dealing with a reported custody dispute with her ex-husband Jason Fontaine. . . . What cops found was an incredibly bloody scene: Fontaine, 38, her daughters, 4-year-old Catherine and 2-year-old Julia, and Fontaine’s mother, 67-year-old Bonnie Hoult, shot dead in the hallway, lying in close proximity, sheriff’s spokesman Jim Amormino told CBS affiliate KFMB.

VIRGINIA

Appeals court asked to keep mom, daughter together

Fighting out-of-state order to give 7-year-old to lesbian

By Bob Unruh, © 2009 WorldNetDaily

12-11-09 -- The Virginia Court of Appeals has been asked to keep a mother and daughter together by affirming a state law that voids orders stemming from out-of-state civil unions. . . .Mathew Staver founded Liberty Counsel, which yesterday argued before the court on behalf of Lisa Miller, who has been ordered by a Vermont judge to turn over her young daughter, Isabella, to Miller's lesbian ex-partner, Janet Jenkins, on New Year's Day. . . . WND has reported the case in which a Vermont judge ruled Jenkins, who has not been involved in Isabella's life for years, first should have visitation with Miller's biological daughter, then full custody. . . . The ACLU and Lambda Legal Defense Fund have been demanding that Miller give up her daughter to Jenkins, who maintains a lesbian lifestyle in Vermont. Miller left the lesbian lifestyle shortly after Isabella was born, and Jenkins neither has a blood relationship nor an adoptive relationship with the child. . . . The order is being appealed in Vermont. But the question pending before the Virginia Court of Appeals was whether Virginia must enforce custody and visitation orders arising from a Vermont same-sex civil union.

NEW YORK  

Outrage over convicted divorce judge

By Thomas Tracy, YourNabe.com

12-10-09 -- The fact that disgraced judge Gerald Garson will be home for the holidays is “reprehensible” and a “mockery of justice,” a group of divorced mothers and domestic violence survivors claimed Monday as they protested the convicted septuagenarian’s early release from prison. . . . “Money talks and Garson walks,” screamed Karlene Gordon as she and a handful of protestors from the Voices of Women Organizing Project (VOW) stood across the street of Brooklyn Family Court on Jay Street Monday afternoon. “Gerald Garson and his partner in crime Paul Siminovsky deceived, corrupted and destroyed lives with judicial immunity and protection. Sentenced to a county club, resort-like prison, then allowed to escape his judicial slap on the wrist, Garson’s early release from jail is a slap in the faces of those lives he irreparably destroyed,” she added. “He will complete his sentence, yet the families he injured, on so many different levels, are still serving the sentence this felon imposed on them. His victims continue to suffer in silence without justice or recourse.” . . . Gordon said she knows about suffering in silence all too well.

WASHINGTON

$10 an hour with 2 kids? IRS pounces

Rachel Porcaro knows she's hardly rich. When you're a single mom making 10 bucks an hour, you don't need government experts to tell you how broke you are.

Danny Westneat, Seattle Times staff columnist

12-06-09 -- Rachel Porcaro knows she's hardly rich. When you're a single mom making 10 bucks an hour, you don't need government experts to tell you how broke you are. . . . But that's what happened. The government not only told Porcaro she was poor. They said she was too poor to make it in Seattle. . . . It all started a year ago, when Porcaro, a 32-year-old mom with two boys, was summoned to the Seattle office of the Internal Revenue Service (IRS). She had been flagged for an audit. . . . She couldn't believe it. She made $18,992 the previous year cutting hair at Supercuts. A few hundred of that she spent to have her taxes prepared by H&R Block. . . . "I asked the IRS lady straight upfront — 'I don't have anything, why are you auditing me?' " Porcaro recalled. "I said, 'Why me, when I don't own a home, a business, a car?' " . . . The answer stunned both Porcaro and the private tax specialist her dad had gotten to help her. . . . "They showed us a spreadsheet of incomes in the Seattle area," says Dante Driver, an accountant at Seattle's G.A. Michael and Co. "The auditor said, 'You made eighteen thousand, and our data show a family of three needs at least thirty-six thousand to get by in Seattle." . . . "They thought she must have unreported income. That she was hiding something. Basically they were auditing her for not making enough money."

November 2009

OREGON  

Coos County woman feared for her life

Concerned Divorce Lawyer Followed Client, Witnessed Shooting Aftermath

By Lynne Terry, The Oregonian

11-19-09 -- Details emerged on Thursday indicating that a Coos County woman who was critically wounded by her husband was worried about her safety. . . . Ashley Kendall, 22, was shot by her husband Tuesday evening after she met with her lawyer to discuss an upcoming child custody hearing and divorce proceedings, according to R. Paul Frasier, Coos County district attorney. . . . While Kendall was meeting with her attorney, her 26-year-old husband, Travis Roy Kendall, got out of a borrowed car he had driven to the scene and slipped into the dark green Jeep Wagoneer that his wife had driven. . . . When Kendall finished her appointment, the lawyer walked her to the Jeep. . . . “I think it’s safe to say the lawyer had concerns about what was going on,” Frasier said. . . . The courts had just granted Ashley Kendall a restraining order against her husband. . . . She had no idea that he was hiding in the Jeep and the lawyer did not know either: Its rear passenger and cargo area windows are tinted. . . . The lawyer, Sharon Mitchell, watched her client drive away and even hopped in her own car and followed close behind to ensure that she was safe, Frasier said. . . . During the drive, Ashley Kendall called her sister, and at one point in the conversation screamed that “he” was in the Jeep.

Soldier mom nixes deployment to care for baby

Army cook may face criminal charges after refusing to go to Afghanistan

Associated Press, MSNBC 

11-16-09 -- An Army cook and single mom may face criminal charges after she skipped her deployment flight to Afghanistan because, she said, no one was available to care for her infant son while she was overseas. . . . Spc. Alexis Hutchinson, 21, claims she had no choice but to refuse deployment orders because the only family she had to care for her 10-month-old son — her mother — was overwhelmed by the task, already caring for three other relatives with health problems. . . . Her civilian attorney, Rai Sue Sussman, said Monday that one of Hutchinson's superiors told her she would have to deploy anyway and place the child in foster care. . . . "For her it was like, 'I couldn't abandon my child,'" Sussman said. "She was really afraid of what would happen, that if she showed up they would send her to Afghanistan anyway and put her son with child protective services."

CALIFORNIA

Midlife Mom Launches Web Site On Motherhood

By Jory John, Santa Cruz Sentinel

11-15-09 -- In 2001, Angel La Liberte and her husband had a serious discussion. Both had been married before, but neither had any children. The pair decided, if possible, that they would like to conceive. La Liberte was 40 years old at the time. . . . "Basically, the attitude toward us was that it would be nothing short of a miracle," she says. . . . Against the odds, La Liberte's son was born in 2003. Three years after that, she had a daughter. Both were natural conceptions, occurring without the use of Assisted Reproductive Technologies. And both babies were healthy. . . . When La Liberte turns 50 next year, her son will be 8 and her daughter will be 5. La Liberte realizes that she is on the forefront of mothers having children when they're older than 40. And because she wanted to form a community around the issue, La Liberte recently launched www.flowerpowermom.com, "the truth about motherhood after 40."

KENTUCKY

Protective order didn't stop man from shooting girlfriend, mother

By Andrew Wolfson • courier-journal.com

11-15-09 -- Accused of punching his girlfriend, threatening to kill her and ripping her phones out of the wall, unemployed handyman Terry Stoess stood in a Jefferson County courtroom and admitted only that he and Laura Eagle had argued over money. . . . “As far as harming her in any way,” Stoess, 49, insisted, “I never would.” . . . . . Family Court Judge Donna Delahanty issued a domestic-violence order anyway, directing Stoess to leave the home they shared in Hikes Point, surrender his guns and to stay away Eagle, whom he had dated for six years and lived with for a year. . . . . . Three days later, on June 1, 2007, Stoess shot both Eagle and her mother in the head before turning the gun on himself.

MINNESOTA

Watchdog Group Asks Judge to Resign

FOX 9 News  

11-12-09 -- A courtroom watchdog group is asking for Hennepin County District Judge Stephen Aldrich’s resignation due to several inappropriate comments he has made in the courtroom. . . . Three weeks ago in family court, reviewing a domestic violence order for protection, a transcript shows Judge Aldrich telling the husband and wife, "I’ve been married 45 years. We've never considered divorce, a few times murder, maybe." . . . A court watchdog group, called Watch, is calling for Judge Aldrich’s resignation. The joke lands flat, when you consider 21 women in Minnesota were killed last year in domestic violence. Many like Pam Taschuk, who was murdered last month, and had restraining orders against their partners. . . . And it's not the judge's first attempt at judicial levity. He made a comment to a man who'd been stabbed by his wife that he should do the barbecuing from now on.

WYOMING   

Group seeks to increase legal access

More people represent themselves in court

By Joshua Wolfson - Star-Tribune staff writer

11-11-09 -- The state provides an abusive husband with an attorney for his criminal trial. But when his battered wife needs a restraining order, there's no lawyer to assist her. . . . As an attorney and director of Poverty Resistance, Mary Ann Budenske has witnessed the scenario unfold numerous times. Wyoming is one of only two states that doesn't have a statewide legal assistance program for people who can't afford to hire their own lawyer. . . . The absence of such a program, experts say, leads to a public increasingly disenfranchised by the legal system. . . . "One of the things that has always bothered me is that if you are an ax murderer, you are going to get better legal representation than if you are the victim of the ax murderer," Budenske said. "Somehow that doesn't quite feel like it is fair to me. But with the resources we have, that is what happens."

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October 2009

ILLINOIS

Tenant reported abuse -- then suffered eviction

She sues owner of apartment complex: 'I was punished for protecting myself'

By Sara Olkon Tribune reporter

10-13-09 -- Kathy Cleaves-Milan called police to report that she was the victim of domestic violence. She got help -- but she also got evicted. . . . A day after she told a judge that her live-in boyfriend had brandished a gun and promised to end both of their lives, the managers of her Elmhurst apartment complex served her with eviction papers for violating the terms of the lease, citing the criminal activity she had reported to police. . . . "I was punished for protecting myself and my daughter," Cleaves-Milan, 36, said. . . . Attorneys for Cleaves-Milan have filed a lawsuit against Aimco, the company that owns and operates Elm Creek Apartments. In the Oct. 1 filing, attorneys with the Sargent Shriver National Center on Poverty Law and the law firm of Reed Smith argue Cleaves-Milan's 2007 eviction was a form of sex discrimination, based on Cleaves-Milan's sex and her status as a victim of domestic violence. . . . A representative of the company said the eviction wasn't solely about the domestic violence but also involved her ability to pay the rent if her boyfriend moved out -- an assertion Cleaves-Milan strongly rejects.

ILLINOIS  

La Salle lawyer's license suspended

Steve Stout, MyWebTimes.com

10-7-09 -- The Illinois Supreme Court has suspended a La Salle attorney's law license for 60 days following the recommendation of the Illinois Attorney Registration and Disciplinary Commission. . . . According to the ARDC, Louis L. Bertrand was suspended for neglecting a female client's child support case against her former husband, making a misrepresentation to her and mismanaging the funds she had given him for filing fees. . . . The suspension takes effect Tuesday, Oct. 13. . . . The ARDC said Bertrand, who was first licensed in 1984, violated Illinois rules of professional conduct when he failed to tell his client the local court ordered counsel and the parties to appear at a status hearing Feb. 24, 2006, and also when the attorney told his client her appearance at the hearing was not necessary.

TENNESSEE

Tennessee Mother Regains Custody Of Snatched Newborn, Cleared Of Baby-Selling Claims

Fox News

10-6-09 -- The Tennessee mother of a kidnapped baby was reunited with her four kids and is cleared of involvement in an alleged baby-selling plan, a lawyer for the children said Tuesday. . . . Attorney Thomas Miller said a Tuesday custody hearing was canceled amid an investigation into the claims that the family of mom Maria Gurrolla tried to sell the baby boy after he was abducted by a fake immigration agent. . . . Gurrolla was reunited with 1-week-old Yair Anthony Carillo Tuesday after losing him twice in recent days, first to the alleged kidnapper and then to state foster care. . . . The baby was recovered last week after he was abducted during a Sept. 29 knife attack at Gurrolla's home. A suspect is in custody.

September 2009

NEW YORK

Mom reclaims life, rebuilds relationship with child

Ex-Islander turns her circumstances around after dragging herself down with drugs

By Elise McIntosh, Staten Island Advance

9-29-09 -- Kellie Phelan is in a good place now. Currently, the 35-year-old serves as the volunteer program coordinator at Hour Children, a nonprofit organization in Queens that, as one of its many services, cares for children whose mothers are incarcerated for non-violent offenses. . . . The former Bulls Head resident is delighted for the opportunity to give back to a program that has helped transform her life. . . . A few years ago, she was in prison herself. She wound up at Rikers Island for violating her probation for previous drug-related arrests. During her 60-day sentence, she was pregnant and gave birth to a baby girl, Savannah. . . . The father, a drug dealer, was no longer a part of Ms. Phelan's life, so staff at Hour Children acted as the newborn's guardians while the mother served the rest of her sentence. Two weeks later, she was discharged and arrived at Hour Children, eager to reunite with her infant and start anew. . . . Her top goal after getting settled was to rebuild a very important relationship she had neglected for years: the one with her older daughter, Brittanie, whom she had when she was 17 years old. . . . Brittanie's father was a drug addict, in and out of prison and in and out of her life. . . . Whenever he showed, "I was left to pick up the pieces," Ms. Phelan said about Brittanie's dad, her first love.

Controlling Children's Minds

by Ken Klukowski, Townhall.com

9-5-09 -- Most people have now heard that President Obama is going to address America’s school children on September 8. He’ll be speaking to them directly, without their parents there to serve as a filter. . . . Taken with an outrageous situation unfolding in New Hampshire, where a home-schooling mother has been ordered to put her daughter in public school because the daughter is too outspoken in her Christian beliefs, a terrifying truth emerges: If you can force a child into government schools, you can control that child’s mind. . . . On Tuesday, around the nation, millions of children will be in a setting where they’re expected to accept what adults tell them, and where they are required to obey. . . . Many teachers will carry out White House instructions (now officially modified) to give writing topics to their students. The original theme: How can I help President Obama? Children are also encouraged to read books about Obama, and even kindergarteners will be asked, “Why is it important that we listen to the president?”

OHIO  

Ohio Supreme Court affirms firing of worker for taking lactation breaks

by Emily L., Gather.com

9-2-09 -- Ohio doesn't seem to be in the running for most "family-friendly" state in the Union -- at least, not if you look to the state's Supreme Court. . . . Last week, Ohio's top court ruled in favor of an employer's right to fire a worker who took unauthorized breaks to pump breast milk. That's right. Totes/Isotoner fired new mother LaNisa Allen for taking breaks to pump during work, and the court took their side. According to the ruling, the state's law that protects pregnant women doesn't extend to new moms -- even when the connection is impossible to miss. . . . According to the Columbus Dispatch, the company's attorney "said the case was never about pregnancy or motherhood." Really? No matter how you approach this case, and whatever legal perspective you take, that statement's really hard to take seriously. Totes/Isotoner took the position that Allen shouldn't have been allowed to take unauthorized breaks, even ones resulting from her pregnancy.

NEW JERSEY  

Family Court Gives Soldier Visitation in Custody Case

By David Kocieniewski, New York Times

9-1-09 -- After 10 months in Iraq and three months fighting with her former companion over access to their daughter, a National Guard specialist was granted daily visitation and weekly sleepovers with the 2-year-old girl by a judge in family court here on Tuesday. . . . The specialist, Leydi Mendoza, 22, said after the hearing that she was delighted by the judge’s temporary order and already knew how she would spend the time with her daughter, Elizabeth. “I’m going to eat with her,” Specialist Mendoza said, laughing, “and finally potty-train her.” . . . Elizabeth’s father, Daniel Llares, who had prevented Specialist Mendoza from spending more than a few hours with their child for fear of disrupting her routine, said through his lawyer that he was satisfied with the ruling. After several hours of negotiations among the parents, their lawyers and a mediator failed to resolve the standoff, a Passaic County Family Court judge, George F. Rohde Jr., approved a temporary agreement that would allow Mr. Llares to retain residential custody of Elizabeth but grant Specialist Mendoza the right to see the girl every day and take her home on weekends.

August 2009

CALIFORNIA

You be the judge:
A prayer for relief from court sanctioned child abuse

LA Family Courts ExaminerLaura Lynn

This is the last in a series of the text of a Petition for Writ of Mandate to change venue of a family law case and other relief. You may want to read parts one, two and three first.

VII. PRAYER
8-30-09 -- The Petitioner has no expectation that justice will be done here. She asked for justice May 27, 2008 from this court, and this court denied her request summarily. The Court is acting criminally and is making a concerted effort to ruin the Petitioner emotionally, physically and economically. . . . The Petitioner is not trained in the law, yet she is held to a standard that is far higher than the standard of the Court itself. . . . I pray that the Court will reconsider its ruling of May 29, 2008 and see that Commissioner Alan Friedenthal should have been disqualified from presiding over this case from the start. . . . Criminal charges should be filed against the parties who altered, falsified, and destroyed court documents. Criminal charges should be filed against the officers of the Court who held these corruptions in their hand and did nothing to further the cause of justice. Criminal charges should be filed in Federal Court against the Officers of the Court who perverted justice.

VIRGINIA

ACLU fails in demand to jail child's mother
Mom refused to deliver 6-year-old for unsupervised visit with lesbian

By Bob Unruh, © 2009 WorldNetDaily

8-25-09 --  effort by the American Civil Liberties Union to have a judge jail the mother of a 6-year-old child for not delivering her daughter to another state for unsupervised visitation with a lesbian has been foiled. . . . Lawyers with the Florida-based legal advocacy group Liberty Counsel today appeared in court in Winchester, Va., to defend Lisa Miller from a complaint from the ACLU on behalf of Janet Jenkins. . . . The ACLU had wanted Miller jailed after she refused to deliver her daughter, Isabella, to Vermont for an unsupervised visit with Jenkins, a lesbian who has stated she believes it is not good for a child to be raised in a Christian atmosphere. . . . The ACLU also asked for a court order for Miller to pay for its attorneys.

July 2009

After decades apart, woman finds mom -- homeless in Orlando

Happy reunion: Jessica Wisnoski and Lani Burgos are reunited after Wisnoski spent $20,000 and decades searching for the mother she hadn't seen since she was a toddler.

Susan Jacobson Sentinel Staff Writer

7-20-09 -- For nearly four decades, all Jessica Wisnoski had to remember her mother was a tattered photo of 2-year-old Wisnoski sitting in her mom's lap. . . . The yearning to know her mother never left Wisnoski, 38, who lives near Houston. She and her husband, Bryan, spent $20,000 and 17 years searching for Lani Burgos, 58, who left her only child with Burgos' father and stepmother while she tried to kick a drug habit. . . . On Saturday night, Wisnoski finally found her mom — homeless and living in Orlando. . . . After years of dashed hopes and false leads, the Wisnoskis, with the help of a private investigator, tracked Burgos to a Salvation Army shelter in Ocala and, from there, to Central Florida. . . . During the weekend, they drove to Orlando, where they planned to hand out fliers offering a reward for helping them find Burgos. On the way to the Coalition for the Homeless of Central Florida, they stumbled on police Officer Jonathan Adkins. He offered to drive them. . . . No luck at the shelter. So, Adkins took the couple to other hangouts for the homeless, including Lake Lucerne, where transients said they had seen Burgos at free meals downtown, Adkins said.

UTAH

Court favors mother's rights over former lesbian partner

Charlie Butts - OneNewsNow

7-19-09 -- A Utah woman involved in a lesbian relationship left her partner and took her child with her, a move that led to a courtroom battle. . . . Jana Dickson left the relationship with lesbian partner Gena-Louise Edvalson because she believed it was not a good environment to raise her two-year-old son, among other reasons. Salt Lake City Alliance Defense Fund attorney Frank Mylar represented Dickson. . . . "This other party was living with my client and it was in a lesbian relationship -- and my client and the other party separated and cut off their relationship," he recalls.

NEW JERSEY

Lawsuit fans flames of N.J. debate on adoption privacy

By Jason Nark, Philadelphia Daily News  

7-7-09 -- IN NEW JERSEY adoption circles, the right to privacy versus the need for an identity isn't just an explosive issue of the moment: It's been a painful, simmering fire for both sides for almost 30 years. . . . Legislation to provide adoptees with greater access to birth records and their medical histories has been kicking around in the Garden State since 1980, adoptee-rights groups claim. . . . "The primary issue is a right to our own identity at birth. This should not be a state secret," said Pam Hasegawa, an adoptee and spokeswoman for the New Jersey Coalition for Adoption Reform. "It's really outrageous that this bill is stalemated." . . . The issue has drawn celebrity adoptees such as Darryl McDaniels of the hip-hop group Run-DMC to the state to lobby for reform. But powerful opponents, including the NJ-ACLU, the New Jersey Bar Association and the New Jersey Catholic Conference, hold influence, said state Sen. Diane Allen, a prime sponsor of the most recent bill to open records. . . . "There is a large group of people who are pushing it, but there are just as many groups pushing back," said Allen, a Burlington County Republican.

CALIFORNIA  

Federal Judge Plans to Acquit Mom Convicted in Landmark Cyberbullying Case

By Martha Neil, ABA Journal

7-2-09 -- A federal judge in Los Angeles reportedly has said he intends to acquit a Missouri mother accused of helping to drive a neighboring teen to suicide by participating in a hoax on the MySpace social networking site. . . . Lori Drew was cleared of more serious charges but convicted by a federal jury in Los Angeles last year of misdemeanor counts of accessing computers without authorization. However, interpreting the federal law under which she was found guilty in this manner, says U.S. District Judge George Wu, would mean that anyone who has ever violated a website's terms of service could be found guilty of a crime, reports the Associated Press.

June 2009

Navy censors Christian moms

Tells chat group for relatives of U.S. sailors to change name

By Bob Unruh, © 2009 WorldNetDaily

6-26-09 -- The U.S. Navy has ordered a chat group gathered on a special website the military set up for families of service members to drop the word "Christian" from its title. . . . It also has changed the website's rules to ban all "religious discussions" because such speech "contradicts our purpose by creating unnecessary divisions among site members." . . . The issue was exposed by officials with Liberty Counsel, a public interest law firm that has written to Navy Secretary Ray Mabus demanding that the censorship on the NavyforMoms.com website be reversed. . . . "The prohibition of religious groups and religious speech on Navy for Moms by the United States Navy is unconstitutional," said the letter dispatched also to the private company engaged by the Navy to operate the site. . . . "The government simply may not create a forum and then proclaim religious views are not welcome as that is blatant viewpoint discrimination, absolutely prohibited by the First Amendment. Even if the restrictions were evaluated as content restrictions, the United Sates Navy could not withstand the strict scrutiny required by the Supreme Court for analyzing the restrictions," the letter, signed by attorney David Corry on behalf of Liberty Counsel, said.

Why Women Are Unhappy

by Phyllis Schlafly

6-19-09 -- The National Bureau of Economic Research released a study to be published soon in the American Economic Journal that shows women's happiness has measurably declined since 1970. It's no surprise that this has stimulated much comment. . . . This study covers the same time period as the rise of the so-called women's liberation or feminist movement. The correlation demands an explanation. . . . One theory advanced by the authors, University of Pennsylvania economists Betsey Stevenson and Justin Wolfers, is that the women's liberation movement "raised women's expectations" (sold them a bill of goods), making them feel inadequate when they fail to have it all. A second theory is that the demands on women who are both mothers and jobholders in the labor force are overwhelming. . . . I'm neither an economist nor a psychologist, but I'll join the conversation with my own armchair analysis. Another theory could be that the feminist movement taught women to see themselves as victims of an oppressive patriarchy in which their true worth will never be recognized and any success is beyond their reach. . . . Feminist organizations such as the National Organization for Women held consciousness-raising sessions where they exchanged tales of how badly some man had treated them. Grievances are like flowers; if you water them, they will grow, and self-imposed victimhood is not a recipe for happiness. . . . Another theory could be the increase in easy divorce and illegitimacy (now 40 percent of American births are to single moms), which means that millions of women are raising kids without a husband and therefore expect Big Brother government to substitute as provider. The 2008 election returns showed that 70 percent of unmarried women voted for Barack Obama, perhaps hoping to be beneficiaries of his "spread the wealth" policies. / {MORE}

Reunited after 12 long years apart

Matt Bradley, The National Foreign Correspondent

6-17-09 -- After 12 years of court battles, failed negotiations and deferred hopes, Janet Greer has finally met her daughter, Sarah al Gohary, for the first time since her father kidnapped her and brought her to Egypt in 1997. . . . In the intervening years, the three-year-old American girl Ms Greer remembered has blossomed into a 15-year-old Egyptian teenager. But while Ms al Gohary now shares little more than blood with Ms Greer, a flash of recognition was enough to fill the gaps left by differences in language and culture and years of separation. . . . “She looked at me and my hair … it’s long and blonde,” said Ms Greer, who has since returned to her home in North Carolina, in the United States. “The reason I keep my hair that way is so that she will remember me. She looked at me and she said, ‘yes mum, this is how I remember you’. What can I say, that’s what I needed to hear.” . . . Only days before, such a visit had seemed impossible. On June 1, an administrative court in Cairo had decided against allowing visitation rights for Ms Greer – a decision that marked the culmination of more than a decade of battles in Egyptian courts for custody and eventually, merely for visitation rights.

NEW YORK

Moms sue maker of Baby Gender Mentor kit for inaccurate results

Examiner.com

6-16-09 -- Six moms in New York state are suing the maker of Baby Gender Mentor kits for inaccurate results. The test, which promises that expectant mothers will learn the gender of their unborn child as early as five weeks into the pregnancy, has a 99.9% accuracy rate, according to their website. It also has a money-back guarantee if the results are wrong, which is a nice touch given that the price itself is fairly pricey. Problem is, for these New York moms, the tests were not only wrong but now they can't get their money back. . . . The Baby Gender Mentor kit costs $25 and comes with two pregnancy tests, a blood specimen collection kit, and a prepaid FedEx envelope. It's fairly simple, you prick your finger to collect the blood, put it in a vial, and then send it off to Acu-Gen, the manufacturer of the test. Oh, don't forget your $250 lab fee! You'll be notified when the sample is received and then within a few days you'll receive an email letting you know you can receive your results online with instructions on how to do so. Finally, you can find out whether or not you're having a boy or girl. . . . Just don't get your hopes up too much. The New York moms were told they were expecting one gender, and placed so much faith in the results (and why not, since they were guaranteed and 99.9% accurate?) that they decorated nurseries, named their unborn child, and began to bond with it as the gender they were sure it was. Imagine the shock of learning later that no, Jane is actually a John, or vice versa.

SMW Single Moms' Parenting Tips & Resources
12 Tools Every Single Mom Should Own

By Allison O'Connor, Single Minded Women

6-7-09 -- When I bought my first home as a single woman, the very first housewarming gift I received was a Craftsman’s steel tool box complete with a set of tools from my father. I tried my best to muster an appreciative smile and “thank you” but all the while I was thinking, why the heck do I need this?! Well, to my surprise, that tool box still gets used a couple times a month more than 10 years later. And, I’ve even added a few tools to my collection since then. . . . Whether you own your own home or rent, having a few tools on hand for a quick fix can save you time and money you would otherwise have to spend hiring a handyman. And as any single mom knows, whether you’re putting together a crib for the first time or trying to take the batteries out of a toy, you will always need a screw driver. Click to see what else you should also have in your tool kit.

ENGLAND

Catholic mother's fury after mental breakdown
sees son fostered by gay couple

By Simon Mcgee, Daily Mail

6-7-09 -- A ten-year-old Catholic boy is being placed in the care of homosexual foster parents against the wishes of his religious mother. . . . The child, who cannot be named for legal reasons, is due to arrive tomorrow at his permanent new foster home, a hotel in Brighton run by a middle-aged male couple. . . . In the latest row over gay adoption and fostering, social workers at Brighton and Hove Council, which has full custody of the child, decided his long-term placement last month. . . . A Catholic legal charity is representing the mother in an attempt to change the placement. . . . A devout Catholic, she has told friends she is worried about the environment in which her son will be placed and wants him fostered by a heterosexual couple, in line with her Church’s belief in the traditional family. . . . The boy was first placed in care a year ago when his mother suffered a mental breakdown, the result of an abusive marriage which has left her unable to look after him. . . . Described as ‘bright and lively’, he attends a faith school and is due to take his First Communion soon. He loves tennis and singing, and texts his mother some nights to let her know he has brushed his teeth and said his prayers. . . . The Thomas More Legal Centre, a Catholic legal charity, was instructed last week to represent the mother. Neil Addison, director of the centre, said: ‘We are advising her on her legal options and seeking to resolve the matter with the council by agreement.’ . . . Her parish priest and her son’s headteacher are said to be deeply concerned.

May 2009

ILLINOIS  

Amy Leichtenberg turning pain of sons' slayings into purpose

Mom becoming an advocate, working to draw attention to her case

By Stacy St. Clair | Tribune reporter

5-17-09 -- Amy Leichtenberg clings to the memory of that final morning with her sons -- when the two boys were hers, healthy and alive. . . . She replays it in her mind, looking for things she could have done differently or words she could have used to convince authorities that the boys were in danger. . . . She watches herself call the LeRoy Police Department about 9 a.m. March 7 to tell the on-duty officer that she won't allow her sons to spend a court-ordered weekend with their father because of his increasingly erratic behavior. She hears the officer threaten to arrest her, and she winces as she caves to his authority. . . . Leichtenberg hurriedly packs two backpacks for the boys, kisses them goodbye, tells them that their mama loves them to the heavens and back. She sees them climb into a car with her ex-husband, an unemployed pharmaceutical salesman who has vowed to cut her open, frequently threatens to kill himself and allegedly violated her orders of protection 56 times. . . . She shudders in hindsight, knowing her sons were walking toward their deaths. . . . Duncan and Jack Connolly, ages 9 and 7, never returned from that visit. Their bodies were found in a remote area of Putnam County three weeks later. Their father, Michael Connolly, hanged himself from a nearby tree. . . . "Nobody took me seriously," Leichtenberg said in her first extensive interviews. "I'll spend the rest of my life wondering why no one would listen to me." . . . Troubling picture. . . . Law-enforcement records, court transcripts and other public documents obtained by the Tribune paint a troubling picture of a system that often ignored Leichtenberg's cries for help and instead aided her ex-husband as he worked toward supposed redemption. Despite his odd behavior and criminal record, Connolly received the benefit of the doubt from police, prosecutors and a family court judge in McLean County in central Illinois. . . . Leichtenberg, 39, has filed an official complaint against Judge James E. Souk, who granted Connolly unsupervised visits. She also wants more information about disciplinary action against LeRoy Police Chief Gordon Beck, who was suspended for a week without pay shortly after the Tribune reported that his department had thwarted an Amber Alert request for the boys. No reason was given for the punishment.

LOUISIANA   

Comments in alleged abuse case land judge in hot seat, again

By The Associated Press, Tri Parish Times

5-14-09 -- A Houma judge disciplined for racial insensitivity has been brought back before the Louisiana Supreme Court to answer allegations that he belittled a woman who wanted a restraining order against her husband. . . . Justice Greg Guidry asked why 32nd District Judge Timothy Ellender was back before the Supreme Court only five years after his six-month suspension and orders to take a sociology course about racial diversity for wearing blackface at a Halloween party. . . . "That sanction was severe, but it didn't prevent this from happening," Guidry told the Timothy Ellender Jr., who represented his father at last Wednesday's hearing. . . . "It's a completely different incident," the younger Ellender said. "That was about racial insensitivity." . . . Guidry replied: "And this is insensitivity to women. That's the big distinction you're making? I see lots of similarities between the two cases: disrespectful, insensitive and insightful behavior." . . . Judge Ellender admitted the facts of the case, which was on audiotape. The Supreme Court must decide a penalty.

OREGON  

Mom gets probation for fleeing with baby

Texas trek - The Portland lawyer was afraid the state would take custody of her son

Aimee Green, The Oregonian Staff

5-13-09 -- A Portland attorney who fled to Texas with her 2-month-old son and the boy's father pleaded guilty to custodial interference and was sentenced Tuesday to three years' probation. . . . Amanda Lynn Stanley, 31, sparked a nationwide search in February when she drove off with her baby out of fear that state child-welfare workers would win permanent custody of the boy. . . . Stanley, a tax and business attorney, received the recommended sentence under Oregon's sentencing guidelines. A charge that she stole more than $3,000 from client trust accounts in order to finance her trip was dismissed, but Stanley will have to pay the money back.

Birth Mother's Day eases adoption grief

By Leanne Italie, / Boston Globe

5-3-09 -- Mother's Day, Eileen McQuade used to watch forlornly as flowers were handed out to beaming women surrounded by their loving children. Though she was raising two daughters, her special day was filled with grief and shame. . . . In 1966, when she was an 18-year-old college freshman, she gave up her firstborn for adoption. . . . "I didn't feel like I should take the flower because I didn't feel I deserved it," said McQuade, who splits her time between Delray Beach, Fla., and South Windsor, Conn. . . . Like McQuade, many birth mothers can't shake their anguish and guilt when Mother's Day rolls around each May, so they've taken on the Saturday before the holiday as their own - Birth Mother's Day. The day was established by a group of Seattle birth mothers in 1990, and has grown over the years to include candle lightings, poetry readings, and other events around the country. . . . "The old myth about adoption was that birth mothers would go and have their children and forget it ever happened and the adoptees wouldn't care where they came from," said the 62-year-old McQuade, who was reunited with her daughter 12 years ago. "We know that it doesn't really happen that way. We have a much better sense of it now. Birth Mother's Day is a healing for many."

TENNESSEE

Millions Potentially At Stake In Illegal Immigrant's Child Custody Case

Associated Press, FOXNews 

5-2-09 -- At 4 years old, Alessandra Villalobos spends nearly all of her time confined to a bed. She is severely brain-damaged, can neither walk nor talk and is at the center of a medical malpractice lawsuit and a custody fight waged in two Nashville courts. . . . The child-custody case is complex because of the girl's extraordinary health conditions. Alessandra requires round-the-clock nursing care — the result, lawyers say, of a medical mishap when she was 3 that forever altered her life. If the lawsuit is successful, it could provide millions of dollars to cover the cost of her care. . . . But the battle over the child is complicated even more because her mother, Ingrid Diaz, is in the country illegally and facing deportation while her daughter was born in the U.S. and is an American citizen. . . . Diaz, who moved from Mexico to Nashville five years ago, says she wants to keep her child but is willing to relinquish custody if it's in her daughter's best interests. . . . "All I want is what's best for her, and if other people think that she should be with someone else, I'm willing to accept that, as long as it's best for Alessandra," the mother said last week, speaking through an interpreter.

April 2009

NEW YORK  

Lawyer Says Kaye Scholer Partner Wasn't Abandoning Her Kids

Jim Fitzgerald, The Associated Press, Law.com

4-27-09 -- The woman who allegedly ordered her squabbling young daughters out of her car and drove off without them quickly returned to the scene expecting to pick them up, her lawyer said Friday. . . . Madlyn Primoff, 45, simply drove around the block in downtown White Plains, N.Y., but the 10- and 12-year-old girls were gone when she returned, defense attorney Vincent Bricetti said. . . . "She wasn't abandoning her children," he said. "She expected to find her children." . . . Briccetti said the older girl had begun walking home -- 3 miles away -- and the younger girl was apparently taken in hand by a passer-by who called police on Sunday evening.

DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA  

After Mom's Wistful Remark, A Maternity Ward Inquisition

By Marc Fisher, Washington Post

4-23-09 -- Woozy from pain medication after a Caesarean section, swinging from joy over her newborn boy to exhaustion from the strain of delivering him, Karen Piper mentioned to her doctor that she'd been hoping for a girl. She would come to regret those words. . . . There she was at Washington Hospital Center on an early spring afternoon, three days after giving birth. She'd be taking Luke home to the room she had lovingly prepared, to a time she'd dreamed about for years, just the two of them getting to know each other, reveling in the miracle of new life. . . . When nurses finally told Piper she was free to leave, no discharge papers for her son were brought out. Instead, she faced a parade of inquisitive official visitors, including uniformed police, a social worker, a psychiatrist, and assorted doctors and nurses. Her baby had been placed on medical hold while government investigators considered whether Piper was fit to take Luke home to Prince George's County, the authorities said. She had failed to bond with her baby, a nurse told Piper.

NEW YORK  

Police: Mom ordered daughters out, drove off

Partner in Manhattan law firm reportedly upset by kids' bickering

The Associated Press, MSNBC

4-22-09 -- Usually, it's an empty threat: "If you kids don't stop fighting, I'm going to stop this car right now and leave you here!" But a mother from an upper-crust New York suburb went through with it, ordering her battling 10- and 12-year-old daughters out of her car in White Plains' business district and driving off, police said Tuesday. . . . A judge on Wednesday modified a temporary order of protection against 45-year-old Madlyn Primoff and her two daughters. Her lawyer, Vincent Briccetti, said Primoff is no longer barred from living or talking with her children. . . . Primoff, a partner in a Manhattan law firm, pleaded not guilty to a charge of endangering a child on Monday.

Mental health screening targets moms-to-be

Questionnaire will be used to determine 'depression' in patients

© 2009 WorldNetDaily

4-2-09 -- A bill that would subject pregnant women to mental health screenings – and possibly medications that would follow any diagnosis of "depression" – has returned and already is more than halfway through Congress, a concerned family group is warning. . . . WND reported a year ago when the plan was proposed to allow the government to order tests on mothers for baby blues. The proposal later died. . . . However, officials with United Nonprofits and Individuals for Truth and Ethics say the bill is back, and it already has been approved by the U.S. House and assigned to a Senate committee under the designation S.324. . . . It's named the "Melanie Blocker Stokes Mother's Act" after a pharmaceutical sales manager who killed herself by jumping out of a window after receiving four cocktails of antidepressants, anti-anxiety and antipsychotic drugs and electroshock therapy following the birth of her child.

OKLAHOMA

Bill Lets Moms-To-Be Kill To Save Baby

Measure Would Authorize Deadly Force If Unborn Child's Life At Risk

Koco.com

4-2-09 -- A bill in the Oklahoma Legislature would allow pregnant women to use deadly force in order to save the lives of their babies. . . . The bill stems from a Michigan case where a woman who was carrying quadruplets stabbed and killed her boyfriend after he hit her in the stomach. The woman lost the babies and was convicted of manslaughter. . . . Oklahoma lawmakers said they want to make sure that a woman can legally protect her unborn child. . . . "Unfortunately, we feel we need legislation like this," said Rep. Mike Thompson. "What we want to make sure is that a woman feels safe and secure defending herself and her unborn child against any attacker."

NEW YORK

Woman’s Sting Operation to Free Her Son Incurs Judge’s Wrath

By Kareem Fahim, New York Times

4-1-09 -- A Brooklyn judge issued a stinging rebuke on Wednesday of a mother’s attempt to exonerate her son of murder charges, saying her attempts to elicit incriminating statements from a juror in her son’s trial amounted to “vigilante” behavior. . . . The judge, Alan D. Marrus, denied a motion by the son, John Giuca, to vacate the verdict or at least hold a hearing on allegations of juror misconduct. “The defendant,” Judge Marrus wrote,” is entitled to no relief from his judgment of conviction.” . . . Judge Marrus said that the mother, Doreen Giuliano, “contacted the juror two years after the trial without information that juror had done anything improper, lied to him about who she was and why she was speaking to him, engaged in a long-term, quasi-romantic relationship with the juror during which she repeatedly manipulated their conversations to get him to speak about this case, and surreptitiously recorded some of their conversations.

March 2009

NORTH CAROLINA  

Mom will fight judge's order against homeschooling

'I couldn't believe how he overlooked all the facts to legislate from the bench'

© 2009 WorldNetDaily

3-15-09 -- A North Carolina homeschooling mother, ordered to stop teaching her children at home and send them to public school, said she will appeal the judge's ruling. . . . "I couldn't believe how he overlooked all the facts to legislate from the bench," said Venessa Mills of Wake County District Court Judge Ned Mangum's ruling that it would be in the "best interests" of her three children, ages 12, 11 and 10, to be placed in public school, even though two are learning at two grades above grade level while the third is at grade level. . . . As WND reported, the judge's action came in the divorce proceeding between Mills and her husband, Thomas. . . . At a court hearing last week, Mangum conceded the children are "thriving" under Mills' instruction but said they need to be exposed to the "real world." . . . "It will do them a great benefit to be in the public schools, and they will challenge some of the ideas that you've taught them, and they could learn from that and make them stronger," the judge said. . . . Mangum, when contacted by WND, explained his goal in ordering the children to register and attend a public school was to make sure they have a "more well-rounded education." . . . "I thought Ms. Mills had done a good job [in homeschooling]," he said. "It was great for them to have that access, and [I had] no problems with homeschooling. I said public schooling would be a good complement."

Wake divorce case illustrates what is wrong with the current judicial system
The domestic relations system in this state is broken and needs to be fixed

Delma Blinson News, analysis and commentary

3-15-09 -- We posted an article from the Raleigh News and Observer on our State News page about a domestic relations dispute in Wake County. An oversimplified review of the case is that a District Court Judge, Ned Mangum, has ordered a divorced mom to stop homeschooling her three children and to send them to the public schools. According to reports the judge came to this conclusion without hearing any evidence to support a decision that the homeschooling was harming the children. . . . We think the case is a good illustration of the corruption we see all too often in domestic cases in this state. The problem, it seems to us, is that the current law in North Carolina is all too lax in what it requires of a judge in handing down such decisions. Because of the inadequacies of the law judges operate pretty much as omnipotent arbiters of what is going to happen with children in a divorce case. The law needs to be changed, as this case illustrates.

February 2009

NEW JERSEY

A helping hand for women in need

Posted by Bob Braun/The Star-Ledger

2-18-09 -- There can be money in it -- if the clients are rich enough -- but many lawyers don't like to touch family law issues. That's one of the reasons state courts set aside one judge just to hear so-called "unrepresented" cases -- there are so many of them. . . . So it's no surprise that one of New Jersey's premier voluntary efforts to help women deal with domestic violence and other family law matters is housed in a Montclair office building that is, to be generous, dismal. No glass tower, this--no conference room with leather chairs and an endless polished table. . . . "We sometimes have to say 'No,'" says Jane Hanson, executive director of Partners for Women and Justice, a public interest law firm dedicated to the legal problems of women. . . . "We just don't have the capacity." . . . If the importance of an issue were judged by standards of life and death, then problems related to family law would attract more attention. On average, of some 450 to 500 homicides a year in New Jersey, about one in five is related to domestic violence--usually a man killing a woman. Sometimes, he kills the kids, too, and then himself.

CALIFORNIA  

Panel Affirms Ex-Lawyer’s Life Sentence for Torturing Wife

By Sherri M. Okamoto, Staff Writer

2-10-09 -- The Third District Court of Appeal yesterday upheld the torture conviction of former criminal defense attorney Richard William Hamlin of El Dorado Hills. . . . Although sufficient evidence that Hamlin’s course of conduct physically abusing his wife supported the torture conviction, the panel ruled that El Dorado Superior Court Judge Eddie T. Keller erred in imposing upper terms on Hamlin’s convictions for making a criminal threat and inflicting corporal injury on a spouse based on facts not found to exist by the jury, admitted by defendant, or justified based on defendant’s record of prior convictions. . . . Hamlin’s wife, identified in the opinion only as S., testified that Hamlin physically abused her every day, sometimes multiple times each day, and in front of the couple’s four children, between June 2003 and February 2004. . . . The prosecution contended that Hamlin had committed the crime of torture against S. by his conduct. . . . A jury found Hamlin guilty of torture, three counts of misdemeanor child abuse, on count of making a criminal threat, and three counts of inflicting corporal injury on a spouse.

January 2009

Court: Christian mom's child must visit lesbian

State threatens to take daughter by force, if necessary

© 2009 WorldNetDaily

1-19-09 -- A Christian mother has been told by a Virginia court that her 6-year-old daughter must now visit the mother's former lesbian partner in Vermont, and if she refuses, the law will remove the girl by force, if necessary. . . . As WND has reported, Lisa Miller left the homosexual lifestyle and became a Christian when her daughter, Isabella, was 17 months old. But Janet Jenkins, Lisa's same-sex partner when Lisa gave birth to Isabella, is seeking full custody of the girl, claiming she was a parent even though she is not biologically related to Isabella and never sought to adopt her. . . . The case has been further tangled by the courts, as Jenkins and Miller were joined in civil union in Vermont, but Miller and her daughter now live in Virginia, where the laws forbid recognition of civil unions. . . . Earlier this month, however, Judge William Sharp of the Shenandoah County Domestic Relations District Court in Virginia, ordered Miller to allow Jenkins a three-day unsupervised visit with Isabella. . . . Miller told LifeSiteNews that Sharp also ruled that Vermont's civil union laws must be upheld in Virginia.