Custody and Domestic Violence
The Need for Custody Courts to Understand and Use the Saunders Study
http://www.barrygoldstein.net/important-articles/using-the-sander-s-report-part-two “….The Saunders’ study establishes that the custody courts are getting an intolerably high percentage of domestic violence custody cases wrong and this will continue as long as the courts rely on evaluators and other professionals who do not have the specific domestic violence training they need and refuse to use the expertise that could…
Read MoreJoan Zorza: CHILD CUSTODY CASES, INCEST ALLEGATIONS AND DOMESTIC VIOLENCE
http://www.americanbar.org/content/dam/aba/publishing/cdv_enewsletter/custodyandincest.authcheckdam.pdf By Joan Zorza, J.D. FREQUENCY OF INCEST, PARTICULARLY WHEN THERE IS DOMESTIC VIOLENCE: ”…One study has found that some form of child abuse occurs in 30-60% of families where domestic violence is present, and that the occurrence rate is much higher when it is the father abusing the mother. The same study reports…
Read MoreJoan S. Meier: A Historical Perspective on Parental Alienation Syndrome and Parental Alienation
Joan S. MeierGeorge Washington University Law School , Washington, DCJournal of Child CustodyVolume 6, Issue 3-4, 2009, pages 232- 257Published online: 18 Aug 2009DOI: 10.1080/15379410903084681 http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/15379410903084681#/doi/full/10.1080/15379410903084681 “Claims of parental alienation syndrome (PAS) and parental alienation (PA) have come to dominate custody litigation, especially where abuse is alleged. Although much psychological and legal literature has critiqued…
Read MoreParental Alienation Syndrome (PAS) Is Gender Biased and Punitive
http://pasisascam.wordpress.com/2010/04/06/gender-biased-and-punitive-why-abusers-get-away-with-claiming-parental-alienation/ Why Abusers Get Away With Claiming “Parental Alienation” “Gender Biased and Punitive: Why Abusers Get Away With Claiming “Parental Alienation” The late Richard Gardner developed the theory of parental alienation syndrome (PAS) after claiming that one parent alienated the children from the other parent in 90% of his divorcing patients. Though claiming that the…
Read MoreCustody and Domestic Violence – “Severely abusive fathers may deliberately escalate their abuse to force the woman to complain”
Blog Article on PAS: http://thetruthaboutthefamilycourt.blogspot.com/2010/07/theres-nothing-friendly-about-abuse.html “It’s a statistic so unbelievable that it’s difficult to wrap your head around: A research review by lawyer and domestic violence expert Joan Zorza found that in about half of the 100,000 contested child custody cases each year in the United States, custody goes to the father – even though…
Read MoreSaunders: Child Custody Evaluators’ Beliefs About Domestic Abuse Allegations:
October 31, 2011 https://www.ncjrs.gov/pdffiles1/nij/grants/238891.pdf “The most common areas of knowledge across professional groups were children’s exposure to domestic violence and prevalence of domestic violence. The least common areas—especially among judges, evaluators, and private attorneys—were knowledge of post-separation violence, screening for domestic violence, and assessing dangerousness (although the majority still acquired knowledge in these areas). Domestic…
Read MoreUse of the MMPI-2 in Child Custody Evaluations Involving Battered Women: What Does Psychological Research Tell Us?
When a custody evaluation is conducted by a psychologist, the revised version of the Minnesota Multiphasic Personality Inventory (MMPI-2) is often used as part of the evaluation process. The MMPI-2, like other traditional psychological tests, was not designed to be used in custody evaluations and arguably should not be used for such purpose except…
Read MoreGender bias in the courts: Implications for battered mothers and their children
Dragiewicz, M. (2010). Gender bias in the courts: Implications for battered mothers and their children. In M. Hannah & B. Goldstein (Eds.), Domestic violence, abuse, and child custody: Legal strategies and policy issues (§ 5.1–5.18). Kingston, NJ: Civic Research Institute. Dragiewicz provides a comprehensive summary of gender bias reports pertaining to custody decisions. In…
Read MoreChild custody mediation in cases of domestic violence
Johnson, N. E., Saccuzzo, D. P., & Koen, W. J. (2005). Child custody mediation in cases of domestic violence: Empirical evidence of a failure to protect. Violence Against Women, 11(8), 1022-1053. “This study shows that victims of domestic violence (DV) are greatly disadvantaged when states require mediation of child custody disputes. The investigators empirically…
Read More“Judicial Responses to the Protective Parent’s Complaint of Child Sexual Abuse,” Journal of Child Sexual Abuse 8 (4): 103-122.
A study of 300 cases over a 10-year period in which the mother sought to protect the child from sexual abuse, found that 70% resulted in unsupervised visitation or shared custody; in 20% of the cases the mothers completely lost custody, and many of these lost all visitation rights. Neustein & Goetting (1999), “Judicial Responses…
Read More