Veronica’s Fate: Indian Child Welfare Act Vs US Family Laws Mess

There is one thing I understand in Adoptive Couple vs Baby Girl, which is currently being heard by the Supreme

Veronica (Indian Country Network.com)

Court:  If Veronica was the daughter of rich white folks, we would not even be talking about her in the first place. Ain’t no rich kids embroiled in messy adoption.

But Veronica is the daughter of Dusten Brown, a member of the Cherokee nation, and  Christy Maldonado, an Oklahoma resident. At some point, their relation turns sour. According to Jacqueline Pata, Executive Director of the National Congress of American Indian (NCAI), when Brown learnt about the pregnancy, he asked Maldonado to marry him, move with him in a military housing – Brown is a military- and quit her job. He pledged to financially support her and their unborn child.

That’s not the Nina Totenberg’s version of the story, tough. According to Totenberg, Brown texted Maldonado he was giving up his parental rights and would not support the girl. Maldonado then decided to put up the child for adoption. Through an agency, Maldonado found a couple she liked, Matt and Melanie Capobianco. Through her lawyer, she notified  the Cherokee nation, but not  Dusten. Why? There is a law, the Indian Child Welfare Act from 1978, that prevents Indians, who have been stolen everything, to have their children taken away by adoptive parents with the blessing of family courts always eager to work in “the best interest of the child,” understood as a childhood outside Indian nations.  This law establishes that in case neither parent can claim custody, preference should be given to other Indian family members.

What bugs me with Totenberg’s story (and also, to some extent, Adam Liptak’s from the New York Times) is that Brown would have renounced his father’s rights to Maldonado and then changed his mind, when Maldonado renounced hers to the adoptive parents. That’s an interesting piece of news: we fathers have parental rights we can just forfeit through text message. Second nugget: the adoption lawyers working on the case knew Brown was a Cherokee and knew about the Indian Child Welfare Act; they were also lawyers seeking  to win.  Hence when they inquired if Veronica was an Indian Child, the paper they submitted to the tribe had Brown’s first name misspelled, and the wrong date of birth. At this point, the adoption case moves to South Carolina, where the Capobiancos live. Last but not the least telling information about the way US family laws value parental rights, especially fathers’ rights: just before he ‘s about to be deployed in Irak, Brown is served with the paper about the adoption of his daughter, Veronica. Minor detail.  The striking thing of the story is that without the Indian Child Welfare Act, Brown would be fried. The case would not be before the Supreme Court.

Is it too much to ask – for children’s sake- that regardless of race, income, religion, sexual orientation etc… adoption require the formal consent of both living birth parents before any procedure be undertaken?

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Domestic Violence Doesn’t Just Harm Women, but K Street Doesn’t Want to Know About It

Since 1994 when Congress passed it, the “Violence Against Women Act” has been the weapon against domestic violence.  The act was to be reauthorized in 2012 to include gays, undocumented immigrants, American Indians and students.  Republicans in the Senate joined Democrats to approve the reauthorization, Republicans in the House did not.  Then the Republicans took a beating in the 2012 Presidential elections, and the reauthorization of the bill is back on the floor of the senate in February, with Republicans now more accommodating to compromises, as they hope to lure women and latinos back  (or finally) into their ranks.

One may think that at least, this  hard-learned lesson in political realism is for the greater good – the end of domestic violence. Wrong: the tackling of this problem has been nothing but petty, parochial politics (PPP) and PPP it remains.

Why? We now know  that domestic violence is not only the deed of men against women, but also that of women against men and children: physical violence along with a less apparent but as pernicious a form of violence, parental alienation, which is given a free ride in family courts, which are women-biased courts. The very fact that domestic violence is defined as domestic violence against women gives women leeway to overuse of the accusation of domestic violence, to get the divorce they want and expel their ex from the life of their children.

Want to solve domestic violence? Change course and instead of adding categories of victims, throw universality into the law already. Just pass a Domestic Violence Act, that will aim at protecting women, gays, immigrants, American Indians and… men, too.

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Nicolas Moreno’s Way of Saying “I Want to See My Kids”

That’s the bottom line: for fathers claiming their rights, it all starts with the desperation from not seeing their kids: Jason Hatch (England) could not see his, Charlie and Olivia. He joined Fathers 4 Justice (UK) and stunted Buckingham Palace in September 2004 (The New York Times Magazine, May 8 2004). At the end of 2007, I had not seen my girls for almost three years and was harassed by ex via Manhattan Family Court. I was seeing myself going straight to jail and at least, I wanted my girls to know why; I started this blog.  Nicolas Moreno, from Romans (France), has adopted a bolder way: hunger strike.

Dauphiné Libéré, 01/21/2013

Let me say first that if I could trade the New York State family justice for the French one, I’ll do it in a second. There, I bet justice may be slow but there ain’t no trial for child abuse that lasts more than 6 years; no judge arrogant enough to tell you, after having found you innocent of child abuse, that your relationship with your kids is “damaged” hence your kids and yourself are doomed to therapeutic visitations for an indefinite period of time; finally,  joint-custody is the default option in divorce.

Is the French justice system faultless? On paper, it acknowledges the right to fathers to be part of their kids’ life; Yet it did not protects Nicolas Moreno’s when ex moved with Luca and Evan, their sons, some 400 miles away from him, for no justifiable reason.

Nicolas is part of SVP Papa, a father rights organization which is asking for the inclusion of alternate staying of the kids with each parent into family laws. There is a fathers meeting in Nantes, the city whose mayor is Jean-Marc Ayrault, the Prime minister, on February 20; to help him hear the Nicolas of France.

Hat Tip: Scott Gabriel Alexander Reiss

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The Brearley School Pretends Everything Is Cool

Each year in March, I receive a grade report, at least of one of my girls. Both are now in

Hasta el viento tiene miedo (Carlos Enrique Taboada)

Brearley Upper School, but for some reason, I have never received two grade reports of this School, one for each of my daughter, the same year. I don’t ask why.

This year, in March 2012, along with my oldest one’s grades, was a generic letter signed Evelyn Sigal, Head of the Upper School, with the words:”If you have not already had the chance to discuss with your daughter her performance on her exams, I urge you to use this report as a catalyst for doing so.” 

The Brearley School must either have a special sense of humor I don’t get or a very short memory. In 2009, the Brearley School barred me from attending parents-teachers conference, although I had a Family Court order granting me the right to the contrary. And as I was blogging about it,  I received a cease or desist threat from the Brearley School councel. It was about refraining from comments -supposedly inflammatory-  about the Brearley School on my blog.

I learned then the Brearley School had read my blog.  Hence the Brearley School must have figured out I am incommunicado with my daughters, for almost seven years now. The Brearley School wants me “to use this report as a catalyst to discuss with my daughter on her exams?” I wished the Brearley School had not been another catalyst of my eviction from the lives of my girls. I could perhaps talk about their exams with them now.

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New Variations on “The Best Interest of the Child Stuff” in North Carolina

Montes Famliy (LA Times)

Mexico has a kidnapping problem. I am not talking about the “internal” Mexican kidnapping problem, which the Calderón administration has failed to keep at bay on all account. Making a scapegoat of Florence Cassez has just been a way to hide its failure from the Mexican public.  I am talking here of Mexico’s “external” kidnapping problem, the kidnapping of Mexican children by the US family court system: children whose parents are undocumented workers sent back to their country, and are given for adoption to US families on the grounds it is in their best interest.

First Alfonso Mejia and Margarita Almaraz, Encarnacíon Bail Romero and  Cirila Balthazar Cruz. Enters Felipe Montes.  Felipe Montes comes to the US illegally in 2003, starts working in North Carolina and gets married to Marie with whom he has three children. Unfortunately he gets deported and his wife is declared unfit to raise the children. They are placed with foster parents, who wish to adopt the children.  From that point on, Felipe Montes has to play Sparta family court (Allegheny County, North Carolina)’s lose-lose game, that is demonstrating he is worth the children. Although he has no criminal record and has taken care of the children, social workers did wonder if sending the children to Mexico was in their best interest. Felipe is living in a rural area around Tamaulipas in a house with no running water. These brillant social engineers are asking themselves if poverty should prevent parenting.

Sparta family court is supposed to render a sentence tomorrow.  Too late to suggest to social workers there how they would feel if, after venturing in a foreign country, marrying somebody there, being kicked out of there without their children, they would be denied parenting on the ground that, let say, children are better off  there because, you know, the North Carolina hamburger-based diet is not the healthiest for children, and children are better off be shielded from North Carolina gun violence.

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Family Courts in New York State Finally Get Some Scrutiny from the Media

Gosh, I wish the New York Times had sneaked in Manhattan Family Court when I was a regular customer there, from 2001 to

Guantánamo

2009. But later is better than never. William Glaberson’s article from yesterday, Friday November 18, describes the making of  people’s family justice in New York City. Readers can learn what divorced fathers have come to know as they tasted family courts. It is Guantánamo right here in the city.

I guess many people don’t know the most important piece of news one learns from this article: Family courts in New York City are not supposed to be the secretive places they are. On the contrary, they have been ordered to be opened to the public since 1997. Yet it looks that for fourteen years now, the media has not been welcome there. Glaberson mentions arrogant cops denying reporters entry to court rooms, judges asking reporters to show their credentials to court clerks, who ask them to get the approval of the state’s chief administrative judge. As a result, accountability is nil. The little world of family court does as it pleases and prospers. Trials last what they last – mine lasted more than six years, law guardians sleep on the children’s  interests which they are to represent; unsupervised social-agency workers that supervise the visitations with your children have the leeway to bully you while you are trying to keep your relationship with your kids from deleting.

The media should not stop halfway in this most welcome attempt to lift the veil on the nauseating secrets of family justice in New York State. There is a lot of investigating to do about the work of  support magistrates, these gracious people who behind close doors decide about child support payments that too often put non-custodial parents in the red and sometimes in jail. And please, pay a visit to the nasty fellows of the Support Collection Unit on 151 West Broadway, in the City.

When is the reform of family justice be on the agenda of New York State Attorney General, Eric T. Schneiderman?

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Occupy Family Courts?

Manhattan Family Court

I can’t help thinking last night  of a comment from a reader, Jay, on my last posting. Jay mentioned that in Canada, fathers have started occupy family courts years ago. Perhaps, fathers are less passive in Canada and this is why family laws are not as intensely biased against fathers than in the US, at least than in New York State.

In any case, Zuccoti Park is a only a few blocks from the infamous building of Manhattan Family court, on 60 Lafayette Street.  I visit it in my dreams. On the eight and ninth floors, the court rooms: that’s where fathers are striped from their rights to see their kids. Going down on the fourth floor, the little rooms without natural light,where the support magistrates lend an complacent ear to the mothers’ child support claims and expenses of all kinds.

I really would not mind to see the working of this inhuman bureaucracy disrupted for a while. Fathers for Justice USA, Fathers and families anything in mind? If yes, count me in.

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A.C.F.C. ‘s Save the Turnips Campaign

On May 6 of this year, The American Coalition for Fathers and Children launched a Facebook Save the Turnips Campaign to “confront Child Support Agencies and their inhumane practices towards child support payers.” The point? Protesting against the re-creation of debt prison for failure of child support payment in this country. Why the title? Child Support Agencies commonly refer to child support payers as “turnips,” as their goal is to trump the popular say that “you can’t squeeze blood from a turnip.” A.C.F.C. mentions the Child Support Enforcement Association (I did not know that such fellows existed; As Brecht would say, the belly where from the filthy beast came out is still fecund) which cynically titled a training session “Getting Blood From a Turnip. New Farming Techniques for Increasing Your Yield.” Right after the first day of the campaign, the Child Support Enforcement Association deleted the word turnip on its website.

For some time now I have denounced on this blog the thoughtless and merciless New York State Child Support Laws and their enforcement by the New York State Child Support Collection Unit. I  totally support A.C.F.C. Save the Turnips Campaign. To join the campaign, please just go to  www.facebook.com/savetheturnips and ‘like’ the page.

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New York State Court System to Fathers: Paying Child Support Will Make You a Dad, Son

It has become a reflex. I freeze anytime I happen to hear or read about making us better dads. Check this piece, by Jill Colvin:

Rashomon (Kurosawa)

Midtown Court Helps Ex-Criminals Become Better Dads.  We are not talking of something published by New York State Child Support Collection Unit but by a media outlet,  DNAinfo.com, sadly enough.

In this piece we learn that Bronx Family Court refers ex-criminals to Midtown Community Court, a project of the Center for Court Innovation. Here they attend the Dad United for Parenting  (don’t dream, it ain’t a dads’ grassroots organization) program where they learn skills that will help them find jobs. Why is the Bronx Family Court doing that? The students dads of the program have child support payments problems. Some have accumulated arrears in child support while there were in jail.

That’s where the silence of the piece is deafening: The fact that by law you owe child support while in jail. Let us just talk money here. Depending on your ex-spouse’s financial situation, being in jail has possibly caused hardship to your children. But this hardship, if hardship there was, is past and in civilized countries there are institutions protecting the welfare of those in need. Child support as conceived by New York State laws is accessorily about your children. It is mostly about providing a rent to your ex-spouse no matter what: whether you are employed or not, institutionalized or not.

To reintegrate oneself into society after a jail sentence is not easy, even less so with a debt to pay off. What is the ultimate purpose of this project to better dads? Help ex-criminals to cope with child support laws that provide them with the incentives to do things that will bring them back to jail. It would be a million times more efficient to reform New York State Child Support laws.

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For New York State Justice, The Private Sector Is Much of the Problem, not the Solution

On the first days of this new year, the New York State Justice system is crawling under problems. New York State Judges are

Dog the Bounty Hunter

asking for the first pay raise in twelve years; they are even considering forming a union-like group (these folks are so nineteenth century!); The justiciables of the State of New York too are having problems of their own. Theoretically, they are presumed innocent.  Yet, they will rot in jail while waiting for a trail unless they can buy a bond to remain free. The problem is that the New York bail system is as well regulated as the US financial system. Bondsmen surrenders defendants when they feel like it and then seize part or all of the the collateral of the bond’s buyer. This is not helping already overcrowded State prisons.

As usual, the family court system has eluded the attention of the press. However it stinks as much as the rest. It takes one flimsy accusation of abuse and your right to see your kids is gone. And there is no buying of a bond that would allow you to see them. You are now under the regime of supervised visitations. Your trial will take years and during all this time, your only option to see your kids is through the private sector, with one of these totally unregulated businesses called Family Something, that will pretend to assess your parenting abilities and whose activity is not even checked out by the law guardian -the lawyer of your kids- and the  family court judge.  The outcome of the mix of biased law, private sector involvement and lack of regulation is that non-custodial parents on trial loose their rights to see their kids.

What is the solution? Certainly not more market in the justice system. Let us start by regulating all these loose cannons that the justice system is working with.

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