Note: Cross posted from [wp angelfury] Battered Mothers Rights - A Human Rights Issue.

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Abused Women DO Really Lose Their Children to Their Abusers

Filed under: Activism, Andrew Titelman, Bad Dads, Battered Mothers Custody Conference, Batterers, Child Abuse, Child Custody, Child Custody Battle, Child Custody Issues, Child Rape, Child custody for fathers, Children and Domestic Violence, Children who witness abuse, Children's rights, Claudine Dombrowski, Corrupt Judges, Corrupt Lawyers,Corrupt bastards, Desperate men, Domestic Violence, Georgia, Getting screwed by the Family Courts, Hal Richardson,Hate Crimes, Judicial Immunity, Kansas, Legal abuse, Maternal Deprivation, Mother Child Relationship, Noncustodial Mothers, Sex Predators, Sexual Violence, Violence against women, Wendy Titelman, Women of Distinction, Women's Rights, fathers fighting for custody — justice4mothers @ 9:30 am

Interviews from the Battered Mothers Custody Conference, held every year in New York…this is from the 2008 conference:

[IMPORTANT: The following audiovisual piece includes real-life interviews featuring disturbing verbal content and statements on child abuse and domestic violence. Viewer discretion is advised.]

Prof. Garland Waller produced “Small Justice: Little Justice in America’s Family Courts” which is an independent documentary that explores the relationship between domestic violence, child sexual abuse and custody laws in America. To learn more about the stories of the women seen in this 10 minute clip, please go to http://batteredmotherscustodyconferen…

Jessie Beers Altman, a graduate student in the College of Communication, was in charge of editing this video.

For more information of Boston University’s Department of Film and Television at the College of Communication, visit: http://www.bu.edu/com/ft

On May 11, 2007,  just before Mother’s Day weekend, ten mothers, one victimized child, now an adult,  leading national and state organizations filed a complaint against the United States with the Inter American Commission on Human Rights. Their petition claims that U.S. courts, by frequently awarding child custody to abusers and child molesters, has failed to protect the life, liberties, security and other human rights of abused mothers and their children.  Wendy Titelman, who begins on the video, is a member of the petition…here is her situation:

The story of Wendy Titelman is well known in the United States. Her two daughters were taken from her by a Cobb County judge in Georgia at ages five and seven after sexual abuse was reported against the father who was abusive to her during the nine year marriage. She has not seen them for more than six years. She was jailed twice and acquitted by a jury once. She has filed bankruptcy. Expert after expert, witness after witness verified the child sex abuse. Rather than dealing with the confirmed sexual abuse of the children, parental alienation and mental illness were alleged against her because of her belief that the girls were telling the truth about molestation by their father.

In February of 2000, she was put on supervised visitation. In the divorce, the court made no finding of facts. The court and various related personnel clearly participated in a cover up of the abuse. In September 2000, in an ex parte hearing, the court ordered her not to come near her own children. The court did not hold a final hearing for 5.5 years, did not apply the clear and convincing legal standard as required and did not make findings of fact or conclusions of law.

Instead contempt motions have been filed against her and bogus arrest warrants, one federal and two from Georgia were served and she was jailed for five days in Mississippi and one day in Georgia. She was criminally prosecuted for custodial interference and not only did the jury return a not guilty verdict, but wrote a letter to the judge in the custody case condemning her prosecution as malicious and a cover up of the abuse. The court in Mississippi put the children in protective custody after an investigation there, but the father was successful in having them returned to Georgia where the abuse continued.

The courts have refused her petition and she has had to go to the state Supreme Court to force the lower court to accept the petition. When they were ordered to accept it, they then promptly dismissed it. She filed a federal suit for malicious prosecution and it was dismissed and the attorney sanctioned $84,000. This sanction was upheld all the way to the U.S. Supreme Court. Just recently the Georgia Supreme Court dismissed all her appeals and requests for reconsideration.

As a method of sustaining herself during this nightmare, Wendy has written a book documenting the case. The forward includes endorsements from Paul Fink, M.D., a prominent psychiatrist, Seth Goldstein, a lawyer, former investigator and instructor at the FBI academy, and Sol Gothard, a judge in Louisiana. The book details the marriage, the violence, the early years with the children, the divorce, the mother’s unceasing efforts to protect the children, the court system’s cover up of the abuse including withholding of evidence, ex parte hearings, and denial of due process, the retaliation of the system against the mother and her attorney. Exhibit 2.

It also includes documents from the children, letters, notes, emails, a court petition, reports of the abuse, professional assessments, drawings of the children, documentation of the abuse, supervised visitation reports, and expresses the deep pain, loss and grief the mother is suffering not only because she cannot see her children but knowing they are being abused and she is helpless to prevent it. This case is an extreme example of the State silencing the protective mother and putting the children directly in harms way. Unfortunately, it is not unusual.

See a letter from Wendy here:  Wendy Titelman, a Mother who has Not Seen Her Abused Daughters in Eight Years, Fights for Justice

Visit Stop Family Violence to see information on the petition.  Claudine Dombrowski is also a petitioner in this lawsuit, please visit her website.