Submitted by Teena, a mother from Philadelphia, PA
I am the mother of a seven year old child. I have been in and out of
family court for seven years. My son's father always files to lower support and
has been trying to get physical custody for about four years. Physical custody
was never awarded, in fact his joint legal custody was suspended in 1998, when I
was awarded full legal custody. The father always claims that I don't take care
of my child medically. The judges have always seen through him and he never had
evidence to back his stories up. In February of 2000 I found myself again in
family court for custody. The judge gave father back joint legal custody with
him still seeing my son every other weekend. This went to a full trial, where I
felt I was in no danger of losing primary custody and took a bogus lawyer with me. The
trial was May of 2000,the worst day of my life! The judge awarded primary
physical custody to the father with shared joint legal custody. My visitation is
one day a week and every other weekend. I still don't know or understand the
reasoning of the judge nor did my lawyer. I was taken to court for medical neglect. My
son has behavioral problems in school, calling out, getting out of his seat to
talk to friends, etc. nothing detrimental. I have taken my son to numerous
doctors, therapists, psychologists and hospitals for evaluations and testing way
prior to this filing. The father keeps saying our son has ADD or ADHD. All
the reports/evaluations did not confirm this. The judge also had results from
St. Christopher's hospital were he ordered we go. My son was said to have an
adjustment disorder with mixed emotions and disturbances. The same conclusion
was from Children's Hospital back in 1999. The reports specifically stated my
son was not ADD. was placed on the stand and questioned for about
three hours about the most ridiculous things, they may have just asked me how
many times I took a shit that week. The father was questioned for about ten
minutes (probably due to my inefficient lawyer). The judge made this a
temporary order, therefore there is nothing I could do about the ruling. I also
feel the judge was very bias. I recently changed my religion and I am no longer
Catholic, which the judge did not like. He ordered me to take my son to church
every weekend. (now mind you, we weren't church goers to begin with, neither is
the father) The most recent thing now is the father has his family
physician prescribing Ritalin to my son, without my consent. My lawyer filed an
emergency and contempt petition. The court denied the emergency petition because
my son's life is not in danger. I really don't understand our legal system
and I can't see how a complete stranger can make the decision as to where the
child lives in a couple of hours, just because the other parent asked for it.
Where are my rights?
I find this very interesting. A judge can order
you to go to church? Do you have the transcripts from this case? If
so, I would publish that in as many newspapers, web sites, Fox News...etc. as I
could. Be sure to visit jail4judges.org and learn a little bit about
judicial impeachment. Pennsylvania has a department in Harrisburg
dedicated to judicial misconduct, I suggest you get in touch with them.
This goes back to my original point...I don't think the courts or any
"government agency" has any business telling a parent how to raise his
or her children. The only business they have is making things fair for
both parents in the event of a split up. That is why it is called
justice. Court order equal time for each parent with the children.
Court order both to remain in the same school district so that it will
work. Start holding both men and women
equally accountable to their children in the event of a split up between mother
and father. If one of the two parents does not spend his or her share of
the time required by court order (equal time) then throw that parent in jail for
contempt. That would be true "child support". Oh yeah, did
I mention that if this were the case, monetary child support would not be
needed. "Domestic relations" (as it is called in Pennsylvania)
employees would be looking for another job because there would be no more
"business". Lots of lawyers would be on unemployment because
there would be no more "BUSINESS". Did you notice that the whole
"system" does nothing but create "BUSINESS" for itself?
