Does Parental Alientation Contribute to Custody Decisions?

[Yas]

Dear All, a lot of people say that Parental Alienation contributes to custody court decisions - if the parent currently with the child is trying to "create an exclusive relationship between him/herself and the child, to the exclusion of the other parent" then courts will see this as "negative parenting" and therefore not in in the child's best interests. Is this true, and can it lose you custody?

 

[mazie]

Yas~

Just from personal experience, I think it depends on a lot of different variants. Who's the judge, are you a (voting) resident in his/her district/state, is there plenty documentation to back up the claim of PAS, does the parent claiming PAS have aggressive representation with experience in PAS cases, etc., etc.

For our family, we had hours of taped phone conversations, years of documentation, and witnesses of the CP's attempt to alienate the child from the NCP. We even had phone bills with highlighted phone calls of the days and times of calls that were made to the CP's phone number as further proof to prove that the taped/written phone conversations happened. It didn't matter. I don't think the judge even bothered to listen to our tapes altho we don't know that for sure. If he did listen, we can't understand how he could rule in the favor of the CP after hearing/reading the CP's own words telling the NCP that it was up to her whether or not he got to speak with the child that day and she didn't think it was going to happen! Oy! The judge told us that there wasn't enough consistent evidence of malicious intent by the CP to show PA between the NCP and the child. Go figure?!

We did everything our attorney advised to build our case and prove PAS and the judge still ruled in the CP's favor. We have continued to have difficulty with the CP blatantly disregarding court orders requiring her cooperation and encouragement with a relationship between the NCP and the child. We have many letters from our attorney and hers on file to document her contempt of court orders to continue to build our case. We have spent thousands of dollars and our attorney says that we will have to spend even more to have a psychological evaluation done of the CP and child and to go back to court.

So, altho PAS hasn't gotten us custody of the child yet, we do know that if it can be proved to the judge's satisfaction, it can make a difference in who gets or who loses custody...and so we continue to build our PA case against the CP (with her help) in hopes that soon we will get a new judge who will see the PA going on in our case!

Hopes this helps and good luck!

 

[Yas]

Hi, and thanks for the answer! I can say that, since day one, my ex has told me to leave our baby alone, and give her to him and his mother to raise – whereas I already have a son, why on earth would I give up my 2nd child?? Especially as my ex is manic-depressive! (my son’s dad is not the same as the baby’s dad. I have no issues with my son’s dad).

He has used violence and mental abuse since the birth of the baby, to try and get me to leave. He also says things like “it’s me and the baby against the world” or “you could all die tomorrow but what do I care as long as I have my baby?” He also says if we get joint custody, he will not accept this, and will “leave the country” – it’s “all or nothing”.

He says that our baby, even though she is just a 15 month old girl, “does not need a mother” as “she has the best dad in the world”. He also says he has no wish for my other son and the baby to even know each other, and the only child he wants our baby daughter to know is a child on HIS side of the family – his niece. So he has cut off contact between the 2 siblings – big mistake.

My lawyer has written his lawyer countless letters, asking him to start sharing the baby, or face the consequences of a full-on court battle, but he tells his lawyer to write back, stating that he “refuses” to share, yet he fails to back this up and say why! As for taping, I believe it is illegal to use the tapes if there are any, in the UK (where I am).

I found a FANTASTIC article on parental alienation and it does sum up my ex perfectly – I faxed all 16 pages to my poor lawyer! I hope we can use that in court! Let me know if you want to see this.

Thanks for your help.

 

[mazie]

You GO Yas!!! Good for you! Isn't it amazing how much information there is out there about PAS?! Kinda sad that this problem is so wide spread that if you do a search online for PAS, you get tons and tons of information about it from all sorts of sources! Oy!

Thank you for the offer of the article but we have read it all! Everything we can find, we too send to our attorney! Ha!

It may be a long battle ahead of you, Yas, but most things that are worthwhile in life don't come easy!

It sounds to me like your ex is just setting himself up. If you haven't started to already, keep a journal and log EVERY single thing, word, incident, etc. that happens in regards to your ex and his attempts to alienate you and your son from your daughter! Be patient, hang in there, and no matter how many times you and your attorney have to go back to court to prove PAS in your situation, don't give up! The longer it takes, the more rope your ex uses to hang himself!

And, I would find out for sure about tape recording conversations. If you need to save on money, you can call any attorney's office in your area and usually get the answer to a simple question like this free of charge! This way you don't have to pay for another phone call to YOUR attorney!

We thought that it would be illegal in at least one of the two states here in the US that we and the ex live in but after some investigation, not only did we find out that it was legal but how to make sure it was legal. For instance, as long as the taped conversation was between the caller and the call-ee and no other undisclosed third party was on the line, we didn't even have to inform the call-ee that she was being recorded! We really thought that would solidify our case since the tapes were also admissable. Oh, well....maybe eventually they will make a diff?!

God bless, Yas, and good luck! Keep me posted, k?!

 

[Yas]

Hey thanks mazie!

Oh believe me, every last word is logged! It makes my brain melt down but I will keep going until we resolve this.

I see my ex twice a week for handovers, and as soon as he is gone, I am straight on my computer, and write down everything that happened, every last word. I then fax this to my lawyer, and keep a copy for myself. When I read back on these, it is hard to imagine that he could be so nasty.

My lawyer then responds to this. She says one of the noteworthy things is that my ex is NOT willing to compromise and go for a shared parenting plan, and in fact does all he can to keep me and my baby apart.

Currently, my lawyer is asking him for more time for me and the baby (and my son) while we are waiting to go to court for the custody hearing) and he says "no" every time my lawyer asks him for increased contact while we are waiting for the court date. But he does not say WHY he keeps saying no (there IS no reason!) and apparently he will really suffer for this, and is digging a deeper and deeper hole for himself. Like, he may have the baby for now and is grasping onto her for all he is worth, but what will he say and how will he explain his behaviour in court? He may well end up losing her. There are now plenty of letters from his lawyer to mine, saying he does not "wish" for the baby to see me at all, but yet he just has no grounds for this!

My lawyer has an obligation to contact my ex's lawyer first, and try to work it out amongst ourselves, but it is sadly clear that he will not budge, so it will have to go to court.

And the baby is only 17 months old, and he has NO way had her all this time, so I do not see why he should get to keep her! Maybe that's why he keeps asking me to drop the proceedings!!