The Family Law News Blog

Child custody evaluations have had same flaws in US, UK

A report, 'Evaluation of Expert Witness Psychological Reports: Exploring Quality' by Professor Jane L Ireland and colleagues at the University of Central Lancaster raises concerns about reports of mental health experts in child custody and removal cases, and has findings reminiscient of the long-term problems that the family courts community has been addressing for decades in the US:

1. One fifth of experts in the sample were 'not qualified to provide a psychological opinion'.
2. Few experts in the sample maintained clinical practice at the time writing court reports. 
3. There was an over reliance on psychometrics; obsolete styles of assessment and invalid assessment tools.
4. There was little use of recognised methods to assess risk.
5. A proportion of experts commented on parties' mental health despite having no indicated knowledge of this area of clinical expertise.

- As summarized in  "Multidisciplinary teams - a response to publicity about the quality of expert psychologists’ reports for family courts" -- Family Law Week 

Were Powell children's needs obscured by a glut of false or exaggerated child endangerment claims?

Chuck and Judy Cox, whose daughter Susan Powell and her children were murdered by their father, pointed out on the Today Show that child protection agencies  "deal with a lot of people that exaggerate the threat or cry wolf ... we get lumped into the mass of people they have to deal with. But this was such an extraordinary circumstance that we felt they should have taken more care."

Transcript of Today Show, Feb. 7, 2012.

Spot Psychopaths by their Repertoire

"How to Spot a Psychopath: Look For Speech Patterns, Scientists Say" by Wynne Parry,  Fox News LiveScience October 24, 2011, says psychopaths — 1% of the population and 25% of the male prison population — speak much more in terms of logical cause-and-effect, show little emotion, and talk much more about basic physical needs than other people.

When can children be left home alone?

I became a "latchkey kid" in second grade, and it worked great for me. My father learned to shoot a rifle at 4 and found himself alone in a running locomotive at 6. My grandfather, etcetera, etcetera. But times have changed, and with that change comes uncertainty. When can you leave your children home alone?

There is no simple numerical answer. But Michigan family lawyer Jeanne Hannah, who does a lot of child custody and international family law work, has put together a readiness checklist and guideline sheet,  and a comprehensive five-part series of articles:

Home Alone: Child Care and babysitter Issues Part I
Home Alone: Summer Parenting Issues and "Failure to Protect" Part II
Home Alone Part III
Home Alone Part IV
Home Alone Part V

Prisoners' children's right to family relationship

CHILDREN OF INCARCERATED PARENTS: THE CHILD’S CONSTITUTIONAL RIGHT TO THE FAMILY RELATIONSHIP

Article from THE JOURNAL OF CRIMINAL LAW & CRIMINOLOGY from Northwestern University School of Law, via Ron Nelson

Father has right to seek custody in state child neglect case - Conn. S.Ct.

A non-custodial parent has a constitutional right to participate in a case where the state claims the child is neglected, the Connecticut Supreme Court says in In Re Joseph W., 6/28/11 (official release date). It’s amazing that a court would even have to face that question in this day and age, but the ancient, savage notion that non-custodial parents are not fit parents is still out there. Chief Justice Chase T. Rogers noted that the statute on whether non-custodial parents can be involved in these cases is ambiguous, but the biggest consideration for the Supreme Court was the constitutional one — it would be unconstitutional to interpret the statute to exclude the non-custodial parent from presenting evidence and seeking custody when the state is trying to terminate parental rights and take a child based on the custodial parent’s actions. 

 

Drop-side cribs one of the safest things around - balls, grapes, stairs, sitting are far more dangerous

Some (Non-Mainstream) Thoughts on the Crib Recall -- FreeRangeKids.

"we are talking about roughly 3 deaths a year in a country where about 4 million babies are born annually. That is, about one death per million. That does not prove that the cribs are UNsafe. It proves that the cribs ARE pretty safe. Safer than stairs (1300 deaths/year), safer than eating (about 70 kids under age 10 choke to death on food each year), safer than just sitting there and the next thing you know, you're bitten by a venomous spider (5 deaths/year). ... 3 deaths a year from any cause for any large population is almost something that statisticians call "de minimus." Not that these deaths don't count. Of course they do! But when a cause of death is that rare, you can't base your life on it, or you couldn't do anything.
. . .
"One reason the drop-side models seem so “dangerous” is because they are so popular. When you have millions of people using anything, no matter how safe, the odds of an accident go up because the odds go up with the numbers. ...
... Next the Consumer Product Safety Commission may train its sights on balls because, in their inherent roundness, these sometimes roll into the street, and some kids running out to get them get hit by cars. Moreover, there are millons of balls in Americans’ homes, making balls a far bigger danger than, say, battery-operated guillotines. That is why, if I am ever elected Senator, I will not rest until we redesign the bouncy ball. A slightly boxier one would make our kids safer, would it not?

"Elect me and I will make sure our nation has no more balls."

[More at Some (Non-Mainstream) Thoughts on the Crib Recall -- FreeRangeKids]

Why you can't cancel a family the way you can cancel a TV show. - By Dahlia Lithwick - Slate Magazine

This column by the great observer of American families and culture, Dahlia Lithwick, says it all. Even annoying families and criminal families have the dignity of being a family, an institution far older and still more important than governments.

The Gasbags Who Would Break Up Balloon Boy's Family: Why you can't cancel a family the way you can cancel a TV show. - By Dahlia Lithwick - Slate Magazine.

Can government order chemo for teen?

Here in Virginia, we've got a really tough case going on about who decides on life-saving medical treatment for a child. A teenager named Starchild Abraham Cherrix, 15, has had several rounds of chemotherapy for Hodgkins Disease. He and his parents say that another round of chemo would probably finish him off. The local child protection agency says that chemo is necessary to try to save his life, and the local juvenile court agreed, ordering him to get chemo and giving the agency joint custody over him along with his parents. The family appealed to the Circuit Court, which has apparently reversed or stayed the order and scheduled a new trial for August 14. (Appeals from juvenile court in Virginia are "de novo", which means a complete new trial.)

Here's the full story -- or at least the latest episode of it as of late July -- from the Washington Post.

This is really a togh one. I'd appreciate comments on this post.