{"id":10155,"date":"2021-06-09T14:02:00","date_gmt":"2021-06-09T21:02:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/themendproject.com\/?p=10155"},"modified":"2025-06-27T07:01:28","modified_gmt":"2025-06-27T14:01:28","slug":"the-not-so-just-justice-system","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/staging.themendproject.com\/es\/the-not-so-just-justice-system\/","title":{"rendered":"The Not So Just Justice System: By Valerie"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Valerie\u2019s journey through the family court system might sound extreme to some of you, but it\u2019s not.&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>We at The MEND Project hear so many <a href=\"https:\/\/staging.themendproject.com\/es\/abuse-survivor-stories\/\" style=\"outline: none;\">stories of adult victims of abuse<\/a> who lose custody of their children to their abusive ex-spouses.&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>In this story, you\u2019ll learn:&nbsp;<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li style=\"\"><span style=\"\">What it looks like when abusers weaponize the justice system against their victims&nbsp;<\/span><\/li>\n<li style=\"\"><span style=\"\">How divorce and custody battles often create secondary trauma for victims of abuse&nbsp;<\/span><\/li>\n<li style=\"\"><span style=\"\">How survivors often have most, if not all, of their finances cut off by their abuser&nbsp;<\/span><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>In her own words, this is Valerie\u2019s story.&nbsp;<\/p>\n<h2>Separation&nbsp;<\/h2>\n<p>In retrospect, I can get a sense for how and why my daughter is changing as a person through her many-year ordeal by looking at the conduct of her father over our separation.&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>In the beginning, she was really sad and missing me a lot.&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>Several months went by after her initial abduction when she was permitted to speak to me only four times:&nbsp;<\/p>\n<ol>\n<li>on her 12th birthday,<\/li>\n<li>the day after my birthday (she called me late because no one could remember precisely when my birthday was),<\/li>\n<li>on Thanksgiving,<\/li>\n<li>and on Christmas.<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n<p>From seeing and talking with her daily when she was with me to four times over several months (four times in a week would not have been enough for me).<\/p>\n<p><em>Four times.<\/em><\/p>\n<p>When she talked with me, she wasn\u2019t allowed any privacy unless she locked herself in the bathroom with her dad\u2019s cell phone where she would talk to me until the battery ran out.<\/p>\n<p>On New Year\u2019s Day after that first Christmas, she persuaded them (her father and his parents) to let her talk to me once a week on Sundays.<\/p>\n<p>Even then, for the first two years, they made her talk to me on speakerphone while being as loud as they could in the background so we couldn\u2019t really hear each other speaking.<\/p>\n<p>If I sent her a gift box, they would open it and go through everything, so I almost never wrote her personal letters or cards.<\/p>\n<h2>Fear, Anger, and Lies<em>&nbsp;<\/em><\/h2>\n<p>Before he took her away from me, when she was eleven years old, we cut my daughter\u2019s hair really short to make her look transsexual.<\/p>\n<p>By then, he had filed for custody out of state (even though I was told that wasn\u2019t allowed), and I was certain he would stop at nothing to take her away from me.<\/p>\n<p>She believed that if she pretended to be trans, <em>he would not molest her while she lived with him<\/em>.<\/p>\n<p>She knew I couldn\u2019t come out to visit her because the court order her father got from a judge out-of-state changing custody included a permanent restraining order against me.<\/p>\n<p>The basis for the restraining order were not stated; it only promised I would go to jail if I came near her or her father.<\/p>\n<p>We read it together before she was taken away, and she was angry about the lies her father wrote in his affidavits.<\/p>\n<p>One of them, ironically, was that she had to steal my phone and call him if she wanted to speak to him.<\/p>\n<p>(I had never imposed any restrictions on her phone time with her father when she lived with me. They spoke regularly, and never on speakerphone. She played Wizards 101 online with him, as well.)<\/p>\n<h2 style=\"color: rgb(155, 124, 59) !important; --tcb-applied-color: rgb(155, 124, 59) !important;\">Worsening Health and No Visits<\/h2>\n<p>My daughter knows I\u2019m in stage 3 renal failure and too sick to travel or take road trips anymore.<\/p>\n<p>The year after she was taken, I qualified for permanent disability.<\/p>\n<p>The only way she could have seen me in person would have been for her father to bring her here, but the Court did not order that and he didn\u2019t volunteer to do so (of course).<\/p>\n<p>Once he moved her out-of-state, my lawyers dropped our case.<\/p>\n<h2 style=\"\">Threats and Slander<\/h2>\n<p>Her father, who had left a frightening voicemail right before Thanksgiving in 2014, vowed to have me thrown in jail for \u201cbeing bad.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>He regularly had other members of his family tell her ugly stories about me.<\/p>\n<p>Recently, she asked me about one of them. They told her that he divorced me because I was having an affair with my dentist.<\/p>\n<h2 style=\"color: rgb(155, 124, 59) !important; --tcb-applied-color: rgb(155, 124, 59) !important;\">A Smear Campaign<\/h2>\n<p>Her father\u2019s slander campaign against me began probably around the time she was born or even before.<\/p>\n<p>Eight years ago on \u201csummer parent time,\u201d she called me from her uncle\u2019s house so angry about the blatant falsehoods they were telling her about me that she wanted me to refute them right away.<\/p>\n<p>I laughed about the lies. They were so ridiculous that after I set her straight, we laughed about it together, and I promptly set them aside.<\/p>\n<p>She later told me that after she got off the phone with me her aunt punished her, saying, \u201csnitches get stitches!\u201d<\/p>\n<p>After hearing this, I sued for sole custody for the second time but lost. I can only imagine the rumors spread since then that she will be too frightened to repeat to anyone.<\/p>\n<h2 style=\"color: rgb(155, 124, 59) !important; --tcb-applied-color: rgb(155, 124, 59) !important;\">Suing for Custody<\/h2>\n<p>The first time I sued for custody was in 2010.<\/p>\n<p>This was on the advice of Texas Child Protective Services.<\/p>\n<p>At the time, she had come home from \u201csummer parent time\u201d and sexually molested another girl on a sleepover for the second year in a row. Her sexual acting out affected her relationships at school too.<\/p>\n<p>Eleven years ago, desperate, I sat in the local law library researching the law, unsuccessfully trying to find precedent for mothers winning custody or child support in court.<\/p>\n<p>I now believe that any time this happens, it is an out-of-court settlement. This is precisely to avoid setting precedent for women succeeding in future cases.<\/p>\n<p>Many shocking things I came to know about other mothers\u2019 cases I have since learned about by hearing story after story on Facebook, by speaking with other women, and in other ways.<\/p>\n<h2 style=\"\">Failures of the Justice System<\/h2>\n<p>What I learned from my research was <strong>how complicated the family court and custody laws are<\/strong>, and how easy it is for litigants to escape real life situations of abuse by relying on nuances in the laws, especially where the laws differ among the states.<\/p>\n<p>One way my ex-husband\u2019s attorney exploited the confusion caused by the UCCJEA was by claiming I was trying to modify custody by filing for child support!<\/p>\n<p>(In my state, custody and child support are considered separate issues entirely, and this stymied my lawyers.)<\/p>\n<p>If my ex-husband\u2019s lawyer wanted to have a custody trial in Utah two months before a hearing was scheduled in New York to determine jurisdiction, they could.<\/p>\n<p>If I was served for an out-of-state hearing in a New York courthouse against state law, my lawyer didn\u2019t seem to care or understand what to do to stop it.<\/p>\n<p>My attorney made me go to the hearing in Utah, whereupon I was immediately incarcerated for five days without being able to appear at the custody trial I was there for in the first place!<\/p>\n<p><strong>The hearing date and order to appear had all been a ruse to get me there.<\/strong> There was no accountability for the judge who falsely imprisoned me because he retired the following year.<\/p>\n<p>Local police staked out my house to seize my daughter having been told I was incarcerated in Utah.<\/p>\n<p>Pursuant to the UCCJEA, they could say I had \u201cabandoned\u201d my daughter and \u201cEmergency Jurisdiction\u201d could be declared over her.<\/p>\n<p>My supposedly-impartial judge had instructed my ex-husband\u2019s lawyer to resolve our custody issues this way, but my daughter could not be found at my home.<\/p>\n<h2 style=\"\">When My Ex-Husband Kidnapped Our Daughter<\/h2>\n<p>So, three months later, Rochester City Police came with my ex-husband and his lawyer to her school, waving a court order, taking her nine days before the end of her school year!<\/p>\n<p>The May 15, 2015 court order said my daughter was allowed to finish her school year.<\/p>\n<p>The school principal promised to throw my ex-husband and his lawyer off school grounds, but she was intimidated by police presence!<\/p>\n<p>I would have withdrawn my daughter from public school after her father\u2019s first abduction and homeschooled her if I had any idea the school district would not bother to read the court order before releasing my daughter to kidnappers.<\/p>\n<p>They didn\u2019t even let her call her own court-appointed child\u2019s attorney before forcibly removing her from school and my care.<\/p>\n<h2 style=\"color: rgb(155, 124, 59) !important; --tcb-applied-color: rgb(155, 124, 59) !important;\">Financially Destitute<\/h2>\n<p>At the time we got married in 2002, <strong>my husband forced me to give up my career<\/strong>, leaving me without income.<\/p>\n<p>Utah courts enabled him to exert continuous control over me, allowing him to make his parents and his employer co-conspirators in his financial terrorism over me.<\/p>\n<p>If he would have been made to follow the law, the military would have paid me spousal and child support, and he would have had to retain divorce attorneys for both of us.<\/p>\n<p>Instead, he left me destitute in Baltimore County, living off credit cards, while he transferred to Fort Hood.<\/p>\n<p>I was left without medical insurance from 2006 to 2010. During a vulnerable time in my late 30\u2019s, I could not afford doctor visits.<\/p>\n<p>Meanwhile, my ex-husband put all the military child support payments in his own pocket, enriching himself unjustly.<\/p>\n<p>During the seven years I had full custody, I struggled to pay our bills on my meager student loans.<\/p>\n<p><strong>This is one example of how the legal system was stacked against me from start to finish.<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>In another example dating back to 2005, my husband had his parents take our daughter from our marital home in Fort Meade, MD.<\/p>\n<p>He sued for divorce in Utah less than a month later where the laws served him better!<\/p>\n<p>That\u2019s called \u201cForum Shopping\u201d and \u201cUnconscionable Behavior,\u201d and the Provo Seventh Circuit judge should have denied his application and directed him to bring our daughter back home and file in Maryland, where she was a legal resident.<\/p>\n<p>But the judge didn\u2019t.<\/p>\n<h2 style=\"color: rgb(155, 124, 59) !important; --tcb-applied-color: rgb(155, 124, 59) !important;\">Still Separated<\/h2>\n<p>As far as my daughter, for the first two years after he took her from me, she lived with him at his parents\u2019 house.<\/p>\n<p>Now they live together in a townhouse with his cousin, who has Down Syndrome, whom he cares for.<\/p>\n<p>For years, he tried to have my daughter diagnosed with Aspergers because she wouldn\u2019t cry or laugh in front of him and she wouldn\u2019t let him touch her.<\/p>\n<p>It could have also been a way for him to receive a larger payment for her from the VA, so he could convince the courts that she could never be independent of him.<\/p>\n<p>When my daughter turned 15, she asked me if she should grow out her hair, which she kept in a crew cut like a boy.<\/p>\n<p>I told her yes because she and I both thought her father would let her return home when she was 18.<\/p>\n<p>A few months ago, I found out he wants to keep her with him after high school to attend the college up the road that she can walk to from his house.<\/p>\n<p>My daughter never talks about any dreams she has or her goals for her future which she used to love to do with me when we were together.<\/p>\n<p>Now, we barely have anything to talk about on the phone.<\/p>\n<p>She doesn\u2019t tell me much about her life anymore.<\/p>\n<p>At the time of her abduction, she was supposed to start seventh grade at School of the Arts: she had auditioned and gotten accepted into the Drama program, and we were both so excited.<\/p>\n<p>Now, she\u2019s a senior planning to go to college and study biology.<\/p>\n<p>Her father doesn\u2019t let her out of his sight. On the rare occasions we are allowed to video chat, she keeps her body covered up to the collarbone.<\/p>\n<p>Recently, I began to suspect she\u2019s pregnant, but I do not know for sure.<\/p>\n<p>We cannot always tie a pretty bow on these stories. Often, there isn\u2019t a happy ending in the short term.<\/p>\n<h2 style=\"\">A Note from MEND<\/h2>\n<p>We cannot always tie a pretty bow on these stories. Often, there isn\u2019t a happy ending in the short term.<\/p>\n<p>But we believe there is always hope for healing on the other side of abuse, even though it may take some time.<\/p>\n<p>If you find yourself in an abusive relationship, <em><strong>please<\/strong><\/em><strong>reach out for help<\/strong>.<\/p>\n<p>We encourage you to have a confidential conversation with someone at a local domestic violence agency to help you plan a safe exit for you and your children. Often, they provide free legal services and support to help you to make strong and safe decisions.<\/p>\n<p>If you have a story you would like to share, please visit our website and share your story <a href=\"https:\/\/staging.themendproject.com\/es\/the-m3nd-project-tmp\/\">HERE<\/a>.<\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Valerie\u2019s journey through the family court system might sound extreme to some of you, but it\u2019s not.&nbsp; We at The MEND Project hear so many stories of adult victims of abuse who lose custody of their children to their abusive ex-spouses.&nbsp; In this story, you\u2019ll learn:&nbsp; What it looks like when abusers weaponize the justice [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":23,"featured_media":10158,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","tve_updated_post":"<div class=\"thrv_wrapper thrv_text_element\">\t<p>Valerie\u2019s journey through the family court system might sound extreme to some of you, but it\u2019s not.&nbsp;<\/p><p>We at The MEND Project hear so many <a href=\"https:\/\/staging.themendproject.com\/abuse-survivor-stories\/\" class=\"\" style=\"outline: none;\">stories of adult victims of abuse<\/a> who lose custody of their children to their abusive ex-spouses.&nbsp;<\/p><p>In this story, you\u2019ll learn:&nbsp;<\/p><\/div><div class=\"thrv_wrapper thrv-styled_list\" data-icon-code=\"icon-hand-point-right-solid\" data-css=\"tve-u-1933c32a64f\" style=\"\"><ul class=\"tcb-styled-list\"><li class=\"thrv-styled-list-item\" data-css=\"tve-u-1933c32a652\" style=\"\"><div class=\"tcb-styled-list-icon\"><div class=\"thrv_wrapper thrv_icon tve_no_drag tcb-no-delete tcb-no-clone tcb-no-save tcb-icon-inherit-style tcb-local-vars-root tcb-icon-display\" data-css=\"tve-u-1933c32a64e\" style=\"\"><svg class=\"tcb-icon tcb-local-vars-root\" viewBox=\"0 0 512 512\" data-id=\"icon-hand-point-right-solid\" data-name=\"\" style=\"\"><path d=\"M512 199.652c0 23.625-20.65 43.826-44.8 43.826h-99.851c16.34 17.048 18.346 49.766-6.299 70.944 14.288 22.829 2.147 53.017-16.45 62.315C353.574 425.878 322.654 448 272 448c-2.746 0-13.276-.203-16-.195-61.971.168-76.894-31.065-123.731-38.315C120.596 407.683 112 397.599 112 385.786V214.261l.002-.001c.011-18.366 10.607-35.889 28.464-43.845 28.886-12.994 95.413-49.038 107.534-77.323 7.797-18.194 21.384-29.084 40-29.092 34.222-.014 57.752 35.098 44.119 66.908-3.583 8.359-8.312 16.67-14.153 24.918H467.2c23.45 0 44.8 20.543 44.8 43.826zM96 200v192c0 13.255-10.745 24-24 24H24c-13.255 0-24-10.745-24-24V200c0-13.255 10.745-24 24-24h48c13.255 0 24 10.745 24 24zM68 368c0-11.046-8.954-20-20-20s-20 8.954-20 20 8.954 20 20 20 20-8.954 20-20z\"><\/path><\/svg><\/div><\/div><span class=\"thrv-advanced-inline-text tve_editable tcb-styled-list-icon-text tcb-no-delete tcb-no-save\" data-css=\"tve-u-1933c32a650\" style=\"\">What it looks like when abusers weaponize the justice system against their victims&nbsp;<\/span><\/li><li class=\"thrv-styled-list-item\" data-css=\"tve-u-1933c32a653\" style=\"\"><div class=\"tcb-styled-list-icon\"><div class=\"thrv_wrapper thrv_icon tve_no_drag tcb-no-delete tcb-no-clone tcb-no-save tcb-icon-inherit-style tcb-icon-display tcb-local-vars-root\" data-css=\"tve-u-1933c32a64e\" style=\"\"><svg class=\"tcb-icon tcb-local-vars-root\" viewBox=\"0 0 512 512\" data-id=\"icon-hand-point-right-solid\" data-name=\"\" style=\"\"><path d=\"M512 199.652c0 23.625-20.65 43.826-44.8 43.826h-99.851c16.34 17.048 18.346 49.766-6.299 70.944 14.288 22.829 2.147 53.017-16.45 62.315C353.574 425.878 322.654 448 272 448c-2.746 0-13.276-.203-16-.195-61.971.168-76.894-31.065-123.731-38.315C120.596 407.683 112 397.599 112 385.786V214.261l.002-.001c.011-18.366 10.607-35.889 28.464-43.845 28.886-12.994 95.413-49.038 107.534-77.323 7.797-18.194 21.384-29.084 40-29.092 34.222-.014 57.752 35.098 44.119 66.908-3.583 8.359-8.312 16.67-14.153 24.918H467.2c23.45 0 44.8 20.543 44.8 43.826zM96 200v192c0 13.255-10.745 24-24 24H24c-13.255 0-24-10.745-24-24V200c0-13.255 10.745-24 24-24h48c13.255 0 24 10.745 24 24zM68 368c0-11.046-8.954-20-20-20s-20 8.954-20 20 8.954 20 20 20 20-8.954 20-20z\"><\/path><\/svg><\/div><\/div><span class=\"thrv-advanced-inline-text tve_editable tcb-styled-list-icon-text tcb-no-delete tcb-no-save\" data-css=\"tve-u-1933c32a650\" style=\"\">How divorce and custody battles often create secondary trauma for victims of abuse&nbsp;<\/span><\/li><li class=\"thrv-styled-list-item\" data-css=\"tve-u-1933c32a651\" style=\"\"><div class=\"tcb-styled-list-icon\"><div class=\"thrv_wrapper thrv_icon tve_no_drag tcb-no-delete tcb-no-clone tcb-no-save tcb-icon-inherit-style tcb-icon-display tcb-local-vars-root\" data-css=\"tve-u-1933c32a64e\" style=\"\"><svg class=\"tcb-icon tcb-local-vars-root\" viewBox=\"0 0 512 512\" data-id=\"icon-hand-point-right-solid\" data-name=\"\" style=\"\"><path d=\"M512 199.652c0 23.625-20.65 43.826-44.8 43.826h-99.851c16.34 17.048 18.346 49.766-6.299 70.944 14.288 22.829 2.147 53.017-16.45 62.315C353.574 425.878 322.654 448 272 448c-2.746 0-13.276-.203-16-.195-61.971.168-76.894-31.065-123.731-38.315C120.596 407.683 112 397.599 112 385.786V214.261l.002-.001c.011-18.366 10.607-35.889 28.464-43.845 28.886-12.994 95.413-49.038 107.534-77.323 7.797-18.194 21.384-29.084 40-29.092 34.222-.014 57.752 35.098 44.119 66.908-3.583 8.359-8.312 16.67-14.153 24.918H467.2c23.45 0 44.8 20.543 44.8 43.826zM96 200v192c0 13.255-10.745 24-24 24H24c-13.255 0-24-10.745-24-24V200c0-13.255 10.745-24 24-24h48c13.255 0 24 10.745 24 24zM68 368c0-11.046-8.954-20-20-20s-20 8.954-20 20 8.954 20 20 20 20-8.954 20-20z\"><\/path><\/svg><\/div><\/div><span class=\"thrv-advanced-inline-text tve_editable tcb-styled-list-icon-text tcb-no-delete tcb-no-save\" data-css=\"tve-u-1933c32a650\" style=\"\">How survivors often have most, if not all, of their finances cut off by their abuser&nbsp;<\/span><\/li><\/ul><\/div><div class=\"thrv_wrapper thrv_text_element\"><p>In her own words, this is Valerie\u2019s story.&nbsp;<\/p><h2 class=\"\" data-css=\"tve-u-1933c335b5a\">Separation&nbsp;<\/h2><p>In retrospect, I can get a sense for how and why my daughter is changing as a person through her many-year ordeal by looking at the conduct of her father over our separation.&nbsp;<\/p><p>In the beginning, she was really sad and missing me a lot.&nbsp;<\/p><p>Several months went by after her initial abduction when she was permitted to speak to me only four times:&nbsp;<\/p><ol class=\"\"><li>on her 12th birthday,<\/li><li>the day after my birthday (she called me late because no one could remember precisely when my birthday was),<\/li><li>on Thanksgiving,<\/li><li>and on Christmas.<\/li><\/ol><p>From seeing and talking with her daily when she was with me to four times over several months (four times in a week would not have been enough for me).<\/p><p><em>Four times.<\/em><\/p><p>When she talked with me, she wasn\u2019t allowed any privacy unless she locked herself in the bathroom with her dad\u2019s cell phone where she would talk to me until the battery ran out.<\/p><p>On New Year\u2019s Day after that first Christmas, she persuaded them (her father and his parents) to let her talk to me once a week on Sundays.<\/p><p>Even then, for the first two years, they made her talk to me on speakerphone while being as loud as they could in the background so we couldn\u2019t really hear each other speaking.<\/p><p>If I sent her a gift box, they would open it and go through everything, so I almost never wrote her personal letters or cards.<\/p><h2 class=\"\" data-css=\"tve-u-1933c354594\">Fear, Anger, and Lies<em>&nbsp;<\/em><\/h2><p>Before he took her away from me, when she was eleven years old, we cut my daughter\u2019s hair really short to make her look transsexual.<\/p><p>By then, he had filed for custody out of state (even though I was told that wasn\u2019t allowed), and I was certain he would stop at nothing to take her away from me.<\/p><p>She believed that if she pretended to be trans, <em>he would not molest her while she lived with him<\/em>.<\/p><p>She knew I couldn\u2019t come out to visit her because the court order her father got from a judge out-of-state changing custody included a permanent restraining order against me.<\/p><p>The basis for the restraining order were not stated; it only promised I would go to jail if I came near her or her father.<\/p><p>We read it together before she was taken away, and she was angry about the lies her father wrote in his affidavits.<\/p><p>One of them, ironically, was that she had to steal my phone and call him if she wanted to speak to him.<\/p><p>(I had never imposed any restrictions on her phone time with her father when she lived with me. They spoke regularly, and never on speakerphone. She played Wizards 101 online with him, as well.)<\/p><h2 class=\"\" style=\"color: rgb(155, 124, 59) !important; --tcb-applied-color: rgb(155, 124, 59) !important;\">Worsening Health and No Visits<\/h2><p>My daughter knows I\u2019m in stage 3 renal failure and too sick to travel or take road trips anymore.<\/p><p>The year after she was taken, I qualified for permanent disability.<\/p><p>The only way she could have seen me in person would have been for her father to bring her here, but the Court did not order that and he didn\u2019t volunteer to do so (of course).<\/p><p>Once he moved her out-of-state, my lawyers dropped our case.<\/p><h2 class=\"\" data-css=\"tve-u-1933c3839cd\" style=\"\">Threats and Slander<\/h2><p>Her father, who had left a frightening voicemail right before Thanksgiving in 2014, vowed to have me thrown in jail for \u201cbeing bad.\u201d<\/p><p>He regularly had other members of his family tell her ugly stories about me.<\/p><p>Recently, she asked me about one of them. They told her that he divorced me because I was having an affair with my dentist.<\/p><h2 class=\"\" style=\"color: rgb(155, 124, 59) !important; --tcb-applied-color: rgb(155, 124, 59) !important;\">A Smear Campaign<\/h2><p>Her father\u2019s slander campaign against me began probably around the time she was born or even before.<\/p><p>Eight years ago on \u201csummer parent time,\u201d she called me from her uncle\u2019s house so angry about the blatant falsehoods they were telling her about me that she wanted me to refute them right away.<\/p><p>I laughed about the lies. They were so ridiculous that after I set her straight, we laughed about it together, and I promptly set them aside.<\/p><p>She later told me that after she got off the phone with me her aunt punished her, saying, \u201csnitches get stitches!\u201d<\/p><p>After hearing this, I sued for sole custody for the second time but lost. I can only imagine the rumors spread since then that she will be too frightened to repeat to anyone.<\/p><h2 class=\"\" style=\"color: rgb(155, 124, 59) !important; --tcb-applied-color: rgb(155, 124, 59) !important;\">Suing for Custody<\/h2><p>The first time I sued for custody was in 2010.<\/p><p>This was on the advice of Texas Child Protective Services.<\/p><p>At the time, she had come home from \u201csummer parent time\u201d and sexually molested another girl on a sleepover for the second year in a row. Her sexual acting out affected her relationships at school too.<\/p><p>Eleven years ago, desperate, I sat in the local law library researching the law, unsuccessfully trying to find precedent for mothers winning custody or child support in court.<\/p><p>I now believe that any time this happens, it is an out-of-court settlement. This is precisely to avoid setting precedent for women succeeding in future cases.<\/p><p>Many shocking things I came to know about other mothers\u2019 cases I have since learned about by hearing story after story on Facebook, by speaking with other women, and in other ways.<\/p><h2 class=\"\" data-css=\"tve-u-1933c3a57ac\" style=\"\">Failures of the Justice System<\/h2><p>What I learned from my research was <strong>how complicated the family court and custody laws are<\/strong>, and how easy it is for litigants to escape real life situations of abuse by relying on nuances in the laws, especially where the laws differ among the states.<\/p><p>One way my ex-husband\u2019s attorney exploited the confusion caused by the UCCJEA was by claiming I was trying to modify custody by filing for child support!<\/p><p>(In my state, custody and child support are considered separate issues entirely, and this stymied my lawyers.)<\/p><p>If my ex-husband\u2019s lawyer wanted to have a custody trial in Utah two months before a hearing was scheduled in New York to determine jurisdiction, they could.<\/p><p>If I was served for an out-of-state hearing in a New York courthouse against state law, my lawyer didn\u2019t seem to care or understand what to do to stop it.<\/p><p>My attorney made me go to the hearing in Utah, whereupon I was immediately incarcerated for five days without being able to appear at the custody trial I was there for in the first place!<\/p><p><strong>The hearing date and order to appear had all been a ruse to get me there.<\/strong> There was no accountability for the judge who falsely imprisoned me because he retired the following year.<\/p><p>Local police staked out my house to seize my daughter having been told I was incarcerated in Utah.<\/p><p>Pursuant to the UCCJEA, they could say I had \u201cabandoned\u201d my daughter and \u201cEmergency Jurisdiction\u201d could be declared over her.<\/p><p>My supposedly-impartial judge had instructed my ex-husband\u2019s lawyer to resolve our custody issues this way, but my daughter could not be found at my home.<\/p><h2 class=\"\" data-css=\"tve-u-1933c3bcbcf\" style=\"\">When My Ex-Husband Kidnapped Our Daughter<\/h2><p>So, three months later, Rochester City Police came with my ex-husband and his lawyer to her school, waving a court order, taking her nine days before the end of her school year!<\/p><p>The May 15, 2015 court order said my daughter was allowed to finish her school year.<\/p><p>The school principal promised to throw my ex-husband and his lawyer off school grounds, but she was intimidated by police presence!<\/p><p>I would have withdrawn my daughter from public school after her father\u2019s first abduction and homeschooled her if I had any idea the school district would not bother to read the court order before releasing my daughter to kidnappers.<\/p><p>They didn\u2019t even let her call her own court-appointed child\u2019s attorney before forcibly removing her from school and my care.<\/p><h2 class=\"\" style=\"color: rgb(155, 124, 59) !important; --tcb-applied-color: rgb(155, 124, 59) !important;\">Financially Destitute<\/h2><p>At the time we got married in 2002, <strong>my husband forced me to give up my career<\/strong>, leaving me without income.<\/p><p>Utah courts enabled him to exert continuous control over me, allowing him to make his parents and his employer co-conspirators in his financial terrorism over me.<\/p><p>If he would have been made to follow the law, the military would have paid me spousal and child support, and he would have had to retain divorce attorneys for both of us.<\/p><p>Instead, he left me destitute in Baltimore County, living off credit cards, while he transferred to Fort Hood.<\/p><p>I was left without medical insurance from 2006 to 2010. During a vulnerable time in my late 30\u2019s, I could not afford doctor visits.<\/p><p>Meanwhile, my ex-husband put all the military child support payments in his own pocket, enriching himself unjustly.<\/p><p>During the seven years I had full custody, I struggled to pay our bills on my meager student loans.<\/p><p><strong>This is one example of how the legal system was stacked against me from start to finish.<\/strong><\/p><p>In another example dating back to 2005, my husband had his parents take our daughter from our marital home in Fort Meade, MD.<\/p><p>He sued for divorce in Utah less than a month later where the laws served him better!<\/p><p>That\u2019s called \u201cForum Shopping\u201d and \u201cUnconscionable Behavior,\u201d and the Provo Seventh Circuit judge should have denied his application and directed him to bring our daughter back home and file in Maryland, where she was a legal resident.<\/p><p>But the judge didn\u2019t.<\/p><h2 class=\"\" style=\"color: rgb(155, 124, 59) !important; --tcb-applied-color: rgb(155, 124, 59) !important;\">Still Separated<\/h2><p>As far as my daughter, for the first two years after he took her from me, she lived with him at his parents\u2019 house.<\/p><p>Now they live together in a townhouse with his cousin, who has Down Syndrome, whom he cares for.<\/p><p>For years, he tried to have my daughter diagnosed with Aspergers because she wouldn\u2019t cry or laugh in front of him and she wouldn\u2019t let him touch her.<\/p><p>It could have also been a way for him to receive a larger payment for her from the VA, so he could convince the courts that she could never be independent of him.<\/p><p>When my daughter turned 15, she asked me if she should grow out her hair, which she kept in a crew cut like a boy.<\/p><p>I told her yes because she and I both thought her father would let her return home when she was 18.<\/p><p>A few months ago, I found out he wants to keep her with him after high school to attend the college up the road that she can walk to from his house.<\/p><p>My daughter never talks about any dreams she has or her goals for her future which she used to love to do with me when we were together.<\/p><p>Now, we barely have anything to talk about on the phone.<\/p><p>She doesn\u2019t tell me much about her life anymore.<\/p><p>At the time of her abduction, she was supposed to start seventh grade at School of the Arts: she had auditioned and gotten accepted into the Drama program, and we were both so excited.<\/p><p>Now, she\u2019s a senior planning to go to college and study biology.<\/p><p>Her father doesn\u2019t let her out of his sight. On the rare occasions we are allowed to video chat, she keeps her body covered up to the collarbone.<\/p><p>Recently, I began to suspect she\u2019s pregnant, but I do not know for sure.<\/p><p>We cannot always tie a pretty bow on these stories. Often, there isn\u2019t a happy ending in the short term.<\/p><h2 class=\"\" data-css=\"tve-u-1933c3f88f7\" style=\"\">A Note from MEND<\/h2><p>We cannot always tie a pretty bow on these stories. Often, there isn\u2019t a happy ending in the short term.<\/p><p>But we believe there is always hope for healing on the other side of abuse, even though it may take some time.<\/p><p>If you find yourself in an abusive relationship, <em><strong>please<\/strong><\/em>\n<strong>reach out for help<\/strong>.<\/p><p>We encourage you to have a confidential conversation with someone at a local domestic violence agency to help you plan a safe exit for you and your children. Often, they provide free legal services and support to help you to make strong and safe decisions.<\/p><p>If you have a story you would like to share, please visit our website and share your story <a href=\"https:\/\/staging.themendproject.com\/the-m3nd-project-tmp\/\">HERE<\/a>.<\/p><\/div>","tve_custom_css":"@media (min-width: 300px){.tcb-post-list[data-css=\"tve-u-18955080c98\"] .post-wrapper.thrv_wrapper { width: calc(50% - 15px); }.tcb-post-list[data-css=\"tve-u-18955080c98\"] .post-wrapper.thrv_wrapper:nth-child(n+3) { margin-top: 14px !important; }.tcb-post-list[data-css=\"tve-u-18955080c98\"] .post-wrapper.thrv_wrapper:not(:nth-child(n+3)) { margin-top: 0px !important; }.tcb-post-list[data-css=\"tve-u-18955080c98\"] .post-wrapper.thrv_wrapper:not(:nth-child(2n)) { margin-right: 30px !important; }.tcb-post-list[data-css=\"tve-u-18955080c98\"] .post-wrapper.thrv_wrapper:nth-child(2n) { margin-right: 0px !important; }.tcb-post-list[data-css=\"tve-u-17bf426ee59\"] 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