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Today I met with Dominique Lasseur of Tatge/Lasseur Productions, who just
finished making the PBS movie that comes out this Thursday about Protective
Parents, Family Court failure and PAS entitled "Breaking The Silence:
Children's Stories." Dominique is passionately interested in continuing his
work in this area, as he can see how raising the public's consciousness
about this problem and indeed, creating a public outcry about it, will be
key to achieving the reforms we seek in Family Court.
Dominique would like to focus next on judicial accountability for these
tragedies, and sees media exposure of the judges' heinous misconduct in
these child abuse cases as the best way to make an impact on their future
behavior. I know you will all agree that this is a project that would be
worth its weight in gold if he can pull it off. He envisions marketing a
series on Family Court failure to Court TV,
Frontline
,
America
Undercover, or all three, if we can get him enough information, footage and
support.
The reason he met with me about this project is because I know all of you
and he was hoping I could rally you troops to help him with his project, and
I assured him I would be glad to. He is interested in getting together a
powerful collection of video tapes of Protective Parents' court hearings,
the type he used in "Breaking The Silence: Children's Stories" in which
Richard Ducote was arguing a motion in Shelly's case to keep her daughter
Manya from being given into the custody of her father after disclosing years
of abuse by him, where the judge said the timing is suspicious, therefore I
will deny the motion and send her to live with the father. These types of
courtroom video tapes are used in most California Courtrooms in lieu of a
court reporter, and are available for sale at the court clerk's office. I
assume that most other states use these tapes as well. Shelly's case was in
Washington
State
, and Dominique has good footage from a
Nevada
court too. So far these are the only two court tapes that he has, but he
wants to compile a big collection of them and use them as the basis of his
new series.
Dominique needs each of you to send him videotapes from your cases where
judges were awful to Protective Parents, ie treated them disrespectfully or
inappropriately, blew up at them, or just made completely illogical or
punitive rulings against them, or all of the above.
Dominique requests that we contact all the Protective Parents who might have
access to such evidence and ask them to look in their legal files, try to
determine what day these rulings occurred on, and then each order the tape
from the courtroom for that hearing. Next he needs each Protective Parent to
preview the tape and keep track of where on the tape the good footage is, so
that when we forward them to him, all he has to do is put the tape in the
VCR (or the DVD on the computer), and watch it, and he'll see the best
footage. He does not have time to watch hours and hours of tapes looking for
when the right hearing was called and trying to find the outrageous parts,
he needs us to do that for him.
Once we have compiled a good collection, he will make these into a proposal
piece to market a series for Court TV on Family Court failure to protect
child abuse victims. He could also market the idea to Frontline or to HBO
America Undercover, or all three, if we can get him enough footage to start
with. He has excellent footage that Richard got him from Shelly's trial,
only some of which he included in the movie.
I suggested that we ask Crystal Streiloff to see if she can get Dominique
some videos from her case. I think that anything from Wendy Titelmans or
Idelle Clarks cases would be great examples. These were just my first
thoughts because these are cases I know a lot about and worry a lot about
all the time, but I know there are thousands going on all around the country
and each of you knows at least ten others who you could forward this email
to or suggest that I get in contact with. Please do so!
Anyone who has the videos of their children's MDIC Interview where the child
discloses about the abuse should send Dominique a copy of that.
Also, anyone who has audiotapes of conversations with their kids on the
phone where the kids are pleading to be protected from the abuse or telling
about the abuse should send these in too. Shelly and Manya's conversation
like this in the Breaking the Silence Movie was probably the most compelling
part.
In my experience many Protective Parents have videotaped child visitation
exchanges and have footage of children screaming and pleading not to be
forced to go with the abuser. This kind of footage is so powerful! I have
seen the tape of Idelle's daughter in this situation and it made me come
completely unglued.
Also, some children left in the custody of their abusers stop eating and
become anorexic. Before and after photographs of victim children in this
type of situation would be very visually compelling. Amy Neustein, Crystal
Streiloff, do you have these? Anyone else? Send them in!
Make sure that each tape or photograph is clearly marked with the Protective
Parent's Name and contact information, and whether or not the face of the
child or mom must be blurred out by Dominique in order to protect their
identity. Clearly, if the tape they send is their only copy and they need it
back, they should either get a copy made first and mail that, or include a
letter saying by when it must be returned to them, in which case Dominique
would need them to also give him permission to make a copy for him to use.
He said it does not matter if the quality of the tapes is bad, that this is
just a reality of the way they are made and will not affect their impact.
I want to start
compiling a master list of who are all the current Protective Parents so
that we can be sure that we ask everyone to participate, both in this
project and in the California Protective Parents Association's Protective
Parent Survey, which so far has only had 157 respondents! You seem to be the
ones with the most contact with moms, so would you be willing to help us get
the moms going on this filming project?
Please forward this email to all the Protective Parents you can think of,
and urge them to email me their name, email address, phone number, mailing
address, and if they would be willing to participate in sending information
in to Dominique or at least in filling out the two page questionnaire for
the Protective Parent Survey Research, or if they would simply like to be
included on the list of Protective Parents so that they can network with
each other or get support from each other or get group emails about Family
Court reform initiatives that Child Abuse Solutions, Inc. is working on.
Time is of the essence on this one, since there will be a swell of interest
starting on Thursday evening when the movie first airs on PBS, and
Dominique would like to capitalize on that media interest to start marketing
the idea to the stations he thinks a series on this topic would be best
suited for. Will you please help me help him get this information together?
I am willing to be the one to receive all the tapes and photos and keep them
organized for Dominique. Please send everything to me at:
Meera Fox
Executive Director
Child Abuse Solutions, Inc.
2625 Alcatraz Ave. #607
Berkeley
,
CA
94705
Call me with any
questions at: 510-521-0438
and have all the
Protective Parents you can think of anywhere in the country email me at
abusesolutions@aol.com to get on
the master list of Protective Parents!
Make sure everyone
knows about the incredible new book available from Barnes and Noble entitled
“From Madness to Mutiny: Why Mothers are Running from the Family Courts--and
What Can Be Done About It” by Amy Neustein and Michael Lesher. If every one
of us sent one copy of this book to our local Family Law Judge we would see
a huge change in how these cases are handled. I sent one copy to one judge
who cares, and he sent 25 copies to 25 other judges, on his own steam and at
his own expense! Please try this.
Note that
Dominique is working on getting permission to distribute copies of the
movie. Child Abuse Solutions, Inc. is planning to purchase the first 250
copies to include in a mailing going out to all family court judges in
California
about the devastating effects the PAS fad has had on abused children and
their Protective Parents. I have volunteered my web site,
www.childabusesolutions.com, as
a place where Dominique can make the Breaking The Silence: Children's
Stories documentary available for sale in the future.
Please note that
Garland Waller's excellent documentary "Small Justice" is available from
Intermedia, and would be an excellent gift for your local family law judge
as well.
Finally, encourage
everyone you know to watch Dominique Lasseur and Catherine Tatge’s PBS
documentary this Thursday night: Breaking The Silence: Children’s Stories.
Please let Dominique know if you have any connections to individuals or
corporations who would be willing to provide funding to get this new series
on Family Court Failure project going. Mary Kay Ash Charitable Foundation
has generously underwritten both Breaking the Silence Documentaries, but
this new project will need similar support from other organizations or
companies or people who care. If we all put our creative thinking heads
together, I know we can help him. Please let him know any ideas or leads in
this regard. I can forward his email to anyone who wants to contact him
directly about any of these issues.
Thank you!
For any Protective Parents or concerned professionals receiving this email
as forwarded from one of the original people I sent it out to who do not
know me or of me, I have included my bio, and I encourage you to visit my
website at
www.childabusesolutions.com.
Before becoming a
successful sole practitioner representing Protective Parents of sexually
abused children in Family Court custody proceedings, Meera Fox worked for
attorneys Richard Ducote and for Alan Rosenfeld, helping Protective Parents
in Family Courts all over the country. She also represented juvenile wards
of the Dependency court as an attorney for Children's Law Offices. After a
three-year stint as director of new programs at the Child Abuse Forensic
Institute, working with Seth Goldstein, Ms. Fox now serves as the
Executive Director of Child Abuse Solutions, Inc. Ms. Fox regularly speaks
at conferences, testifies before the
California
legislature on child protection bills, and trains court professionals on
various aspects of child abuse and the law. Meera Fox is a proud member of
the Family Court Reform Coalition.
Child Abuse
Solutions, Inc. is a non-profit educational organization committed to
training Family Court and other related professionals to be responsive to
the needs of abused children. It offers workshops, training, consultation,
advice, referrals and resources to judges, evaluators, mediators, and
attorneys. Its education focuses on best practices in child custody
evaluation, litigation and adjudication involving allegations of child
abuse, sexual abuse, and domestic violence.
CHARMS NOTE: I'm
reminding myself....when I've NO POWER, it's the BEST time to remember PRAYER to
Him who HAS the POWER!
If you have a story
of a loved one that has lost the fight against Domestic Violence, please
share
it with us. We would like to continue sharing the
stories in hope that others will see just what Domestic Violence is, a travesty
that must end.
If you are a
Non-Custodial Mother, and would like support, or can share your case file,
please contact
us. You are NOT alone.......
If you are a Victim
or Survivor of Domestic Violence, and you have not received the help that you
needed, or did not gain justice through the courts, please,
let us
know. We must work together to bring about a change,
and the only way to do that is to show the problem.
Enough is ENOUGH!
Together, we CAN and WILL make a difference!
A victim's first scream is
for help: a victim's second scream is for justice."-
Carol Anika Theill
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