http://www.petition2congress.com/2386/stop-court-ordered-child-abuse
Please take a stand for child victims being placed in harms way thank you!
Tuesday, April 26, 2011
http://www.petition2congress.com/2386/stop-court-ordered-child-abuse
http://www.petition2congress.com/2386/stop-court-ordered-child-abuse
Please take a stand for child victims being placed in harms way thank you!
Please take a stand for child victims being placed in harms way thank you!
Our Concerns Regarding "Deprogramming" Therapy http://www.leadershipcouncil.org/1/med/%20pr-2-09.html#1
http://www.leadershipcouncil.org/1/med/%20pr-2-09.html#1
. Being Confined and Isolated from Family and Friends in an unfamiliar Setting May be a Traumatic Experience for Children Leading Them to Feel Trapped, Helpless, and Powerless.
Isolating a child from everyone they are familiar with and attempting to force a new view of their parents, especially by strangers who know little about the child's experiences with their parents can be traumatic. This is of particular concern as many children being exposed to these techniques have reported a history of abuse from the very individuals they are being forced to reunify with.
One girl subjected to this treatment was placed in a treatment facility by her father. The therapists adopted the father''s viewpoint and the child was repeatedly told that her father who had abused her on a numerous occasions, hadn't. She finally parroted what she was told to say in order to get out the facility where she was being held. When returned to her father, she ran away from home and lived on the streets until she was able to get a judge to listen to listen to her. She was finally allowed to return to her mother after a hearing in which the young teen's concerns were finally listened to.
Coercive and punitive “therapies” are especially inappropriate when used on children who have already been traumatized. These children may find this kind of setting a “trigger” for further post-traumatic reactions. Forced reunification against a child's will and without taking into consideration the child's point of view and emotional well-being, can be expected to reinforce a sense of helplessness and powerlessness in an already vulnerable child. Such “treatment” can be expected to do more harm than good, and could potentially cause lasting emotional harm.
2. According to APA Ethical Standards, Psychologists Respect and Protect Civil and Human Rights (Preamble to the APA Ethical Guidelines)
The right to one's belief system is considered the most basic of human rights. The confinement of a child who has committed no wrong doing away from parents and friends in unfamiliar surroundings in order to force them to adopt a new belief system may violate a child's basic civil rights.
3. According to APA Ethical Principles, Individuals have a Basic Right to Self-Determination (Principle E: Respect for People's Rights and Dignity)
Being forced to change one's belief system may violate the principle of self-determination.
4. According to APA Ethical Principles, Psychologists Avoid Multiple Relationships to Avoid Conflicts of Interest (APA Ethics code: 3.05)
According to ethical standards set forth by the APA, "a psychologist refrains from entering into a multiple relationship if the multiple relationship could reasonably be expected to impair the psychologist's objectivity, competence, or effectiveness in performing his or her functions as a psychologist, or otherwise risks exploitation or harm to the person with whom the professional relationship exists."
A psychologist who has contracted with a parent to force a child against his will into a relationship is engaged in a dual relationship: one with the contracting parent and one with the client-child. The child's goals and interests may be in direct conflict to those of the parent that has engaged the therapist. This dual role presents an unavoidable conflict that would keep the child's feelings, beliefs, and desires from being central during treatment.
5. According to APA Ethical Principles, Psychologists Must Engage in Therapeutic Services Only After Obtaining Informed Consent – Even when a Client is Not Legally Capable of Giving Informed Consent, The Psycologist Still Must Explain the Procedures, Consider the Individual's Preferences and Gain Their Assent Prior to Treatment. (APA Ethics code: 3.10).
According to ethical standards set forth by the APA, "For persons who are legally incapable of giving informed consent, psychologists nevertheless (1) provide an appropriate explanation, (2) seek the individual's assent, (3) consider such persons' preferences and best interests.."
It is not possible to obtain meaningful informed consent from children who are isolated from family and friends, confined in a facility and subjected to coercive treatment.
http://www.leadershipcouncil.org/1/med/%20pr-2-09.html#1
. Being Confined and Isolated from Family and Friends in an unfamiliar Setting May be a Traumatic Experience for Children Leading Them to Feel Trapped, Helpless, and Powerless.
Isolating a child from everyone they are familiar with and attempting to force a new view of their parents, especially by strangers who know little about the child's experiences with their parents can be traumatic. This is of particular concern as many children being exposed to these techniques have reported a history of abuse from the very individuals they are being forced to reunify with.
One girl subjected to this treatment was placed in a treatment facility by her father. The therapists adopted the father''s viewpoint and the child was repeatedly told that her father who had abused her on a numerous occasions, hadn't. She finally parroted what she was told to say in order to get out the facility where she was being held. When returned to her father, she ran away from home and lived on the streets until she was able to get a judge to listen to listen to her. She was finally allowed to return to her mother after a hearing in which the young teen's concerns were finally listened to.
Coercive and punitive “therapies” are especially inappropriate when used on children who have already been traumatized. These children may find this kind of setting a “trigger” for further post-traumatic reactions. Forced reunification against a child's will and without taking into consideration the child's point of view and emotional well-being, can be expected to reinforce a sense of helplessness and powerlessness in an already vulnerable child. Such “treatment” can be expected to do more harm than good, and could potentially cause lasting emotional harm.
2. According to APA Ethical Standards, Psychologists Respect and Protect Civil and Human Rights (Preamble to the APA Ethical Guidelines)
The right to one's belief system is considered the most basic of human rights. The confinement of a child who has committed no wrong doing away from parents and friends in unfamiliar surroundings in order to force them to adopt a new belief system may violate a child's basic civil rights.
3. According to APA Ethical Principles, Individuals have a Basic Right to Self-Determination (Principle E: Respect for People's Rights and Dignity)
Being forced to change one's belief system may violate the principle of self-determination.
4. According to APA Ethical Principles, Psychologists Avoid Multiple Relationships to Avoid Conflicts of Interest (APA Ethics code: 3.05)
According to ethical standards set forth by the APA, "a psychologist refrains from entering into a multiple relationship if the multiple relationship could reasonably be expected to impair the psychologist's objectivity, competence, or effectiveness in performing his or her functions as a psychologist, or otherwise risks exploitation or harm to the person with whom the professional relationship exists."
A psychologist who has contracted with a parent to force a child against his will into a relationship is engaged in a dual relationship: one with the contracting parent and one with the client-child. The child's goals and interests may be in direct conflict to those of the parent that has engaged the therapist. This dual role presents an unavoidable conflict that would keep the child's feelings, beliefs, and desires from being central during treatment.
5. According to APA Ethical Principles, Psychologists Must Engage in Therapeutic Services Only After Obtaining Informed Consent – Even when a Client is Not Legally Capable of Giving Informed Consent, The Psycologist Still Must Explain the Procedures, Consider the Individual's Preferences and Gain Their Assent Prior to Treatment. (APA Ethics code: 3.10).
According to ethical standards set forth by the APA, "For persons who are legally incapable of giving informed consent, psychologists nevertheless (1) provide an appropriate explanation, (2) seek the individual's assent, (3) consider such persons' preferences and best interests.."
It is not possible to obtain meaningful informed consent from children who are isolated from family and friends, confined in a facility and subjected to coercive treatment.
http://www.leadershipcouncil.org/1/med/%20pr-2-09.html#1
http://www.randijames.com/2009/02/parental-alienation-deprogramming-is.html
http://www.randijames.com/2009/02/parental-alienation-deprogramming-is.html
From the Leadership Council (emphasis mine):
Experts Warn About Dangers of Deprogramming Treatment
February 10, 2009: Specialists in childhood trauma and therapy from the Leadership Council have grave concerns about the ethics of deprogramming treatment described in a recent article published in the Globe and Mail (see: Judge Blocks Sending Teen for Deprogramming Treatment, Feb 7, 2009).
We support the decision of the judge who refused to court-order deprogramming treatment (sometime called Reunification Therapy) overturning a 2008 arbitrator’s order that the 14-year-old boy be coercively treated. The controversial treatment is designed to “deprogram” children who are “alienated” from one of their parents during divorce.
Various forms of this type of “treatment” have sprung up over the last decade. The therapy usually involves confining the child in a location away from home, and isolating the child from the parent to whom the child is most attached. The attachment to the favored parent is challenged, while encouraging the child with intensive sessions to re-accept the rejected parent.
Some children have reported receiving treatment involving threats and coercion. The child may be told that he or she may not return home until they have accepted a more favorable view of the denigrated parent. One child the LC has interviewed described recurrent nightmares of the de-programming episodes that were used on him. In addition, there have been several lawsuits related to this type of approach. (see: http://rachel-foundation-lawsuit.com)
This so-called “therapy” is reminiscent of the kind of brainwashing techniques used in prison camps where deprivation and isolation are used to coerce false confessions and to force ideological changes in captives. While these techniques can produce changes in belief and in behavior, we are concerned that these techniques are harmful to the mental health of children.
We are also concerned that deprogramming treatments may violate basic ethical principles that guide practice. According to the American Psychological Association’s ethical standards, the goals of psychologists are the welfare and protection of individuals. We question whether deprogramming treatment protects the welfare of the children involved. We have listed some of our concerns at the end of this release. (see: Concerns)
Deprogramming treatment raises philosophical and legal questions which remain unresolved in our approach to children. Are children simply the property of adults whose legal interests can control what children think and believe? In what sense does the child’s intellectual and emotional freedom have precedence over these legal interests? While these complex issues are not yet resolved, the controversial nature of this deprogramming treatment would argue for caution in safeguarding the mental health of children while we wrestle with these complex questions.
One of the concrete dangers of this type of therapy is that it has been used to force children into reunification with adults that have committed violent crimes against them, thus putting the children at risk of further victimization.
The Leadership Council has spoken with several victims of this type of therapy who were traumatized by the treatment. One young man says he continues to have flashbacks from his forced isolation from his mother and from continually being confronted by a therapist who told him his beliefs were wrong. After reunification with the parent he had been coerced to accept (in this case his father), he discovered that this parent was indeed abusive, his previous beliefs had been correct, and he felt betrayed and maltreated by the courts that had ordered this therapy. This case clearly illustrates that therapy that stems from the agenda of an interested legal party may be detrimental to the autonomy and welfare of the child for whom it is ordered.
Sometimes reunification therapy does not involve confinement and separation from the primary parent, but involves forced therapy sessions with a rejected parent. Many of the same ethical questions apply to this type of therapy as well, as the child is often forced to attend these sessions against his/her will. If the child is being forced to reunify with a parent he has clearly stated was abusive to him or her, the child may react with increased symptoms, suicidal ideation, or even suicide attempts.
Does this mean that children shouldn’t receive therapy in situations where a child is estranged from one of their parents? No.
There are respectful and accepted techniques available that do not involve coercion or confinement that can help children in these situations. For example, one technique involves listening to children and helping them sort through their often conflicted feelings about their parents. This form of therapy, when done with a neutral therapist who is committed to safeguarding the interests of the child, is a more humane and appropriate approach. In addition, this is the approach that is most likely to be effective.
For all of these reasons, the LC strongly supports the judge’s decision described in the Globe and Mail article, and advises parents seeking remedies for children from whom they are estranged to seek less coercive and more ethical forms of treatment. Also, courts should resist ordering children into any treatment that is coercive and experimental. Instead, any court-ordered treatment should abide by APA ethical guidelines and be based on empirical evidence.
Children have a right to their thoughts, beliefs, feelings, and opinions. The legal interests of warring adults should not be the agenda that drives the mental health approach used for vulnerable children.
Our Concerns Regarding “Deprogramming” Therapy
1. Being Confined and Isolated from Family and Friends in an unfamiliar Setting May be a Traumatic Experience for Children Leading Them to Feel Trapped, Helpless, and Powerless.
Isolating a child from everyone they are familiar with and attempting to force a new view of their parents, especially by strangers who know little about the child’s experiences with their parents can be traumatic. This is of particular concern as many children being exposed to these techniques have reported a history of abuse from the very individuals they are being forced to reunify with.
One girl subjected to this treatment was placed in a treatment facility by her father. The therapists adopted the father’’s viewpoint and the child was repeatedly told that her father who had abused her on a numerous occasions, hadn’t. She finally parroted what she was told to say in order to get out the facility where she was being held. When returned to her father, she ran away from home and lived on the streets until she was able to get a judge to listen to listen to her. She was finally allowed to return to her mother after a hearing in which the young teen’s concerns were finally listened to.
Coercive and punitive “therapies” are especially inappropriate when used on children who have already been traumatized. These children may find this kind of setting a “trigger” for further post-traumatic reactions. Forced reunification against a child’s will and without taking into consideration the child’s point of view and emotional well-being, can be expected to reinforce a sense of helplessness and powerlessness in an already vulnerable child. Such “treatment” can be expected to do more harm than good, and could potentially cause lasting emotional harm.
2. According to APA Ethical Standards, Psychologists Respect and Protect Civil and Human Rights (Preamble to the APA Ethical Guidelines)
The right to one’s belief system is considered the most basic of human rights. The confinement of a child who has committed no wrong doing away from parents and friends in unfamiliar surroundings in order to force them to adopt a new belief system may violate a child’s basic civil rights.
3. According to APA Ethical Principles, Individuals have a Basic Right to Self-Determination (Principle E: Respect for People’s Rights and Dignity)
Being forced to change one’s belief system may violate the principle of self-determination.
4. According to APA Ethical Principles, Psychologists Avoid Multiple Relationships to Avoid Conflicts of Interest (APA Ethics code: 3.05)
According to ethical standards set forth by the APA, “a psychologist refrains from entering into a multiple relationship if the multiple relationship could reasonably be expected to impair the psychologist’s objectivity, competence, or effectiveness in performing his or her functions as a psychologist, or otherwise risks exploitation or harm to the person with whom the professional relationship exists.”
A psychologist who has contracted with a parent to force a child against his will into a relationship is engaged in a dual relationship. One with the contracting parent and one with the client-child. The child’s goals and interests may be in direct conflict to those of the parent that has engaged the therapist. This dual role presents an unavoidable conflict that would keep the child’s feelings, beliefs, and desires from being central during treatment.
5. According to APA Ethical Principles, Psychologists Must Engage in Therapeutic Services Only After Obtaining Informed Consent – Even when a Client is Not Legally Capable of Giving Informed Consent, The Psychologist Still Must Explain the Procedures, Consider the Individual’s Preferences and Gain Their Assent Prior to Treatment. (APA Ethics code: 3.10).
According to ethical standards set forth by the APA, “For persons who are legally incapable of giving informed consent, psychologists nevertheless (1) provide an appropriate explanation, (2) seek the individual’s assent, (3) consider such persons’ preferences and best interests..”
It is not possible to obtain meaningful informed consent from children who are isolated from family and friends, confined in a facility and subjected to coercive treatment.
From the Leadership Council (emphasis mine):
Experts Warn About Dangers of Deprogramming Treatment
February 10, 2009: Specialists in childhood trauma and therapy from the Leadership Council have grave concerns about the ethics of deprogramming treatment described in a recent article published in the Globe and Mail (see: Judge Blocks Sending Teen for Deprogramming Treatment, Feb 7, 2009).
We support the decision of the judge who refused to court-order deprogramming treatment (sometime called Reunification Therapy) overturning a 2008 arbitrator’s order that the 14-year-old boy be coercively treated. The controversial treatment is designed to “deprogram” children who are “alienated” from one of their parents during divorce.
Various forms of this type of “treatment” have sprung up over the last decade. The therapy usually involves confining the child in a location away from home, and isolating the child from the parent to whom the child is most attached. The attachment to the favored parent is challenged, while encouraging the child with intensive sessions to re-accept the rejected parent.
Some children have reported receiving treatment involving threats and coercion. The child may be told that he or she may not return home until they have accepted a more favorable view of the denigrated parent. One child the LC has interviewed described recurrent nightmares of the de-programming episodes that were used on him. In addition, there have been several lawsuits related to this type of approach. (see: http://rachel-foundation-lawsuit.com)
This so-called “therapy” is reminiscent of the kind of brainwashing techniques used in prison camps where deprivation and isolation are used to coerce false confessions and to force ideological changes in captives. While these techniques can produce changes in belief and in behavior, we are concerned that these techniques are harmful to the mental health of children.
We are also concerned that deprogramming treatments may violate basic ethical principles that guide practice. According to the American Psychological Association’s ethical standards, the goals of psychologists are the welfare and protection of individuals. We question whether deprogramming treatment protects the welfare of the children involved. We have listed some of our concerns at the end of this release. (see: Concerns)
Deprogramming treatment raises philosophical and legal questions which remain unresolved in our approach to children. Are children simply the property of adults whose legal interests can control what children think and believe? In what sense does the child’s intellectual and emotional freedom have precedence over these legal interests? While these complex issues are not yet resolved, the controversial nature of this deprogramming treatment would argue for caution in safeguarding the mental health of children while we wrestle with these complex questions.
One of the concrete dangers of this type of therapy is that it has been used to force children into reunification with adults that have committed violent crimes against them, thus putting the children at risk of further victimization.
The Leadership Council has spoken with several victims of this type of therapy who were traumatized by the treatment. One young man says he continues to have flashbacks from his forced isolation from his mother and from continually being confronted by a therapist who told him his beliefs were wrong. After reunification with the parent he had been coerced to accept (in this case his father), he discovered that this parent was indeed abusive, his previous beliefs had been correct, and he felt betrayed and maltreated by the courts that had ordered this therapy. This case clearly illustrates that therapy that stems from the agenda of an interested legal party may be detrimental to the autonomy and welfare of the child for whom it is ordered.
Sometimes reunification therapy does not involve confinement and separation from the primary parent, but involves forced therapy sessions with a rejected parent. Many of the same ethical questions apply to this type of therapy as well, as the child is often forced to attend these sessions against his/her will. If the child is being forced to reunify with a parent he has clearly stated was abusive to him or her, the child may react with increased symptoms, suicidal ideation, or even suicide attempts.
Does this mean that children shouldn’t receive therapy in situations where a child is estranged from one of their parents? No.
There are respectful and accepted techniques available that do not involve coercion or confinement that can help children in these situations. For example, one technique involves listening to children and helping them sort through their often conflicted feelings about their parents. This form of therapy, when done with a neutral therapist who is committed to safeguarding the interests of the child, is a more humane and appropriate approach. In addition, this is the approach that is most likely to be effective.
For all of these reasons, the LC strongly supports the judge’s decision described in the Globe and Mail article, and advises parents seeking remedies for children from whom they are estranged to seek less coercive and more ethical forms of treatment. Also, courts should resist ordering children into any treatment that is coercive and experimental. Instead, any court-ordered treatment should abide by APA ethical guidelines and be based on empirical evidence.
Children have a right to their thoughts, beliefs, feelings, and opinions. The legal interests of warring adults should not be the agenda that drives the mental health approach used for vulnerable children.
Our Concerns Regarding “Deprogramming” Therapy
1. Being Confined and Isolated from Family and Friends in an unfamiliar Setting May be a Traumatic Experience for Children Leading Them to Feel Trapped, Helpless, and Powerless.
Isolating a child from everyone they are familiar with and attempting to force a new view of their parents, especially by strangers who know little about the child’s experiences with their parents can be traumatic. This is of particular concern as many children being exposed to these techniques have reported a history of abuse from the very individuals they are being forced to reunify with.
One girl subjected to this treatment was placed in a treatment facility by her father. The therapists adopted the father’’s viewpoint and the child was repeatedly told that her father who had abused her on a numerous occasions, hadn’t. She finally parroted what she was told to say in order to get out the facility where she was being held. When returned to her father, she ran away from home and lived on the streets until she was able to get a judge to listen to listen to her. She was finally allowed to return to her mother after a hearing in which the young teen’s concerns were finally listened to.
Coercive and punitive “therapies” are especially inappropriate when used on children who have already been traumatized. These children may find this kind of setting a “trigger” for further post-traumatic reactions. Forced reunification against a child’s will and without taking into consideration the child’s point of view and emotional well-being, can be expected to reinforce a sense of helplessness and powerlessness in an already vulnerable child. Such “treatment” can be expected to do more harm than good, and could potentially cause lasting emotional harm.
2. According to APA Ethical Standards, Psychologists Respect and Protect Civil and Human Rights (Preamble to the APA Ethical Guidelines)
The right to one’s belief system is considered the most basic of human rights. The confinement of a child who has committed no wrong doing away from parents and friends in unfamiliar surroundings in order to force them to adopt a new belief system may violate a child’s basic civil rights.
3. According to APA Ethical Principles, Individuals have a Basic Right to Self-Determination (Principle E: Respect for People’s Rights and Dignity)
Being forced to change one’s belief system may violate the principle of self-determination.
4. According to APA Ethical Principles, Psychologists Avoid Multiple Relationships to Avoid Conflicts of Interest (APA Ethics code: 3.05)
According to ethical standards set forth by the APA, “a psychologist refrains from entering into a multiple relationship if the multiple relationship could reasonably be expected to impair the psychologist’s objectivity, competence, or effectiveness in performing his or her functions as a psychologist, or otherwise risks exploitation or harm to the person with whom the professional relationship exists.”
A psychologist who has contracted with a parent to force a child against his will into a relationship is engaged in a dual relationship. One with the contracting parent and one with the client-child. The child’s goals and interests may be in direct conflict to those of the parent that has engaged the therapist. This dual role presents an unavoidable conflict that would keep the child’s feelings, beliefs, and desires from being central during treatment.
5. According to APA Ethical Principles, Psychologists Must Engage in Therapeutic Services Only After Obtaining Informed Consent – Even when a Client is Not Legally Capable of Giving Informed Consent, The Psychologist Still Must Explain the Procedures, Consider the Individual’s Preferences and Gain Their Assent Prior to Treatment. (APA Ethics code: 3.10).
According to ethical standards set forth by the APA, “For persons who are legally incapable of giving informed consent, psychologists nevertheless (1) provide an appropriate explanation, (2) seek the individual’s assent, (3) consider such persons’ preferences and best interests..”
It is not possible to obtain meaningful informed consent from children who are isolated from family and friends, confined in a facility and subjected to coercive treatment.
continued NATIONAL CENTER FOR PROSECUTION OF CHILD ABUSE
Volume 16, Number 7, 2003
Parental Alienation Syndrome: What Professionals Need to Know Part 2 of 2
By Hope Fields1 & Erika Rivera Ragland2
Quick Tips for Challenging PAS Evidence
There are many things that prosecutors can do to challenge PAS evidence in child abuse cases:
- Challenge under Daubert/Frye. Argue that PAS evidence does not meet the evidentiary standard in your jurisdiction.
- Know statistics and studies. Statistics about false reporting are available through the National Center for the Prosecution of Child Abuse (NCPCA) or from the National Clearinghouse on Child Abuse and Neglect Information at http://nccanch.acf.hhs.gov/.
- Know psychological dynamics of child abuse. Arm yourself with information about child abuse disclosures. Learn the psychological process of disclosure, the significance in the timing of disclosures, recantation, and proper procedures for conducting forensic interviews.22
- Share information. Share your motions, briefs, and transcripts with other prosecutors. Create central files in the office so other prosecutors do not have to reinvent the wheel.
- Write the APA. Send a letter to the American Psychiatric Association23 to discourage inclusion of PAS in the DSM-V.
- Prepare your experts. Meet with your experts before trial to prepare them for the defense expert and what you anticipate his or her testimony will be.
- Contact the National Center for Prosecution of Child Abuse (NCPCA). Call or E-mail the NCPCA with questions about child abuse or expert testimony.
Conclusion
PAS is an unproven theory that can threaten the integrity of the criminal justice system and the safety of abused children. Prosecutors should educate themselves about PAS and be prepared to argue against its admission in court. In cases where PAS testimony is admitted, it is a prosecutor’s responsibility to educate the judge and jury about the shortfalls of this theory. As more criminal courts refuse to admit PAS evidence, more protection will be afforded to victims of sexual abuse in our court system.
Volume 16, Number 7, 2003 Parental Alienation Syndrome: What Professionals Need to Know Part 2 of 2
Volume 16, Number 7, 2003
Parental Alienation Syndrome: What Professionals Need to Know Part 2 of 2
By Hope Fields1 & Erika Rivera Ragland2
Introduction
Parental Alienation Syndrome (PAS) has created obstacles for child abuse prosecutors. It is crucial for child abuse prosecutors to understand the theory of PAS, and know how to best challenge its legitimacy in court. Part 1 of this article addressed the PAS theory and its inherent flaws.3 We now turn to the courts’ approaches to PAS, and propose arguments and methods to suppress this unreliable evidence.
Case Law Status
PAS has been received differently by criminal and civil courts. However, defendants draw from both civil and criminal opinions in crafting arguments for admitting PAS as scientific evidence in child abuse cases. Therefore, it is important for prosecutors to be aware of both criminal and civil law when preparing a suppression argument. PAS has been addressed in a few criminal cases and approximately fifty civil cases in courts of record.
Criminal Case Law4
In 1995, the Ohio Court of Appeals allowed evidence of PAS in a sexual abuse case.5 The defendant was convicted by the trial court of three counts of rape and one of sexual battery, all against his own children. The trial court allowed the defendant to present an expert who testified about PAS and the potential effects it can have in alienating children involved in custody battles. It is unclear from the court’s opinion whether the prosecution ever objected to presentation of this evidence, or to what extent the PAS evidence was used by the defense. The court did not discuss the admissibility of PAS evidence in its decision.
New York courts have consistently refused to admit evidence of PAS in criminal cases. In People v. Loomis6, the defendant, who faced charges of sexual abuse, moved the court to have the victims and their mother examined by Dr. Richard Gardner, the doctor who created and coined PAS, to determine if allegations of abuse were fabricated. The court denied defendant’s motion, holding that
New York practice does not allow experts to offer an opinion on the ultimate issue of fact as to whether sexual abuse occurred. The issue is strictly reserved to the trier of fact… The defendant’s expert purports to make such a determination by determining if a particular accusation has the criteria of a truthful or a false accusation.
In a later case, another New York court refused to admit PAS evidence.7 The court held that PAS failed to meet the Frye standard because defendant failed to show that it was generally accepted in relevant scientific communities.
California is the only other state to have discussed the admissibility of PAS in a criminal context. In an unpublished opinion earlier this year, the California Court of Appeals held that the defendant, convicted of sexual assault and lewd and lascivious acts on a child, had not been deprived of his due process rights by the trial court’s refusal to allow his expert to testify regarding PAS.8 Among the reasons for affirming the trial court’s decision was the determination that an understanding of the PAS theory was not beyond common experience and that PAS evidence is not scientific enough to meet the Kelly-Frye evidentiary standard.
Civil Case Law
Evidence of Parental Alienation Syndrome is admitted more frequently in civil cases than in criminal court. PAS evidence has been admitted in cases involving custody determinations and is usually introduced in an attempt to show that one parent, in denigrating the other parent in the presence of the child, has caused that child to express distaste and/or hatred for that other parent.9
States’ approaches to PAS evidence vary. A few states have allowed PAS evidence to be admitted in civil custody cases.10 Other courts, when confronted with PAS, have discussed it or allowed some evidence of it while emphasizing that such discussion did not comprise an evaluation of the legitimacy of PAS theory.11
Challenging PAS Evidence
Daubert12 and Frye13 are the most prominent cases dealing with admissibility of scientific evidence and expert testimony. While different jurisdictions employ different admissibility standards, there are a number of factors that can contribute relevant information to any admissibility evaluation. First, evidence of a scientific theory is more likely to be admitted in court if the techniques underlying that theory have been tested and if an error rate has been determined. The theory of PAS does not employ any assessable technique but rather, as stated in the Part 1 of this article, it is based upon anecdotal evidence that was personally observed and reported by Dr. Gardner. As a result, the accuracy of PAS theory has not been rigorously studied and verified. Second, the reliability of scientific evidence is more easily evaluated when it has been subject to peer review. As previously indicated, Gardner published his own work and his writings were not frequently subjected to scientific peer reviews.
Prosecutors should diligently question any case law or article that is cited as supporting PAS theory. Some Web sites that discuss PAS refer to case law as supporting the reliability of PAS theory, but the opinions in these cited cases are often not adequately explained or they prove to be less supportive of PAS theory than argued. Prosecutors reviewing literature that is referenced as positive on PAS should scrutinize it carefully.14
Procedural Arguments
The strongest procedural argument against admission of PAS evidence vis a vis expert testimony is that it invades the province of the jury. Most states do not allow experts “to offer an opinion on the ultimate issue of fact as to whether the sexual abuse has occurred.”15 In those states, prosecutors should argue that allowing a PAS expert to testify that the allegations arose out of a sour relationship between parents permits that expert to testify as to the ultimate issue of the case.
Prosecutors in jurisdictions that have adopted the Federal Rules of Evidence can argue for exclusion of PAS evidence under two rules. First, under rule 104(a), a trial judge must make “a preliminary assessment of whether the reasoning or methodology underlying the testimony is scientifically valid.”16 PAS is not based on an easily articulable methodology that can be assessed for scientific validity and, consequently, prosecutors should argue that it fails even to pass the preliminary assessment for validity.
Second, rule 403 states that evidence should be excluded when the probative value is outweighed by the danger of unfair prejudice.17 There is a possibility that the jury will see the court’s acceptance of defendant’s PAS expert as a determination that the testimony presented by the expert represents some scientific truth. Prosecutors should argue that it is within the common experience of jurors to contemplate the possibility that the non-accused parent planted ideas in the child’s head. Qualifying an expert to testify about PAS creates the risk that the jury will place too much emphasis and reliance on PAS evidence.
Substantive Arguments
A syndrome is a group of symptoms that appear to occur together.18 However, the cause of the symptoms is “often unknown or poorly understood,” while the cause of a disease, by contrast, is usually known.19 It is possible for a syndrome to indicate a strong relationship between a cause and a set of symptoms, but each syndrome falls in a different place along the continuum of certainty. The continuum is a concept that explains the strength and reliability of the supposed relationship.20
Some syndromes are nondiagnostic, which means that they do not point to particular causes. PAS is a nondiagnostic syndrome.21 Thus, while an expert can argue the legitimacy of the theories underlying PAS, the expert is not able to point to a particular cause of the syndrome with certainty. Even if courts reject arguments regarding unreliability, prosecutors should remain acutely aware of how the evidence is being presented. If the expert is offering an opinion regarding the cause of the “syndrome,” prosecutors should object to the improper use of the evidence.
http://www.petition2congress.com/2386/stop-court-ordered-child-abuse
http://www.petition2congress.com/2386/stop-court-ordered-child-abuse
Please sign for child abuse victims suffering from pas mis-use!
Please sign for child abuse victims suffering from pas mis-use!
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