NPO Blog Archive

Below are some recent articles and items of interest from Fathers & Families’ latest News Digest.

Local agencies get grant support (The Troy Messenger, 10-15-07)

DHS, courts split on custody case (The Courier, 10-17-07)

Local case points out complexities of schools, child custody (Naples Daily News, 10-17-07)

Prosecutor: Custody dispute led to death (Winston-Salem Journal, 10-19-07)

Documents Show Rowland Asked For Divorce Seal To Protect Kids (Associated Press, 10-17-07)

Jon Voight Talks About His Divorce and Family Stigma (ABC News, 10-17-07)

A domestic violence court? (Deseret Morning News, 10-16-07)

Child support, bankruptcy trail former NBA player Caffey (The Press-Register, 10-21-07)

Behind on child support? Forget getting a hunting license in Kansas (Pratt Tribune, 10-19-07)

Truth-telling Missouri child support auditor Susan Montee (pictured) is under fire from the child support industry after revealing her finding that 27% of the state’s 240,000 child support cases have incorrect balances. She points out that when child support transferred cases from an old computer system to a new one nearly a decade ago, many of their figures were incorrect, and now–nearly a decade later–they still have not corrected them.

According to Montee’s figures, 65,000 cases have incorrect balances, some with phony arrearages of several hundred thousand dollars.

Director of Missouri Family Support Division Janel Luck has struck back at Montee, calling her “highly irresponsible” and accusing her of “misleading the public.” As I’ve pointed out on numerous occasions, child support enforcement agencies are notorious for their computer errors and bureaucratic bungling. Many innocent fathers have been wrongly targeted for enforcement action–including driver license suspensions and jail–as a result. Frankly, if anything, the 27% figure seems low.

To learn more about the Missouri controversy, read and/or watch the KOMU TV report by clicking here.

KOMU reporter Erica Bennett handled the story–if you’re concerned about this issue, or if you are a child support obligor in Missouri who believes he has been saddled with an incorrect arrearage, I suggest you contact her by clicking here.

Also, see my recent blog post Ponder This the Next Time You Hear Some Chest-Thumping DA Pledge to Crack Down on ‘Deadbeat Dads’ (Part I).

Thanks to child support expert Jane Spies of the National Family Justice Association for sending me the article. Jane discusses problems with the child support system in her recent article The Myth of the Successful Child Support System.

Background: During my youth, Jim Palmer (pictured) was pretty much the best pitcher in baseball, with the possible exception of Tom Seaver. He was usually the first starting pitcher we’d draft whenever I played Strat-O-Matic table baseball with my friends. From 1970 to 1978, Palmer went 176-97, and was voted into the Hall of Fame in 1990.

In Jim Palmer’s autobiography, Palmer and Weaver, he discusses his post-divorce relationship with his kids. Palmer praises his custody arrangement, which appears to have been quite like shared parenting:

“We’d raised our kids [in Baltimore] and were part of the community. And I’d always had the luxury, even after the divorce, of living in the same neighborhood as my kids and having them around when I was home, having breakfast with them in the morning, and them coming by on their way to school or on the way back from school, before I went to the ballpark.”

Jim has two daughters, Jamie and Kelly.

“Missouri”s child-support record-keeping is so bad that in an estimated 51,000 cases where back payments were owed, parents owed far more or less than records show.“An audit released Thursday by state Auditor Susan Montee”s office said that of 187,033 cases in which more than $1,000 in back child support was owed as of June 30, 2006, the amount owed was incorrect in 27 percent of the cases. That conclusion was based on a sample of findings from 209 cases.“In some cases, the audit found, record-keeping was so far off that parents were shown as owing $309,409 to $454,647 more than they actually owed…“It”s extremely sloppy,’ Montee said of the division”s system of tracking back child support. “It”s just a total inattention to making sure these numbers are right.’“The result, she said, is that unjustified enforcement actions against some parents — like paycheck deductions or confiscation of passports — may be taking place…”On numerous occasions I’ve discussed the fact that child support enforcement agencies’ information about child support obligors is often faulty, and that many fathers are unfairly victimized because of it.

In the new Kansas City Star article Audit criticizes Missouri”s child-support record-keeping, we learn that a new audit of Missouri child support found that “the amount owed was incorrect in 27 percent of the cases” and “record-keeping was so far off that parents were shown as owing $309,409 to $454,647 more than they actually owed.” Moreover, these errors “may” have led, um, to some “unjustified enforcement actions against some parents.” Oops.

Keep this in mind the next time you hear some chest-thumping District Attorney or Attorney General pledge to crack down on so-called “deadbeat dads.” Often the fathers targeted claim that they have been the victim of mistakes, and this audit again demonstrates that sometimes they’re right.

Tim Hoover, the Kansas City Star reporter, deserves credit for his frank reporting of this story. I suggest that readers send him a quick note to thank him–click here. The full story is here.

Thanks to child support expert Jane Spies of the National Family Justice Association for sending me the article. Jane discusses problems with the child support system in her recent article The Myth of the Successful Child Support System.

“‘Elian II,’ the sequel we hoped never to see, is what fathers’ groups are calling a Miami case that once again highlights our confusion about paternal rights in child custody battles…“The principle is…Does the biological father, assuming he is fit, have a right to his own child? The answer should seem obvious: Not yes, but hell yes…“Projecting our own values, it’s easy to imagine that [the five-year-old girl at the center of the custody battle] would be materially better off in America. We’d all prefer to live among prosperity in a free country than in relative poverty under a communist dictatorship.

“But that’s not the point. We don’t disenfranchise parents or deny children their natural parents, assuming they’re fit, based on politics, income or material goods…[the girl]…should have been put on a plane back to Cuba as soon as her mother was determined unfit.

“[The girl] had a father then. She has one now.”

I mentioned the other day that I had contacted syndicated columnist Kathleen Parker of the Washington Post Writers Group about the Elian II case, and that she expressed interest. Today Parker, who is published in over 300 newspapers each week, came out with an article on the case in which she endorsed embattled Cuban father Rafael Izquierdo in his struggle to get his five-year-old daughter out of foster care so he can return home with her.

This week I partnered with Dr. Ned Holstein and Fathers & Families in a campaign to protest this injustice. Thousands of you have answered our call to action, the campaign has been covered by the Associated Press and many others, and Florida DCF has opened a dialogue with us. To learn more or to join our campaign, click here.

Parker is concerned about the decline of fatherhood, and was one of the most articulate defenders of Juan Miguel Gonzalez during the original Elian Gonzalez case in 1999/2000. Her new column is Elian II: The Sequel (10/19/07).

Background: Charlotte Hardwick’s Dear Judge (Kid’s Letters to the Judge) is a fascinating collection of letters which children caught in divorces have written to family law judges.

In the letter below, a young girl blames herself for her parents’ divorce.

Dear Judge,

I think my mom and dad are fighting because of me. Could you put me in a new family so my mom and dad can be happy again?

Sandy S.

Background: In the outrageous “Elian Gonzalez II” case in Miami, Rafael Izquierdo, a fit, loving father, has faced numerous obstacles to reunite with his 5-year-old daughter. From day one of this case, the Florida Department of Children & Families has done everything in its power to separate Rafael Izquierdo from his little girl.

This week I partnered with Dr. Ned Holstein and Fathers & Families in a campaign to protest this injustice. Thousands of you have answered our call to action, the campaign has been covered by the Associated Press and others, and Florida DCF has opened a dialogue with us. To learn more or to join our campaign, click here. Syndicated columnist Kathleen Parker, who is published in over 300 newspapers every week, is concerned about the decline of fatherhood, and was one of the most articulate defenders of Juan Miguel Gonzalez during the original Elian Gonzalez case in 1999/2000. She has covered our campaigns in the past, including our Campaign Against PBS’s Father-Bashing Breaking the Silence in this column, and has expressed interest in our Elian Gonzalez II campaign.
Below I reprint excerpts from one of Parker’s best columns–When did fathers become fair game? (12/12/99)–written during Elian Gonzalez I. Parker wrote:

“The persistent negative messages about fathers as abandoners, ‘deadbeats,’ or batterers is so pervasive – and has been so successful – that we readily condemn men guilty of nothing.

“Just as readily, apparently, many Americans have been willing to essentially kidnap a child from his only living parent on the basis that, well, he’s only a father.

“My mail the past few days following a column in which I insisted the boy be returned to his father – Juan Miguel Gonzalez – underscores the strength of this bias against fathers. Though the majority agreed, a disturbing many questioned the father’s ‘motives’ in trying to get back his son. Love isn’t enough, apparently; there must be an ulterior motive.

“Readers suggested variously that the father might be an abuser. After all, he and his wife were divorced, surely through no fault of the woman’s. Or, as one wrote, ‘He may have been boozing, whoring, gambling, etc, instead of loving. It may be that she (the mother) went to such desperate measures to escape his influence on her son.’

“Maybe. Then again, maybe not. Shouldn’t we presume that fathers are as good as mothers absent evidence to the contrary. Why do fathers have to prove they’re fit, while mothers enjoy our instant support? The gender bias implicit in such questions – and the inherent prejudice against fathers – has rarely been so clear…

“Critics of Elian’s return to Cuba have justified their position by saying we know nothing of the father. We don’t know his birth sign or his suit size, that’s true, but we do know that the father loves his child and had an ongoing relationship with him, according to Elian’s own U.S. relatives.

“That’s good enough for me, but there’s more. Juan Miguel Gonzalez was a custodial parent, caring for Elian during the day while his mother worked. Elian’s mother cared for him at night while his father worked as a doorman at a resort hotel. Theirs sounds like the kind of cooperative post-divorce relationship most Americans couldn’t manage if world peace depended on it.

“Now, imagine that your own child, whom you love and care for every day, suddenly disappears and is found days later floating on the open sea. Suppose he is rescued by citizens of a foreign nation, which refuses to return him to you on the basis of your country’s political system.

“Let’s just say that if I were Juan Miguel Gonzalez, the people detaining my child should consider me armed and dangerous. Juan Miguel Gonzalez deserves not only his son, but an apology and, perhaps, a congressional medal for self-restraint.”

I 100% agree with that last sentence.

Boston, MA–As a result of over 2,000 protests from around the nation, Florida’s Department of Children and Families (DCF) has asked me to meet with them this Wednesday in Miami. Our protest campaign, led by Fathers & Families in Boston and Glenn Sacks in Los Angeles, has been covered by the Orlando Sentinel, the Associated Press, nationally syndicated columnist Kathleen Parker of the Washington Post Writers Group and others. If you haven’t sent your protest yet, please do so now. It only takes two clicks. If you want to know all the facts of the case first, click here and you will find everything you might want to know.
But if you trust Glenn and I on this, just click here to go straight to the protest email, which you can modify or send as is. In this case, a Cuban mother brought her young daughter to the U.S., but quickly deteriorated psychologically and eventually attempted suicide. The DCF found that she had repeatedly hit and neglected her five-year-old girl, whose father is Cuban farmer Rafael Izquierdo, and placed the girl in temporary foster care. The DCF made no attempt to contact Izquierdo in Cuba even though it had his name and phone number. Worse, once Izquierdo learned on his own and came to the states to get his daughter, the DCF ginned up a series of now-discredited accusations against him. In September, District 11 Judge Jeri B. Cohen found that Izquierdo is a fit and committed father. But, instead of dropping its case against him, the DCF has escalated, hiring 21 lawyers to appeal Judge Cohen’s decision and to wrest custody away from a fit father so that the girl can be given permanently to her temporary foster parents. In our Wednesday meeting in Miami, I will ask DCF to drop its appeal, to get out of this girl’s life, to let her grow up in the loving care of her father, and to respect the right of fit parents to raise their own children free of government interference. I will also suggest ways that DCF can improve its outreach to non-custodial parents so that other cases like Izquierdo’s can be avoided. And I will inquire about yet another case that has come to attention, “Elian Gonzalez III.” Glenn Sacks says, “It is to DCF’s credit that they are willing to meet with those who disagree with them in this case. It shows that they have heard the massive protests of those who believe that politics should not be allowed to interfere between a child and her parents.” Once again, join this bandwagon, and add your voice to the thousands whose protests are already making a difference. Click here if you want to learn more details about the case. But if you just want to go straight to the protest email, click here. I will give you further updates after the Wednesday meeting.

Background: In the outrageous “Elian Gonzalez II” case in Miami, Rafael Izquierdo, a fit, loving father, has faced numerous obstacles to reunite with his 5-year-old daughter. From day one of this case, the Florida Department of Children & Families has done everything in its power to separate Rafael Izquierdo from his little girl.

This week I partnered with Dr. Ned Holstein and Fathers & Families in a campaign to protest this injustice. Thousands of you have answered our call to action, the campaign has been covered by the Associated Press and others, and Florida DCF has opened a dialogue with us. To learn more or to join our campaign, click here.

The Miami Herald article “Cuban child custody cases piling up” (9/21/07) reveals that there is an Elian Gonzalez III case, and apparently Florida DCF is doing the same thing to the dad as they’re doing to Rafael Izquierdo. Miami Herald reporter Carol Marbin Miller writes:

“With her father’s consent, a small child emigrates from Cuba to Miami with her mother. Some time later, the little girl’s mom is gripped by mental illness and ends up in a psychiatric hospital.

“The girl, now 5, is in the care of state child-welfare administrators. Her father, still in Cuba, wants her back.

“Sound familiar?

“Just as the battle for custody of Rafael Izquierdo’s 5-year-old daughter enters what could be its final chapter in Miami, a strikingly similar case is attracting attention.

“The new case is one of at least three involving children born in Cuba currently being handled by the Florida Department of Children & Families, which already has spent more than $250,000 in an effort to prevent Izquierdo from getting custody of his daughter…

“The other Miami case began in late August. The 5-year-old girl’s mother was involuntarily committed to a psychiatric hospital, according to DCF spokeswoman Erin Geraghty.

“The girl’s father lives in Havana and is seeking to regain custody. DCF investigators believe, however, that he has a drinking problem.

“The department has not yet discussed the girl’s plight with the dad, Geraghty said.

”’We are in the initial process of contacting the father,’ she said.

“The parents lived together in Havana, but separated when the girl was two, Geraghty said. The case has been assigned to Miami-Dade Circuit Judge Valerie Manno Schurr.

“The girl is currently in the care of her mother’s cousins. It is unclear whether they are seeking permanent custody.

“Reached by telephone in Cuba, the father declined to comment on the case…”

Interesting. In “Elian III”, DCF’s reason (or pretext) for cutting the young girl’s father out of the picture is that he may have a drinking problem. Well, maybe he does, maybe he doesn’t. But it’s strange how DCF is capable of ascertaining this intimate detail of his life, yet has somehow been unable to contact him.

DCF says they are “in the initial process of contacting the father.” They make it sound so long and difficult, but it wasn’t a problem for the Miami Herald reporter, and DCF had a lot more time than she did. I would bet that if we had his phone number from the DCF file, we could call him directly and have him on the phone in about a minute.