E.V. vs. R.V.: The Mental Health Profession Abets Parental Alienation

August 7, 2014 by Robert Franklin, Esq.

The ability and the all-too-frequent tendency of mental health professionals to aid and abet one parent in the alienation of a child from its other parent is made entirely clear in this case out of Westchester County, New York. In it, the willingness of at least three mental health professionals to exchange the well-being of a little boy for pay is apparent and enough to make reasonable people gape in wonder and outrage.

But there’s good news too. The judge in the case, John P. Colangelo, fully grasped what was going on and issued an order that is sensible in every detail.  It’s not only sensible, but it looks very much like an order that actually has the best interests of the child as its object. If his recitation of the facts of the case and his order are any indication, Judge Colangelo appears to be that rarest of birds – a judge who gets it. Most basically, he understands the concept of and the need for equal parenting. He understands parental alienation and its terribly deleterious consequences for children. And he understands the law. Specifically, when a statute requires a parent to promote the relationship of a child with the other parent, it means just that.

E.V. (the mother) and R.V. (the father) divorced in 2009 when their son G. was four years old. The trial judge gave each parent half time with G. E. immediately went about attempting to sabotage both that order and R’s relationship with his son. She carried on the campaign for over three years and, for about two years was all but completely successful. Without the avid and well-paid assistance of two mental health professionals, she could never have separated G. from his father to the extent she did. A third mental health professional, no less well-paid, did what he could, but failed to be of much help to E. in her war of alienation.

Both E. and R. were found by the court to be highly intelligent, affluent and successful in their careers. Both are acknowledged by all to be loving parents to G. But from the very beginning, E. did everything in her power to remove R. from his son’s life.

She appealed the original equal custody order and, when that order was unanimously upheld, she fired her lawyers and hired new ones. She then set out on a search for mental health professionals who would support her in her claims that R. was a detriment to his son and should be marginalized in his life. She did so despite the fact that G. was a healthy, happy, well-adjusted child with no need for psychotherapy.

She didn’t have to look far. It’s true that more than one therapist turned her down when it became clear that she wanted a doctor who would engage in a frank conflict of interest. She wanted a professional who would act as both therapist to G. and testify against his father in court, and, to their credit, some professionals refused the invitation. (Indeed, it is precisely that conflict of interest that helped get New Jersey psychologist Marsha Kleinman’s license to practice revoked.)

Less scrupulous was psychologist Daniel Lobel who, under the guise of helping G. in his relationship with his father (that had been damaged by E.’s alienation), openly exacerbated her alienation of the little boy. By the time Lobel was finished with the child, G. was almost never seeing his father and then only via Skype, never in person.

To accomplish the feat of abetting a mother’s alienation of her child from his father, Lobel had to work hard. Most notably, he had to avoid any information that might contradict what E. was telling him – that G. hated and feared his father. So, for example, he never once did the obvious thing of simply having G. and his father come to his office together and watch them interact. Had he done so, he’d have been confronted by the fact that, as the court-appointed forensic psychologist found, father and son got along very well and were entirely comfortable in each other’s presence.

But Lobel had bigger fish to fry than assisting the welfare of a child in his “care.” He had money to make and E.’s behavior made it clear that any doctor who didn’t back up her story would be replaced by another who would. Had he crossed E., Lobel would have been out the door in a heartbeat. For his visits with E. and G., he charged $275 an hour, but for his testimony in court, his fee went up to a whopping $6,000 a day. If my arithmetic is correct, E. ended up paying Lobel almost $100,000 for his assistance.

But he wasn’t the only one. As part of his professional intervention, Lobel decided he needed another mental health professional to evaluate G. That was E.’s cue to once again seek out a doctor who would assist in her alienation of G. She had to go to Manhattan, 50 miles away, to find one, but as usual, E. was equal to the task.

However, Dr. Lobel proved unable to promptly coax out of G., during his sessions with him, any significant statements critical of his father, or the time spent with him. (See Tr. pp. 1087; 1111 – 1115; 1087; 1153). Instead, beginning in January 2010, G. discussed with Dr. Lobel his difficulties in adjusting to the changes in his young life that had been caused by E. — including her remarriage and changing homes on multiple occasions — and his anger directed not toward R., but toward his stepfather C. R., anger that resulted in at least three physical altercations with C. R.. (Tr. at 1064; 1074-1081; 1098-1110). However, Dr. Lobel soon justified E.’s selection of him. Based not upon the Child’s reports to him or his direct observations of G., but upon E. and C. R.’s reports to Dr. Lobel of what G. purportedly told them and their alleged observations, Dr. Lobel provided a recommendation for a formal psychiatric evaluation of G. (Tr. 1122-1123; 3192). This was certainly music to E.’s ears; she responded to this siren song in June 2010 by retaining psychiatrist Dr. Donna Moreau with offices in New York City — 50 miles from G.’s home — to perform the evaluation.

On her island in the city, Dr. Moreau paid dividends almost immediately. Having never spoken with R., having never observed his interaction with his son and relying almost exclusively on information gleaned from E., Dr. Moreau produced a report diagnosing G. with Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder and Generalized Anxiety Disorder. Armed with that report, E. virtually flew to the court seeking an order strictly limiting R.’s access to his son. And, having nothing but that report before it, the court changed the parenting time order, restricting R.’s time with G. to only every other weekend.

That too was too much for E. She continued her campaign alienation assisted by Dr. Lobel, that soon resulted in R.’s seeing his son only occasionally via Skype. Needless to say, R. filed motions in court to change the custody arrangement and to get his son back.

His efforts resulted in a hearing on custody that lasted 44 days and stretched out over 16 months. Interestingly though, 25 days of that hearing were taken up with E.’s testimony and another seven by Dr. Lobel’s. E.’s lawyers called no other witnesses and R. was the only witness called by his attorneys. The balance of the hearing was taken up by the court-appointed expert, Dr. Stephen Herman.

To put it mildly, the judge was less than impressed with E. and Lobel. From the start it was clear that the two had collaborated in alienating G. from his father and E., for her part, didn’t balk at lying and dissembling under oath.

Put simply, E. was not a credible witness. Her testimony was frequently a study in evasion; she answered few questions directly, feigned ignorance or failure to understand simple terms such as "consequences" (Tr. 3556), "discuss" or "explain" (Tr. 2524-2528) and claimed that she, for some unknown reason, could not answer a question which appeared to the uncoached eye more than susceptible to a straightforward response. Indeed, her too clever-by-half refusal to directly answer a direct question needlessly prolonged the Hearing; her testimony alone consumed over 25 days. And the substance of the testimony she did give often seemed, to put it charitably, difficult to comprehend. Her inveterate refusal to admit to any tangible foible in her care of G. — even when such shortcomings were obvious, such as the several and frequent moves to different houses shortly after the parties’ divorce — and her failure to find virtually anything at all good to say about R. calls into question the veracity of much of her testimony.

But, bad a witness as she was, Lobel gave her a run for her money, literally. The first problem was Lobel’s clear conflict of interest whereby he acted as G.’s treating psychologist in which role he was expected to attempt to help the child, while testifying for his mother in court, i.e. assisting her efforts to remove G.’s father from his life. Second was the matter of his exorbitant fees.

Third, it came out at trial that Dr. Lobel had given a speech on parental alienation during a symposium of the American College of Forensic Psychology. In it he had described the E.V./R.V. case in detail using pseudonyms and stated that E.’s behavior “looked like parental alienation.” Knowing this, he nevertheless continued to assist her in doing just that.

Each step recommended by Dr. Lobel decreased contact between G. and his father, from weekend visitation at R.’s home, to day visits in a park, to regular Skype calls, to virtually no contact whatsoever, a path leading inexorably to the unstated but apparent goal of G.’s mother — a world of G. and E. without R. at all.

Finally, having done precisely the opposite of what a treating physician of any stripe is supposed to do, Dr. Lobel had the gall to tell the court that G. should see yet another mental health professional to mend his relationship with R, i.e. the very relationship Lobel had played such an important part in damaging. That seemed to grate on the trial judge more even than Dr. Lobel’s other deficiencies.

Then there was Dr. Moreau. Sensing, as they surely did, that Moreau would be ripped to shreds on cross-examination, E. and her lawyers decided not to call her to testify, a fact noted by the court. Why would she have made such a vulnerable witness? Principally because her diagnoses of PTSD and Generalized Anxiety Disorder were based almost entirely on an “event” that never happened and that all, including E. never seriously pretended had.

It seems that G. once mentioned that his father had applied some sort of cream to his buttocks due to a rash. As every parent knows, this is not uncommon. But E. seized on it with the fury of a ravenous wolf. Moreover, she decided that the routine application of medication by R. had actually been the insertion of the entire tube of cream into the boy’s rectum. Now again, even E. never believed that had happened, but she related the claim to Moreau who duly put it in her report and based her entire diagnosis on it. No wonder she wasn’t asked to testify.

This version of the story, although often repeated by E. when it suited her purposes (see H. Tr., pp 86-88; Herman Report, Court Exh. I at 25, 28; Tr. at 2769-2770), was clearly thought by her to be apochophal (sic), as evidenced by the fact that it was never believed to be true by her or anyone else who heard it. Neither E. nor a cavalcade of mandated reporters — including G.’s pediatrician, his treating therapist Dr. Lobel, the consulting psychiatrist Dr. Moreau, or anyone else — ever reported R. or this alleged incident to any authority, including the Department of Social Services ("DSS") or Child Protective Services (H. Tr. at 80-86; Herman Rpt., Court Exh. I at 25, 28-29; Tr. 2769-2770). Significantly, when Plaintiff had an opportunity to raise this "butt cream" issue with both R. and G.’s pediatrician while meeting jointly with them, she — incredibly — chose not to do so. (Tr. 2743-2748). Her reticence spoke volumes.

The only independent expert in the case, Dr. Stephen Herman, was appointed by the court. He examined G. over a period of six months and ascertained that the child was suffering from no trauma or disorder, that he had a good relationship with his father and his father with him. In fact, Herman was the only doctor to have taken the simple, obvious step of observing R. and G. together. Their interactions and his examination of the child convinced him that the only thing wrong with the boy stemmed from his mother’s dogged efforts to keep him from his father. His recommendation that G. be gradually restored to his father was carefully considered by the court and rejected.

And that rejection is what tells us for certain that this judge knows what he’s doing. That’s because Herman remained convinced that E. should have primary custody. Just why that is remains a mystery, at least in part. The court clears it up for us.

Dr. Herman’s ultimate custody recommendations — whether made at the time of his Report or at the time he gave his testimony as the first witness of the Hearing — were made without the benefit of the following salient facts revealed during the course of the Hearing:

 

(1) That E. received extensive — over 50 hours — of preparation for her forensic interview with Dr. Herman from a fellow expert, Dr. Jonathan Gould. (Tr. at 2946-3007; Deft. Exh. OOO).

(2) That Dr. Lobel expressed a view that conduct of an allegedly "fictional" mother with a "fictional" child Ulysses — a child who was struggling and engaging in conduct strikingly similar to G. — may have been exhibiting signs of "parent alienation syndrome"; nor did Dr. Herman have the benefit of Dr. Lobel’s extensive files or the fact that the cost of his Court appearance, paid by E., far exceeded his regular hourly rate for his time;

(3) That Dr. Lobel had been hired more for the purpose of litigation rather than therapy, as witnessed by the above as well as the fact that he was the sole potential therapist interviewed by E. who was not at all reticent about serving as both therapist and witnesses, despite the obvious conflict posed by a therapist’s assumption of such a dual role;

(4) That G. had experienced significant difficulties in school and home as a result of disruption in his life caused by E.’s remarriage and rapid, successive relocations to the extent that G. physically attacked and drew blood from his new step-father C. R. — not R. — during that period;

(5) That E. had enlisted her personal therapist — Dr. Patricia Gallagher — for advice and strategy in her custody battle. (Tr. 2683-2687; 3057; 3057-3061).

(6) That E. made every effort to stop the implementation of even Dr. Herman’s own modest recommendations aimed at restoring a personal — rather than electronic — relationship between G. and R., and testified that requiring G. to spend time with his father would amount to a "punishment" for G. (Tr. 2486-2487).

(7) Nor did Dr. Herman have the benefit of R.’s testimony and photographic exhibits that, contrary to E.’s professed fears, showed G. enjoying vacation time with his father both in July 2010 and August 2012 — enjoyment expressed by G. (Tr. 4436-4441; Deft. Exhs. T and OOOO). When E. was shown such photos of the July 2010 vacation of G. and R., even she was compelled to concede that they depicted a happy child, enjoying time with his father — similar to what Dr. Herman observed when he first saw G. and R. together — not the blank expression of an inmate or survivor of Post Traumatic Stress. (Tr. 3368 – 3378; Deft. Exh. T).

So the court, aware of much that Dr. Herman wasn’t, rejected his recommendation and gave sole legal custody to R. including the power to make all significant decisions about G.’s upbringing on his own without prior consultation with E. Moreover, the court ordered 50/50 parenting time on a week-on/week-off basis.

Is that sensible given E.’s tireless efforts to alienate G. from his father? Time will tell. It’s a fair guess that her next move will be to abduct G., but we can’t know that now. For the time being, I think Judge Colangelo’s decision was the right one. I’ve said it before: children need both parents and all agree that E. is a loving and capable mother. She doesn’t look to be a likeable person, but that sort of animus isn’t what should determine what’s best for G. It’s no more right to remove a mother from a child’s life than it is a father.

Yes, she’s abused G. Parental alienation constitutes child abuse and she’s guilty as charged. But G. appears to have not suffered unduly. When he’s with his father he responds immediately, warmly and naturally. E. engaged in a campaign of alienation, but it wasn’t very successful. G. appears to be relatively unscathed and that shouldn’t mean he loses his mother.

Of course, if she continues her alienation, the court should revisit the matter and restrict her contact to supervised visitation.

Oh, and about that third mental health professional I mentioned at the outset. He’s Dr. Jon Gould referred to but once in Number (1) above. I’ll write more about him and the practice of litigant preparation by mental health professionals next time.

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