Unsupervised experts could harm children in family courts

Unsupervised professionals appointed by family courts in England and Wales are harming children by separating them from their mothers and forcing them to live with and have contact with fathers accused of violence and abuse, according to a new study by a UCL researcher.

Study, It was published inside Journal of Social Welfare and Family LawIt describes three devastating situations: big kids (Ages 9-17) were taken away from their mothers against their will, forced to live with their fathers despite the allegations, and sometimes court findings of abuse.

These family court decisions were made on the advice and guidance of unregulated experts who offered to detect so-called “alienation,” or finding that the mother was manipulating the children and unfairly turning them against their father.

(The highly controversial concept of “parental alienation” was criticized last year by the UN Special Rapporteur on Violence against Women and Girls, who called on governments to ban the use of the label in custody and family law cases, particularly when mothers and/or children bring credible allegations of domestic violence He will deny his history of domestic violence and abuse in pending custody cases. coercive controlphysical or sexual abuse.”)

In one of the cases analyzed, two children were taken from their mother to live with their father and were subjected to a “therapeutic residential reunification plan.” Explaining their father’s oppressive and controlling behavior, the children escaped by breaking the first floor window and jumping in the middle of the night.

In another case, two children were forced to live with their father and found their relationship with their mother restricted, despite a previous court ruling that their father was “coercive and controlling”.

Author Dr. Sonja Ayeb-Karlsson (UCL Risk and Disaster Reduction, UCL Research Group on Everyday Disasters and Violence) said: “In these shocking cases the children clearly expressed their desire to stay with their mothers but were ignored. Once they were labeled, their voices were silenced because they were ‘alienated’.” They were legally trapped and therefore unable to influence the proceedings that determined their lives.

“These cases demonstrate the harm of the ‘alienation’ belief system, which has become a legal weapon to punish and control those who speak out about their experiences of abuse. They also demonstrate the potential harm of family court-appointed ‘experts’ who claim to be educated and able to identify so-called alienation.” There are regulated and unregulated individuals.

“In the case law examined, the courts resorted to brutal efforts to reconcile children with their fathers, despite the children’s feelings and fears about living with their fathers.

“We don’t know how common these alienation treatment plans and interventions are, but six kids are six kids and their rights are too many to have their rights violated in this way.

“We must ensure that these Supreme Court cases serve as a cautionary tale rather than giving us a window into the future behavior of our family courts.”

An unregulated professional is someone who is not registered with and controlled by the Health and Care Professions Council (HCPC). Currently the HCPC regulates only a few specific psychologist titles, such as “clinical psychologistThis means that titles such as “psychologist,” “child psychologist,” and “family psychologist” are not protected and there are no legal requirements for their use.

Dr. “This poses a risk to the public as family court users may be misled into believing that a court-appointed professional is clinically trained to evaluate and diagnose their child,” Ayeb-Karlsson said. “Unmonitored experts should not guide the courts on an issue as valuable as our children’s future.”

Dr. Other measures that could minimize future risks to children include limiting expert fees, greater transparency in family courts, better evaluation and control of health professionals who evaluate and treat children through the family court system, and ending the use of the Alienation belief system in court, Ayeb-Karlsson said.

The study noted that unregulated professionals may appear to be better positioned to be trained by the family court than regulated psychologists, who, for example, call themselves “child psychologists” who specialize in evaluating children.

cases

In a case not reported in the media, the family court decided that two girls, aged 11 and 13, should cease communication with their mother and move to their father’s residence and care for 90 days, despite allegations of pressure and control. behaviors including digital surveillance, physical and sexual abuse. The older daughter, Z, had previously called mental health emergency providers from her father’s bedroom and said she would hang herself if she could not get to her mother.

The plan was suggested by an independent social worker who moved in with the father and daughters, supposedly to facilitate reconciliation. The treatment plan ended in disaster five days later, when the sisters escaped by breaking a first-floor window and then jumping. They were found by roadside workers in the early hours of the morning and taken to police custody.

Following a series of decisions, a period in foster care, and efforts to strengthen contact with his father while limiting his contact with his mother and social network, Z was allowed to return to his mother, but only after a long period of suicidal ideation and self-esteem. -harm, while her younger sister, X, was allowed to live with her mother’s new partner’s parents, she also refused to remain in her father’s care.

In the Supreme Court’s final ruling, the judge criticizes the label “parental alienation”, saying it is “completely unhelpful in situating conflict” and giving the feeling that one parent is right and in the right while the other parent is acting wrong and inappropriate. . “Somewhere in the history of this case, we lost our humanity,” he lamented.

In another case described in the research, two children, aged 9 and 12, were taken away from their mother by the family court to live with their father, on the grounds that they exhibited “alienating” behavior towards their father.

This happened despite something district judge Finding that the father had previously been “coercive and controlling” towards the mother and that there was “significant emotional abuse” in their relationship may be an indication that the children have rejected their father.

The decision was also against the children’s wishes; One of the children described their father as drunk and violent and claimed that their father had hit him.

The decision was made on the advice of a non-regulated ‘parental alienation’ expert and on the use of a tool from England’s Children and Family Court Advice and Support Service (Cafcass) which aims to assess whether ‘alienating’ behavior causes or contributes to alienation. the child’s refusal to see the parent.

Dr. Ayeb-Karlsson said: “As Cafcass operates within a framework that recognizes the existence of domestic abuse, it is not clear why the Cafcass Alienating Behavior Tool was applied in a case where the court found coercive and controlling behavior to be the reason for the children’s justified resistance.”

“We would also argue that Cafcass should abandon the use of any study tools and checklists that incorporate the belief system of ‘alienation’, particularly after the UK Government’s progress with the Domestic Abuse Act 2021,” the UN Special Rapporteur on Violence against Women and Girls said. published last year describes custody violence and the wonderful progress Cafcass has made this year with its new approaches to dealing with domestic abuse cases.”

The family court also ordered that the children continue to see a therapist with their father, despite older child B saying that the therapy “made things worse, not better” because their father did not take responsibility for his actions.

In the third case described in the investigation, two children, aged 14 and 11, were forced to move in with their father despite the mother disclosing a history of abuse by the father, including against the children. Their relationship with their mother was also severely damaged by the court’s no-contact order.

The children wrote to their school alleging physical and emotional abuse – “it hurts us physically and breaks us mentally” – but the judge overseeing the proceedings stepped in and prevented the Metropolitan Police and social services from properly investigating and interviewing the children. He stated that he found the allegations unfounded. This decision was later overturned by the Supreme Court.

Almost two years later, it was reported that the children’s feelings had changed or their hopes of being reunited with their mother had disappeared, with the final verdict being that they were happy and satisfied with their father’s care. The study notes that court-induced alienation from their mother “does not cause the same anxiety and urgency as their earlier ‘alienation’ from their father.”

The peer-reviewed article is the first of its kind to explore the experiences of the so-called “alienated child” facing “reunification interventions” in the family court system in England and Wales. The author points out a serious gap in the research of studies examining family court experiences from the child’s perspective.

The legal narrative was published in a special issue of the jurisprudence study. Journal of Social Welfare and Family Law Dedicated to the pioneering feminist family Law and legal experts Professor Felicity Kaganas from Brunel University, London, Professor Alison Diduck (UCL Law) and Dr. Edited by Adrienne Barnett.