Dad is identified as ROBERT SMITH SR.
http://www.cbsnews.com/news/washington-d-c-father-admits-to-squeezing-5-week-old-son-to-death/
By Crimesider Staff CBS News August 20, 2015, 2:40 PM
D.C. father admits to squeezing 5-week-old son to death
WUSA9
WASHINGTON -- The D.C. man arrested for the Aug. 4 death of a five-week-old infant admitted he would squeeze the child to get him to stop crying, reports CBS affiliate WUSA.
Robert Smith Sr. of Northwest, D.C. was charged with first degree felony murder in connection with the death of five-week-old Robert Smith Jr. of Northwest, D.C., police said.
Smith admitted in court that when the child would become fussy, he would squeeze the child to stop him from crying, reports the station. He reportedly did this throughout the infant's short life. According to court documents, Smith called himself a "monster" and says no one else, including the baby's mother, knew what he was doing.
According to reports, officers responded to the D.C. house where the infant was found for a death investigation on the afternoon of Aug. 4th. According to the station, the officers found a man performing CPR on an infant child when they arrived on scene.
The baby was taken to the hospital, where he was pronounced dead, reports the affiliate. The cause of death was determined to be multiple blunt force injuries in the manner of homicide, police said.
According to the station, police had previously stated that there was nothing suspicious about the infant's death.
Showing posts with label Washington DC. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Washington DC. Show all posts
Wednesday, August 26, 2015
Saturday, May 30, 2015
The Hague upholds US custody rulling: 10-year-old girl returned to junkie child molester dad (Washington, DC)
Sickening that a father like DAVID HUNTER is not only NOT behind bars, but getting custody of a 10-year-old girl. This is directly due to the courts being infiltrated and controlled by the fathers rights/pro-pedophile groups.
http://www.commdiginews.com/family-today/international-custody-quagmire-court-sends-girl-to-father-she-fears-42513/
International custody quagmire: Court sends girl to father she fears
by Michael Volpe - May 30, 2015 1 128
Despite expert opinion warning against it, The Hague upheld US custody rulings and sent "Ruby" now aged 10 or 11 to live with her father who she says has been sexually abusing her since age 5
WASHINGTON, May 30, 2015 – A court in The Hague recently forced a child to live with the father she claims has molested her. This is the same court which recently heard cases involving notorious international criminal scofflaws like José Maria Sison, Frans Van Anratt, Heshamuddin Hesam, and Habubullah Jalazoy.
Geerte Frenken first met David Hunter in 1998 while doing intake work for with Ibogaine for Ibeginagain, an alternative detoxification clinic for hard drug addicts, where Hunter was a patient. According to statements Hunter made on the internet, he has been using drugs off and on since he was eleven years old.
Frenken and Hunter met again in 2000 in San Francisco. They began dating and married in 2001. They had a daughter “Ruby” in 2004.
Frenken told CDN that when “Ruby” was about six months old, Frenken caught Hunter doing heroin. Later the same week, he admitted he was having an affair. The marriage, Frenken said, quickly fell apart. She and Ruby moved to Texas a few months later.
Frenken said that she had primary custody of Ruby, with Hunter getting visitation. Hunter, says Frenken, never asked for sole custody until allegations that he was molesting Ruby surfaced.
Frenken said that initially Hunter only visited Ruby sporadically. This lack of consistency became a source of tensions between Frenken and Hunter, because Frenken wanted Hunter to participate more regularly in Ruby’s life.
An email from Frenken to Hunter on December 4, 2008, reflects that view.
In the email, Frenken writes,
“Can we get back to the discussion of earlier this year where you said you would be coming more regularly? At that point we talked about every six weeks. I understand if that is not feasible financially any longer, but I think there is a serious need for some consistency- a regular schedule Ruby can get used to.”
In 2009, a Nevada County Court, California family court gave Frenken custody of Ruby 80% of the time with the rest to Hunter. However, Judge Julie McManus of Nevada County then changed the custody agreement, giving both Frenken and Hunter 50% custody.
In 2010, Hunter admitted to a drug relapse and failed two drug tests. Hunter was required by the courts to provide Frenken with the results of his drug tests. However, when he started to fail those tests, Frenken lacked the financial ability to challenge the custody ruling with the court.
Hunter told CDN that the failed drug tests were for prescription drugs. However, test results revealed levels of opiates, the primary ingredient in heroin.
Frenken said that around this time, “Ruby” started coming home angry and agitated from visits with her father.
“Ruby comes back from the visit with uncontrollable behavior again. Similar scenario as the previous visits: kicking, screaming, biting herself, biting me, bedwetting etc.” Frenken said of one visit. “This time she also starts leaving the lights on, even during the day and she won’t let me out of her sight. I even have to go to the bathroom with her. In my mind I am thinking: ‘what is going on’? She tells me she was being forced along a steep cliff by her father and she was afraid.”
In 2011, Frenken took Ruby to Kathryn Carter, a child therapist in Texas. Carter’s report concluded that Ruby was processing “humiliation, cruelty and revenge” and noted “sexualized behavior.”
In 2012, Frenken’s mother in the Netherlands became ill. Frenken and Ruby went to the Netherlands for what should have been a short visit.
During that trip to the Netherlands, Frenken said her daughter confided that Hunter had been “touching me in the private parts” and that this had gone on since she was four years old.
Days later, Ruby was referred by Dutch Child Protective Services to a State Mental Health Institute for Children called GG Net Jeugd where for the next eight months experts in child abuse tested, interviewed, and investigated the claims.
Dr. Rita Zecher Ianhoro led the investigation and submitted a report January 31, 2013.
“I ask her what the visits with father were like. Ruby becomes anxious and the building blocks with which she was building a portal on the table fall down. ‘Father should be locked up,’ says Ruby.” Dr. Zecher’s report stated. “When I ask why, Ruby becomes angry, ‘because he touched my private parts.’ When I ask when this started, Ruby said it happened at age 4 and when she was five and six years old.”
“Since the start of her treatment, Ruby states that she definitely does not want to return to her father. She is quite emphatic about this,” reported Dr. Zecher.
Frenken said that when she told Hunter about the results of the investigation and about her intention to stay in the Netherlands because she no longer had the funds to fight custody he filed an appeal with the International Court in The Hague demanding that Ruby return to the United States.
Hunter, his current U.S. attorney Kelly Reiter, and Dona Woods Glanz, who represented him in custody hearings in Nevada County from 2009 to 2014, all say the charges against Hunter are false.
“These incidents did not happen,” Glanz said.
Hunter added that he was “thoroughly investigated by the Fairfax Police Dept. and the Marin County DA’s special investigator on all of her allegations, all of which were dismissed.” Hunter also stated that the DA’s office and Child Protective Services conducted the investigation. He also claimed that Ruby was questioned in his presence. If true, this would represent a substantial breach of protocol for investigations of child abuse.
CDN could not independently verify that any investigation has been conducted.
“I think she suffers from some pretty serious mental health issues,” Reiter said about Frenken in a voice mail. Those sentiments were echoed by Hunter in an email, “You sir, are dealing with a pathological liar / hypocritical ex-junkie/ sexworker woman with serious emotional problems.” But a 2010 custody evaluation paints a more complicated picture, showing that both parents were dealing with some normal psychological issues.
“Dave scored in the high category on the histrionic clinical personality scale, and in the low category on the compulsive, narcissistic, and antisocial clinical personality scales, in that order.”
“Regarding diagnostic impressions, Geerte’s psychological testing is associated with moderate paranoid personality functioning, and partial breakdowns of reality testing under stress. Concerns with respect to psychosomatic problems were also suggested, but this may be an understandable spike in her psychological testing based on her ongoing physical disability issues.”
Frenken said that the child abuse team at GG Net was not allowed to testify at The Hague. Ruby, according to Frenken, did testify, and repeated that she didn’t want to go back with her father.
According to information from the Court,
“In the interview for this appeal the minor child showed a great resistance to returning to the USA. She does not want to return because she is afraid the Father will visit her and states she does not feel safe with him. She is very angry because she has the feeling no one is listening to her.”
The Hague Court dismissed Ruby’s testimony stating that it was of the opinion “that the minor child did not show a sufficient degree of maturity during the hearing in the judge’s chambers, so that the views of child cannot be taken into account.”
Frenken’s Dutch attorney, Ariane Hendriks, said that the psychiatrist hired by The Hague court also concluded that Ruby should not be reunited with her father:
“(a) child psychologist spoke with Ruby during the cross-border mediation that took place between Geert and Mr. Hunter. The child psychologist had agreed to supervise a meeting between Ruby and her father within the context of the mediation UNLESS she would find that Ruby’s resistance against meeting her father was so strong that in her professional opinion, enforced contact would be against Ruby’s best interests. And this is what she found. No supervised meeting took place during mediation because the child psychologist was of the opinion that this was not responsible.”
The Hague ignored Ruby’s request and recommendations by both psychologists, and ruled in jurisdictional grounds,
“Now that the grounds for refusal as referred to in Article 1 paragraph 13, subparagraph b, and paragraph 2 do not apply, while less than one year has passed since the illegal detention and submitting the petition, the minor child must be returned at once.”
The decision stated that since a US court gave joint custody to both parents in the USA, this situation should continue. #In issuing this decision, The Hague Court ignored its own convention which states that a child would not be sent back if, “there is a grave risk that his or her return would expose the child to physical or psychological harm or otherwise place the child in an intolerable situation. The judicial or administrative authority may also refuse to order the return of the child if it finds that the child objects to being returned and has attained an age and degree of maturity at which it is appropriate to take account of its views.”
An email to The Hague Court was not returned.
On May 21, 2015, Hunter’s girlfriend emailed Frenken, scolding her for starting a website on the story. However, in the email she suggested that Hunter was in fact abusing her daughter,
“You name her school and show her photos though. She will be a teenager soon and will have Internet access, if you were a young victim of abuse; would you want all that splashed all over the world for anyone to see?”
She later clarified to CDN that she only wrote this because Frenken believes the claims,
“My comment was taken entirely wrong. I only meant for Geerte to reconsider sharing all that personal information in the permanent context of cyber space. I believe that Geerte was, personally, a young victim of abuse and I believe she’s putting all her past experiences onto Ruby.”
Frenken denies that she was ever abused and this purported claim, she told CDN, is part of a campaign to gas-light her.
Neither Hunter nor his girlfriend provided any evidence, besides their accusations, that Frenken had been abused.
After the verdict, Frenken hid with Ruby for about six months. She then returned to the Netherlands, at which point a SWAT team removed Ruby from her custody. Ruby was then deported back to the United States.
Ruby has been living with her father since April 2014. Frenken said she has been allowed only one session on Skype with Ruby over the last six weeks.
While CDN is the first media to cover this story in the USA, her story has received some traction in the Netherlands.
Reiter said Ruby is doing “great” since moving back to the USA. She also admitted, however, that she has had no personal contact with Ruby.
http://www.commdiginews.com/family-today/international-custody-quagmire-court-sends-girl-to-father-she-fears-42513/
International custody quagmire: Court sends girl to father she fears
by Michael Volpe - May 30, 2015 1 128
Despite expert opinion warning against it, The Hague upheld US custody rulings and sent "Ruby" now aged 10 or 11 to live with her father who she says has been sexually abusing her since age 5
WASHINGTON, May 30, 2015 – A court in The Hague recently forced a child to live with the father she claims has molested her. This is the same court which recently heard cases involving notorious international criminal scofflaws like José Maria Sison, Frans Van Anratt, Heshamuddin Hesam, and Habubullah Jalazoy.
Geerte Frenken first met David Hunter in 1998 while doing intake work for with Ibogaine for Ibeginagain, an alternative detoxification clinic for hard drug addicts, where Hunter was a patient. According to statements Hunter made on the internet, he has been using drugs off and on since he was eleven years old.
Frenken and Hunter met again in 2000 in San Francisco. They began dating and married in 2001. They had a daughter “Ruby” in 2004.
Frenken told CDN that when “Ruby” was about six months old, Frenken caught Hunter doing heroin. Later the same week, he admitted he was having an affair. The marriage, Frenken said, quickly fell apart. She and Ruby moved to Texas a few months later.
Frenken said that she had primary custody of Ruby, with Hunter getting visitation. Hunter, says Frenken, never asked for sole custody until allegations that he was molesting Ruby surfaced.
Frenken said that initially Hunter only visited Ruby sporadically. This lack of consistency became a source of tensions between Frenken and Hunter, because Frenken wanted Hunter to participate more regularly in Ruby’s life.
An email from Frenken to Hunter on December 4, 2008, reflects that view.
In the email, Frenken writes,
“Can we get back to the discussion of earlier this year where you said you would be coming more regularly? At that point we talked about every six weeks. I understand if that is not feasible financially any longer, but I think there is a serious need for some consistency- a regular schedule Ruby can get used to.”
In 2009, a Nevada County Court, California family court gave Frenken custody of Ruby 80% of the time with the rest to Hunter. However, Judge Julie McManus of Nevada County then changed the custody agreement, giving both Frenken and Hunter 50% custody.
In 2010, Hunter admitted to a drug relapse and failed two drug tests. Hunter was required by the courts to provide Frenken with the results of his drug tests. However, when he started to fail those tests, Frenken lacked the financial ability to challenge the custody ruling with the court.
Hunter told CDN that the failed drug tests were for prescription drugs. However, test results revealed levels of opiates, the primary ingredient in heroin.
Frenken said that around this time, “Ruby” started coming home angry and agitated from visits with her father.
“Ruby comes back from the visit with uncontrollable behavior again. Similar scenario as the previous visits: kicking, screaming, biting herself, biting me, bedwetting etc.” Frenken said of one visit. “This time she also starts leaving the lights on, even during the day and she won’t let me out of her sight. I even have to go to the bathroom with her. In my mind I am thinking: ‘what is going on’? She tells me she was being forced along a steep cliff by her father and she was afraid.”
In 2011, Frenken took Ruby to Kathryn Carter, a child therapist in Texas. Carter’s report concluded that Ruby was processing “humiliation, cruelty and revenge” and noted “sexualized behavior.”
In 2012, Frenken’s mother in the Netherlands became ill. Frenken and Ruby went to the Netherlands for what should have been a short visit.
During that trip to the Netherlands, Frenken said her daughter confided that Hunter had been “touching me in the private parts” and that this had gone on since she was four years old.
Days later, Ruby was referred by Dutch Child Protective Services to a State Mental Health Institute for Children called GG Net Jeugd where for the next eight months experts in child abuse tested, interviewed, and investigated the claims.
Dr. Rita Zecher Ianhoro led the investigation and submitted a report January 31, 2013.
“I ask her what the visits with father were like. Ruby becomes anxious and the building blocks with which she was building a portal on the table fall down. ‘Father should be locked up,’ says Ruby.” Dr. Zecher’s report stated. “When I ask why, Ruby becomes angry, ‘because he touched my private parts.’ When I ask when this started, Ruby said it happened at age 4 and when she was five and six years old.”
“Since the start of her treatment, Ruby states that she definitely does not want to return to her father. She is quite emphatic about this,” reported Dr. Zecher.
Frenken said that when she told Hunter about the results of the investigation and about her intention to stay in the Netherlands because she no longer had the funds to fight custody he filed an appeal with the International Court in The Hague demanding that Ruby return to the United States.
Hunter, his current U.S. attorney Kelly Reiter, and Dona Woods Glanz, who represented him in custody hearings in Nevada County from 2009 to 2014, all say the charges against Hunter are false.
“These incidents did not happen,” Glanz said.
Hunter added that he was “thoroughly investigated by the Fairfax Police Dept. and the Marin County DA’s special investigator on all of her allegations, all of which were dismissed.” Hunter also stated that the DA’s office and Child Protective Services conducted the investigation. He also claimed that Ruby was questioned in his presence. If true, this would represent a substantial breach of protocol for investigations of child abuse.
CDN could not independently verify that any investigation has been conducted.
“I think she suffers from some pretty serious mental health issues,” Reiter said about Frenken in a voice mail. Those sentiments were echoed by Hunter in an email, “You sir, are dealing with a pathological liar / hypocritical ex-junkie/ sexworker woman with serious emotional problems.” But a 2010 custody evaluation paints a more complicated picture, showing that both parents were dealing with some normal psychological issues.
“Dave scored in the high category on the histrionic clinical personality scale, and in the low category on the compulsive, narcissistic, and antisocial clinical personality scales, in that order.”
“Regarding diagnostic impressions, Geerte’s psychological testing is associated with moderate paranoid personality functioning, and partial breakdowns of reality testing under stress. Concerns with respect to psychosomatic problems were also suggested, but this may be an understandable spike in her psychological testing based on her ongoing physical disability issues.”
Frenken said that the child abuse team at GG Net was not allowed to testify at The Hague. Ruby, according to Frenken, did testify, and repeated that she didn’t want to go back with her father.
According to information from the Court,
“In the interview for this appeal the minor child showed a great resistance to returning to the USA. She does not want to return because she is afraid the Father will visit her and states she does not feel safe with him. She is very angry because she has the feeling no one is listening to her.”
The Hague Court dismissed Ruby’s testimony stating that it was of the opinion “that the minor child did not show a sufficient degree of maturity during the hearing in the judge’s chambers, so that the views of child cannot be taken into account.”
Frenken’s Dutch attorney, Ariane Hendriks, said that the psychiatrist hired by The Hague court also concluded that Ruby should not be reunited with her father:
“(a) child psychologist spoke with Ruby during the cross-border mediation that took place between Geert and Mr. Hunter. The child psychologist had agreed to supervise a meeting between Ruby and her father within the context of the mediation UNLESS she would find that Ruby’s resistance against meeting her father was so strong that in her professional opinion, enforced contact would be against Ruby’s best interests. And this is what she found. No supervised meeting took place during mediation because the child psychologist was of the opinion that this was not responsible.”
The Hague ignored Ruby’s request and recommendations by both psychologists, and ruled in jurisdictional grounds,
“Now that the grounds for refusal as referred to in Article 1 paragraph 13, subparagraph b, and paragraph 2 do not apply, while less than one year has passed since the illegal detention and submitting the petition, the minor child must be returned at once.”
The decision stated that since a US court gave joint custody to both parents in the USA, this situation should continue. #In issuing this decision, The Hague Court ignored its own convention which states that a child would not be sent back if, “there is a grave risk that his or her return would expose the child to physical or psychological harm or otherwise place the child in an intolerable situation. The judicial or administrative authority may also refuse to order the return of the child if it finds that the child objects to being returned and has attained an age and degree of maturity at which it is appropriate to take account of its views.”
An email to The Hague Court was not returned.
On May 21, 2015, Hunter’s girlfriend emailed Frenken, scolding her for starting a website on the story. However, in the email she suggested that Hunter was in fact abusing her daughter,
“You name her school and show her photos though. She will be a teenager soon and will have Internet access, if you were a young victim of abuse; would you want all that splashed all over the world for anyone to see?”
She later clarified to CDN that she only wrote this because Frenken believes the claims,
“My comment was taken entirely wrong. I only meant for Geerte to reconsider sharing all that personal information in the permanent context of cyber space. I believe that Geerte was, personally, a young victim of abuse and I believe she’s putting all her past experiences onto Ruby.”
Frenken denies that she was ever abused and this purported claim, she told CDN, is part of a campaign to gas-light her.
Neither Hunter nor his girlfriend provided any evidence, besides their accusations, that Frenken had been abused.
After the verdict, Frenken hid with Ruby for about six months. She then returned to the Netherlands, at which point a SWAT team removed Ruby from her custody. Ruby was then deported back to the United States.
Ruby has been living with her father since April 2014. Frenken said she has been allowed only one session on Skype with Ruby over the last six weeks.
While CDN is the first media to cover this story in the USA, her story has received some traction in the Netherlands.
Reiter said Ruby is doing “great” since moving back to the USA. She also admitted, however, that she has had no personal contact with Ruby.
Sunday, March 15, 2015
DA refuses to prosecute custodial dad accused of raping 8year-old son--even though abuse corroborated by child porn found in home (Nashville, Tennessee)
So all the child porn found at the Pedo Daddy's house, all the porn that corroborated the boy's rape....Mom somehow "coached" that into being too?
UNNAMED DAD.
http://www.tennessean.com/story/news/crime/2015/03/13/advocacy-group-criticizes-da-child-rape-case/70312682/
Advocacy group criticizes DA over child rape case
Anita Wadhwani, awadhwani@tennessean.com 8:39 p.m. CDT March 14, 2015
A national child advocacy organization is criticizing Nashville District Attorney Glenn Funk for the delay in prosecuting a father accused of raping his 8-year-old son — a case the FBI turned over to the district attorney's office three years ago.
The father, a 58-year-old Missouri veterinarian, was arrested in August of 2012 after a grand jury issued indictments on four counts of child rape and one count of aggravated sexual battery. In a letter to Funk this week, Child Justice, a Washington, D.C.-based advocacy group, urged him to move forward with the trial. Executive Director Eileen King said she feared Funk would drop the case after a former prosecutor in charge of it left the district attorney's office. Funk is now serving as the chief prosecutor on the case.
"This child deserves some justice in his life after all that he has endured," wrote King. "Anything short of prosecuting this man who is believed to have committed these atrocities is, in our view, a miscarriage of justice."
Funk said he was reviewing the case as he would any other before proceeding. He will make a decision within the next three weeks about the next steps, he said.
The case has garnered national attention among advocates focused on how child sexual abuse allegations are handled in divorce courts and in the criminal justice system.
The criminal charges followed years of claims by the child's mother that her ex-husband was sexually abusing their son. A pediatrician, a child therapist and a caseworker with the Department of Children's Services also alleged the boy had been sexually abused, but no charges were filed until a 2011 FBI investigation found pornography and other items at the father's home that prosecutors said corroborate the boy's story.
By then, however, the mother had lost primary custody of the boy. A Robertson County family court judge had ruled that the mother's repeated insistence that her son was being sexually abused was untrue, "obsessive," and harmful to the child. He awarded custody of the boy to the now-accused father in 2007.
The father's attorneys have argued that the boy has been coached all along into making false accusations by the mother, who now has custody again.
The Tennessean does not identify victims of alleged sexual abuse and is withholding the parents' names to protect the identity of the child.
The case has been delayed once pending appeal on an interim order from the court, which rejected the father's efforts to require the boy undergo a psychiatric evaluation. An appeals court upheld the ruling. Then the chief prosecutor on the case resigned, among a group of lawyers who departed after Funk was elected as district attorney.
Reach Anita Wadhwani at 615-259-8092 or on Twitter @AnitaWadhwani.
UNNAMED DAD.
http://www.tennessean.com/story/news/crime/2015/03/13/advocacy-group-criticizes-da-child-rape-case/70312682/
Advocacy group criticizes DA over child rape case
Anita Wadhwani, awadhwani@tennessean.com 8:39 p.m. CDT March 14, 2015
A national child advocacy organization is criticizing Nashville District Attorney Glenn Funk for the delay in prosecuting a father accused of raping his 8-year-old son — a case the FBI turned over to the district attorney's office three years ago.
The father, a 58-year-old Missouri veterinarian, was arrested in August of 2012 after a grand jury issued indictments on four counts of child rape and one count of aggravated sexual battery. In a letter to Funk this week, Child Justice, a Washington, D.C.-based advocacy group, urged him to move forward with the trial. Executive Director Eileen King said she feared Funk would drop the case after a former prosecutor in charge of it left the district attorney's office. Funk is now serving as the chief prosecutor on the case.
"This child deserves some justice in his life after all that he has endured," wrote King. "Anything short of prosecuting this man who is believed to have committed these atrocities is, in our view, a miscarriage of justice."
Funk said he was reviewing the case as he would any other before proceeding. He will make a decision within the next three weeks about the next steps, he said.
The case has garnered national attention among advocates focused on how child sexual abuse allegations are handled in divorce courts and in the criminal justice system.
The criminal charges followed years of claims by the child's mother that her ex-husband was sexually abusing their son. A pediatrician, a child therapist and a caseworker with the Department of Children's Services also alleged the boy had been sexually abused, but no charges were filed until a 2011 FBI investigation found pornography and other items at the father's home that prosecutors said corroborate the boy's story.
By then, however, the mother had lost primary custody of the boy. A Robertson County family court judge had ruled that the mother's repeated insistence that her son was being sexually abused was untrue, "obsessive," and harmful to the child. He awarded custody of the boy to the now-accused father in 2007.
The father's attorneys have argued that the boy has been coached all along into making false accusations by the mother, who now has custody again.
The Tennessean does not identify victims of alleged sexual abuse and is withholding the parents' names to protect the identity of the child.
The case has been delayed once pending appeal on an interim order from the court, which rejected the father's efforts to require the boy undergo a psychiatric evaluation. An appeals court upheld the ruling. Then the chief prosecutor on the case resigned, among a group of lawyers who departed after Funk was elected as district attorney.
Reach Anita Wadhwani at 615-259-8092 or on Twitter @AnitaWadhwani.
Monday, February 16, 2015
Dad pleads guilty to voluntary manslaughter in beating death of 1-month-old son (Washington, DC)
This is how f***ed up our country is. MOTHERS of 1-month-old infants are forced into the workforce in order to support their babies and useless deadbeat pieces of sh** like dad TYRIK LAMONT BROWN. HE lounges in bed while SHE (the family breadwinner) bathes and feeds the baby and then leaves him in bed next to the lazy father. Then the useless piece of sh** beats the baby to death because he is "frustrated" by the crying.
Parenting classes aren't going to help aggressive young fathers with poor impulse control. That's just wishful thinking. We need to get a$$holes like this one of bed and into the workforce--that is, is anybody will hire them. They need to support their kids instead of maiming and killing them because they are "frustrated" with normal infantile crying. Moms need paid maternity leaves too, so they don't get pushed into working too early and forced to rely on men like this for babysitters.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/local/crime/father-pleads-guilty-to-voluntary-manslaughter-in-infants-beating-death/2015/02/12/a05e2650-b2d8-11e4-827f-93f454140e2b_story.html
Father pleads guilty to voluntary manslaughter in infant’s beating death
By Keith L. Alexander February 12
#Tyrik Lamont Brown beat his 1-month-old son so badly, prosecutors said, that a D.C. medical examiner found more than a dozen injuries to the infant’s body, including fractures to his leg, ribs and skull.
#Brown pleaded guilty Thursday to voluntary manslaughter in the Oct. 29 death of the infant, Raj’saun Tyrik Brown. Prosecutors said the baby’s mother left the infant with Brown as she went to work. She fed him, bathed him and laid him on the bed next to the baby’s father.
#But when the infant began crying and would not stop, prosecutors said, Brown grew angry and began beating his son. The medical examiner ruled the infant died of blunt force to the body.
#As part of the plea deal with prosecutors, Brown, 20, faces between four and 10 years in prison. Prosecutors also agreed not to charge Brown with first-degree felony murder.
#D.C. Superior Court Judge Rhonda Reid-Winston asked the soft-spoken Brown several questions to ensure he understood the details of the case and the charges to which he was pleading guilty.
#“Did you do something to cause these injuries?” she asked. Brown, with his wrists and ankles in shackles and standing next to his public defender, responded, “Yes, ma’am.”
#“Did you apply blunt force on this day?” she asked.
#“Yes, ma’am,” he said. #“Did you do it by accident?” she asked. Brown initially said yes, but then his public defender, Madalyn Harvey, interjected and whispered in his ear, and he changed his response to “No, ma’am.” #Then the judge asked, “Did you intend to inflict this force on him, and did you know a 1-month-old baby could be injured?” Brown again said yes. #Outside the courtroom, Assistant U.S. Attorney Cynthia Wright, who specializes in infant and child deaths, said the case was an example of why all new parents should take parenting classes. #“The infant wouldn’t stop crying, and he didn’t know what to do or how to respond,” Wright said. #Brown is scheduled to be sentenced April 24.
Parenting classes aren't going to help aggressive young fathers with poor impulse control. That's just wishful thinking. We need to get a$$holes like this one of bed and into the workforce--that is, is anybody will hire them. They need to support their kids instead of maiming and killing them because they are "frustrated" with normal infantile crying. Moms need paid maternity leaves too, so they don't get pushed into working too early and forced to rely on men like this for babysitters.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/local/crime/father-pleads-guilty-to-voluntary-manslaughter-in-infants-beating-death/2015/02/12/a05e2650-b2d8-11e4-827f-93f454140e2b_story.html
Father pleads guilty to voluntary manslaughter in infant’s beating death
By Keith L. Alexander February 12
#Tyrik Lamont Brown beat his 1-month-old son so badly, prosecutors said, that a D.C. medical examiner found more than a dozen injuries to the infant’s body, including fractures to his leg, ribs and skull.
#Brown pleaded guilty Thursday to voluntary manslaughter in the Oct. 29 death of the infant, Raj’saun Tyrik Brown. Prosecutors said the baby’s mother left the infant with Brown as she went to work. She fed him, bathed him and laid him on the bed next to the baby’s father.
#But when the infant began crying and would not stop, prosecutors said, Brown grew angry and began beating his son. The medical examiner ruled the infant died of blunt force to the body.
#As part of the plea deal with prosecutors, Brown, 20, faces between four and 10 years in prison. Prosecutors also agreed not to charge Brown with first-degree felony murder.
#D.C. Superior Court Judge Rhonda Reid-Winston asked the soft-spoken Brown several questions to ensure he understood the details of the case and the charges to which he was pleading guilty.
#“Did you do something to cause these injuries?” she asked. Brown, with his wrists and ankles in shackles and standing next to his public defender, responded, “Yes, ma’am.”
#“Did you apply blunt force on this day?” she asked.
#“Yes, ma’am,” he said. #“Did you do it by accident?” she asked. Brown initially said yes, but then his public defender, Madalyn Harvey, interjected and whispered in his ear, and he changed his response to “No, ma’am.” #Then the judge asked, “Did you intend to inflict this force on him, and did you know a 1-month-old baby could be injured?” Brown again said yes. #Outside the courtroom, Assistant U.S. Attorney Cynthia Wright, who specializes in infant and child deaths, said the case was an example of why all new parents should take parenting classes. #“The infant wouldn’t stop crying, and he didn’t know what to do or how to respond,” Wright said. #Brown is scheduled to be sentenced April 24.
Saturday, May 17, 2014
Dad with court-ordered visitation charged with manslaughter in death of 3-uear-old son (Prince George County, Virginia)
Another case where you have to wonder about the back story. What court, what judge granted this father visitation? Was there a past history of abuse/neglect that was ignored or minimized? Was there a protective mother who objected, but was overruled?
Dad is identified THOMAS E. HOLLAND.
http://www.nbcwashington.com/news/local/Father-Charged-With-Manslaughter-in-3-Year-Old-Sons-Death-259544111.html
Father Charged With Manslaughter in 3-Year-Old Son's Death From Drugs, Police Say
Saturday, May 17, 2014 | Updated 6:56 AM EDT
Pat Collins
A Maryland dad is facing manslaughter charges after police say he gave his 3-year-old son a fatal cocktail of drugs, including cocaine.
Thomas E. Holland, 38, drove his unresponsive son to the United Medical Center in southeast Washington in January, police said. Officers were called to the hospital when the boy passed away, and a death investigation was launched.
A toxicology report revealed a number of drugs in the child's system, including toxic levels of of cocaine, acetaminophen and codeine.
The amount of drugs in the boy's system would have killed him within four hours, according to court documents. Police say he could not have accidentally swallowed them.
"The investigators and the medical examiner feel very strongly there's no way this child accidentally ingested this collection of drugs all together," said Bill Alexander of Prince George's County Police.
Holland had a court-ordered visit with his 3-year-old just before the boy's hospital visit. News4's Pat Collins spoke to the boy's great-grandparent Maurice Gaither.
"It's the most horrific and the most terrible thing I've ever experienced," Gaither said.
Holland was taken into custody May 15 and remains behind bars, facing manslaughter and child abuse charges.
A lawyer for Holland was not available for comment.
Dad is identified THOMAS E. HOLLAND.
http://www.nbcwashington.com/news/local/Father-Charged-With-Manslaughter-in-3-Year-Old-Sons-Death-259544111.html
Father Charged With Manslaughter in 3-Year-Old Son's Death From Drugs, Police Say
Saturday, May 17, 2014 | Updated 6:56 AM EDT
Pat Collins
A Maryland dad is facing manslaughter charges after police say he gave his 3-year-old son a fatal cocktail of drugs, including cocaine.
Thomas E. Holland, 38, drove his unresponsive son to the United Medical Center in southeast Washington in January, police said. Officers were called to the hospital when the boy passed away, and a death investigation was launched.
A toxicology report revealed a number of drugs in the child's system, including toxic levels of of cocaine, acetaminophen and codeine.
The amount of drugs in the boy's system would have killed him within four hours, according to court documents. Police say he could not have accidentally swallowed them.
"The investigators and the medical examiner feel very strongly there's no way this child accidentally ingested this collection of drugs all together," said Bill Alexander of Prince George's County Police.
Holland had a court-ordered visit with his 3-year-old just before the boy's hospital visit. News4's Pat Collins spoke to the boy's great-grandparent Maurice Gaither.
"It's the most horrific and the most terrible thing I've ever experienced," Gaither said.
Holland was taken into custody May 15 and remains behind bars, facing manslaughter and child abuse charges.
A lawyer for Holland was not available for comment.
Saturday, January 14, 2012
Dad gets 30 years for stabbing mom to death in front of kids (Washington, DC)
Dad CLAUDE KINNEY gets just 30 years for what was obviously the pre-mediated murder of his "estranged" wife. He has a history of domestic violence assault. And he killed the mother in front of their four kids. But he comes up with this sad story about wanting to spare the kids from testifying, and the court just fawns all over him. He just wanted to spare his @$$ a few years in prison....
http://www.washingtonpost.com/local/crime/dc-man-gets-30-years-for-stabbing-wife-to-death-in-front-of-children/2012/01/13/gIQA2qUBxP_story.html
D.C. man gets 30 years for stabbing wife to death in front of children
By Keith L. Alexander, Published: January 13
A District man who pleaded guilty to stabbing his estranged wife to death after she picked her children up at school was sentenced to 30 years in prison Friday.
Claude Kinney, 48, pleaded guilty in October to first-degree felony murder in the Sept. 12 slaying of Alecia Wheeler, 42, behind a Northeast Washington recreation center. Kinney was arrested shortly after the attack.
It’s unusual for defendants to plead guilty to first-degree murder. In court Friday, Renee Raymond of the D.C. Public Defender Service said her client did so to keep the children from having to testify. When she was killed, Wheeler was with her children, ages 1, 3, 5 and 9; the youngest three were Kinney’s, and Raymond said he treated the oldest as his own.
“My mommy is getting stabbed,” the 9-year-old yelled during the attack, according to authorities. Wheeler, who also had two adult children from a previous relationship, was killed on the 3-year-old’s birthday.
At Friday’s hearing, several of Wheeler’s family members urged D.C. Superior Court Judge Gerald I. Fisher to give Kinney a longer sentence. “All she wanted was to be protected and loved by this man,” said Felicia Sweet, Wheeler’s older sister.
“My sister got up every day and took care of her children. He took her from them,” said Lisa Gonzalez, another sister. “No child should have to go through that.”
Fisher commended Kinney for sparing the children a trial. Fisher called the attack “a momentary lapse of sanity” and pointed to Kinney’s “irrational rage and emotions.”
If the case had gone to trial and Kinney had been convicted, Fisher said, he was “confident” Kinney would have received a longer sentence.
Wheeler had picked up her children at Wheatley Elementary School when she walked through an alley behind the Joseph H. Cole Recreation Center in the 1200 block of Neal Street NE, prosecutors said. That’s where Kinney approached her and fatally stabbed her, according to authorities.
Gonzalez said Wheeler was heading to a shelter for crime victims after picking up the children. Before her death, Wheeler had filed at least two court complaints against Kinney — they described a pattern of domestic assaults — including one just one day before she was killed.
Kinney, a tall, stout man, apologized to Wheeler’s family at the sentencing.
“I’m sorry for what happened. I’m sorry in my heart. I’m sorry it happened in front of my children,” he said. “My children have lost their mother and their father. I regret it. I miss, and I love her.”
http://www.washingtonpost.com/local/crime/dc-man-gets-30-years-for-stabbing-wife-to-death-in-front-of-children/2012/01/13/gIQA2qUBxP_story.html
D.C. man gets 30 years for stabbing wife to death in front of children
By Keith L. Alexander, Published: January 13
A District man who pleaded guilty to stabbing his estranged wife to death after she picked her children up at school was sentenced to 30 years in prison Friday.
Claude Kinney, 48, pleaded guilty in October to first-degree felony murder in the Sept. 12 slaying of Alecia Wheeler, 42, behind a Northeast Washington recreation center. Kinney was arrested shortly after the attack.
It’s unusual for defendants to plead guilty to first-degree murder. In court Friday, Renee Raymond of the D.C. Public Defender Service said her client did so to keep the children from having to testify. When she was killed, Wheeler was with her children, ages 1, 3, 5 and 9; the youngest three were Kinney’s, and Raymond said he treated the oldest as his own.
“My mommy is getting stabbed,” the 9-year-old yelled during the attack, according to authorities. Wheeler, who also had two adult children from a previous relationship, was killed on the 3-year-old’s birthday.
At Friday’s hearing, several of Wheeler’s family members urged D.C. Superior Court Judge Gerald I. Fisher to give Kinney a longer sentence. “All she wanted was to be protected and loved by this man,” said Felicia Sweet, Wheeler’s older sister.
“My sister got up every day and took care of her children. He took her from them,” said Lisa Gonzalez, another sister. “No child should have to go through that.”
Fisher commended Kinney for sparing the children a trial. Fisher called the attack “a momentary lapse of sanity” and pointed to Kinney’s “irrational rage and emotions.”
If the case had gone to trial and Kinney had been convicted, Fisher said, he was “confident” Kinney would have received a longer sentence.
Wheeler had picked up her children at Wheatley Elementary School when she walked through an alley behind the Joseph H. Cole Recreation Center in the 1200 block of Neal Street NE, prosecutors said. That’s where Kinney approached her and fatally stabbed her, according to authorities.
Gonzalez said Wheeler was heading to a shelter for crime victims after picking up the children. Before her death, Wheeler had filed at least two court complaints against Kinney — they described a pattern of domestic assaults — including one just one day before she was killed.
Kinney, a tall, stout man, apologized to Wheeler’s family at the sentencing.
“I’m sorry for what happened. I’m sorry in my heart. I’m sorry it happened in front of my children,” he said. “My children have lost their mother and their father. I regret it. I miss, and I love her.”
Friday, October 28, 2011
Molester dad sentenced to 40 years in prison for killing 17-year-old daughter (Washington, DC)
Horrifying. The mom was "estranged" from dad RODNEY MCINTYRE early in the daughter's life (for good reason as it turns out), but kids are told they "must have a father," so the girl sought him out when she was 15. Result? This sleeze bag had a "sexual relationship with her" (i.e. sexually abused her) for two years, then brutally murdered her when he couldn't "control" her anymore and keep her from having a boyfriend.
Notice how this sh** groomed her for abuse by giving her money and clothes--all the things that single moms have trouble affording.
Why are we always told that the instincts of mothers are not to be trusted???
http://www.washingtonpost.com/local/dc-man-sentenced-to-40-years-in-prison-for-killing-teenage-daughter/2011/10/27/gIQAzVd7MM_story.html
D.C. man sentenced to 40 years in prison for killing teenage daughter
By Keith L. Alexander, Published: October 27
A District man who admitted to stabbing his teenage daughter to death and dumping her body in a trash bin after a two-year sexual relationship with her was sentenced to 40 years in prison Thursday by a judge who said Rodney McIntyre acted with a “depraved heart.”
McIntyre, 45, showed little reaction as D.C. Superior Court Judge Lynn Leibovitz recounted his incestuous — and, ultimately, deadly — history with Ebony Franklin, 17. “You betrayed the bond a father should have with his child,” Leibovitz said.
Three days after her death on Nov. 26, Franklin’s body was found in an alley behind the gym in the 1000 block of Fairmont Street NW, where McIntyre worked. She had 15 stab wounds to her chest, side and back.
McIntyre pleaded guilty in July to first-degree, premeditated murder while armed.
Before being sentenced, McIntyre turned to the rows of family who packed the courtroom and tried to offer an explanation. “I blacked out,” he said. “I’m deeply sorry for the pain and suffering. I’m sorry for taking the life of my daughter. I robbed her of her childhood.”
When McIntyre began to speak, Ebony’s mother walked out of the courtroom.
McIntyre’s attorney, Elizabeth Mullin of the District’s Public Defender Service, said he was on medication for depression and irritability a month before Franklin’s slaying but had not taken his medication the day of his daughter’s death.
But Assistant U.S. Attorney Jocelyn S. Ballantine said McIntyre was “obsessive” and “jealous,” leading him to murder.
McIntyre believed his daughter was “seeing” other men, according to Ballantine, who said Franklin was dating a teenage boy when she was killed. A photograph obtained by The Washington Post shows the boy’s name etched into her red, manicured fingernails over a small, white heart.
“Ebony Franklin was a beautiful young woman — vivacious, spirited, a dancer who had plans for her future,” Ballantine said. “She had dreams. Mr. McIntyre killed his daughter because he couldn’t control her.”
Ballantine said McIntyre and his daughter were estranged during the early part her life, when he was in jail and Franklin lived with her mother in Maryland. When McIntyre was released in 2008, Franklin — then 15 — sought him out. A short time later, McIntyre initiated a sexual relationship with his daughter, during which he regularly showered her with money and clothes.
Ebony’s mother, fearing McIntyre’s jealous rages, tried to keep them apart, Ballantine said. But on Nov. 26, Franklin and McIntyre had plans to meet for Christmas shopping in Columbia Heights. Franklin’s stepfather dropped her off to meet McIntyre. She was killed that day.
Authorities said McIntyre tried to make it look as if someone else had killed Franklin. He filed a missing persons report with police and, after her slaying, used her cellphone to send a number of text messages, including one to Franklin’s mother that read, “Remember the bitch told on my man now yoo get her out the trash.”
Notice how this sh** groomed her for abuse by giving her money and clothes--all the things that single moms have trouble affording.
Why are we always told that the instincts of mothers are not to be trusted???
http://www.washingtonpost.com/local/dc-man-sentenced-to-40-years-in-prison-for-killing-teenage-daughter/2011/10/27/gIQAzVd7MM_story.html
D.C. man sentenced to 40 years in prison for killing teenage daughter
By Keith L. Alexander, Published: October 27
A District man who admitted to stabbing his teenage daughter to death and dumping her body in a trash bin after a two-year sexual relationship with her was sentenced to 40 years in prison Thursday by a judge who said Rodney McIntyre acted with a “depraved heart.”
McIntyre, 45, showed little reaction as D.C. Superior Court Judge Lynn Leibovitz recounted his incestuous — and, ultimately, deadly — history with Ebony Franklin, 17. “You betrayed the bond a father should have with his child,” Leibovitz said.
Three days after her death on Nov. 26, Franklin’s body was found in an alley behind the gym in the 1000 block of Fairmont Street NW, where McIntyre worked. She had 15 stab wounds to her chest, side and back.
McIntyre pleaded guilty in July to first-degree, premeditated murder while armed.
Before being sentenced, McIntyre turned to the rows of family who packed the courtroom and tried to offer an explanation. “I blacked out,” he said. “I’m deeply sorry for the pain and suffering. I’m sorry for taking the life of my daughter. I robbed her of her childhood.”
When McIntyre began to speak, Ebony’s mother walked out of the courtroom.
McIntyre’s attorney, Elizabeth Mullin of the District’s Public Defender Service, said he was on medication for depression and irritability a month before Franklin’s slaying but had not taken his medication the day of his daughter’s death.
But Assistant U.S. Attorney Jocelyn S. Ballantine said McIntyre was “obsessive” and “jealous,” leading him to murder.
McIntyre believed his daughter was “seeing” other men, according to Ballantine, who said Franklin was dating a teenage boy when she was killed. A photograph obtained by The Washington Post shows the boy’s name etched into her red, manicured fingernails over a small, white heart.
“Ebony Franklin was a beautiful young woman — vivacious, spirited, a dancer who had plans for her future,” Ballantine said. “She had dreams. Mr. McIntyre killed his daughter because he couldn’t control her.”
Ballantine said McIntyre and his daughter were estranged during the early part her life, when he was in jail and Franklin lived with her mother in Maryland. When McIntyre was released in 2008, Franklin — then 15 — sought him out. A short time later, McIntyre initiated a sexual relationship with his daughter, during which he regularly showered her with money and clothes.
Ebony’s mother, fearing McIntyre’s jealous rages, tried to keep them apart, Ballantine said. But on Nov. 26, Franklin and McIntyre had plans to meet for Christmas shopping in Columbia Heights. Franklin’s stepfather dropped her off to meet McIntyre. She was killed that day.
Authorities said McIntyre tried to make it look as if someone else had killed Franklin. He filed a missing persons report with police and, after her slaying, used her cellphone to send a number of text messages, including one to Franklin’s mother that read, “Remember the bitch told on my man now yoo get her out the trash.”
Thursday, October 13, 2011
Ex-wife of D.C. Sniper speaks (Fort Lee, New Jersey)
Mildred Muhammad is one of my great heroes, a true survivor.
Like the recent daddy killer in southern California who murdered eight people at a salon because he was miffed over child custody, JOHN MUHAMMAD's violence couldn't be contained to just his family. Eventually many others were slaughtered to satisfy Daddy's blood lust and elusive quest for control.
Evidence from the trial demonstrated that the sniper killings were just a diversion from Muhammad's true goal: to kill his ex-wife and regain control of their children. And there is evidence that at least one fathers rights group provided him with assistance too. Though this is usually hushed up in the mass media.
And note how the FBI put this woman's in danger....
http://progress-index.com/news/ex-wife-of-d-c-sniper-i-just-sat-on-the-floor-and-screamed-1.1217503#axzz1agrT2Trl
Ex-wife of D.C. Sniper: "I just sat on the floor and screamed"by markus schmidt (staff writer)
Published: October 13, 2011
FORT LEE - For nine years, fear was Mildred Muhammad's closest companion. Every day, she feared that her ex-husband would find her and her children.
"He was going to shoot me in the head, because I was his enemy," she said about the man who was her husband for 12 years and who was the father of her three children - John Muhammad, also known as the D.C. Sniper. The man executed two years ago for the indiscriminate killing of at least 10 innocent people in 2002 that sent waves of fear among residents of Virginia, Maryland and Washington, D.C.
Yesterday, Mildred Muhammad was a special guest at a Domestic Violence Awareness Month event at the Regimental Club at Fort Lee, hosted by the Army Community Service's Family Advocacy Program.
While her former husband had randomly selected his victims before he killed them, she was his victim at home - a victim of domestic abuse and sudden outbreaks of violence. And to this day, Mildred Muhammad believes that John's and his young partner Lee Boyd Malvo's killing spree only served one purpose - to delude his plan to eventually kill her and take back their children.
Muhammad is a small woman with a shy smile. But when she begins to speak, a fire begins to flicker in her eyes. No doubt, she has told her story of survival countless times. And it is her story that makes her big.
When Mildred first met John Muhammad, she was 23 years old, still living at home with her mother. It was easy for John to win her over. They both had grown up without fathers, and John's mother had died of breast cancer when he was only 5. As a child, John had suffered physical abuse from an uncle. He was charming, handsome and always knew the right thing to say.
They soon became a couple and got married. John, who was born John Allen Williams, later took the name Muhammad, after joining the Nation of Islam. In the mid-1980s, he had volunteered for active duty in the military and qualified with the M-16, the Army's standard infantry rifle, earning the Expert Rifleman's Badge.
In the late 1980s, the couple lived in Germany, where John was based. When Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein invaded Kuweit, he was sent to Saudi Arabia, from where he would soon leave to Iraq, fighting in Operation Desert Storm. "Like all soldiers, John had been trained well," Mildred said. "But no soldier has a clue what it is like in a war zone until he actually goes there."
John returned back to Germany after only three months in combat because of a shoulder injury he sustained when he was accidentally struck by the gun of a tank.
But the man who came home to Mildred was a different man.
"Before he went to Saudi, John was a very popular guy, everyone liked him, he was the life of a party," Mildred said. "But the man whom I married is still over there, because the man who came back was somebody else. I don't know what happened to him while he was there."
John mostly sat in a corner, often for hours, without saying a word. When he was deployed to California, things got worse. The change within him was now also visible on the outside. "He stopped wearing clothes with colors and he kept a crew cut," Mildred said. Diagnosed with post-traumatic stress disorder, he was discharged in 1994.
"We started our own company, and things were going good for a while," Mildred said. But when she discovered his constant womanizing, Mildred filed for divorce in 1999.
It was the beginning of the abuse at home.
"There was a time when I sat on my bed all night, ready to protect my family from him," Mildred said. Even after he had moved out, John tried to change the phone number and the locks in their home. He would enter her home at night and walk around her bed while she pretended to be asleep. He would try to use the children to get through to her.
One day, he told Mildred something that would haunt her forever.
"He said that I was now his enemy and that he would kill me, and that I would not raise my children without him," she said.
While friends and even her own brother didn't take the threat seriously, Mildred knew that John meant what he said. She filed for a life-long restraining order.
But she still wanted her three children to have a father in their lives. "I was hoping that someone could fix him, because he was crazy," she said. "I just wanted my life back. I wanted to go on like it was before."
One weekend, after a visitation, John did not return their children to Mildred as planned. After a few days, she called police for help but was told that there was nothing they could do. "We had no parental plan, so he was legally entitled to keep the children," she said. "The window of opportunity between divorce and custody dates is when most children are taken."
Mildred started a search for her children that would last 18 months. Little did she know that her former husband had brought them to the Carribean island Antigua, where he is believed to have engaged in credit card and immigration fraud activities.
Worn out from the stress, Mildred suffered a nervous breakdown. In her hospital room, she received a call from John. "We had a casual conversation, and I asked him to bring my children back," Mildred said. John's response: "You can't always get what you want in life."
Mildred's situation seemed hopeless. "I had two choices, to go back and die, or never see my children again," she said.
While looking for her children, Mildred lived in constant fear that her ex-husband would find and kill her. "I had to disconnect from everybody I know," she said. "I changed my name and I changed locations, because I was terrified of John. I knew what he could do."
Mildred learned to live on the edge. "I knew he was going to kill me with a headshot, because that's how he was trained. So I always closed the curtains, never stood close to a window." Whenever she entered a public building, she first tried to locate all exits and possible escape routes. Eventually, she moved to a women's shelter and began to study law to initiate the legal process to get her children back.
When the F.B.I. offered to help her find her children, Mildred turned the offer down. "They wanted to put me in the middle of a parking lot and use me as a decoy, because they knew that he was coming to get me," she said, shaking her head.
In August 2001, Mildred got the call that her children were found near the Canadian border. When she first spoke to them on the phone, she was overwhelmed by emotion. "I had not heard their voices in 18 months," she said. "My youngest daughter told me that she was now 9 years old and that she believed I had forgotten her birthday."
To finalize the custody ruling, Mildred had to face her ex-husband in court. "I was so scared," she said. "It was just John, my attorney and me, and I was sure he was going to try to kill me. By the time you think about it, he's done it - he's going to snap my neck."
After the judge ordered John to sign away his custody rights, Mildred was reunited with her children. "I hardly could see them through my tears," she said.
At her new home in Maryland, Mildred and her children still had to live with the fear that he might come back to kill her.
When she first heard of the Beltway Sniper attacks in October 2002, Mildred had no idea that her former husband could be behind these crimes.
For three weeks, John and Malvo terrorized the Capital Beltway area from Maryland down the Interstate 95 corridor to Ashland, killing 10 people and injuring three critically. They fired the deadly shots from the trunk of a 1990 Chevrolet Caprice sedan. Apparently, they had begun their murder spree in Louisiana and Alabama.
"Just like everybody else in those weeks, I was looking out for two Caucasians in a white van," Mildred said, referring to media and police reports from that time. But she also continued to look out for Muhammad, not aware that he was the man behind the sniper attacks.
On Oct. 11, Mildred and one of her co-workers noticed a car parked outside her workplace. It was a Chevrolet Caprice sedan, with New Jersey license plates. "As we walked by, the driver, a young African-American, looked at us, and the passenger hid his face behind a newspaper," she said.
They could do little more but call police about the suspicious incident, which they did not connect to the sniper attacks.
Almost two weeks later, police came to pick up Mildred at her house. "Three officers kept asking me questions about a shooting in Nevada, but I didn't know what this was about," she said. "They showed me a letter that they had found in a tree near the one of the sniper attacks and asked if I could identify the handwriting."
Eventually, the investigators put their cards on the table. "They told me that they were going to name my ex-husband as the sniper," Mildred said.
While she was shocked and in tears, Mildred did not doubt for a second that John was able to kill innocent victims indiscriminately. She remembered one evening, when they were still married and were watching a movie. "John suddenly told me that he could take a whole city out if he wanted to, and that nobody would notice that it was just a single man," she said. When Mildred asked him what he meant by that, he didn't answer.
Investigators also told her that they believed she was the intended target in the killing spree. "They said that he wanted to kill me so he could take custody of the kids," she said. In his trial, the judge later ruled that there was insufficient evidence to support this argument.
Mildred let police take her into protective custody. "They took us to a hotel. I still don't know where," she remembered. "We turned on the TV and it was the first time that I saw John there." Mildred walked to the TV and touched her former husband's face. "What's happening to you," she whispered.
With the children crying, Mildred locked herself in the bathroom. "I just sat on the floor and screamed," she said.
Muhammad and Malvo were arrested the next day, after a passerby had found them sleeping in their car at a rest stop off of Interstate 70 near Myersville, Md.
"Before they let us out of protective custody, police made us pay our dinner bill, which was $273.45," Mildred said. "Then all this stuff started coming out about John."
For their children, it seeing their father face multiple murder charges wasn't the only ordeal. They were also shocked to find out that Malvo had been Muhammad's partner - a young man whom they had come to love like a brother in the 18 months they were on the run with their father. "Lee was looking for a father figure, and John introduced him to our children as their big brother," Mildred said. "They were best friends." Malvo is serving six life terms in a Virginia prison with no chance of parole.
Mildred testified against John in the sentencing phase of his trial. "The jury said that they gave him the death penalty because they didn't want him to finish what he started - to kill me," she said.
John was exectuted Nov. 10, 2009, at Greensville Correctional Center in Jarratt, just 30 minutes south of Petersburg.
"When he was executed, one of my daughters broke down to cry," Mildred said. "I cradled her and she looked me in the eye, looking for something," she said. "But there was nothing there, no compassion, no feeling. When she noticed that, she stopped crying."
Mildred Muhammad has made peace with her former husband's hatred towards her, long before he was executed. All three children attended their father's funeral. But Mildred did not go. "Many in his family are against me. They even told my children that it is my fault that their father was executed," she said.
Today, Mildred is a motivational speaker and national spokesperson against domestic violence. She has authored books and appeared on national television. Her children are now young adults and she is proud of them. "My two girls sing opera in five languages," she said.
They still talk about their father and they continue to ask questions. "I told my children that I would always answer all their questions about their dad's actions, and I told them that they have a right to love him and pray for him," Mildred said. "And I will always tell them the truth about what happened, even if it makes me look bad."
Because talking is understanding, and understanding is healing. Mildred knows that. "I will not allow my kids to fail in life because their dad is the D.C. Sniper," she said.
Like the recent daddy killer in southern California who murdered eight people at a salon because he was miffed over child custody, JOHN MUHAMMAD's violence couldn't be contained to just his family. Eventually many others were slaughtered to satisfy Daddy's blood lust and elusive quest for control.
Evidence from the trial demonstrated that the sniper killings were just a diversion from Muhammad's true goal: to kill his ex-wife and regain control of their children. And there is evidence that at least one fathers rights group provided him with assistance too. Though this is usually hushed up in the mass media.
And note how the FBI put this woman's in danger....
http://progress-index.com/news/ex-wife-of-d-c-sniper-i-just-sat-on-the-floor-and-screamed-1.1217503#axzz1agrT2Trl
Ex-wife of D.C. Sniper: "I just sat on the floor and screamed"by markus schmidt (staff writer)
Published: October 13, 2011
FORT LEE - For nine years, fear was Mildred Muhammad's closest companion. Every day, she feared that her ex-husband would find her and her children.
"He was going to shoot me in the head, because I was his enemy," she said about the man who was her husband for 12 years and who was the father of her three children - John Muhammad, also known as the D.C. Sniper. The man executed two years ago for the indiscriminate killing of at least 10 innocent people in 2002 that sent waves of fear among residents of Virginia, Maryland and Washington, D.C.
Yesterday, Mildred Muhammad was a special guest at a Domestic Violence Awareness Month event at the Regimental Club at Fort Lee, hosted by the Army Community Service's Family Advocacy Program.
While her former husband had randomly selected his victims before he killed them, she was his victim at home - a victim of domestic abuse and sudden outbreaks of violence. And to this day, Mildred Muhammad believes that John's and his young partner Lee Boyd Malvo's killing spree only served one purpose - to delude his plan to eventually kill her and take back their children.
Muhammad is a small woman with a shy smile. But when she begins to speak, a fire begins to flicker in her eyes. No doubt, she has told her story of survival countless times. And it is her story that makes her big.
When Mildred first met John Muhammad, she was 23 years old, still living at home with her mother. It was easy for John to win her over. They both had grown up without fathers, and John's mother had died of breast cancer when he was only 5. As a child, John had suffered physical abuse from an uncle. He was charming, handsome and always knew the right thing to say.
They soon became a couple and got married. John, who was born John Allen Williams, later took the name Muhammad, after joining the Nation of Islam. In the mid-1980s, he had volunteered for active duty in the military and qualified with the M-16, the Army's standard infantry rifle, earning the Expert Rifleman's Badge.
In the late 1980s, the couple lived in Germany, where John was based. When Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein invaded Kuweit, he was sent to Saudi Arabia, from where he would soon leave to Iraq, fighting in Operation Desert Storm. "Like all soldiers, John had been trained well," Mildred said. "But no soldier has a clue what it is like in a war zone until he actually goes there."
John returned back to Germany after only three months in combat because of a shoulder injury he sustained when he was accidentally struck by the gun of a tank.
But the man who came home to Mildred was a different man.
"Before he went to Saudi, John was a very popular guy, everyone liked him, he was the life of a party," Mildred said. "But the man whom I married is still over there, because the man who came back was somebody else. I don't know what happened to him while he was there."
John mostly sat in a corner, often for hours, without saying a word. When he was deployed to California, things got worse. The change within him was now also visible on the outside. "He stopped wearing clothes with colors and he kept a crew cut," Mildred said. Diagnosed with post-traumatic stress disorder, he was discharged in 1994.
"We started our own company, and things were going good for a while," Mildred said. But when she discovered his constant womanizing, Mildred filed for divorce in 1999.
It was the beginning of the abuse at home.
"There was a time when I sat on my bed all night, ready to protect my family from him," Mildred said. Even after he had moved out, John tried to change the phone number and the locks in their home. He would enter her home at night and walk around her bed while she pretended to be asleep. He would try to use the children to get through to her.
One day, he told Mildred something that would haunt her forever.
"He said that I was now his enemy and that he would kill me, and that I would not raise my children without him," she said.
While friends and even her own brother didn't take the threat seriously, Mildred knew that John meant what he said. She filed for a life-long restraining order.
But she still wanted her three children to have a father in their lives. "I was hoping that someone could fix him, because he was crazy," she said. "I just wanted my life back. I wanted to go on like it was before."
One weekend, after a visitation, John did not return their children to Mildred as planned. After a few days, she called police for help but was told that there was nothing they could do. "We had no parental plan, so he was legally entitled to keep the children," she said. "The window of opportunity between divorce and custody dates is when most children are taken."
Mildred started a search for her children that would last 18 months. Little did she know that her former husband had brought them to the Carribean island Antigua, where he is believed to have engaged in credit card and immigration fraud activities.
Worn out from the stress, Mildred suffered a nervous breakdown. In her hospital room, she received a call from John. "We had a casual conversation, and I asked him to bring my children back," Mildred said. John's response: "You can't always get what you want in life."
Mildred's situation seemed hopeless. "I had two choices, to go back and die, or never see my children again," she said.
While looking for her children, Mildred lived in constant fear that her ex-husband would find and kill her. "I had to disconnect from everybody I know," she said. "I changed my name and I changed locations, because I was terrified of John. I knew what he could do."
Mildred learned to live on the edge. "I knew he was going to kill me with a headshot, because that's how he was trained. So I always closed the curtains, never stood close to a window." Whenever she entered a public building, she first tried to locate all exits and possible escape routes. Eventually, she moved to a women's shelter and began to study law to initiate the legal process to get her children back.
When the F.B.I. offered to help her find her children, Mildred turned the offer down. "They wanted to put me in the middle of a parking lot and use me as a decoy, because they knew that he was coming to get me," she said, shaking her head.
In August 2001, Mildred got the call that her children were found near the Canadian border. When she first spoke to them on the phone, she was overwhelmed by emotion. "I had not heard their voices in 18 months," she said. "My youngest daughter told me that she was now 9 years old and that she believed I had forgotten her birthday."
To finalize the custody ruling, Mildred had to face her ex-husband in court. "I was so scared," she said. "It was just John, my attorney and me, and I was sure he was going to try to kill me. By the time you think about it, he's done it - he's going to snap my neck."
After the judge ordered John to sign away his custody rights, Mildred was reunited with her children. "I hardly could see them through my tears," she said.
At her new home in Maryland, Mildred and her children still had to live with the fear that he might come back to kill her.
When she first heard of the Beltway Sniper attacks in October 2002, Mildred had no idea that her former husband could be behind these crimes.
For three weeks, John and Malvo terrorized the Capital Beltway area from Maryland down the Interstate 95 corridor to Ashland, killing 10 people and injuring three critically. They fired the deadly shots from the trunk of a 1990 Chevrolet Caprice sedan. Apparently, they had begun their murder spree in Louisiana and Alabama.
"Just like everybody else in those weeks, I was looking out for two Caucasians in a white van," Mildred said, referring to media and police reports from that time. But she also continued to look out for Muhammad, not aware that he was the man behind the sniper attacks.
On Oct. 11, Mildred and one of her co-workers noticed a car parked outside her workplace. It was a Chevrolet Caprice sedan, with New Jersey license plates. "As we walked by, the driver, a young African-American, looked at us, and the passenger hid his face behind a newspaper," she said.
They could do little more but call police about the suspicious incident, which they did not connect to the sniper attacks.
Almost two weeks later, police came to pick up Mildred at her house. "Three officers kept asking me questions about a shooting in Nevada, but I didn't know what this was about," she said. "They showed me a letter that they had found in a tree near the one of the sniper attacks and asked if I could identify the handwriting."
Eventually, the investigators put their cards on the table. "They told me that they were going to name my ex-husband as the sniper," Mildred said.
While she was shocked and in tears, Mildred did not doubt for a second that John was able to kill innocent victims indiscriminately. She remembered one evening, when they were still married and were watching a movie. "John suddenly told me that he could take a whole city out if he wanted to, and that nobody would notice that it was just a single man," she said. When Mildred asked him what he meant by that, he didn't answer.
Investigators also told her that they believed she was the intended target in the killing spree. "They said that he wanted to kill me so he could take custody of the kids," she said. In his trial, the judge later ruled that there was insufficient evidence to support this argument.
Mildred let police take her into protective custody. "They took us to a hotel. I still don't know where," she remembered. "We turned on the TV and it was the first time that I saw John there." Mildred walked to the TV and touched her former husband's face. "What's happening to you," she whispered.
With the children crying, Mildred locked herself in the bathroom. "I just sat on the floor and screamed," she said.
Muhammad and Malvo were arrested the next day, after a passerby had found them sleeping in their car at a rest stop off of Interstate 70 near Myersville, Md.
"Before they let us out of protective custody, police made us pay our dinner bill, which was $273.45," Mildred said. "Then all this stuff started coming out about John."
For their children, it seeing their father face multiple murder charges wasn't the only ordeal. They were also shocked to find out that Malvo had been Muhammad's partner - a young man whom they had come to love like a brother in the 18 months they were on the run with their father. "Lee was looking for a father figure, and John introduced him to our children as their big brother," Mildred said. "They were best friends." Malvo is serving six life terms in a Virginia prison with no chance of parole.
Mildred testified against John in the sentencing phase of his trial. "The jury said that they gave him the death penalty because they didn't want him to finish what he started - to kill me," she said.
John was exectuted Nov. 10, 2009, at Greensville Correctional Center in Jarratt, just 30 minutes south of Petersburg.
"When he was executed, one of my daughters broke down to cry," Mildred said. "I cradled her and she looked me in the eye, looking for something," she said. "But there was nothing there, no compassion, no feeling. When she noticed that, she stopped crying."
Mildred Muhammad has made peace with her former husband's hatred towards her, long before he was executed. All three children attended their father's funeral. But Mildred did not go. "Many in his family are against me. They even told my children that it is my fault that their father was executed," she said.
Today, Mildred is a motivational speaker and national spokesperson against domestic violence. She has authored books and appeared on national television. Her children are now young adults and she is proud of them. "My two girls sing opera in five languages," she said.
They still talk about their father and they continue to ask questions. "I told my children that I would always answer all their questions about their dad's actions, and I told them that they have a right to love him and pray for him," Mildred said. "And I will always tell them the truth about what happened, even if it makes me look bad."
Because talking is understanding, and understanding is healing. Mildred knows that. "I will not allow my kids to fail in life because their dad is the D.C. Sniper," she said.
Wednesday, June 22, 2011
How an Abuse Case From Florida Being Heard in Washington D.C. Affects Hawaii
Excellent piece by Dara Carlin at the Coaltion Against Legal Abuse in New York blog.
http://calany.wordpress.com/2011/06/20/how-an-abuse-case-from-florida-being-heard-in-washington-d-c-affects-hawaii/
How An Abuse Case From Florida Being Heard In Washington D.C. Affects Hawaii
http://calany.wordpress.com/2011/06/20/how-an-abuse-case-from-florida-being-heard-in-washington-d-c-affects-hawaii/
How An Abuse Case From Florida Being Heard In Washington D.C. Affects Hawaii
Being at the the furthest reaches of the United States, it’s often difficult to see how events from the mainland or Washington DC actually directly affect all of us over here in Hawaii, but a particular case coming before the United States Supreme Court next Thursday, June 23rd, has the potential to not only rock Hawaii but the entire nation.
If the victim happens to have photos of her injuries, how those injuries came about is cause for speculation in court (ie: how can you prove the injuries weren’t self-inflicted?) and the victim’s accounts and testimony against the abuser are all referred to as allegations and accusations sometimes even AFTER those allegations and accusations are proven to be facts!
The courts tend to keep children out of legal proceedings (there go your witnesses) to keep them from being “caught in the middle”. Instead the children are “given a voice” through a Guardian Ad Litem (GAL – an attorney whose supposed to represent the children’s interests) or a Custody Evaluator who may be assigned to the case so the judge can learn what “the facts” are and make decisions from their “professional” conclusions and opinions.
An inherent problem with this however is the GAL and/or CE’s approach to the case and kids: Is that professional listening to the kids and relaying to the court what the children have expressed/desire OR is that professional stepping in as the “expert” in determining what THEY think should be in the kids’ best interests?
Most often it’s the latter which strips the victim-turned-survivor of her expertise over her own children.
Complain and point out any of these blaring problems in your DV case and/or challenge and question the authority, professionalism, legality or decisions reached and you’ll end up like Linda Marie. In April 2007, Linda Marie’s daughter said “Mommy fight for us, and do something every day to get us back, and don’t ever stop”. Because this mother kept this promise, her case is going before the United States Supreme Court on Thursday, June 23rd where the highest court in the country will decide whether or not to hear her case.
Outraged? You should be! If you are, let our US Supreme Court know! A postcard campaign has been launched to say that we believe ALL CHILDREN should have violence and abuse-free childhoods and that we stand behind Linda Marie’s quest for justice. If you’d like to join, send a postcard with a picture of the town/city/island you’re on saying “I support Certiorari Case #10-1381 and Linda Marie Sacks. Please hear her case on June 23, 2011.” Mail it to:
Supreme Court of The United States, 1 First Street NE, Washington, DC 20543
Through Linda Marie’s historical case, new case law could be established to uphold the constitutional right for a parent to establish a home, to have custody over and care of their children and to let our US Justices know that the human rights of children and survivors of abuse are being violated in courtrooms all across our nation.
There is a Family Court Crisis going on in our country and in our Hawaiian Islands, and Linda Marie’s case would be the first strike in bringing the crisis to an end.
In 2002, a self-proclaimed “squeaky clean soccer mom” who lived her life for her two daughters in Daytona Beach, FL received a disturbing call from her daughter’s school; she was told that her 7 year-old daughter was sexually acting out with a knowledge beyond her years. Linda Marie Sacks did not recognize the the verbal and emotional abuse she regularly endured from her husband as domestic violence and she was having a very hard time trying to wrap her mind around the concept that her husband, the father of her children, could actually be sexually molesting them.
When Linda Marie walked in on her husband being sexually inappropriate with their daughters before school one morning in 2004, no explanation could make sense of what she saw and she filed for divorce. Believing that she would surely receive full custody of her daughters based on the history and evidence of abuse, Linda Marie got the shock of her life when her abusive ex received full custody and she was “awarded” supervised visitations.
Sadly and tragically what happened to Linda Marie is more the norm then the exception when domestic violence victims flee with their children from their abusers and YES, it DOES happen here in Hawaii every day. How? Like this:
(Typically a) Mom realizes that the relationship with the father of her children isn’t what it’s supposed to be and follows the message we send to all victims of abuse: ”If you’re in a violent or abusive relationship, get out NOW, help IS available”.
Mom usually takes the children with her – and here’s the first part of the whole thing going wrong: some judges will not see the violence or abuse the mom claims is occurring – all they’ll see is a parent who decided to take the children away from the other parent – and the judges will focus on that fact over and above the fact of violence and/or abuse that prompted the the escape in the first place.
Then there’s the argument of “Ok, so you say YOU’RE being abused. If that’s the case, why don’t YOU just go to the shelter and leave the kids behind? Why put the kids through that? Just leave them with their father. You’re saying he’s abusing YOU not them, right?”
Any protective parent will tell you that they’re NOT going to leave their child in a potentially dangerous situation or harmful environment and domestic violence is a dangerous situation and a harmful environment for ANYONE to be in, let alone children, so the victim will usually take the children with her. (There ARE situations, however, where the victim will leave without her children because she’s been convinced by the abuser that she’s not a fit parent and believes that the children are “better off without her”.)
Going back to those who would suggest that mom leave the kids behind because THEY’RE not being abused, the consequences of doing so would be disastrous because leaving the children behind will be used against her in future child custody and family court proceedings if not child protective services proceedings.
A mom whose fled without her children can and will be accused of either abandonment, neglect, failure to protect or contributing towards the abuse for leaving the children in a situation she knew to be potentially dangerous so right from the get-go, a domestic violence victim with children trying to escape is already placed in a lose-lose situation.
By the time mom has “successfully left” the abusive relationship, the legal proceedings in family court (which is NOT criminal court!) are well under way. IF the victim lives in a state that has a rebuttable presumption against sole or joint custody to a perpetrator of family violence (like Hawaii does - Hawaii Revised Statute 571-46(9)) then the law is quite clear: no sole or joint custody to an abuser BUT several things can go wrong in a DV divorce/child custody case that will keep the victim and her children from getting the protection they desperately need and deserve.
Unfortunately what’s being seen across the country is that “broad judicial discretion” trumps the law, state statutes, evidence, judicial canons, best practices and in some tragic cases, even common sense and ethics (ie: the Katie Tagle case). Part of a judge’s job is to exercise discretion over the case in front of him/her; ideally, this is supposed to be done within the confines of the law and state statute but “broad judicial discretion” has instead been cited as the judge’s right to violate and/or disregard the law and state statute! You don’t have to be in one of these cases to realize that if you feel the judge on your case has done you wrong, who exactly are you going to call to complain/report it to and at what price? YOUR word vs. a judge’s who you’ll come before again at your next court hearing? Good luck with that one…
Another thing that can keep a victim and the children from getting the protection and justice they deserve under the law is a lack of tangible evidence of abuse. Courts rely on physical evidence and witnesses to get to the truth but since domestic violence occurs in secrecy and silence, there typically are no witnesses other then the victim and the children (and it’s a very rare instance indeed for a victim to capture her abuse on film/audio/video. Also remember that the primary form and foundation of domestic violence is INVISIBLE: psychological/mental/emotional abuse).
The courts tend to keep children out of legal proceedings (there go your witnesses) to keep them from being “caught in the middle”. Instead the children are “given a voice” through a Guardian Ad Litem (GAL – an attorney whose supposed to represent the children’s interests) or a Custody Evaluator who may be assigned to the case so the judge can learn what “the facts” are and make decisions from their “professional” conclusions and opinions.
An inherent problem with this however is the GAL and/or CE’s approach to the case and kids: Is that professional listening to the kids and relaying to the court what the children have expressed/desire OR is that professional stepping in as the “expert” in determining what THEY think should be in the kids’ best interests?
Most often it’s the latter which strips the victim-turned-survivor of her expertise over her own children.
Complain and point out any of these blaring problems in your DV case and/or challenge and question the authority, professionalism, legality or decisions reached and you’ll end up like Linda Marie. In April 2007, Linda Marie’s daughter said “Mommy fight for us, and do something every day to get us back, and don’t ever stop”. Because this mother kept this promise, her case is going before the United States Supreme Court on Thursday, June 23rd where the highest court in the country will decide whether or not to hear her case.
Linda Marie would like you all to know that “This is a historic case for all of America’s children who are not being protected by the official avenues which were put in place to protect them. I am truly the ‘All American Mom’ and never did I ever imagine, that I could lose custody of my children for believing them and trying to protect them. The family court system is giving pedophiles and batterers custody. Typically, the parental rights of safe and absolutely fit protective parents are being terminated – or like me, are placed on supervised visitations for years without a case plan or reunification plan.”
Outraged? You should be! If you are, let our US Supreme Court know! A postcard campaign has been launched to say that we believe ALL CHILDREN should have violence and abuse-free childhoods and that we stand behind Linda Marie’s quest for justice. If you’d like to join, send a postcard with a picture of the town/city/island you’re on saying “I support Certiorari Case #10-1381 and Linda Marie Sacks. Please hear her case on June 23, 2011.” Mail it to:
Supreme Court of The United States, 1 First Street NE, Washington, DC 20543
Through Linda Marie’s historical case, new case law could be established to uphold the constitutional right for a parent to establish a home, to have custody over and care of their children and to let our US Justices know that the human rights of children and survivors of abuse are being violated in courtrooms all across our nation.
There is a Family Court Crisis going on in our country and in our Hawaiian Islands, and Linda Marie’s case would be the first strike in bringing the crisis to an end.
In 2002, a self-proclaimed “squeaky clean soccer mom” who lived her life for her two daughters in Daytona Beach, FL received a disturbing call from her daughter’s school; she was told that her 7 year-old daughter was sexually acting out with a knowledge beyond her years. Linda Marie Sacks did not recognize the the verbal and emotional abuse she regularly endured from her husband as domestic violence and she was having a very hard time trying to wrap her mind around the concept that her husband, the father of her children, could actually be sexually molesting them.
When Linda Marie walked in on her husband being sexually inappropriate with their daughters before school one morning in 2004, no explanation could make sense of what she saw and she filed for divorce. Believing that she would surely receive full custody of her daughters based on the history and evidence of abuse, Linda Marie got the shock of her life when her abusive ex received full custody and she was “awarded” supervised visitations.
Sadly and tragically what happened to Linda Marie is more the norm then the exception when domestic violence victims flee with their children from their abusers and YES, it DOES happen here in Hawaii every day. How? Like this:
(Typically a) Mom realizes that the relationship with the father of her children isn’t what it’s supposed to be and follows the message we send to all victims of abuse: ”If you’re in a violent or abusive relationship, get out NOW, help IS available”.
Mom usually takes the children with her – and here’s the first part of the whole thing going wrong: some judges will not see the violence or abuse the mom claims is occurring – all they’ll see is a parent who decided to take the children away from the other parent – and the judges will focus on that fact over and above the fact of violence and/or abuse that prompted the the escape in the first place.
Then there’s the argument of “Ok, so you say YOU’RE being abused. If that’s the case, why don’t YOU just go to the shelter and leave the kids behind? Why put the kids through that? Just leave them with their father. You’re saying he’s abusing YOU not them, right?”
Any protective parent will tell you that they’re NOT going to leave their child in a potentially dangerous situation or harmful environment and domestic violence is a dangerous situation and a harmful environment for ANYONE to be in, let alone children, so the victim will usually take the children with her. (There ARE situations, however, where the victim will leave without her children because she’s been convinced by the abuser that she’s not a fit parent and believes that the children are “better off without her”.)
In the meantime, it’s been clinically proven that children who witness or are exposed to domestic violence ARE indeed negatively affected EVEN if they don’t directly observe the acts and altercations so it truly is in their best interests to be kept safe from the situation and abuser.
A mom whose fled without her children can and will be accused of either abandonment, neglect, failure to protect or contributing towards the abuse for leaving the children in a situation she knew to be potentially dangerous so right from the get-go, a domestic violence victim with children trying to escape is already placed in a lose-lose situation.
Reposted in part from the Examiner, Written by Dara Carlin, M.A.
Tuesday, June 14, 2011
Dad charged with killing mom, 1-year-old daughter to avoid child support (Washington, DC)
It appears that dad RICHMOND PHILLIPS was a married man who didn't want to pay child support to his girlfriend. So he "allegedly" shot the mother to death, and left the baby in a hot car to die from hypothermia. We need better social and economic assistance for unmarried mothers. Relying on child support from dangerous ex-boyfriends just puts women and children at risk.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/local/dc-police-officer-charged-with-womans-murder-after-she-and-baby-are-found-dead/2011/06/03/AGWCqQIH_story.html
D.C. police officer charged with woman’s murder after she and baby are found dead
By Matt Zapotosky and Paul Duggan, Published: June 3
Richmond Phillips, a married D.C. police officer, met in a Prince George’s County park on Monday with Wynetta Wright to talk about her year-old daughter.
Phillips was due in court the next day for a hearing that would begin to determine whether he was the baby girl’s father and, if so, how much he’d have to pay to support her.
The meeting ended horribly, police said. Phillips, 39, allegedly pulled out a gun and killed the 20-year-old Wright with a bullet to the head. He then left her body in the park, drove her car up a hill away from the scene and abandoned the baby in the car, according to law enforcement officials with direct knowledge of the case.
When an officer found the car Thursday, after the scorching midweek heat, the baby was dead. As police awaited autopsy results Friday, they said she might have died from the extreme heat in the car. Her body showed no clear signs of trauma. The car has tinted windows, one official said, so passersby were unlikely to notice the baby inside.
“Just a tragic, tragic incident,” said Prince George’s Deputy Police Chief Gary Cunningham.
D.C. Police Chief Cathy L. Lanier called it “a horrific crime.”
Phillips, a vice officer who joined the D.C. police force in 2003, was arrested by Prince George’s police Friday and charged with first-degree murder. A family member said Phillips, who is being held without bond, lived in the county’s Temple Hills area with his wife of 13 years and their 12-year-old daughter.
Wright, an aspiring Prince George’s sheriff’s deputy, also lived in Temple Hills. She filed a court petition in February seeking to have Phillips declared the father of her daughter, Jaylin Wright, who was born June 6, 2010. She also asked the court to order Phillips to make child support payments and provide health insurance for Jaylin.
Wright was found dead Thursday on the ground in Oxon Run Spring Valley Park, about a mile from Phillips’s home, authorities said. They said Jaylin was found elsewhere in the park, dead in a car seat in Wright’s green 2008 Saturn Vue.
Phillips has been charged in Wright’s slaying, but authorities are awaiting the autopsy results on Jaylin before deciding whether to charge him in her death.
Two county police officials familiar with the case, speaking on the condition of anonymity because the investigation is continuing, said Wright told a friend that she planned to meet with Phillips on Monday to discuss what would happen Tuesday at a scheduled court hearing in the paternity matter.
Detectives have obtained surveillance video showing Phillips and Wright arriving a few minutes apart Monday in a parking lot of the Hillcrest Heights Community Center, at the edge of Oxon Run Spring Valley Park, the officials said.
After Wright failed to return from the meeting, her mother alerted authorities that she was missing, police said. On Tuesday, Phillips showed up for the paternity hearing in Prince George’s Family Court and agreed to take a DNA test, said Paula Tolson, a spokeswoman for the Maryland Department of Human Resources.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/local/dc-police-officer-charged-with-womans-murder-after-she-and-baby-are-found-dead/2011/06/03/AGWCqQIH_story.html
D.C. police officer charged with woman’s murder after she and baby are found dead
By Matt Zapotosky and Paul Duggan, Published: June 3
Richmond Phillips, a married D.C. police officer, met in a Prince George’s County park on Monday with Wynetta Wright to talk about her year-old daughter.
Phillips was due in court the next day for a hearing that would begin to determine whether he was the baby girl’s father and, if so, how much he’d have to pay to support her.
The meeting ended horribly, police said. Phillips, 39, allegedly pulled out a gun and killed the 20-year-old Wright with a bullet to the head. He then left her body in the park, drove her car up a hill away from the scene and abandoned the baby in the car, according to law enforcement officials with direct knowledge of the case.
When an officer found the car Thursday, after the scorching midweek heat, the baby was dead. As police awaited autopsy results Friday, they said she might have died from the extreme heat in the car. Her body showed no clear signs of trauma. The car has tinted windows, one official said, so passersby were unlikely to notice the baby inside.
“Just a tragic, tragic incident,” said Prince George’s Deputy Police Chief Gary Cunningham.
D.C. Police Chief Cathy L. Lanier called it “a horrific crime.”
Phillips, a vice officer who joined the D.C. police force in 2003, was arrested by Prince George’s police Friday and charged with first-degree murder. A family member said Phillips, who is being held without bond, lived in the county’s Temple Hills area with his wife of 13 years and their 12-year-old daughter.
Wright, an aspiring Prince George’s sheriff’s deputy, also lived in Temple Hills. She filed a court petition in February seeking to have Phillips declared the father of her daughter, Jaylin Wright, who was born June 6, 2010. She also asked the court to order Phillips to make child support payments and provide health insurance for Jaylin.
Wright was found dead Thursday on the ground in Oxon Run Spring Valley Park, about a mile from Phillips’s home, authorities said. They said Jaylin was found elsewhere in the park, dead in a car seat in Wright’s green 2008 Saturn Vue.
Phillips has been charged in Wright’s slaying, but authorities are awaiting the autopsy results on Jaylin before deciding whether to charge him in her death.
Two county police officials familiar with the case, speaking on the condition of anonymity because the investigation is continuing, said Wright told a friend that she planned to meet with Phillips on Monday to discuss what would happen Tuesday at a scheduled court hearing in the paternity matter.
Detectives have obtained surveillance video showing Phillips and Wright arriving a few minutes apart Monday in a parking lot of the Hillcrest Heights Community Center, at the edge of Oxon Run Spring Valley Park, the officials said.
After Wright failed to return from the meeting, her mother alerted authorities that she was missing, police said. On Tuesday, Phillips showed up for the paternity hearing in Prince George’s Family Court and agreed to take a DNA test, said Paula Tolson, a spokeswoman for the Maryland Department of Human Resources.
Monday, May 23, 2011
Dad charged with 1st-degree murder; 17-year-old daughter found in dumpster (Washington, DC)
After much public display of grief and gnashing of teeth, dad RODNEY JAMES MCINTYRE has been arrested in the stabbing murder of his 17-year-old daughter. Her body was found in a dumpster. Seems that Daddy was sexually abusing her. Not one word here about this girl's mother....
INVISIBLE MOTHER ALERT.
http://dcist.com/2011/05/father_of_ebony_franklin_charged_wi.php
Father of Ebony Franklin Charged with First Degree MurderNearly 6 months ago, MPD made the gruesome discovery of the body of 17-year-old Ebony Franklin in a dumpster in the ally of the 1000 block of Fairmont Street NW. Now, they have arrested Rodney James McIntyre, Ebony Franklin's father, for her murder. Ebony was stabbed 17 times.
Sources say McIntyre was linked both by DNA and cell phone records to Franklin's death.
Police Chief Cathy Lanier indicated in her press conference announcing McIntyre's arrest that there was also evidence of a sexual relationship between Ebony Franklin and her father.
McIntyre had been quoted in the press saying that "The way my baby was found in the trash, it's unacceptable. What I want to know as her father, what really took place with my child?"
INVISIBLE MOTHER ALERT.
http://dcist.com/2011/05/father_of_ebony_franklin_charged_wi.php
Father of Ebony Franklin Charged with First Degree MurderNearly 6 months ago, MPD made the gruesome discovery of the body of 17-year-old Ebony Franklin in a dumpster in the ally of the 1000 block of Fairmont Street NW. Now, they have arrested Rodney James McIntyre, Ebony Franklin's father, for her murder. Ebony was stabbed 17 times.
Sources say McIntyre was linked both by DNA and cell phone records to Franklin's death.
Police Chief Cathy Lanier indicated in her press conference announcing McIntyre's arrest that there was also evidence of a sexual relationship between Ebony Franklin and her father.
McIntyre had been quoted in the press saying that "The way my baby was found in the trash, it's unacceptable. What I want to know as her father, what really took place with my child?"
Thursday, May 5, 2011
Historic U.S. Supreme Court Case, re Sacks vs. Sacks (Florida)
May 5, 2011
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
PRESS CONFERENCE May 6th, 2011 at 12 Noon
Location:
US Supreme Court
One First Street, NE
Washington, DC 20543
Sidewalk in front of the US Supreme Court
HISTORIC US SUPREME COURT CASE
Child Advocates and Legal Scholars are anxiously awaiting the filing of a Petition for Writ of Certiorari on May 6, 2011 at 12 noon at the US Supreme Court in Washington, D.C. in the Sacks v. Sacks case.
This truly will be an Historic Day at the US Supreme Court, for America’s children and their “Protective Parents”, as this landmark case is being hand delivered by a Florida Mother and exposes a national crisis all over the US.
The Sacks v. Sacks case is the perfect opportunity for the US Supreme Court to thoroughly explore and address the issue of Battered Mothers and child abuse, and their documented evidence of “protective parents” losing custody and the failure of family courts and Child Protective Services to thoroughly investigate and handle Domestic Violence, child sexual/and or child physical abuse cases properly, therefore resulting in a verdict, contrary to the “bests interests of the child(ren)”.
Kathleen Russell, from the Center for Judicial Excellence, in the California Progress Report, on 10/19/09 “When Family Courts Get It Wrong”, says “When a parent harms his or her own child, family courts are supposed to step in and safeguard the victim. Can you imagine what a tragedy it would be if courts awarded custody to the wrong parent Actually according to one conservative estimate, more than 58, 000 children a year are court ordered by family courts into unsupervised visitation contact with physically or sexually abusive parents following a divorce in the U.S. The fact that this type of scandal is taking place in the American justice system defies the imagination. Not since the Roman Catholic Church pedophile scandal has the US seen this type of institutional harm inflicted on innocent children.” (www.centerforjudicalexcelllence.org)
The National Organization for Women, NOW and the NOW Ad Hoc Law Committee are addressing this issue and in their Spring 2011, “and explore what can happen to a protective mother and her children when she does nothing more than to protect her children”, as quoted on page 36 of the Petition for Certiorari.
The Petitioner, in the US Supreme Court case, Linda Marie Sacks, has been chosen as the “Poster Mother” of the Family Court Crisis, is interviewed for the article.(www.now.org) Click on the Family Law Spring Newsletter.
On April 21, 2011, in the BMCCVI Digest Number 2011, reports that Eileen King representing Justice for Children participated in the Office of Violence Against Women Roundtable Discussion that took place at George Washington University Law School. The Roundtable was organized by Rita Smith, the Director of the National Coalition Against Domestic Violence and Prof. Joan Meier, Director of the Domestic Violence Legal Empowerment and Appeals Project (DVLEAP) at GWU Law School. OVW will post a report about the Roundtable on their website in the near future. (www.justiceforchildren.org) and (www.dvleap.org)
As noted by Barry Goldstein, Esq. The Office of Violence Against Women (OVW) is part of the US Justice Department that provides grants for programs to reduce and prevent domestic violence. They recently sponsored a forum for their staff and other professionals in various parts of the government to learn about the crisis in the custody court system.
“It was a discussion based upon current scientific research and actual experiences that courts are routinely making catastrophic mistakes in failing to protect children and domestic violence survivors. Linda Marie Sacks, a Florida Mother, truly the “All American Mom”, has only seen her children at the Family Tree House Visitation Center for 82 hours in the last 4 years and 2 months, is challenging the “Best Interests of The Children” Statute 61.13, as Domestic Violence, child sexual and physical abuse must be considered in a judge’s decision determining the “Best Interests of the Children”. In the Pro se Cert Petition, Sacks raises the constitutional implications of a fit parent to the care, custody, of her children, and without a finding of unfitness by clear and convincing evidence, established by the US Supreme Court ruling in Santosky v. Kramer, U.S. 745, 769-770 (1982).
Her daughters said in April 2007, “Mommy fight for us and do something every day to get us back and don’t ever stop”. Their Mother not only kept her promise to them, but now is a national spokesperson on the child custody crisis, and is speaking up for her children, and all of America’s children affected by the failure of our justice system to protect our most innocent children from sexual and physical abuse. She is a formidable legal opponent, as she has been self taught, going to “Internet Law School” to continue her legal challenge after spending $140,000 to undo an unjust custody decision. The Fifth District Court of Appeals REVERSED and REMANDED the issue of child custody back to the lower court for a violation of the Petitioners constitutional rights to due process, in 08/08. This rare reversal provided no relief as the lower court of Judge Shawn L. Briese refused to abide by the Appeals court and refused to protect the children and said one child lied about being sexually abused.
In an article by John Weiss, from Post-Bulletin, Rochester, MN , “Do children lie about sexual abuse? Not Usually.” Children do lie, but seldom about being abused. “All human beings can and do lie, but it’s hard for kids to do it about sex”, said Victor Vieth, the director of the national Child Protection Training Center at Winona State University. “They can’t lie about something they have no knowledge of” he said, and children don’t learn about oral sex from Sesame Street.
Dr. Deborah Day of Psychological Affiliates, the court ordered custody evaluator said the minor child at 8 years old had pediatric bipolar and that negates any child sexual abuse, and then thwarted the DCF investigation. The court record clearly showed that the child DID NOT have bipolar, but the trial court still refused to protect the children, which is typical from cases all over the US.
Sunday, February 6, 2011
Media Release: Mothers of Lost Children to hold press conference, vigil and speakout (Washington, DC)
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Contact Anne Hart 916-715-5243
On Valentine’s Day, February 14, 2011 at 11:00 am, Mothers of Lost Children will hold a press conference in front of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, 200 Independence Ave SW, Washington DC. They are protesting the enormous expenditure of tax dollars to help ex-prisoners and known abusers connect with their children, and the heartbreak for mothers and children when this funding is misused and misapplied. A vigil and speakout by mothers and chlild victims will be held at the White House, 1600 Pennsylvania Ave NW on Sunday February 13 from 2:00 to 4:00 pm.
During the past two decades, mothers have been losing custody of their children (even nursing infants) in increasing numbers to fathers who are convicted or identified batterers, child molesters, drug addicts, gang-bangers and felons. Family courts force children into the custody of abusive fathers at alarming rates, allowing these men to continue controlling and abusing their victims. Research shows that 70% of batterers who ask for custody get it. Safe mothers who left the abusers in order to protect their children are frequently labeled “unfriendly” and are inappropriately ordered to supervised visitation or denied all contact with their children.
“The reason, in part,” says Karen Anderson, Executive Director of California Protective Parents Association, “lies in a misguided and dangerous objective of the Fatherhood Initiative to give fathers access to their children regardless of the risk they pose.” ‘The goal is to have former prisoners paying child support and reconnecting with their children as soon as possible,’ (Washington Post June 21, 2010.)
“It’s crazy to believe that allowing violent men to care for children is a good idea. Vulnerable children should not be used as guinea pigs to try to rehabilitate criminals,” says Anderson.
The National Fatherhood Initiative website states in 15 years it hasfcr “ensured that two million more children are living with their fathers”. The Leadership Council research indicates 58,000 children are placed with abusers every year. These statistics may be connected.
“Thousands of former prisoners and identified abusers have also discovered that if they get custody, they can receive child support instead of paying it.” says Ms. Anderson. “It’s a batterers’ and molesters’ paradise. Federally-funded supervised visitation centers are meant to protect children during visits with potentially dangerous fathers. Instead, family courts order safe mothers to see their children under supervision, which means the children aren’t able to tell their mothers about abuse by their fathers. That way the Fatherhood Initiative goals are met to access even more federal funds.”
During this time of deep fiscal crisis, when children are hungry and parents are penniless, $500,000,000.00 dollars designated to increase marriage and promote ex-prisoners to reconnect with and often harm children is doubly offensive.
Mothers of Lost Children call for a Congressional investigation into the failure of family courts to protect children and potential fraud, waste and abuse of taxpayer dollars.
www.mothers-of-lost-children.com
Contact Anne Hart 916-715-5243
On Valentine’s Day, February 14, 2011 at 11:00 am, Mothers of Lost Children will hold a press conference in front of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, 200 Independence Ave SW, Washington DC. They are protesting the enormous expenditure of tax dollars to help ex-prisoners and known abusers connect with their children, and the heartbreak for mothers and children when this funding is misused and misapplied. A vigil and speakout by mothers and chlild victims will be held at the White House, 1600 Pennsylvania Ave NW on Sunday February 13 from 2:00 to 4:00 pm.
During the past two decades, mothers have been losing custody of their children (even nursing infants) in increasing numbers to fathers who are convicted or identified batterers, child molesters, drug addicts, gang-bangers and felons. Family courts force children into the custody of abusive fathers at alarming rates, allowing these men to continue controlling and abusing their victims. Research shows that 70% of batterers who ask for custody get it. Safe mothers who left the abusers in order to protect their children are frequently labeled “unfriendly” and are inappropriately ordered to supervised visitation or denied all contact with their children.
“The reason, in part,” says Karen Anderson, Executive Director of California Protective Parents Association, “lies in a misguided and dangerous objective of the Fatherhood Initiative to give fathers access to their children regardless of the risk they pose.” ‘The goal is to have former prisoners paying child support and reconnecting with their children as soon as possible,’ (Washington Post June 21, 2010.)
“It’s crazy to believe that allowing violent men to care for children is a good idea. Vulnerable children should not be used as guinea pigs to try to rehabilitate criminals,” says Anderson.
The National Fatherhood Initiative website states in 15 years it hasfcr “ensured that two million more children are living with their fathers”. The Leadership Council research indicates 58,000 children are placed with abusers every year. These statistics may be connected.
“Thousands of former prisoners and identified abusers have also discovered that if they get custody, they can receive child support instead of paying it.” says Ms. Anderson. “It’s a batterers’ and molesters’ paradise. Federally-funded supervised visitation centers are meant to protect children during visits with potentially dangerous fathers. Instead, family courts order safe mothers to see their children under supervision, which means the children aren’t able to tell their mothers about abuse by their fathers. That way the Fatherhood Initiative goals are met to access even more federal funds.”
During this time of deep fiscal crisis, when children are hungry and parents are penniless, $500,000,000.00 dollars designated to increase marriage and promote ex-prisoners to reconnect with and often harm children is doubly offensive.
Mothers of Lost Children call for a Congressional investigation into the failure of family courts to protect children and potential fraud, waste and abuse of taxpayer dollars.
www.mothers-of-lost-children.com
Friday, January 21, 2011
D.C. sniper attacks: one side of the story you've never heard
Great post by Tara Grimes at the Psychology of Crime in the News blog.
http://healthcrimeinthenews.wordpress.com/2011/01/19/dc-sniper-attacks/
D.C. Sniper Attacks: One Side Of The Story You’ve Never Heard
By Tara Grimes
Domestic violence is no joke as a crime. This blog entry originally appeared in Tara’s Tales as a way to point out journalists need to make sure they explore every angle of a story.
On Oct. 24, 2002, relief washed over Washington D.C., Virginia, and Maryland after the “D.C. Sniper” John Muhammad’s arrest. For 22 days before his arrest, residents felt danger and fear around every corner; many barely even dared to step outside. In the course of these 22 days, ten random people were killed and six hurt by Muhammad and his accomplice 17-year-old Lee Boyd Malvo. For weeks on end this story plagued the front of newspapers and captured the attention of millions around the nation, but there’s one side of the story you probably never heard.
Sept. 29, 2010 I had the opportunity to hear a lecture from Muhammad’s ex-wife Mildred on domestic violence. The story I heard enthralled me, entranced me, and most of all touched me. It was a story I knew I wouldn’t be able to find anyway in the media, especially in the days following Muhammad’s arrest. Mildred opened up her heart to the audience and let out her emotions. She spoke to us about the beginning of her and John’s relationship, how it began as normal. When John came back from the Gulf War everything changed. He became violent and started seeing other woman. After she demanded a divorce, he was granted visitation times with the kids on weekends. One weekend though, he never brought them back. For 18 months Mildred didn’t hear from her kids, they had been kidnapped and taken to Antigua by John. This is also where John met his accomplice in the shootings Lee Boyd Malvo, taking him in and acting as a father figure to him. Mildred went to the police, but they marked the case as “custodial interference” and told her they couldn’t do anything about it because there was no parenting plan in place. Later John called her and told her, “You are my enemy and as my enemy I will kill you.” “John was a man of his word,” Mildred told us.
This threat caused Mildred, a hardworking woman who owned her own business, into hiding for 8 months. After an emergency custody hearing, Mildred got her children back. But once again she was forced finding a place she hoped John wouldn’t find them. This is when the shootings started. She never believed it could have been John, but she did know he was “the perfect shot”, able to take one shot from afar and kill someone. This is what she feared. Everywhere she went, she looked up and around at the rooftops, waiting to see John standing there with a gun aimed at her. But the shot never came, rather it was the police who came… knocking on her door one day and convincing her to come to the jail for questioning. This is when she found out her ex-husband was the prime suspect in the D.C. shootings. This is also when she found out the main target of the shootings was her. John had planned to carry out random killings, so once he was able to get her everyone would blame it on the “D.C. sniper”. However, no one would know who the sniper really was and he would gain custody of the children.
Since he hadn’t been caught when the police took Mildred in for questioning, they rushed her to a hotel under police protection. Mildred shared with us what exactly happened in that hotel that night… how when his picture popped up on CNN she reached out to the TV and placed her hand over his picture saying “Who have you become?”, how after she tucked her three children into bed for the night she went to the bathroom, turned on the bathtub water, and curled up on the cold floor and cried into a pillow for hours.
She shared with us what she and her children went through the day of his execution on Nov. 10, 2009. How it took her all her strength and will to go against what she believed could be harmful to her children… asking them if they wanted to talk with their father one last time. She believed one sentence from the manipulative man she had once married could ruin the years of counseling her kids went through, but she knew if she didn’t allow them to talk to their dad they would be mad at her forever. They decided yes, they did want to talk to them. At 9 pm though, they turned on the TV and at 9:11 pm the news declared him dead. The last call never came. She was later given a reason by John’s attorney: John, who proclaimed his innocence since his arrest, would have to answer the question “why” to his kids. This would ruin all the years he had spent declaring his innocence.
It hasn’t even been a year yet since his execution, so it surprised me she was able to come out and speak to all of us. But she wanted to share her story of being a survivor of domestic violence; in hopes those being abused all around the country can find ways to survive.
What I also find really interesting about this story is how much coverage the shootings and her husband received, but how I never once found her side of the story. Sometimes, when reading news stories, you forgot about the third party in the story. Mildred mentioned the media never really blamed the shootings on John just wanting to kill her and gain custody of the kids. The media decided John had really committed his acts for other reasons, so Mildred’s story never came out. What we decide to print and broadcast over air is the only story the public will ever know. I think it’s something we as journalists have to remember. We need to investigate all sides of a story.
If you get a chance, I suggest reading her memoir: Scared Silent… When the one you love becomes the one you fear.
http://healthcrimeinthenews.wordpress.com/2011/01/19/dc-sniper-attacks/
D.C. Sniper Attacks: One Side Of The Story You’ve Never Heard
By Tara Grimes
Domestic violence is no joke as a crime. This blog entry originally appeared in Tara’s Tales as a way to point out journalists need to make sure they explore every angle of a story.
On Oct. 24, 2002, relief washed over Washington D.C., Virginia, and Maryland after the “D.C. Sniper” John Muhammad’s arrest. For 22 days before his arrest, residents felt danger and fear around every corner; many barely even dared to step outside. In the course of these 22 days, ten random people were killed and six hurt by Muhammad and his accomplice 17-year-old Lee Boyd Malvo. For weeks on end this story plagued the front of newspapers and captured the attention of millions around the nation, but there’s one side of the story you probably never heard.
Sept. 29, 2010 I had the opportunity to hear a lecture from Muhammad’s ex-wife Mildred on domestic violence. The story I heard enthralled me, entranced me, and most of all touched me. It was a story I knew I wouldn’t be able to find anyway in the media, especially in the days following Muhammad’s arrest. Mildred opened up her heart to the audience and let out her emotions. She spoke to us about the beginning of her and John’s relationship, how it began as normal. When John came back from the Gulf War everything changed. He became violent and started seeing other woman. After she demanded a divorce, he was granted visitation times with the kids on weekends. One weekend though, he never brought them back. For 18 months Mildred didn’t hear from her kids, they had been kidnapped and taken to Antigua by John. This is also where John met his accomplice in the shootings Lee Boyd Malvo, taking him in and acting as a father figure to him. Mildred went to the police, but they marked the case as “custodial interference” and told her they couldn’t do anything about it because there was no parenting plan in place. Later John called her and told her, “You are my enemy and as my enemy I will kill you.” “John was a man of his word,” Mildred told us.
This threat caused Mildred, a hardworking woman who owned her own business, into hiding for 8 months. After an emergency custody hearing, Mildred got her children back. But once again she was forced finding a place she hoped John wouldn’t find them. This is when the shootings started. She never believed it could have been John, but she did know he was “the perfect shot”, able to take one shot from afar and kill someone. This is what she feared. Everywhere she went, she looked up and around at the rooftops, waiting to see John standing there with a gun aimed at her. But the shot never came, rather it was the police who came… knocking on her door one day and convincing her to come to the jail for questioning. This is when she found out her ex-husband was the prime suspect in the D.C. shootings. This is also when she found out the main target of the shootings was her. John had planned to carry out random killings, so once he was able to get her everyone would blame it on the “D.C. sniper”. However, no one would know who the sniper really was and he would gain custody of the children.
Since he hadn’t been caught when the police took Mildred in for questioning, they rushed her to a hotel under police protection. Mildred shared with us what exactly happened in that hotel that night… how when his picture popped up on CNN she reached out to the TV and placed her hand over his picture saying “Who have you become?”, how after she tucked her three children into bed for the night she went to the bathroom, turned on the bathtub water, and curled up on the cold floor and cried into a pillow for hours.
She shared with us what she and her children went through the day of his execution on Nov. 10, 2009. How it took her all her strength and will to go against what she believed could be harmful to her children… asking them if they wanted to talk with their father one last time. She believed one sentence from the manipulative man she had once married could ruin the years of counseling her kids went through, but she knew if she didn’t allow them to talk to their dad they would be mad at her forever. They decided yes, they did want to talk to them. At 9 pm though, they turned on the TV and at 9:11 pm the news declared him dead. The last call never came. She was later given a reason by John’s attorney: John, who proclaimed his innocence since his arrest, would have to answer the question “why” to his kids. This would ruin all the years he had spent declaring his innocence.
It hasn’t even been a year yet since his execution, so it surprised me she was able to come out and speak to all of us. But she wanted to share her story of being a survivor of domestic violence; in hopes those being abused all around the country can find ways to survive.
What I also find really interesting about this story is how much coverage the shootings and her husband received, but how I never once found her side of the story. Sometimes, when reading news stories, you forgot about the third party in the story. Mildred mentioned the media never really blamed the shootings on John just wanting to kill her and gain custody of the kids. The media decided John had really committed his acts for other reasons, so Mildred’s story never came out. What we decide to print and broadcast over air is the only story the public will ever know. I think it’s something we as journalists have to remember. We need to investigate all sides of a story.
If you get a chance, I suggest reading her memoir: Scared Silent… When the one you love becomes the one you fear.
Saturday, October 2, 2010
Mothers Demand Changes in Family Courts (Washington, DC)
Since I lost custody of my daughter to her abusive father in 1996, the protective parents movement has really grown. I truly wish I could have been in Washington to show my support. Praise to Connie, Barry, Eileen, and everybody else who made this happen.
http://www.wusa9.com/news/local/story.aspx?storyid=113776&catid=158
Mothers Demand Changes In Family Courts
Peggy Fox
WASHINGTON, D.C. (WUSA) -- They call themselves "Mothers of Lost Children." They say family courts awarded custody of their children to the very people the children said hurt them. But the courts didn't believe them.
"Children very rarely lie about these things. And the reports are coming from the children. Even when they're switched over to the custody of the batterers and the molesters, continue to report abuse. And they're ignored," said Connie Valentine with the Protective Parents Coalition.
"The courts are sending children to live with abusers at a terrifying rate," says Barry Goldstein who helped compile research from the scientific non-profit Council for Justice for a book he co-edited.
The Leadership Council found more than 58,000 children every year are ordered into unsupervised contact with physically or sexually abusive parents following a divorce.
"Seventy-five children were murdered by fathers involved in contested custody cases last year by battered in a nine month period that ended in April," said Goldstein.
Three of those children were siblings killed by their father Mark Castillo who drowned them last year in a Baltimore hotel room. Earlier, Amy Castillo had asked a judge to keep her children away from her estranged husband , because he had threatened to kill them. The judge denied her request.
The group started their march at the Department of Justice. They want the DOJ to launch an investigation into when they call family court corruption.
The group alleges custody decisions are made based on which parent has more money instead of safety.
"We want to see the child put first. We want to see the 'best interest of the child' mean the safety, protection, love and nurture of the child. That should be the priority in the courts," said Eileen King with Justice for Children.
Written by Peggy Fox
9NEWS NOW & wusa9.com
http://www.wusa9.com/news/local/story.aspx?storyid=113776&catid=158
Mothers Demand Changes In Family Courts
Peggy Fox
WASHINGTON, D.C. (WUSA) -- They call themselves "Mothers of Lost Children." They say family courts awarded custody of their children to the very people the children said hurt them. But the courts didn't believe them.
"Children very rarely lie about these things. And the reports are coming from the children. Even when they're switched over to the custody of the batterers and the molesters, continue to report abuse. And they're ignored," said Connie Valentine with the Protective Parents Coalition.
"The courts are sending children to live with abusers at a terrifying rate," says Barry Goldstein who helped compile research from the scientific non-profit Council for Justice for a book he co-edited.
The Leadership Council found more than 58,000 children every year are ordered into unsupervised contact with physically or sexually abusive parents following a divorce.
"Seventy-five children were murdered by fathers involved in contested custody cases last year by battered in a nine month period that ended in April," said Goldstein.
Three of those children were siblings killed by their father Mark Castillo who drowned them last year in a Baltimore hotel room. Earlier, Amy Castillo had asked a judge to keep her children away from her estranged husband , because he had threatened to kill them. The judge denied her request.
The group started their march at the Department of Justice. They want the DOJ to launch an investigation into when they call family court corruption.
The group alleges custody decisions are made based on which parent has more money instead of safety.
"We want to see the child put first. We want to see the 'best interest of the child' mean the safety, protection, love and nurture of the child. That should be the priority in the courts," said Eileen King with Justice for Children.
Written by Peggy Fox
9NEWS NOW & wusa9.com
Thursday, September 16, 2010
Dad accused of murdering mom, 13-week-old daughter won't face death penalty because he's "mentally ill" (Seattle, Washington)
Seems the Kings County Prosecutor's Office has decided that dad DANIEL HICKS is "mentally ill" and therefore will not face the death penalty for the shooting death of his girlfriend and their 13-week-old daughter. He was acting under "extreme mental disturbance," you see, even though he was apparently "rational" enough to re-load his weapon at least twice.
You really think that murderous moms have a monopoly on the mental health card? Not even close. But don't accuse the prosecutors of being soft or anything. They are perfectly capable of pursuing a death penalty case--IF you are an accused cop killer, or a woman-boyfriend killer combination.
You really think that murderous moms have a monopoly on the mental health card? Not even close. But don't accuse the prosecutors of being soft or anything. They are perfectly capable of pursuing a death penalty case--IF you are an accused cop killer, or a woman-boyfriend killer combination.
http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/localnews/2012915019_hicks17m.html
Originally published Thursday, September 16, 2010 at 11:26 AM
Prosecutors won't seek death for man accused of killing girlfriend, infant girl
A Seattle man accused of shooting his girlfriend and their 13-week-old daughter days before Christmas last year will not face the death penalty because he is mentally ill, the King County Prosecutor's Office announced Thursday.
By Jennifer Sullivan
Seattle Times staff reporter
A Seattle man accused of shooting his girlfriend and their 13-week-old daughter days before Christmas last year will not face the death penalty because he is mentally ill, the King County Prosecutor's Office announced Thursday.
Daniel Hicks, 30, used a .45-caliber handgun to shoot Jennifer Morgan at least 12 times and his daughter at least seven times on Dec. 21 inside their home on Seattle's Beacon Hill, according to charging documents. Seattle police believe that Hicks reloaded his weapon at least twice to kill Morgan, 28, and Emma.
A spokesman for King County Prosecutor Dan Satterberg's office said that Hicks' mental illness was a crucial reason for not seeking the death penalty.
"The defense presented evidence from experts suggesting that the defendant may have been acting under extreme mental disturbance. It's not considered a defense, but it is a recognized mitigating factor," said spokesman Dan Donohoe. Because Hicks is charged with two counts of aggravated murder, he faces an automatic sentence of life in prison without parole if convicted.
Hicks has been in jail since his arrest Dec. 28 in Santa Cruz, Calif., where he allegedly fled after the slayings. Police say they located him after tracing a collect phone call he placed from a pay phone in Santa Cruz to a relative in Seattle.
Kevin Dolan, one of Hicks' lawyers, said that the defense presented Satterberg with a thick packet of information detailing Hicks' severe mental illness.
"The mental illness is the major factor in this case," Dolan said. "It doesn't detract from the terrible thing he did, but it's the major factor that a prosecutor has to consider in determining whether or not to seek the most stringent penalty he can."
Mental illness was a common trait in some members of Hicks' family, Dolan said. His great-grandfather committed suicide and his grandfather killed his wife and son. Prosecutors say that Hicks' grandfather, Marlen Hicks, killed Hicks' grandmother and his own son in 1983. Marlen Hicks, who claimed he was insane, was convicted on two counts of first-degree murder in December 1983 and was later sentenced to life in prison. In addition, Dolan said Hicks' uncle killed his wife and two others.
Dolan said that Hicks was abused as a child and started attending mental health counseling at the age of 6. While Dolan declined to say what mental illness Hicks has been diagnosed with, he said some of the man's relatives have been diagnosed with schizophrenia.
Relatives of Hicks and Morgan told police that Hicks had been depressed and suicidal for some time. His condition worsened when he learned his girlfriend of nine years was pregnant, charging documents said. He wanted Morgan to have an abortion, claiming she "was just trying to trap him with the pregnancy," the papers say.
Morgan told her mother Hicks was upset the baby was a girl instead of a boy, charges said. He also "became very jealous and suspicious of Jennifer," and questioned if he was the baby's biological father.
Renee Morgan, the slain woman's mother, found her daughter and granddaughter slain in their home. After killing his family, Hicks left behind a note for his brother in which he compared himself to his mentally ill grandfather, according to charging papers The note read, "I am sick, like Grandpa. Sorry cannot fix life. Please live for yourself and not others. Do not cry," according to court charging documents.
The announcement in the Hicks case comes two weeks after Satterberg said his office will seek the death penalty against Christopher Monfort, who is charged in the Halloween night slaying of Seattle police Officer Timothy Brenton.
Satterberg's office is also seeking the death penalty against Michele Anderson and her former boyfriend, Joseph McEnroe, who are accused of killing six members of Anderson's family in Carnation on Christmas Eve 2007.
Earlier this year, convicted Conner Schierman was condemned to death for murdering a woman, her sister and her two children in Kirkland 2006.
Information from Seattle Times archives is included in this report.
Jennifer Sullivan: 206-464-8294 or jensullivan@seattletimes.com
Thursday, September 9, 2010
Mildred Muhammad speaks out about breaking the cycle of violence (Norman, Oklahoma)
Mildred Muhmmad is one of my heroes. It takes real courage to continually speak out on these issues when it would be just as easy to retreat into private life. Mildred's ex-husband was JOHN ALLEN MUHAMMAD, better known to the general public as the D.C. Sniper. Notice how this abusive and paranoid man who had threatened to kill her STILL GOT VISITATION with their children, and used that visitation as a means to abduct them. As usual, authorities didn't take violence against women and children seriously until the public at large was threatened by this idiot. Then it's suddenly a REALLY BIG DEAL and action had to be taken.
Not mentioned here, is the continual support that John Muhammad received from fathers rights groups back in 2002, and how he became this FR poster boy for poor, oppressed daddies. For additional information, see these previous posts.
http://normantranscript.com/headlines/x885939804/Speaker-talks-about-breaking-the-cycle-of-violence
September 9, 2010
Speaker talks about breaking the cycle of violence
By Meghan McCormick
The Norman Transcript The Norman Transcript Thu Sep 09, 2010, 01:54 AM CDT
NORMAN — Domestic violence doesn’t discriminate.
“It can happen to anyone at anytime,” Mildred Muhammad told a crowd Wednesday morning at the Partnership Conference on Domestic/Sexual Violence and Stalking.
Muhammad was the featured speaker at this year’s conference. The forum opened Wednesday at the Embassy Suites Hotel and Conference Center. It concludes today.
Muhammad said she suffered years of emotional abuse from her ex-husband John Allen Muhammad. He was later known as the D.C. Sniper, who terrorized the region with random shootings in fall 2002.
John Muhammad was convicted in the attacks and sentenced to death. He was executed in November 2009.
Muhammad said she was married for 12 years. The couple had three children.
At the beginning of the marriage, John was “happy and jovial,” Muhammad said.
“He was the go-to man,” she said.
That all changed when military orders sent him to the Middle East for combat in Desert Storm.
“When he got back, he was the man that sat in the corner,” she said.
The family moved to Tacoma, Wash., and ran an automobile repair service. She said John Muhammad’s personality changed more.
“He began questioning everything and putting me down,” she said.
Muhammad said domestic violence comes in all shapes and sizes. Religion, race, color and creed don’t matter.
She said one day she decided to ask her husband for a divorce. He questioned why she wanted to end their marriage.
“That’s when it started,” she said.
Muhammad said her ex-husband once told her that he saw her as his enemy. He even threatened to kill her.
Muhammad took his threats serious. She filed for a restraining order against him.
She recalled sitting in a lobby waiting to fill out the necessary paperwork for the court order.
“I tried to figure out how did we get here,” Muhammad said.
The judge agreed with Muhammad that her ex-husband was a danger to her safety.
“They gave me a lifetime restraining order,” she said.
She and John Muhammad worked out a visitation schedule for their children to spend time with their father. Then one day, John Muhammad didn’t bring the children home.
“Five o’clock came. There was no John,” she said.
Muhammad said John Muhammad emptied their bank accounts and took off with their kids.
“I had no money,” she said.
After spending nearly two months searching for her children, Muhammad was hospitalized after becoming ill. During her hospital visit, she received a call from her former husband.
“I knew he was going to find a way to kill me,” she said. “ I couldn’t get anyone to believe me.”
Muhammad said when she was discharged from the hospital, she moved into a shelter for domestic abuse victims. She continued to search for her children and find a way to get custody of them.
In September 2001, Muhammad received a call that her children had been found. It had been 18 months since she last saw her kids’ faces. At a hearing on Sept. 4, 2001, a judge granted Muhammad custody of all three children.
About a year later, the shootings began in the Washington D.C. area. Muhammad still feared for her safety.
“Now I have a sniper to worry about,” Muhammad recalled thinking.
On Oct. 23, 2002, agents with the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives knocked on Muhammad’s door. They wanted to know the last time she saw her ex-husband.
“My hands began sweating immediately,” she said.
Muhammad told agents she hadn’t seen John Muhammad since the custody hearing held a year earlier. Investigators explained she was the target of the shootings.
Muhammad and her children were placed into protective custody. When word got out that John Muhammad was the D.C. sniper suspect, media swarmed Muhammad’s house.
It’s been almost 10 months since John Muhammad was executed. Muhammad said her two oldest children attend college. Her youngest child lives with her.
Attorney General Drew Edmondson spoke briefly before Muhammad addressed the crowd. Edmondson said domestic violence diminishes society.
“It perpetuates a cycle of violence,” he said.
Edmondson commended the audience for attending the conference. He said violence will grow unless someone takes action.
“We need to break that cycle,” Edmondson said.
The conference is sponsored by the Attorney General’s Office, CASA, the Catholic Archdiocese, the Criminal Justice Resource Center, the Department of Corrections, the Department of Health, the District Attorneys Council, the Oklahoma Coalition against Domestic Violence and Sexual Assault (OCADVSA), the Regional Community Policy Institute and the Oklahoma U.S. Attorney’s Office.
Meghan McCormick 366-3539 mmccormick@normantranscript.com
Not mentioned here, is the continual support that John Muhammad received from fathers rights groups back in 2002, and how he became this FR poster boy for poor, oppressed daddies. For additional information, see these previous posts.
http://dastardlydads.blogspot.com/2009/10/beltway-snipers-violent-past-providence.html
http://dastardlydads.blogspot.com/2009/09/john-muhammed-devoted-dad-connecting.htmlhttp://dastardlydads.blogspot.com/2009/09/dc-sniper-former-fr-poster-boy-to-be.html
http://normantranscript.com/headlines/x885939804/Speaker-talks-about-breaking-the-cycle-of-violence
September 9, 2010
Speaker talks about breaking the cycle of violence
By Meghan McCormick
The Norman Transcript The Norman Transcript Thu Sep 09, 2010, 01:54 AM CDT
NORMAN — Domestic violence doesn’t discriminate.
“It can happen to anyone at anytime,” Mildred Muhammad told a crowd Wednesday morning at the Partnership Conference on Domestic/Sexual Violence and Stalking.
Muhammad was the featured speaker at this year’s conference. The forum opened Wednesday at the Embassy Suites Hotel and Conference Center. It concludes today.
Muhammad said she suffered years of emotional abuse from her ex-husband John Allen Muhammad. He was later known as the D.C. Sniper, who terrorized the region with random shootings in fall 2002.
John Muhammad was convicted in the attacks and sentenced to death. He was executed in November 2009.
Muhammad said she was married for 12 years. The couple had three children.
At the beginning of the marriage, John was “happy and jovial,” Muhammad said.
“He was the go-to man,” she said.
That all changed when military orders sent him to the Middle East for combat in Desert Storm.
“When he got back, he was the man that sat in the corner,” she said.
The family moved to Tacoma, Wash., and ran an automobile repair service. She said John Muhammad’s personality changed more.
“He began questioning everything and putting me down,” she said.
Muhammad said domestic violence comes in all shapes and sizes. Religion, race, color and creed don’t matter.
She said one day she decided to ask her husband for a divorce. He questioned why she wanted to end their marriage.
“That’s when it started,” she said.
Muhammad said her ex-husband once told her that he saw her as his enemy. He even threatened to kill her.
Muhammad took his threats serious. She filed for a restraining order against him.
She recalled sitting in a lobby waiting to fill out the necessary paperwork for the court order.
“I tried to figure out how did we get here,” Muhammad said.
The judge agreed with Muhammad that her ex-husband was a danger to her safety.
“They gave me a lifetime restraining order,” she said.
She and John Muhammad worked out a visitation schedule for their children to spend time with their father. Then one day, John Muhammad didn’t bring the children home.
“Five o’clock came. There was no John,” she said.
Muhammad said John Muhammad emptied their bank accounts and took off with their kids.
“I had no money,” she said.
After spending nearly two months searching for her children, Muhammad was hospitalized after becoming ill. During her hospital visit, she received a call from her former husband.
“I knew he was going to find a way to kill me,” she said. “ I couldn’t get anyone to believe me.”
Muhammad said when she was discharged from the hospital, she moved into a shelter for domestic abuse victims. She continued to search for her children and find a way to get custody of them.
In September 2001, Muhammad received a call that her children had been found. It had been 18 months since she last saw her kids’ faces. At a hearing on Sept. 4, 2001, a judge granted Muhammad custody of all three children.
About a year later, the shootings began in the Washington D.C. area. Muhammad still feared for her safety.
“Now I have a sniper to worry about,” Muhammad recalled thinking.
On Oct. 23, 2002, agents with the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives knocked on Muhammad’s door. They wanted to know the last time she saw her ex-husband.
“My hands began sweating immediately,” she said.
Muhammad told agents she hadn’t seen John Muhammad since the custody hearing held a year earlier. Investigators explained she was the target of the shootings.
Muhammad and her children were placed into protective custody. When word got out that John Muhammad was the D.C. sniper suspect, media swarmed Muhammad’s house.
It’s been almost 10 months since John Muhammad was executed. Muhammad said her two oldest children attend college. Her youngest child lives with her.
Attorney General Drew Edmondson spoke briefly before Muhammad addressed the crowd. Edmondson said domestic violence diminishes society.
“It perpetuates a cycle of violence,” he said.
Edmondson commended the audience for attending the conference. He said violence will grow unless someone takes action.
“We need to break that cycle,” Edmondson said.
The conference is sponsored by the Attorney General’s Office, CASA, the Catholic Archdiocese, the Criminal Justice Resource Center, the Department of Corrections, the Department of Health, the District Attorneys Council, the Oklahoma Coalition against Domestic Violence and Sexual Assault (OCADVSA), the Regional Community Policy Institute and the Oklahoma U.S. Attorney’s Office.
Meghan McCormick 366-3539 mmccormick@normantranscript.com
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