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Showing posts with label CONNECTICUT GENERAL ASSEMBLY. Show all posts
Showing posts with label CONNECTICUT GENERAL ASSEMBLY. Show all posts

Monday, April 1, 2019

HOW FATHER'S RIGHTS PEOPLE HAVE IT ALL WRONG WHEN IT COMES TO FAMILY COURT REFORM!

In a recent hearing at the CT State Legislature, father's rights activists demanded that legislators and citizens define the problem with family court as one of parental alienation.  They are wrong, and I will tell you why. 

My introduction to the CT family court reform movement was around 2011 when Keith Harmon Snow, author of "The Worst Interests of the Child", contacted me to discuss the ways in which victims of domestic violence were losing custody to their abusers. Next, on or around 2013, father's rights advocates seized control of the family court reform movement and reframed its agenda.  

Instead of demonstrating concern regarding protective mothers, they insisted that the problem of family court could only be traced back to the celebrated [or debunked, depending upon your perspective,] theory of parental alienation (PA), or parental alienation syndrome (PAS).  This recently culminated in the raised House Bill 7393 [now withdrawn] which proposed either jail or fines for those whom the Court determines have committed it. 

The Bill also included two separate "friendly parent" provisions which would have guaranteed that anyone who reported domestic violence or child sexual abuse would promptly lose custody.  After all, it is most unfriendly to assert that you or your child are the victims of abuse.  [Ok, I know, not funny.  I'm just joking.]

To begin, for those who do not know, what is parental alienation, or parental alienation syndrome?  

For a definition, I'm taking the easy route, and I will simply quote wikipedia. Parental alienation syndrome is, "a term introduced by child psychiatrist Richard Gardner in 1985 to describe a distinctive suite of behaviors in children that includes showing extreme but unwarranted fear, disrespect or hostility towards a parent. Observed repeatedly in families involved in child custody litigation, these behaviors result from manipulation or undue influence, typically by the other parent who may be attempting to prevent an ongoing relationship between a child and other family members after family separation or divorce." 

The clincher in this discussion is the statement that comes next, "The syndrome has not been accepted by either the medical or legal communities and Gardner's theory has been criticized by legal and mental health scholars for lacking scientific validity and reliability."  

Yet despite the fact that this syndrome has no scientific validity, father's rights people insist upon embedding it in our laws here in CT and making it a central factor in all custody determinations.  

Again, in doing this, I believe that fathers' rights people have it all wrong.  

Why?  

If you have a problem, then you need to look for solutions.  However, these solutions will not work as long as the problems haven't been defined properly.  When it comes to the broken family court system here in CT, I have been increasingly disgusted with the incapacity of many advocates -- father's rights advocates in particular, the Task Force to Study Legal Disputes Involving the Care and Custody of Minor Children (2013 - 2014), members of the legislature and the CT Judicial Branch -- to define the problem in an intelligent manner.  

How can you begin to think of developing policies or crafting bills when you have no idea what is going on?  For me personally, as an advocate, I don't get that approach. 

For instance, blaming the victims. For too long now, starting with the "Report of the Governor's Commission on Divorce, Custody and Children" of December 2002, experts on family court, i.e. attorneys, judges, mental health professionals -- have placed the blame for the problems of family court on the litigants themselves. In the words of the Governor's report, which were again quoted in the report of the Task Force on the Care and Custody of Minor Children (2014), the problem arises from "a small minority of parents [which] engages in persistent conflict because of anger, characterological or mental health problems, or the force of personality."  

The theory that character flaw or mental illness repeats itself in fathers' rights advocates insistence that the problem can be understood almost solely within the context of parental alienation syndrome.  Also, that the solution should be strict punishments for PAS, i.e. jail and hefty financial fines, as well as forced shared parenting.  But is this true?

For a closer look at this phenomenon, take a look at the hearing which took place earlier this month on February 5, 2019. I spent a considerable amount of time yesterday reviewing the entire video which is a little over 9 hours long.  For at least the first three hours of this testimony, viewers were subjected to lengthy lectures on parental alienation theory.  First came Dr. William Bernat, a parental alienation expert, who broke down the theory to its 17 recognized behaviors and 8 symptoms.  After he had completed his testimony, we were forced to listen to Dr. Steve Miller, a frequent flyer at the CT Legislature, who talked about parental alienation syndrome as an epidemic plaguing our nation.  Once he was done, then we were bombarded with more lectures on parental alienation from Linda Gottlieb, who I've been informed is not a psychologist. She talked more about planting false memories and false allegations in the light of parental alienation. 

Then after that, we were required to hear the testimony of Ms. Joan Kloth-Zenard who runs the organization "PAS Intervention"--she apparently is qualified by an MFT, whatever that is, as opposed to an LMFT which is what we would ordinarily be looking for.  What is interesting about Joan's testimony is that, for an example, she described a case where the mother was stabbed in the abdomen and labia by the father, and yet the father still got custody.  To me, this looked to be a case of domestic violence.  However, this is the very interesting twist on the parental alienation movement in that father's rights people have couched this theory in the language of the domestic violence movement and so many people, including women, have come to believe that parental alienation theory is just another word for domestic violence.  That, in itself, is an entirely, different, but interesting story that I will hopefully touch upon in another blog.  

Let me get back to my point. This is the dilemma that arises when folks define the problem of family court as a mental health problem among litigants, whether you want to define it as parental alienation or some other ailment.  It simply isn't true.  

If you look at the Governor's Report of December 2002, there is one paragraph in that report on that nasty, chronic, minority of litigators who they said cause all the trouble.  After that, you get the 65 page detailed report regarding all the systems malfunctions within the family court system itself which actually cause the problems in family court.  

Likewise, once you plow through the insistent litany in regard to PA or PAS in the first 3 hours of the video of the February 5, 2019 day of testimony, which father's rights people provided as the ideological context for the later citizen testimony, you will find 6 additional hours of testimony from at least 30 victims of family court detailing the many systems breakdowns within the CT Family Court system itself.  In other words, the problem is not PA or PAS.  The problem is a broken family court system.  

One person spoke about the fact that there are no consequences for disobeying orders, a failure to obey the ADA, and judges would not listen to her testimony or look at her evidence. She lost everything, her job, her home, her income.  Here is another person who spoke of the collusion between court actors, the failure to obey the constitution, in chambers hearings where parents are not included, impacts including alcohol and drug addiction, homelessness, bankruptcy, trauma, and PTSD.  Another person spoke of the denial of due process, attorneys hiding exculpatory evidence, having to be in court so often it was like a full time job, his case discussed behind closed doors without the parties present, financial costs of up to $300,000 - $500,000 and even more.  

Again, corruption, collusion, racketeering, slander, perjury, lack of ethics, no checks and balances, absolute immunity for negligent and incompetent GALs and other vendors, failure to adhere to the rules of court or case law, financial and emotional blackmail, hired guns, perverted custody evaluations and psychological evaluations, no oversight, no accountability, false allegations, inexperienced and unqualified court personnel, unnecessary continuances, documents that disappear from the court files, transcripts that are tampered with, and on and on.  This is exactly the same testimony we heard during the daylong testimony on February 9, 2014 and the breakdown of family court here in CT.

Forced shared parenting, punishments for so-called alienation, and for not being "friendly", will not correct engrained and deliberately engineered systems failures which are kept in place for profit.  In fact, given the introduction of harsh punishments, settling disputes over whether one parent did or did not alienate the other, will invite additional corrupt vendors into the courtroom, and exacerbate already existing problems within the system.

These systems problems were originally detailed in the Governor's Commission report of 2002 and, for the better part, they have gotten worse, and not better.  

Parental Alienation theories are about the gender wars taking place in America.  Forced shared parenting is about the Men's Rights movement and the backlash against the Women's Rights movement of the 1970s. It is about ideology, and it is about indoctrination. If you talk to the people who promote PAS theory, you quickly get the idea that these are people who act as though they are in a cult reciting their treasured mantras.  

Ideology is like religion.  If you try to enshrine it in your statutes and laws, it will lead to endless confusion. Thinking we can solve the problem of family court by sprinkling holy water on it in the form of the ideology of parental alienation, I think is a recipe for disaster.  

Instead, if we are serious about resolving the problems of family court, we have to do the hard work of looking again at the system itself.  In other words, we have to investigate the machinery of the CT Family Court system which is operating on a daily basis. We have to examine what works, and what does not. It is a difficult and painstaking job, one which often does not have any easy answers, but it is at least a fairly concrete task from which we can garner measurable results. 

Every member of the former Governor's Commission of 2002 is currently notable for being at the center of the corruption and malfeasance in family court which we are looking at today.  The membership list is literally a who's who of legal and mental health professionals who later became famous for exploiting and taking advantage of family court victims.  It is paramount that we make sure nothing like that happens again.  When these kinds of criminal court actors take advantage of Moms and Dads, those parents are not mentally ill, they are victims of corrupt family court practices. 

This doesn't mean that the Commission didn't do a good job of laying the groundwork for future reform in its examination of the family court system. It's just that they immediately ignored the outcome of the report and used the network they estalished doing the work to exploit and harm family court victims.  I  simply believe we need to retrieve that work and use it to continue to make progress here and now.

Sunday, April 30, 2017

CREATING A CT FAMILY COURT REFORM MOVEMENT THAT EVERYONE CAN GET BEHIND!

Recently, we all watched the fiasco of SB #1049 go down where rogue leaders of the CT Coalition for Family Court Reform tried to slip a bill through the Finance Committee rather than the Judiciary Committee.  They did this after members of the Judiciary Committee quite sensibly refused to hear proposed bills from The Coalition that were destructive and damaging to women.  

The only thing I can say about the Finance Committee at this point is: "What were they thinking?"  

Wednesday, January 18, 2017

MICHAEL NOWACKI DECRIES THE WIDESPREAD PERJURY PRACTICED BY JUDGES AND JUDICIARY COMMITTEE MEMBERS DURING THE REAPPOINTMENT HEARINGS!

By Email

Wednesday, 
January 18, 2017 
9:16 PM





Rep. Tong:

Today, your suggestion and that of Rep. Rebimbas will be challenged through a media strategy to indicate that the Chairs have engaged, personally, in aiding and abetting false testimony‎ to be delivered in your self described "rigorous" review of those re-nominated for judicial reappointments.

I have confirmed by performing due diligence on the Chairs that the six page form of the Judicial Selection Commission have never been secured and distributed to the membership of the entire Judiciary Committee.

While we would agree that it would be important to redact telephone numbers and addresses for judges to ensure you, as attorneys, do not abuse your position to talk to judges on matters under current litigation including appeal.

There is a legitimate and well grounded concern about a far too "cozy" relationship between the Chairs of the Judiciary Committee and ranking members who are attorneys.

We noted the Chief Justice, in the offices of the Judiciary Committee where the Chairs have an office, meeting prior to the start of the re-confirmation process which began on January 11, 2017.

Do you really believe that members of the United States Congress meet to discuss cases which are controversial decisions?

It may be time for the citizens of this State to initiate a change in the State Constitution to change the Connecticut judiciary to an elected---not an appointment position inasmuch as lawyers, as legislators, have consistently voted favorably on all judicial re-appointments.

Your refusal and failure to provide for public inspection copies of the Judicial Selection Commission forms sworn as "truthful" and not distributing that redacted document to the members of your OWN committee raises serious issues of your self-proclaimed "due dilligence" today.

The decision of the Chairs to limit public posting of transcripts to refute testimony of judges is another example of creating a system where "perjured" testimony is not only tolerated but condoned by the chairs who are definitely more interested in coddling judges than "professional skepticism" which is the hallmark of many professions.

The Judicial Review Council needs to be revised so that all complaints, dismissed or not, are a matter of public record.

The comments on "sealing cases" by Judge Buzzuto for judges who go through a divorce is inconsistent with open disclosure of records to ensure that "addresses are redacted" but the decisions an open public record---just as you make our decisions a matter of an "open public record" which is used to humiliate the citizens while protecting the privacy rights of public officials.

Recent surveys done on the judiciary ranks Connecticut as one of the least transparent of any state in the country.

The fact that the judiciary cut $60 million from its budget because it was bloated without services being decreased should be a clear sign that the legislators, in general, don't have the same "access issues" to the courts that the general public has to endure.

The fact that Rep. Rebimbas refused to disclose on her "stump speech" on Judge Adelman that she received appointments by Judge Adelman smacks of an undisclosed conflict of interest.

As you know, the lack of disclosure of the answers to the 32 questions by your Committee Chairs is a clear sign that what you don't know can hurt the citizens you claim to serve.

There will be letters sent to those who you serve who will be randomly selected off the voter roles to expose the failure of the Chairs to have properly investigated allegations of misconduct reported to you by "railroading" controversial candidates within a week of the controversy involving allegations of perjury to be investigated by a select subcommittee which is balanced with lawyers and non-lawyers to review transcripts which the Chairs refuse to post and share with the colleagues on the committee as "equals".

The lack of "professional skepticism" by lawyers serving as legislators is demonstrated by your consistent voting and "unchallenged" public comments by Rep. Tong and Rep. Rembimas.

The Chairs of the Judiciary Committee asked no tough questions about the "Hightower" matter raised by Rep. Tong---who never even asked a question about it to Judge Adelman today.

There is only ONE representative of the people on your committee who asks tough questions and that is Minnie Gonzalez.

I watched all but one interview conducted by your committee on Wednesday and Friday and I am one of five individuals who will have filed by tomorrow complaints with the Chief State Attorney on five judges who meet the standard of probable cause for arrest for perjury defined in C.G.S. 53a-156 (a).

If the Chief State Attorney Office had a grand jury system in place, then judges would be far less likely to deliver material and false testimony and in written statements provided to the Judicial Selection Commission is provided with a General Release Form.

Until the Chairs take corrective actions to rebuild the trust that only you can restore, the public will exercise our rights to expose "corrupt practices" which the Chairs seem to support.

Have any of you ever sat in a Monday short calendar in family court and watched the meter running?

Have any of you visited a courthouse in Virginia where a help desk directs clients to "calendered" matters in which Connecticut has to run a "pilot program".

The "cattle calls in family courts" is the single, most inefficient way to conduct the public's access to justice.

Despite Rep. Tong's statements that you take these comments seriously, all we need to do is review the voting records of the 19 lawyers on the judiciary committee (if we include one member who had a direct relative on the Supreme Court) and your attempts to deliver Judge Fuger's head on a platter today to show how "tough you are".

At no point in time, since Judge Frazzini sent a "letter of retraction" after I filed a criminal complaint alleging perjury to the Chief's State Attorney's Office has any judge been subject to a delayed vote until a full investigation of allegations of perjury occurs.

There is a section of the Code of Judicial Conduct which prohibits a Judge from making a knowingly false statement to a legislative committee.

Until there is either legislative reforms to clean up this system of inefficiencies in due process and remove judges from sitting on administrative committee meetings which take them away from their duties "in court", we will continue to challenge publicly and privately, whether you approve or not, our "professional skepticism" that the lawyers in the legislature are engaging and abetting perjury by refusing to table the vote on any judge who is alleged to have committed perjury under oath.

We will be unrelenting because this "tyranny" creates through the empowerment of "judicial discretion" to rape and pillage the financial resources of parents via a reallocation of our lifetime savings to support your "system of racketeering" by having lawyers sitting in a courtroom for hours and then billing their clients for accomplishing nothing and being paid for it.

I would be happy to sit down with you to discuss with a group of litigants to show us the evidence of perjury---which are now on their way ‎for review by the "probable cause" standards which apply to criminal arrests of those judges who made knowingly false material statements to a committee.

For Rep. Rebimbas to have made a claim that "she has some sort of access to transcripts" to the 3,850 pages of transcripts, is nothing less than balderdash.

We are tired of the "obstruction" by the Chairs to a proper review of evidence by limiting the posting of transcripts on the judiciary committee website.

In the movie "A Few Good Men", Jack Nicholson's line seems appropriate to close this email:

"You can't handle the truth."

Michael Nowacki,
Public Advocate

MICHAEL NOWACKI TO REP. ROSA REBIMBAS, "YOU LIED!"

BY EMAIL:

Wednesday, 
January 18, 2017 
1:55 PM




Rep. Remimbas:

You lied to the public today on CT-N when you said you have the ability to review public records on-line about a judge to evaluate the authenticity of testimony.

Transcripts of court proceedings are not readily available on line and your comments were disingenuous.

You and your colleagues as lawyers have ZERO credibility in the fawning which I am watching on CT-N today regarding judges re-confirmation hearings today in the House.

When my house sells in Connecticut, I may need to reside somewhere for two years and will expose you by taking residence in your district to reveal your conflicts of interest in having been appointed by Judge Bozzuto as a GAL when she was first appointed to the bench.

We will continue to expose you and the other lawyers on the judiciary who don't allow transcripts to be shared on line on the judiciary website to refute the sworn testimony of judges at public hearings.

I have a bag of marshmellows here in my home for a reason today---to toss them at the screen when legislators like Labriola and you stand up and lie to protect  judges who deliver knowingly false testimony under oath.

There is a reason why we call Connecticut--Corrupticut--to honor your personal enduring legacy which is causing people to leave the State---30,000 of them last year.

In your entire time of voting on judicial confirmations which I have observed for the last sic years, I am still waiting for you to oppose an re-nomination---even on Judge Parker.

We have no respect for you and your legal colleagues on the judiciary committee who you allow to perjure themselves under oath without consequence.

It is time for citizens to expose you for your undisclosed conflicts of interest.

Look for my LTE in your weekly newspaper exposing your mis-statements about "your access" to public records to review "difficult cases".

Sincerely,

Michael Nowacki
New Canaan, CT

NOWACKI LETTER TO CT STATE LEGISLATORS ON THE REAPPOINTMENT OF JUDGES! VOTE NO!

To the Members of the General Assembly:

By the time you consider the Re-Appointment Votes on Judges of the Superior Court, you should be aware that there have been or will be five criminal complaints filed with the Chief State Attorney's Office that certain judges on January 11 and January 13, delivered sworn testimony which constitutes grounds for "material mis-statements" of "facts" and/or "knowing or willful" sworn testimony in documents provided to the Judicial Selection Commission.

The lack of the willingness of the Chairs of the Judiciary Committee to re-consider an "arbitrary rule" limiting public testimony to five pages, has resulted in an "erosion" in the public confidence in the elected members of the General Assembly to be provided to documents refuting sworn testimony via this "five page rule".

The Chairs of the Judiciary Committee have been unresponsive to emails requesting a "waiver" be issued to allow the public the opportunity to post documents to refute "materially false and misleading" sworn testimony and documents notarized which are required to be submitted to the Judicial Selection Commission.

The Judicial Selection Commission, as noted in the six page form attached to this email, has never provided access to the answers to all 32 questions---even to the members of the Judiciary Committee of this legislature.

This failure to have "full disclosure" of the answers to the Judicial Selection Commission documents for review by the members of the Judiciary Committee erodes the confidence of the public trust placed in the hands of legislators who will be voting today.

We urge you to consider "abstaining" or "voting no" consistent with your "due diligence" responsibilities before casting a vote confirming a candidate today.

Sincerely,

Michael Nowacki
Public Advocate

LINK TO THE JUDICIAL QUESTIONNAIRE.  SEE BELOW:

http://divorceinconnecticut.blogspot.com/2017/01/judges-questionnaire-to-which-judiciary.html

Wednesday, January 4, 2017

THE OFFICE OF LEGISLATIVE RESEARCH REPORT ON MAJOR ISSUES THE CT GENERAL ASSEMBLY IS CURRENTLY FACING!


FROM THE OLR REPORT: 

"Every year, legislative leaders ask the Office of Legislative Research (OLR) to identify and provide brief descriptions of important issues that the General Assembly may face in the upcoming session.

This report represents the professional, nonpartisan views ofstaff in OLR, the Office of Fiscal Analysis (OFA), and the Legislative Commissioners’ Office (LCO) on possible upcoming legislative issues. It does not represent staff suggestions or recommendations. 

We identified issues based on interim studies; research requests; non-confidential discussions with legislators, other legislative participants, and executive branch agencies; and our general subject matter knowledge..."

READ MORE:

https://www.cga.ct.gov/olr/Documents/year/MI/2017MI-20161209_Major%20Issues%20for%202017.pdf?utm_source=Hampton&utm_campaign=6fcd3b13eb-EMAIL_CAMPAIGN_2017_01_03&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_fedf93c99b-6fcd3b13eb-27852809

Sunday, February 21, 2016

UPDATES ON IMPORTANT CGA HEARINGS RELATED TO DCF, ETC.!

This in from Cheryl Martone of CT Concerned Parents:

Dear Parents, 
 
Please spread the word about this hearing as it is about CPS/DCF trying to get more programs and justify them selves that they are doing alright for the children and families when they are NOT! Come speak your mind

On 9 Bills, we need many here:

I will be speaking on this one: 


Also in room 1A Judges on Tues. Feb. 23 at the LOB who are being questioned to be on the JRC -Judicial Review Council" 


Sunday, April 26, 2015

CT LATINO NEWS SPEAKS OUT IN SUPPORT OF REP. MINNIE GONZALEZ!

Gerry Garcia speaks out in support of Rep. Minnie Gonzalez as follows:
"I read with sadness and disappointment the Courant’s editorial, Rep Gonzalez Insulting Email Disgraceful. In your zeal to pin blame on Connecticut’s senior Latina legislator, what’s most disgraceful is that the Courant’s editors completely miss the much bigger issue.
We happen to be in the midst of a national conversation on police use of excessive force, of dead black men, of brutality that would never have come to light but for ordinary citizen bystanders with camera phones.  Too many black and brown Americans – from South Carolina to New York to Los Angeles to our own East Haven – fear for our lives when we’re engaged by police.  Rather than blaming the Latina for an inappropriate e-mail, where is the Editors’ righteous indignation that Republican legislators put politics and personal animus ahead of this important national conversation and related legislation?"

For more information on this important issue, please click on the link below:

http://ctlatinonews.com/2015/04/18/op-ed-why-is-rep-minnie-gonzalez-criticized-and-not-republicans/

Saturday, April 25, 2015

PAUL RYAN SPEAKS OUT ON THE REAPPOINTMENT OF CHASE T. ROGERS: MORE CORRUPTION AS USUAL!

Paul Ryan states as follows:

"Eight years. By our historical temporal scale, eight years is but an instant . . . a veritable flash of light that will barely be noticed on our anthropological calendar. If, however, you are an individual — or worse yet — a family living in Connecticut and need to use the programs, activities or services of our state courts to help you resolve any sort of legal dispute, best if you're wearing a seat belt or something else because it's likely to be a bumpy ride for the foreseeable future.

Either our General Assembly was uninformed, duped, or chose to ignore the full scope of information before them. The Senate had already voted unanimously, as had the Joint Committee on Judiciary, but is it possible that all the public voices would be dismissed, individually and collectively? At this point, it would appear so as the final vote was 139 members of the House voting in favor of the resolution confirming the nomination of the Honorable Chase T. Rogers of Old Lyme to be Chief Justice of the Supreme Court and a Judge of the Superior Court. Just 74 votes were needed for passage, and so the resolution carried. Only 6 legislators voted "Nay" (Representatives Arce, Candelara, Gonzalez, Sanchez, Tercyzak, and Carter), but even among this group, only Rep. Minnie Gonzalez, a Hartford-Democrat, rose to explain her vote in opposition..."

For more information on this matter, please click on the link below:



Wednesday, April 22, 2015

CT MIRROR REPORTS ON FINAL ACT OF JUSTICE CHASE T. ROGERS' REAPPOINTMENT DRAMA!

Reporter Mark Pazniokas of the CT Mirror reports as follows:

"A noisy path to reconfirmation for Chief Justice Chase T. Rogers reached its end with a 139-6 House vote Wednesday, but not before a Latina legislator accused Rogers of slighting the Supreme Court's first and only Latina justice.
Rep. Minnie Gonzalez, D-Hartford, voted against Rogers' confirmation to a second eight-year term as chief justice of Connecticut's highest court, citing an opinion in which the majority accused the dissenting Justice Carmen Espinosa of dishonoring the court.
“A chief justice should not condone or support such an attack,” Gonzalez said during a brief debate in the House. “She should exercise moral leadership.”
Gonzalez choosing to make an issue of intemperate language struck some in the House as odd, given that Gonzalez' insults of a Republican colleague recently prompted a newspaper's call for her censure and the GOP minority's demand for an apology..."  
For more information on this matter, please click on the link below:

Tuesday, April 21, 2015

IN LETTER TO CT GENERAL ASSEMBLY, ACTIVIST SCOTT BUDEN DECRIES ATTACKS ON REP. MINNIE GONZALEZ AND MEMBERS OF THE CT FAMILY COURT REFORM MOVEMENT!

It appears that the anonymous person who penned the April 14th op-ed piece run by the Hartford Courant googled the term "inflammatory language", copied all the results, and called it an article.  Its dearth of formed opinion notwithstanding, was there a reason why this author could not stand behind his or her words?


Governor Malloy then publicly admonished both Representatives Rebimbas and González on April 17th, as if Ms Rebimbas' misdirecting attention away from criminal activity and Ms González' calling out the covering of crimes were the same thing:  a spat.


It is necessary to provide a foundation of facts to give context to the drama, because there has been so much done to shield the underlying information that brought rise to the altercation.

We have a theme going:  Attack all critics of the courts.  Blame victims.  The threadbare "disgruntled litigant" epithet is a warped record loop stuck playing over the propaganda speakers, and Göbbels hasn't realized that the playbook has already been put into evidence at Nuremberg.

Representative Rebimbas attacks all critics of the courts.  That fact makes perfect sense, given her investment as a GAL in the continued unrestricted looting of assets in all family cases.  In Friday'shearing, instead of recusing herself on a matter where she stands to profit, she concerned herself entirely with misrepresenting other people's thoughts and feelings and protecting the delicate egos of judges who have done unspeakable harm to the people of Connecticut.  Again on Monday's hearing, instead of recusing herself, she participated in a plan to grind the legislative process to a halt over an apology that was already given.  Not once did she speak or act for the interests of the people of Naugatuck who elected her to represent them.

Representative González, by contrast, has no financial stake in the administration and operation of the Judicial Branch.  She is an impartial member of the Judiciary Committee.

In a dirty maneuver while Ms González was out of the hearing room, Ms Rebimbas made some large claims that there was no supporting evidence of the failures of law that Ms Gonzáles raised.  In what appears to be a public call for retaliation, Ms Rebimbas went so far as to name a specific litigant who dared to bring to the legislature the transcript of her judge attacking her, fabricating imaginary lawsuits, accusing the litigant in his paranoid delusions of chasing away all professional therapists, and even letting slip that there is a secret tier system of qualified vendors.

Here Judge Adelman in D'Amato v D'Amato (July 11, 2014), monologuing from the bench, attacks all critics of the courts, ironically hoisting himself with his own petard:

ADELMAN:  Have you ever heard the expression being hoisted [sic] by [sic] your own petard?

LITIGANT:  No.

ADELMAN:  It's from Hamlet, I believe.  The attack on the therapeutic community by litigants who have not been successful in court has, obviously, made many of these therapists adverse [sic] to getting involved in these cases.  They're getting sued, and there's plenty of therapy work for people who are not involved in litigation.  It's hard to believe that so many PhDs, therapists would refuse the work, but I can understand it when they find out that this is a case that's in litigation and an appeal and why ask for trouble, I guess?

That's tragic because you and these girls need some therapeutic assistance in an effort to repair the parental relationship, and now, quite frankly, I'm going to have to go to second tier individual.

LITIGANT:  What does that mean, Your Honor?

ADELMAN:  What that means is I'm going to have to use somebody who's not a PhD therapist.  I'm going to have to go down the stream to other therapeutic individuals because you and others like you have created a hostile environment to ther --

LITIGANT:  I would like that stricken, Your Honor, because I did not create this problem, and there's no proof that he contacted anybody.  There's no proof.

ADELMAN:  I have his sworn testimony.  What proof do you have?  You want to call those ten people into court?  You're calling the man a liar?

LITIGANT:  I'm questioning his credibility, yes I am.

ADELMAN:  All right.  The court finds him incredibly credible.  [sic]  There's no reason to think he's done anything other than what he said he has done.  The environment in Family Court and in family therapy is hostile and becoming difficult -- it's getting very difficult to find people, quite frankly, to even volunteer to be Special Masters to help people resolve their cases before they have to go to litigation, and I hope that the people who are creating the hostility think about that.


On Friday, Ms Rebimbas, however, went on to deny the existence of the transcript, to accuse the litigant of making up the judge's tyrannical behavior, and wrongly claim that the only proper channel for remedy is through the judicial branch, which has been established through now hundreds of individuals' testimony, as not the slightest bit capable of policing itself.

The transcript exposes some very serious questions:

  • Why would licensed providers be afraid of being sued if everything they are doing is perfectly ethical?  Are they engaging in the same unethical practices that victims' evidence to the legislature and federal task force reflects?
  • Are judges ordering therapy for children without there being a diagnosis?  Is a "custody evaluation" any more credible than peering into a crystal ball?  Could this be why these court-appointed providers accept only cash for their services?
  • Why do judges have a tier system among state licensed treaters?  Are the providers who are members or directors of AFCC along with the judges and GALs given preference, such as the transcript references to CT Chapter president Linda Smith?
  • Where are these multiple lawsuits against Connecticut therapists to which the judge alludes, and for which the judge blames the litigant standing before him?
  • Was the judge threatening the litigant by referencing an explosive device harming her in his non-sequitur comment?
  • Why would Ms Rebimbas try so hard to deny, or at least deflect from, the existence of this transcript?

Representative González has spent the past seven years hearing heart-wrenching testimony from hundreds of Connecticut citizens being cannibalized by the scam operating out of the Judicial Branch.  She has done exactly what she was elected to do, which is to represent the interests and needs of her constituents and the people of Connecticut -- not to protect the asset-raiding operation of the judges and GALs.  She has never backed down from her duties, even in the harshest of fights against lawlessness.  She got emotional and angry over the past few days, which proves a well-calibrated moral compass in the face of, at best, unprofessional behavior from a member of the Judiciary Committee.  At worst, she defended against a lobbyist installed to ensure that the moneyball game keeps the cash flowing to court-appointees.  Anyone with a heart should be very angry.

It seem that the Federal Task Force agrees.  I'll leave you with their own words about their current operation in Connecticut.  Remember to call the hotline and press #6 to report public corruption in Connecticut.

"U.S. Attorney Daly explained that the Task Force is focused on rooting out not only corrupt elected officials, but also federal, state and municipal employees who use their position for personal gain at the expense of the public good."

"The Task Force will also focus on the hundreds of millions of dollars that are distributed annually by federal and state agencies to ensure that taxpayer funds reach their intended recipients without corrupt interference."

“Public servants are entrusted by all of us to act in the best interests of the public they serve. It is important for the United States to bring to justice those who betray that trust,” said FBI Special Agent in Charge Patricia M. Ferrick. “Public corruption at all levels of local, state, and federal government must not be tolerated, and this task force will leverage the best assets of the task force partner agencies to address the threat posed by corrupt public officials.”

The task force includes staff from the Federal Bureau of Investigation, U.S. Postal Inspection Service, Internal Revenue Service’s Criminal Investigation Division, the Inspector General’s Offices of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, and the U. S. Department of Housing and Urban Development.