TASK FORCE HEARING, DECEMBER 19, 2013, PART III: GAL ABUSES!

(Continued from Part II)

 

Ms. Jennifer Verraneault asked does the State pay a GAL for travel time or lunchtime?

 

Attorney Christine Rapillo responded, "No."  They will, for example, pay hourly for a home visit, but will not pay for travel to court.

 

Ms. Jennifer Verraneault asked what does it mean when the Court talks about "an independent study."  Is it an independent study if the GAL has lunch with opposing counsel?  Is it independent if the GAL goes to the house to visit the child taking the AMC along with him in a tag team kind of situation? 

 

Attorney Rapillo stated that there is an hourly billing menu which lists what GALs can and cannot do.

 

Ms. Verraneault asked how do you determine whether an attorney is padding the bill, particularly without an audit?

 

Attorney Rapillo responded that there is no standard procedure yet for family court bills, but for child welfare cases there is more of a set procedure.

 

Ms. Verraneault asked would it be appropriate to charge for emailing?

 

Attorney Rapillo responded by saying no, there is $500 for general case administration which covers emails.  The OPD has a list of what is allowable for hourly billing.

 

Mr. John DiTunno asked, what about these rates?  How did you set the rates?

 

Attorney Rapillo responded that these rates are the same as in all other areas.

 

Judge Thomas Weissmuller stated that there are 1300 GALs on the statewide list, yet only 100 actually registered to work with the OPD.  Not many want a State assignment.

 

Judge Weissmuller also asked would it be appropriate to request to know how many GALs are appointed sua sponte?  It would be nice to be able to see these attorneys' qualifications.

 

Attorney Sharon Dornfeld said probably not.  Often a motion is filed, and then it is months later before the judge responds and appoints someone.

 

Rep. Vargas interjected the point that this one size fits all approach to GALs seems wrong.  He is also dissatisfied with the big gulf between public and private pay parties.  He suggested that a good solution would be to improve the rate of State paid OPD GALs and then put a cap on private GALs.  He recommends that GALs are supervised and evaluated at regular intervals.

 

Attorney Sue Cousineau stated that there were concerns regarding how State GALs were paid.  Originally such GALs were managed out of the Office of Child Protection and they did hourly rates, but it wasn't working out well and that is why GALs are now handled through the OPD.

 

Attorney Sharon Dornfeld stated that the focus should be on the children and not the parents.  [Again, the co-chairs try to make a distinction between the wellbeing and the children and that of the parents, but the bottom line is the wellbeing of both are so intimately interlinked that you cannot separate them. 

If you destroy the mental health of parents by bullying and harassing them in family court, if you drive them to despair by pushing them into bankruptcy and taking their life savings, and plunder the college accounts they set up for their children, this can by no means be said to have been done in the "best interests of the child." 

So GALs like these two co-chairs--Dornfeld and Cousineau like to imply that parents are selfish for acting in self preservation, but in fact, destroying the wellbeing of parents inevitably destroys the wellbeing of the children whichever way you look at it.]

 

Attorney Dornfeld also stated that you can file a lien on a litigant's house, but you must first have a judgment to do so.  [But get real.  When did any judge ever deny a GAL a judgment no matter how corrupt, inept, negligent or incompetent the GAL or how padded the GALs bills.  So what we parents who have worked so hard to put this task force would like is to have these two co-chairs Dornfeld and Cousineau stop playing us all for fools because we are not fools, amazingly enough!]