SPEND THE $250,000 FOR AN ANTI-STIGMA CAMPAIGN REGARDING MENTAL ILLNESS TO EDUCATE THE CONNECTICUT JUDICIAL BRANCH!

As a long time mental health advocate, I was very excited and encouraged that last Friday, January 24, 2014, the State of Connecticut under Governor Malloy's leadership decided to spend $250,000 on an anti-stigma campaign in regard to mental illness.  

 

Of course, my problem with these campaigns is that prejudice towards persons with mental illness is so severe and widespread that even people who have good intentions create campaigns that are as stigmatizing as the stigma they are trying to mitigate, or do very little to change attitudes. 

 

One of my favorite examples of this was a Massachusetts campaign that portrayed psychiatric patients in strait jackets with the question written underneath, "Is this what you think mental illness is?"  My response, which I am sure many others had as well was, yes, of course, that is exactly what everyone thinks mental illness is.  

 

I mean, wake up and smell the coffee!  This is America--a country with a long and time honored history of discriminating against anyone with a disability, not only those with mental health disabilities. 

 

So, good luck to you folk working on the anti-stigma campaigns.  I can just imagine what they will be like! 

 

On a more serious note, if we are going to start spending money to reduce stigma and the harm that it causes, why don't we start using that anti-stigma campaign money on educating the Connecticut Judicial Branch?  If there is any place where stigma plays a major role in twisting and destroying the lives of disabled and falsely labeled disabled Connecticut citizens and their families, it is in the Family Courts here in Connecticut. 

 

For instance, I had one protective mother tell me that her ex husband had been given sole custody of the children because she was considered unstable, despite the fact that he had sexually molested two of her children and been violent towards a third. 

 

For the majority of her children's lives she had been their primary caretaker while he travelled extensively for his job.  Once father obtained full custody, he placed the care of the children in the hands of successive nanny's while he continued to travel. 

 

Eventually, the father was again found to have been sexually inappropriate with the children and DCF removed them from the home.  At a Court hearing, the father was found unfit to care for the children.  When the mother's attorney then suggested that the children be returned to the mother who had always cared for them prior to the divorce, the Judge stated loudly, "She can't care for these kids.  She's bipolar!" 

 

Of course, mother had not had bipolar during all the years she parented the children prior to the divorce.  The diagnosis was placed on her during the initial period that she had brought up the sexual abuse before it had been verified, pretty much as a punishment for the fact that she insisted on bringing it to the attention of authorities. 

 

Recently, we have the case of Ms. Colleen Kerwick whose ex husband fraudulently had an amber alert issued stating that Colleen had made off with their son when, in fact, Ms. Kerwick had never left town and was in constant communication with her ex-husband regarding what was going on with the child. 

 

In Ms. Colleen Kerwick's case, during the course of litigation, the Family Court judge ordered four psychiatric evaluations of Ms. Kerwick attempting to find some diagnosis he can pin on Ms. Kerwick to justify the fact that the Court is currently denying Ms. Kerwick access to her child illegally. 

 

Finding that none of these psychiatric evaluations have diagnosed Ms. Kerwick with any mental illness whatsoever, the Court has now ordered a fifth. 

 

The purpose of these repeated tests and constant legal abuse is to push Ms. Colleen Kerwick over the edge, or to get some mental health professional to just throw up his hands and say, "All right, I surrender, here...she has whatever mental illness you want to label her with." 

 

What about Ms. Elizabeth Richter who, during the course of her custody battle was subjected to multiple motions from the opposing attorney in her case bringing up a 35 year old misdiagnosis of mental illness.  The motions requested that the Court appoint a GAL to make decisions for Ms. Richter due to that old history.  The opposing attorney persisted in these actions even though Ms. Richter had undergone several mental health evaluations all of which indicated that she did not have a mental illness. 

 

And the list goes on--Ms. Susan Skipp, diagnosed with an unspecified mental health illness by the judge in her case absent any documentation or testimony from a mental health professional to justify such a diagnosis. 

 

Mr. Hector Morera, also diagnosed by the judge and the opposing attorney in his case as having a serious organic mental illness despite the fact that his own mental health counselor had given testimony on the stand stating that Mr. Morera did not have one. 

 

Luckily, Elizabeth Richter was able to retain custody of her children after paying $200,000 in legal fees, but Ms. Susan Skipp and Mr. Hector Morera have been denied all access to their children based on these fabricated mental health diagnoses. 

 

How about Ms. Andrea Cota, a loving Christian mother who has had her faith reinterpreted as a form of mental illness and subsequently been denied all access to her children as a result. 

 

What about Joe Watley and Karin Hasemann who have been denied the custody of their children based upon completely trumped up diagnoses of mental illness that anyone with the rudiments of an understanding of mental health diagnosis would laugh right out the door! 

 

Of course, and I will emphasize this again, all these examples of litigants who lost all their parental rights involve parents who had never been diagnosed as having a mental illness before they walked through the doors of family court, and there are many more of these stories emerging every day from courthouses throughout the State of Connecticut. 

 

The question is, how can Governor Malloy stand up in front of the citizens of the State of Connecticut and decry the stigma towards those with mental illness, how can he say one in four will be affected by mental illness, or that many of us will experience mental illness during our lifetime and, therefore, we should cease stigmatizing mental illness when licensed, practicing attorneys in family court throughout Connecticut use the stigma of mental illness to deny fit parents access to their children every day of the week? 

 

In addition, judges regularly deny such parents their due process rights under the 14th Amendment, as well as their fundamental human and constitutional rights, using fabricated accusations of mental illness to justify their actions. 

 

In his recent announcement, I heard Governor Malloy deploring the fact that people are afraid to take advantage of treatment because of the stigma associated with mental illness. 

 

I heard both Governor Malloy and the Commissioner of DHMAS, Patricia Rehmer talk about their plans to overcome stigma and provide services for those with mental illness. 

 

None of that will be in the least bit meaningful for any of the citizens of the State of Connecticut, both those who actually have mental illness and those the Court finds convenient to label as having mental illness for the purpose of denying them their legal rights, until the State of Connecticut takes concrete and believable steps to enforce legislation such as Title II of federal ADA law which prohibits discrimination against people who have mental health disabilities as well as those who are falsely perceived of as having mental health disabilities in the legal system. 

 

We have to go beyond talk and seriously begin to take action. 

 

The Connecticut Judicial Branch plays a major role in according legal rights to the Citizens of the State of Connecticut. 

 

As long as the Branch systematically denies the legal rights of people with mental health disabilities, and uses the stigma attached to mental illness as a means to dehumanize, marginalize, humiliate and degrade people who have mental health disabilities, and those the Court finds convenient to label as having mental health illnesses, any campaign to destigmatize mental illness is completely useless. 

 

If Governor Malloy and Commissioner Patricia Rehmer really want to make a difference and remove stigma, they should use that $250,000 in a campaign to educate attorneys, judges, and other employees of the Connecticut Judicial Branch. 

 

These are the very people who are called upon to defend the rights of people with mental illness, who are called upon to confer these legal rights to people with mental illness in the courtroom, and to translate those rights so that they can be enforced in administrative systems throughout the State.  If the Connecticut Judicial Branch can't get it right, no other organization will be able to get it right either! 

 

Ultimately, as long as people with mental health labels continue to be treated as third class citizens, as long as the legal system continues to stick persons with mental health labels at the back of the legal bus and treat them like garbage, no one is going to be fool enough to believe a billboard or a radio/television public service announcement saying otherwise.

The bottom line is, I'd like to know how we can have the language of recovery on Governors Malloys lips, but not in family court.  What's up with that?