Jayden Hedley another child failed by the Family Court
I am happy for Jayden now ? that he has returned to his dad and a loving paternal extended family. I am sad for Jayden? now seperated? from a mum and extended maternal family. I have no doubt that Kay , despite her actions, loves Jayden.
? I am angry that Jayden represents tens of thousand of New Zealand children failed by a system that encourages years of litigation and is impotent at protecting Jayden’s right to be parented by both mum and dad. This is the reality of the Family Court, not the spin doctoring of Chief Family Court Judge Peter Boshier.
This mess has dragged on for the whole of a little boy’s life and the Family Court has allowed that to continue. This is the reality of what an adversarial system of family law produces it’s a norm not an exception. Boshier’s own statistics show that his court is happy to accept and encourage absent or part time dads.
Let’s look at what might happen in a better world. It’s a New Zealand with the presumption of equal shared parenting , both sides BATNA (Best Alternative to Negotiated Agreement) is the same, 50/50 equal shared supporting this is a child support system that fixes the cost of children and? apportions cost ? by the percentage of time spent with each parent.
Chris and Kay would make an appointment with a mediator. The mediator’s task would be to work Chris and Kay to a negotiated agreement between parents from a position where both parties are equal and the child’s right to be parented by both parents is protected. Assuming Chris and Kay can’t agree the 50/50 shared care kicks in.
?
Kay wants to fight it out in a court and is obstructive with the clear aim of alienating a child from his father. To be ultra sure she throws in domestic violence and abuse allegations What happens now?
If a parent deliberately obstructed the child’s right to be parented by the other parent, resulting in drawn out proceedings, or violence and abuse claims not substantiated by a criminal standard of proof, they would be punished and suffer the prescribed penalty. Yes it will have an effect on the child but a punishment must take place as parental alienation greatly increases the damage to a child compared with a reduced amount of time with mum.
The punishment needs to be twofold, a period of limited supervised contact with the children and compulsory attendance at a Kids need Mum and Dad course run by parents. Counselling would be provided free of charge and free access to services that may be needed for example drug and alcohol rehabilitation. Knowing that the best outcome for Kiwi Kids is when both mum and dad share parental rights and responsibilities society would condemn parental alienation and workplaces would adjust to enable shared parenting.
That? New Zealand ? is only a short distance away, the sleeping giant is awakening and the system is shuddering.
?
Regards
Scrap
I spoke with a very strong and well Government funded women’s centre on this very issue only yesterday. She was very determined that the Family Court is OK and that father’s are upset because the child usually goes to the parent who had the main day-to-day care of the child prior to the final decision of the Family Court. I say ‘final’ because the lawyers drag them on for as long as possible (their words) with the help of the law itself.
I’ll tell you what’s really going on.
Women know they can phone women’s refuge and women’s groups who will instantly demand a protection order be put on the father to protect the mother and children. This way the mother is the main caregiver while the Family Court argues about it. These protection orders along with an accusation ONLY of Domestic Violence prevents the father instantly from having shared parenting arrangements.
The women’s groups have set this up to protect women in serious danger yet any and many females use this even when they decide they want a new boyfriend because one of the father’s mates or some other guy she met when out, tickles her fancy and she wants the father out of the picture so she can have her new fun relationship.
This is what Auckland Single Parents Trust deals with sometimes especially with young fathers.
Then the mother realises she can’t cope on her own because she had never raised the children on her own prior to the split, phones the father demanding he help out, saying she can’t cope and the children will suffer, where he steps in only to be breaking the orders. This is not uncommon and this father ends up in court on breach of orders and can be locked up there and then. I try so hard to convince them that they can’t go near the children but they love their children so much and believe the mother will not hurt them. They always believe the mother would never hurt them. They are males and males are different than females. Let’s not get into feminist and socialist University studies here where everyone is equal because it’s all in the mind.
But the women do turn on them again. They use the orders because of “I don’t know what I really want” and other type of excuses.
Then there is the cases when the female regrets what she has done and wants to get back with the father. He gets sucked in and sooner or later she changes her mind again and he is up for breaching the orders as he is by law not to be in 100 – 400 metres near her.
The laws have to change so that there is equal parenting. I have to say that many or all of these young fathers I personally have dealt with are totally hands on fathers. They are not 100 years old and they should not be treated as men who existed 100 years ago. Time has passed, things are different. We are not at war. We have men who don’t have callouses, men that do show feelings, men that want to spend more time at home than at work.
And children need fathers and mothrs. Each has a special part to play in a child’s development.
If women’s groups are so into men can’t cope then teach them to cope. Give them some time when the baby is born. At present their is more attention and support given to mothers that fathers.
Put the children first for real. There beast interest is to have a mum and a dad.
Comment by julie — Wed 24th January 2007 @ 12:03 pm
I strongly recommend that Scrap and the rest of us get a petition to parliament in favour of complete review and (SCRAPPING) of present family court system. Yes not interim parenting orders….number one! Mediation only and then orders made…number two….! No bloody lawyers and no bloody judges. No moaning and she said he said thing…..or they said. The present timing of family court things is just so long and drawn out and destroys everybodies lives and especially the kid/s involved. I have done well not to burn court down…..but can’t say for how much longer a court, judge, lawyer, etc is going to remain undamaged. Just too heartbreaking……don’t think F Court is a humane institution serving the best interests of Kiwi families.
LETS DO SOMETHING NOW>>>
Comment by P-offed — Wed 24th January 2007 @ 5:31 pm
For me the Jayden Headly case has given me a small glimmer of hope and some inspiration that the feminazi influenced family court may have finally come to it’s senses. I have been arguing the parental alienation syndrome (PAS) since 2001 to no avail.
I am stunned that a judge would mention classic symptoms of PAS like;
“ Jayden should be returned to his father, who offered consistency rather than conspiracy “ And the court was told “Jayden was anxious and confused and had been schooled to think in a particular way — exposing him to on going manipulation —a plot by the maternal family to systematically alienate”.
The millions of tax —payers dollars spent by a radical feminist Government have not broken the loving bonds of love I still enjoy with my alienated daughters who are influenced by PAS. I know in my heart love will conquer all. RIP Mum.
Change is coming and I agree the insidious family court gravy train must be de —railed and melted down. Time to start again —get rid of the greedy lawyers and psychologists – mediate not litigate.
Never, never, never give in d4j — justice is coming – watch the sky the F4J Bat will fly.
Comment by dad4justice — Wed 24th January 2007 @ 6:25 pm
The law needs to be changed, but it not a case that some people will need to be moved, they will need to be removed.
Comment by Bevan Berg — Wed 24th January 2007 @ 8:15 pm
Hi P-offed,
Wayne Pruden walked from Hamilton to Wellington collecting signatures for a petition only a few months ago. Thousands signed but it didn’t get change. Petitions are over. They don’t work. Prostesing and juming up and down, getting as much publicity as possible is what it looks like it will take. These people need to be hurt and as Bevan says, some need to be removed.
Comment by julie — Wed 24th January 2007 @ 10:45 pm
With the return of abducted boy Jason Headley, New Zealanders can reflect on how well the Government serves citizens and especially their children, through the Family Court.
Many citizens don’t worry about the quality of Family Court services, as they hope that they will never have to use it themselves. Actually, we are not in total control of this situation.
For my children, I do want a wise, good quality and timely service to be available, as the norm, whether my children need it or not. I want judges that have relevant training, that is useful for constructively and cost effectively solving family disputes.
The public can only judge, if they have access to the truth and the whole truth and nothing but the truth about what is happening, IN THEIR NAME.
The public can only judge, if they are willing to listen.
At the least, our society must learn, in a timely fashion, from it’s mistakes and improve practices. Better still, we should get legislation right in the first place. This takes open discussion of all of the issues, in Parliamentary Subcommittees, before the legislation is passed into law. When a strong party leader rushes legislation and the Subcommittees just go through the motions and rubber stamp it, then there is a large risk that the legislation will be of poor quality and fail to perform well in the real world. The non-lawyers in Parliament must stop standing back and play a more active role in developing legislation.
I cannot see that the present lawyers, trained only in adversarial procedure, can ever provide the conciliatory approach promised by Judge Trapski at the opening of the Family Court in 1980. Judge Boshier made the same promise in 2006, without referring to Judge Trapski’s promise made in 1980. In the intervening 25 years, many tens thousands of families have been “processed”, without this conciliatory approach coming into practice. How long should we wait? A whole generation of time has drifted by, while families are unnecessarily being damaged.
Why would these lawyers ever offer conciliatory negotiation, when there is a conflict of interest. Their incomes will obviously be better served by promoting dispute and lack of trust, than by constructively, speedily and cost effectively solving disputes. We must face the conflict of interest and manage it. Relying on the present system lacking supervision of judges is clearly unworkable. I tell my children to be very wary of people who say “trust me”. Honest workers appreciate good supervision. Undeclared unmanaged conflicts of interest bleed society and damage vulnerable people.
These lawyer’s skills are no more relevant to solving family disputes, than they are to fixing leaky homes. Lawyers seem to offer more for creating problems, than for solving them cost effectively.
The solution for the Family Court lies in employing people with a relevant knowledge of family finances, negotiation, child raising and integrity. Such people are readily available in our community, but not from legal workers. We must move on from listening to promises from the legal “profession” and enact constructive changes without further unnecessary delays.
Child abduction is a serious problem in our community.
There are about 60 Hague applications made each year for children abducted into NZ and a similar number for children abducted out of NZ. These represent just those abductions where the remaining parent could locate the child and the child was taken to a Hague signatory country. Thus international abductions presently probably run at about 200 children per year into NZ and the same number removed.
Of these, about 85% are mother abductors and 15% father abductors. This latter detail is hidden from the NZ public, by publicity being given mainly to father abductor cases. Family Court judges do not correct the public mis-impression that most abductors are fathers.
Family Court judges frequently actively support mother abductors on the basis that they might have been subjected to violence. Family Court judges lack the skills to assess family violence at a single sitting (no human on Earth could reliably achieve this!). This illegal support for mother abductors is why the abduction problem continues to grow at 15% per year. This covert support only occurs because it can be hidden from the wisdom of the public.
The public knows that good parenting is based on honesty, working together and accountability, not on lying, secrecy and running away from accountability. Abductors are not good parents, particularly as sole parents and judges are not serving these children by supporting abductors.
Abduction within NZ and withholding, is frequently used to gain the advantage for mothers, in day to day care applications, as they know the Family Court judges will reward them for carrying out their abduction. The public must stop the Family Court from rewarding mothers for doing these abductions. Child removal should only be carried out by honestly negotiated agreement, anything else is abduction. Agreements should be followed through, so that people can have reasonable trust and faith in court orders. This leads to good parenting.
Family damage resulting from these abductions leads to suicides of parents (mainly fathers) and of the children (boys and girls) too. Many people not quite so affected lead damaged lives, sometimes through no direct fault of their own. Lets do all we can to prevent these abductions and discourage them too.
Lets stop talking and carry out constructive changes to the Family Court, so that it can work and serve.
In the Jason Headley case, the Family Court has turned around after six years, the whole life of this child and criticised the mother and her family.
How could these judges have been so slow?
Have they only turned around now, because the facts could no longer be hidden?
The answers can only show that the wrong people have been following the wrong approach. Families are about more than just money. I am sure that Kay Skelton could have been a good mother from six years ago, if she had been given the constructive signals from the Family Court judges.
The inability of the Family Court judges to accept responsibility for their role shows clearly that they lack the skills and motivation to be ever able to perform their tasks effectively. (They could still get jobs as a spin doctors, in an area where profit is the main issue.)
I have been through the Family Court as a result of the abduction of my children (twice) and I do want a Family Court that works for everyone. There is nothing wrong with sharing children and parents. Actually, there is much to be gained.
Yours faithfully,
Murray Bacon.
34 Valley Road,
Mount Eden,
Auckland
Comment by MurrayBacon — Thu 25th January 2007 @ 7:52 am
Murray.
While I am quietly estatic at the result for Jayden and Chris. We all know it should have never come to this and something in the back of my mind is telling me that if this story did not have the media spotlight on it then the result would have been far different.
Do we all have to bare our private lives to the media to get a fair and just go thru the system?
If so then the system is still going to fail us surely?
Comment by Mark Lloyd — Thu 25th January 2007 @ 3:06 pm
Hi Mark,
I hear what you say and that makes good sense. That is the downfall of having the FC open to the public. But then again if it was open to the public people would behave themselves better. Accountability sucks but is neccessary.
Comment by julie — Thu 25th January 2007 @ 6:31 pm
Well said James – Onward to MORE Bothering
**NZ-FATHERS-Coalition** secures the Right to BOTHER those who damage our **Whole-NATURAL-Biological-FAMILY**
The case proceeded as normal until Rod Hooker submitted that in fact there was no case to answer and summarised what had happened so far and invited the JP’s opinion and to tell her he would proceed if she felt there was a case
The prosecutor summarised his position and the JP took a recess to decide
To our surprise (The whole court including Police) she read a prepared speech (I wonder if Margaret Wilson wrote the template??) telling me I was charged with disorderly behaviour
Both Rod and the prosecutor jumped up.
The prosecutor reminding the JP that there was futhur witnesses to call and that Rob had mealy challenged her that there was NOT a case to answer
The JP apologised and Rod was asked if he wanted to proceed
Rod called for time out with me and explained that it was clear what she wanted to do and asked if I wanted to proceed and be sure of conviction or call to start again
I chose to start again and we quickly returned to tell the JP
As Rod did so the prosecutor jumped up and withdrew the charge
END of case no cost requested or ordered although the JP’s previous speech suggested I would have costs of $150 awarded against me
It was clearly a set-up that Rod saw thru
Thanks for the encouragement from many of you especially for the hospitality of Kobus, Elizabeth and Paul-C
And those who attended the court case and played a part in the DEMO
Onward to increased BOTHERING of ALL who damage our **Whole-NATURAL-Biological-FAMILIES**
Onward — Jim
http://www.HandsOnEqualParent.org.nz
PS – Get those nominations for Shame (BOTHERING to Noelle
Comment by Jim Bailey — Fri 26th January 2007 @ 12:55 am
Sorry Jim,
But I think that you are saying the charges are withdrawn. Is that the case? I can’t follow all the little bits very well. What does this mean for ordinary Joe Blogg? Are you free from this?
Comment by julie — Fri 26th January 2007 @ 12:59 pm
Murray,
read your comment on CYFSwatch (leaky homes analogy was a giveaway) and had to say well done. Keep up the excellent work. Note also the mirror blog site lawgate, which is dedicated to naming and shaming lawyers and judges.
Comment by xsryder — Sun 28th January 2007 @ 12:13 am
My ex gave my son to me because she felt that he new partner who beat her up would turn on him.We sorted this out without the laywers until one day she wanted him in her custody. Because we sorted this agreement verbally out between us no one had interuim custody until she went to the lawyer behind my backand put our son legally in her care. So what I am saying is that we the parents involved the lawyers and the judges into our life.
She accused me of alagations that the lawyer for our son had to act on her imformation.
Since she could not get him she wanted the lawyers to take him up North to her family away from me..
I am so happy for Jayden H to go to his father.
I had been following the news papers and felt that there were alot of simlirties to my case.
The mother and family making it hard for me to see my son. There constant request for the boy not to have anything to do with myself.
Jayden was given custody to the father and it’s not that easy for courts to give the child to the father , unless there are concerns inwhich there may have been serious issues for the courts to award Jayden to his dad, usally from my case and other males in the same limelight the child will go to the mother in this case it did not. So I assume there must have been good reason. However when custody of jayden was given to the father the mother uplifhts Jayden and hides in Australia until she is caught and has to come back. A second time the courts gave Jayden to the father and now the grandfather uplifhts the boy and decides to blackmail the system while on the run by sending letters to the newspapers looking for support
to get public opinion against the father
Since the grandfather took his granchild it’s been all the same emotional blackmail I will give him back only if you give him to my daughter. BOTH HAVE SAID THE FAtHER SHOULD NOT SEE THE KID. Even when Jayden was returned because they could not have Jayden they still requested they would perfer Jayden to go into a care giver than the father, what does that say. To me it says that they would rather Jayden go in custody of cyfs than see the father at all becasue they cannot control the situation and have him to themselves.
My son was 5 when this all occurred and I got him back at 10 in the beginging he blamed me for his mother leaving the country [we sold the house and she move to England] and had issues at school. Thanks to my wife we have been able to re-adjust his behavior and attitude. I always make sure that he knows his mother loves him as much as i do, this is very important for my son to know this.
Comment by michael — Sun 28th January 2007 @ 10:41 pm
Letter to editor published 29 January 2007 — Christchurch Press
Try mediation
The recent high — profile case concerning Jayden Headley will provide a glimmer of hope for many non-custodial parents that are presently suffering in New Zealand.
It is encouraging that the Family Court judges in this case use words to describe the behaviour of a maternal family as, “ manipulation”, “brainwashing” and
“ systematically alienate”. Their description of the mother’s behaviour as “ceaseless slippery determination” can be mirrored in the wrongful conduct of many Kiwi custodial parents.
Family Court judges often support mothers who alienate children through parental alienation syndrome, which is the coaching of the abducted children into thinking the non-custodial parent is not worthy of access.
Lawyers in the Family Court are trained in adversarial procedure. A far beater approach would be to use a practical service that tried to reach a mutually agreeable solution.
I think it would benefit society if we headed in a direction of mediation rather than the present system of litigation.
Peter Burns
Rolleston
Comment by dad4justice — Mon 29th January 2007 @ 8:13 am
mediation is always a good Idea before court
Comment by michael — Mon 29th January 2007 @ 10:06 pm
Michael
I believe we should replace all cases with mediation and only the worse conflicts ever reaching the Courtroom. We could easy provide a service by experienced divorcees who would work even when conflict is high to a desirable outcome for the all parties.Less stress for the kids. I sent my 12 point brochures to Judge Boshier two years ago and Ministry of Justice but they couldn’t give a toss as they love the gravy train of blood sucking puss riden mongrels which make up the de family court !!!I have tried to put hundreds of my brochures in the Christchurch Family Courthouse but the dirty lowlife lawyers and nutbar psychologists soon throw them in the rubbish .
Comment by dad4justice — Tue 30th January 2007 @ 7:46 am