Domestic Abusers Given Sole Custody

On February 21, 1992, Rhode Island Family Court's Chief Judge Jeremiah Jeremiah gave this two-year-old to the sole custody and possession of her father despite his history of domestic violence and failure to pay child support. The father, a police officer, brought false charges against his ex-wife, first saying she was a drug addict. (Nineteen random tests proved she was not.) Then he had her arrested for bank fraud, then for sexual abuse, then for kidnapping. None of his charges stuck.

Despite all these false accusations against the mother, she never accused the father of sexually abusing their child, for there was no such evidence. Good parents do not subject their children to the ordeal of an investigation unless the children themselves show signs they are being sexually abused.

The child remained with her father and stepmother until 2003, when she was 14 years old. Having realized during a visit that her mother was not a drug addict, the teenager persuaded another judge to let her live with her mother. There she began working on the painful issues of lifelong coercion and emotional abuse. Most painful has been her father’s continuing refusal to let her visit two dearly loved half-sisters, whom she has not seen since 2003.

She is one of countless children in Rhode Island subjected to severe emotional and physical trauma by Family Court. After she turned 18 in 2007, she gave the Parenting Project permission to publish her picture on behalf of all children who have been held hostage by Rhode Island custody scams.