APRIL IS CHILD ABUSE PREVENTION MONTH. PROTEST JUDICIAL CHILD ABUSE

An area not spoken of relating to child abuse is family courts bias. Charged with providing expertise in the best interest of the child, family courts have grown a culture that seem to use children as prawns to influence punitive measures against targeted parents, courts seem not to favor parents in cases when the parent is not of their choosing.

 Children are abused in many form unnecessarily by family courts. Many situations involving separation and or divorce may have existed for months or years and resolutions to many issues would have been established. Family court would usually be seen as a means of legitimizing decisions already in place.

Then comes the City or State and special interest representatives to include judges, attorneys, social workers and other interest to initiate the family ordeal.

 Guaranteed to initiate a situation ridden with procedures that all but ensure suffering and misery to children and parents ensuring confusion and enmity between parents and all sorts of negative consequences for children.

 Family court 246 Houston Texas is staffed by two judges male and female. One would think the combination would bring about balance decisions favorable to children. Not so. Rulings from the court seem to depict clear disparities favorable to mothers at a ratio 80 to 20% against fathers. In real life, situations of research dealing with similar matrix hoping to achieve equity with such disparity would by very alarming necessitating systematic review.

Judicial child abuse is an area that should concern everyone because of the potential to affect many children for long periods with unbelievable consequences.

 What is damning is that judges seem to care less about obvious abuse to children caused by their indifference to humanity, careless disregard for laws and knowledge that law makers and citizens have accepted latitude given to them.

 Laws, statutes, higher court opinions, codes and American Constitution should be sufficient assets for judges to use without the national brain wash provided to judges to determine disputes involving families.

 Giving judges wide latitude to determine family issues, armed with lawyers, social services and the almighty attorney general office against a vulnerable minority parent unable to afford legal representation is like demanding a one leg man run up hill chased by a pack of hungry dogs with a referee given the responsibility to determine the duration of the race. Clearly no latitude is needed in this scenario.

 Cases should be decided on merit, without any unnecessary advantage to any party. The coins should be allowed to fall where they may, which is not the case with family cases.

Family court 246 Houston seem to consistently make use of its latitude, denying litigants of civil rights and due process also openly violating constitutional rights of parties not of their liking. What is even more disturbing is that both judges seemingly show the same disregard for basic humanity choosing to use both deceitful and punitive measures to punish parents wanting one thing, that to love and protect their children.

 One mother told me court 246 took the side of a felon and advocated and ruled against her in a custody case. I know of a case where a mother abandoned two children for more than two years. Approaching conclusion of the divorce case, the judges took turns getting rid of the father from his home of 15 years and returning the abandoning mother to the house and the children.

April was first declared Child Abuse Prevention Month by presidential proclamation in 1983. Since then, April has been a time to acknowledge the importance of families and communities working together to prevent child abuse.

 In Child Maltreatment 2015 (U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, Administration on Children, Youth and Families, Children's Bureau) it was reported that in FFY 2015 in the fifty states, the District of Columbia, and Puerto Rico, an estimated 683,000 children were victims of child abuse or neglect; and 1,670 children died as a result of abuse or neglect.

 The majority of child abuse cases stemmed from situations and conditions that can be preventable when community programs and systems are engaged and supportive. A community that cares about early childhood development, parental support, and maternal mental health, for instance, is more likely to foster nurturing families and healthy children.

A body of research has identified factors known to prevent and reduce child abuse and neglect. These factors—including parental resilience, nurturing and attachment, social connections, knowledge about parenting and child development, social and emotional competence of children, and concrete supports for parents—are outlined in Preventing Child Maltreatment and Promoting Well-Being:

 A Network for Action 2017 Resource Guide, also developed by the Children's Bureau. In recognition of the collaborations needed to help prevent child abuse and neglect, the NCTSN has compiled a list of resources for advocates and policy makers, children and adolescents, educators, families and communities, and mental health and child welfare professionals.