Activist judges have taken on mask infractions as a lightweight reason for rejecting parents custody of their kids.
In April 2020, NBC ran a story about a physician in Florida who was avoided her children on the pretense that her job postured a COVID threat to them. That very same month, CNN ran a story about an E.R. doctor who likewise lost custody temporarily since a judge chose her task was no longer safe.
” The Court does not enter this Order gently but provided the pandemic in Florida and the recent boost in confirmed COVID-19 cases, the Court finds in order to insulate and protect the best interests and health of the small kid, this Order should be entered upon a short-term basis,” the judge wrote in that court ruling.
This phenomenon, nevertheless, is barely restricted to health care specialists with instant direct exposure to the virus. On the contrary– although COVID-19 has been regularly revealed to present no significant threat to children– in a variety of recent cases around the U.S., judges have actually used partially COVID-related reasons to validate rejecting a parent custody or perhaps modifying a pre-existing custody agreement.
The American Conservative interviewed Melanie Joseph and Dr. Micheline Epstein, both of whose custody cases have actually recently received limelights. Both informed TAC that their circumstances provide windows into prevalent judicial tyranny in the U.S.A.
In September 2020, Joseph went to court believing the judge would finally hear her motion after she had not seen her child since March of that year. Rather, her ex-husband produced a weeks-old image of her not using a mask at a medical professional’s workplace, which she had actually posted on social networks; her judge, Dale Cohen, then entered into a harangue about her flaunting of COVID rules, and suspended all custody time. The tirade was recorded.
” She is among these anti-mask individuals and she’s got the audacity to put that on social networks, that she’s an anti-mask individuals, and to expose the kid to a flight to North Carolina and to run the risk of the kid’s health over that is not acceptable to me,” Judge Cohen said in the hearing.
Joseph said her issues began when she moved from Florida to North Carolina shortly before the pandemic for her existing other half’s work. When it was time to pick up her son for her custody time, in mid-March 2020, her ex-husband failed to react to all interaction and she was never able to see her child.
Her ex-husband, Michael Manley, stated in an email that he did not respond due to the fact that he feared she would abduct his child: “She did send out that e-mail which was her first error, she wasn’t going on Spring Break, she was moving that week without me understanding. That is right when Covid began and no one was going on trip. She was attempting to take him and make me deal with getting him back.”
However Joseph stated that Manley obstructed her from seeing her son from that minute forward. Manley declared she had deserted him by vacating state.
” She does not even attempt to contact him, this is a fraud she is running to raise money for individual gain,” Manley said. “She moved out of state without any authorization from myself or the court system, then anticipated she would have the very same custody however from 800 miles away.”
Joseph did file to move in court, though that petition was still being heard at the time she moved. She likewise filed duplicated motions with the court to restore the custody time that remained in place; in fact, it was among these motions which was expected to be considered in the September hearing.
Joseph said her ex-husband’s lawyers proposed a settlement in which some custody time would be brought back but much less than in the previous plan. She used to see her son the entire summer break; she now sees him for just 21 days.
Cohen recused himself from her case shortly after the National File first broke the story, however she said that reversing the present arrangement will be challenging regardless, “because the case is settled … The only way to change is to file a motion to set aside however that does not happen that frequently.” She stated that, according to lawyers she consulted with, she would require to reveal a change in scenario or encourage the court she had actually been persuaded into accepting the current deal.
In another case, Cohen suspended a mother’s time sharing rights based on findings that “the Better half has actually gone to the beach throughout the pandemic and has not practiced social distancing, and that she “has gone on dates throughout the pandemic.” Joseph stated she found out that Cohen later put a gag order on that case.
In late March, the National File did a follow-up on Cohen, finding much more mothers losing custody due to specious COVID-related decisions released by him. “In the trial the mask concern was raised. The only thing his lawyer asked me was did you take your child out without a mask in October or November of last year? I stated there was no mask required at the time. Our county mandate in Palm Beach County had religious and medical exemptions in it,” one mother told the National File, “The judge decided on my more youthful boy and the mask thing was a concern in the judgment and the vaccination concern was a concern in the judgment.”
Joseph stated many domestic violence victims called her to say they were dealt with as terribly by Cohen as she was.
Dr. Epstein, meanwhile, informed TAC it has actually been more than a month considering that she has seen her child, thanks to Justice Matthew Cooper of the New York Supreme Court.
When she dropped her child off at school in early March, she was not wearing a mask on the pathway. A school worker demanded she put one on and Epstein refused, leading to an argument. The school worker reported the matter to the school who reported it to both moms and dads; Epstein said her ex-husband then filed an emergency movement suspending her custody time.
Justice Cooper granted him the movement while more buying Epstein to use a mask in her own house as a condition of renewing supervised gos to. She has not seen her child considering that Cooper’s order in March.
Colleen Ní Chairmhaic just recently took over as Epstein’s attorney and specified in a Facebook message that after viewing the surveillance, “It did appear to me that the school nurse faced Dr Epstein for not using a mask on a public walkway. The school who are mandated press reporters did not call child protective services and the school therapist suggested that the small kid is a delightful lady who is prospering.”
Sebastian Doggart, a documentary filmmaker and executive director of the Family Civil Liberties Union, stated he’s dealing with a documentary about Cooper tentatively entitled Unsuited to Sit “A menace to society,” Doggart stated of the judge. “He is genuinely a public threat.” Of his own transactions with Cooper, Doggart stated that he was making another movie when he was required to testify, and Cooper refused to acknowledge his 5th Amendment assertion.
Cooper has actually also been the topic of a number of judicial problems that allege inappropriate habits. One movement to recuse Cooper from a case declares that his court “is not conducted in a civil tone, with Cooper typically yelling at the plaintiff and never speaking in a civil tone to the plaintiff.” Another grievance from the exact same litigant makes similar claims:
On December 6, 2017, there was a hearing for a cross motion modification of assistance in front of Judge Cooper. At that hearing and apparently on the record I asked Judge Cooper why he had actually not informed the Court about his close family relationship with Hunter College where the other party works … This nevertheless is not my principal concern. My issue was the way Judge Cooper dealt with the grievance. Rather than just state, “this was not an issue,” he exploded in an individual tirade versus me. He shrieked and threatened me, this all in front of a congested courtroom.
An e-mail to Karen Lundell, who represents Epstein’s ex-husband, was left unreturned. The public information department for New York State Courts and Meredith Bush, who handles media for Cohen’s judicial circuit, also did not respond to emails for comment.
Michael Volpe has actually worked as a freelance journalist since 2009, after investing more than a decade in finance. He’s based in Chicago.
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