http://www.thepetitionsite.com/1/stop-court-ordered-child-sexual-abuse
If you care at all about the very problem I have been writing about, civil/family courts that with the help of psychologists unwilling to report abuse or allowing their personal bias to interfere with correct assessment of participants; attorneys that are looking for wins, instead of looking for truth and justice; witnesses that lie; children's attorney's that choose a side and stay on it, regardless of the reality of the abuse a child or children may be suffering; please go to the site above and sign the petition.
You have nothing to lose. The abused children of the United States have everything to gain.
Sunday, September 28, 2008
Saturday, September 27, 2008
Thursday, September 25, 2008
Another Case of Court-Ordered Child Abuse
Please remember that these photos were not taken by a professional photographer. But if you look closely, you can see where the arrows point--to places where this child's fingernails were cut below the quick, so that the fingers were bleeding when the child walked into the visit with her mother.
Again, remember that these photos were not taken by a professional. Some of the injuries to Sophia can be difficult to see. In this photo notice the bruising around the eye. This kid has a black eye. Johanna vonGeldern and Sophia Grace:
With These Pictures, We Come to the Story of a Mother Who Must Pay to See the Daughter Born of Her Own Flesh…and of the Three-Year-Old Child Who Pays a Price of Her Own in Order to be Allowed to Spend Time with Her “Mommy"
This is a picture of a younger Sophia, Johanna vonGeldern's little daughter. Notice the rashy, sort-of-bruised scrape on her face, plus the slightly swollen area around her eye. This injury occurred compliments of Sophia's father and Johanna's one-time boy friend.
Here is how the story began:
Once upon a time there was a mother who gave birth to a beautiful little girl. This little girl had a father, too, since that seems to be one of the rules governing how such things must proceed. If a woman wants to have a beautiful little girl like this one, she must also have a man person willing to provide the sperm, so that she can choose one of said sperm, join it to an egg she has produced from her own body, and begin the process of creating the child of her own flesh and blood. The sperm donor has little to do with the process thereafter, although many a sperm donor proves quite adept at disturbing the process.
As a matter of fact, when Bennett Tocci first learned that Johanna was creating a child, he became furious and demanded that she have an immediate abortion. Johanna refused. Tocci’s fury increased and he became more aggressive and threatening: “If you have this baby, plan on spending every dime you’ve got fighting me for custody. I will use my money, my connections and influence to take this baby away from you. I will take you down, Johanna. I will not share ‘my’ child with anyone. My mother will move in with me and raise the baby. I have already talked to my parents about it.”
When Johanna still refused to give in to Tocci’s demands, he began a legal attack beyond belief, suing for paternal rights over the unborn fetus. This suit occurred in Saratoga County, New York, Family Court in March of 2005.
As a matter of fact, when Bennett Tocci first learned that Johanna was creating a child, he became furious and demanded that she have an immediate abortion. Johanna refused. Tocci’s fury increased and he became more aggressive and threatening: “If you have this baby, plan on spending every dime you’ve got fighting me for custody. I will use my money, my connections and influence to take this baby away from you. I will take you down, Johanna. I will not share ‘my’ child with anyone. My mother will move in with me and raise the baby. I have already talked to my parents about it.”
When Johanna still refused to give in to Tocci’s demands, he began a legal attack beyond belief, suing for paternal rights over the unborn fetus. This suit occurred in Saratoga County, New York, Family Court in March of 2005.
When Johanna was six months pregnant, January 1, 2005, she filed a Domestic Incident Report with the New York State Police, documenting in detail physical abuse, emotional abuse, and repeated threats from Tocci that he would murder the mother of “his” child. That filing is not the only record of the abuses claimed by Johanna. Other documentation exists in the form of witnesses, obstetrician’s records, pediatrician’s records, shelter records and sworn statements.
Sophia Grace was born later in 2005, and by November 9, 2005, Johanna was still living in fear of Bennett Tocci. On that day, she was forced to call 911 after Tocci completely lost control of himself and shoved Johanna repeatedly back and forth across a living room—while Johanna held seven-month-old Sophia in her arms and tried to protect her baby from the abuse being inflicted. A Jackson County Deputy arrived and removed Tocci from the home.
Then came what Johanna terms “a fatal error on my part.” The pastor of her church, a man named Jack Hollis, arrived almost immediately, with a word of advice: Johanna must not press charges against Tocci for the domestic violence, because—among other things—Tocci would then lose his license to teach. It was this advice and Johanna’s decision to follow said advice and refrain from pressing charges that kept the abuse out of legal records. And it was this advice that turned the whole situation around and turned it against Johanna vonGeldern.
After the 9-1-1 call when Sophia was just seven months old, Johanna allowed Tocci to have daily visitation with the baby. But the results were unexpected. The visits had a clear negative impact on the child. Sophia began hitting herself in the head. She began screaming for no apparent reason. She began crying if someone said the word “no.” She demonstrated an extreme fear of men. Her reaction to any form of confinement was dramatic. And Sophia became hysterical at the mere sight of Tocci’s parents.
Then came further details—more clues that there was something terribly wrong with Sophia’s emotional and physical well being. Every visit brought some new negative: neck injuries; leg injuries; bruises; sullen, withdrawn moods; stretched labia; specks of blood in the child’s diaper; and a persistent anal rash and redness. Johanna was doing her best to cooperate with the Tocci’s. One of the major problems for mothers trying to protect their child or children is that the mother is sometimes literally unable to realize the true horror of what is happening to her offspring. Despite what would seem in retrospect to be obvious signs of abuse, this was part of Johanna’s mind-set: Nobody, but nobody did the things she suspected Tocci and his family were doing . Did they?
Before long, Bennett Tocci began stalking Johanna. Over the next few months, he entered her house unannounced, tampered with her belongings and destroyed her mailbox. The final straw for Johanna, however, was when Bennett Tocci returned Sophia to Johanna with the entire side of her face bruised, scraped and raw.[ See the photo above.] The child was only eleven months old. Tocci handed the child, in her car seat, to Johanna; then he turned and walked away without a word. Johanna looked at the baby and asked, “What happened to her face?” From several feet away, Tocci half turned and said, “Oh…she fell. She’s fine.” And he got into his car and drove away.
Through that incident, Johanna came at last to realize that she needed to go far beyond what she was already doing. In the middle of the night, she moved herself and her daughter to a domestic violence shelter, driving two states away. Behind her she left everything of life as she knew it—except for her baby. She left a beautiful home, her teaching position, her church, her friends and all of life as she had known it.
Since there was nothing in Johanna’s background to give Bennett legal grounds to sue for custody of Sophia, he began to search for a back door to custody. To date, he has “manipulated” she says, people in high places in the state of Florida—Jackson County. He has persuaded these people to prosecute her on “bogus criminal charges.”
“As a consequence,” says Johanna, “of his legal warfare and criminal charges, I am not able to work in my career as an elementary teacher. I am only allowed four visits a month—which I pay for—and I also pay my ex-boyfriend for gas money to transport her to and from visits. It costs me close to $500.00 a month to see my own daughter.
No more than four months after Johanna made her escape from Tocci’s grip, his most devastating act of abuse occurred. He managed to create a criminal charge against Johanna, based on a complaint filed by Tocci’s friend, Jackson County Deputy Rusty Booth. The charge read to this effect: “…violating a court order on March 5, 2006…removing child from jurisdiction contrary to a court order.”
However, there was no court order until the created and illegal “order”suddenly appeared on June 20, 2006. Johanna has a letter stating that her entire family was at the Domestic Violence Shelter in March. Even if there had been a court order in place, leaving for safety reasons is an exception to the law.
But it was not over. On August 15, 2007, Johanna was arrested on this trumped-up “violating a court order” charge, near the shelter where she and Sophia had been staying. The police threw her into the car, as if she were a hardened criminal. She spent the night in a freezing cold cell, hungry and sobbing as if her heart would break over the pain of not knowing what was happening to her daughter. Every breath she took was agony about the pain and fear she imagined the child must be experiencing. Johanna had had no opportunity to say good-by to Sophia or try to explain what was happening.
The police were no help. Detectives advised Johanna that the baby was hysterical and inconsolable and wanted to know if “she had had a nap,” as if a simple thing like a nap would solve the problem of a mother who had suddenly been disappeared from her sight. Johanna tried to explain that the hysteria and panic were quite natural for a child who was still nursing, and who had never been away from her mother for more than four hours at a time, never left with a sitter or a stranger.
Suddenly, like some lost soul, the child was ripped away from her mother and placed in a foster home with total strangers. And the following day, Sophia was handed over to Johanna’s abuser—who was also Sophia’s abuser.
At the time that Johanna left Florida, paternity of Sophia had not even been legally established. No custody order existed. Johanna seems to have been well within her legal rights—as set forth in Section 742 of Florida Statutes to maintain custody and control over her daughter. Yet Johanna feared that Bennett Tocci would follow through on his continual threats to use family money and family influence, as well as “mob connections” he seemed to be constantly boasting about—to hunt Johanna down and kill her as his solution to the problem of gaining control of Sophia.
The first death threat was made in August, 2004, when Tocci sneered at Johanna, “I’ve got our solution. If you are out of the way, I can have total control of her.”
In addition to that charge of violating a court order that didn’t exist, Johannna was to be arrested again—a mere three days before her first scheduled contact with Sophia in over two months—this time for “making a false report of child abuse.”
There was nothing false about the report. Johanna was deathly concerned for her daughter’s safety. Her report was made the day that Sophia was handed over to Tocci.
On that day, Johanna called the abuse hotline, as directed by her attorney, and made a simple, truthful statement about her concerns for Sophia’s safety. Johanna has a sworn statement, taken from a friend, Ruth Hansen, by the lead detective, Rusty Booth, in which Hansen stated that Tocci had been violent, both with Johanna and the baby, during 2005. Hansen further stated that Tocci had been taking baths with Johanna’s infant daughter when Johanna was not at home. It was Hansen’s opinion that these “baths” had caused the baby to “act strangely.”
In December, 2006, before Johanna felt forced to flee with her daughter, the pediatrician’s report shows that Sophia had anal irritation and an anal tear. On the basis of that report, DCF conducted a superficial investigation, concluding that since Sophia’s hymen was intact, Johanna could not be telling the truth. Thus Rusty Booth and the state prosecutor, with the help of DCF, proceeded to charge Johanna with “false reporting of abuse.”
In December, 2006, before Johanna felt forced to flee with her daughter, the pediatrician’s report shows that Sophia had anal irritation and an anal tear. On the basis of that report, DCF conducted a superficial investigation, concluding that since Sophia’s hymen was intact, Johanna could not be telling the truth. Thus Rusty Booth and the state prosecutor, with the help of DCF, proceeded to charge Johanna with “false reporting of abuse.”
Bennett Tocci is a charming, gregarious elementary school teacher. Behind closed doors, however—where Johanna and Sophia know him well—there is a Tocci that few people have met.
This Bennet Tocci is violent, with a history of drug and alcohol abuse, and has been arrested for driving while intoxicated. He has attempted suicide and displayed impulsive and erratic behavior. He has a special method of achieving climax during sex—the only way he can achieve climax—by fantasizing that he is overpowering and sodomizing a young girl.
Also extremely distressing to Johanna are Tocci’s bouts of paranoid delusion and manic mood swings. During one such episode, Tocci’s father explained to Johanna, “When Bennett gets upset like this, he doesn’t respond because he can’t hear anyone talking to him.” The father’s solution to the problem was to “grab Bennett by the elbow and whisk him out of the house whenever his son ‘lost it’.”
Likewise, there are other examples of mental difficulties in the household. The father, Anthony Tocci, is diagnosed with bipolar disorder, and his mother, Natalie, with clinical depression. Both control their illnesses with medication. Two of Bennett Tocci’s uncles committed suicide within the last three years.
Such is the story of Sophia Grace, three-year-old battered child, trapped in her father’s attempt to steal the child from her mother. Legal files show that since Sophia was handed over to her abuser, she is withdrawn, she hits herself in the head, she throws her stuffed puppy on the floor and punishes it, she is emotionally shut down. During visits, she plays a game where her stuffed bunny is sad because he can’t find his mommy.
The first time Johanna managed to see Sophia after two and one-half months, she bent down close to the child and asked the question that choked her throat with tears, “Do you know who I am?” Sophia nodded and smiled softly, but at the same time she appeared dull and lifeless. It is as if, says Johanna, “the sweet, curious, vibrant, joyous little girl I raised has been reduced to a hollow shell.” During visits, Johanna adds, “she revives in my presence, and I catch glimpses of the pure spirit inside her. It is unforgiveable what her ‘father’ and his parents are doing to this child.”
For nearly a year, this problem has been dragged out—intentionally, Johanna believes—by opposing counsel. Tocci is so intent on keeping Johanna out of her daughter’s life that he even found a way to have the judge who granted Johanna visitation removed from the case.
Today, visits consist of Johanna's reminding Sophia how much she is loved. During visits Johanna showers the child with tender care, hoping against hope to make up for some of the tragedy Sophia endures with her father. Johanna shows her photographs, feeds her homemade cookies and gives her homemade cards. And all the time these things are going on, Johanna is asking herself, “What kind of a father wants his child to suffer like this?”
Every visit closes with the same question from Sophia. “Do you have to go bye-bye? I want to stay with you!” How do you explain to a three-year-old where her mommy went—and why? And besides, Johanna is not allowed to discuss any facts about the case, so she must simply smile and pretend everything is fine—when both of them know their hearts are broken.
Sophia was born a free citizen of the United States, but the United States “justice” system has failed to protect her and her mother. Bennett Tocci has filed for sole custody. Johanna has hired five attorneys to combat attempts to convict her of crime. She is still waiting for some of the charges to be dismissed, so she can be Sophia’s mommy once again. She has spent her life savings. She has been forced to file bankruptcy.
And Sophia? She continually cries and asks when she can go to “mommy’s house.”
If we heard about such legal contortions as this in another country, we would shake our heads and declare, “What a shame! What a damn shame!” But it is not taking place elsewhere. It is taking place in the United States of America. It is happening to thousands of women and children. And it is the United States of America and our justice system that is the subject of the head shaking and the shame.
Where is the person—or persons—with authority who will put an end to this kind of gender bias in the courts? An end to this torment of mothers and children?
Tuesday, September 23, 2008
Now THAT is Tacky!
Well…today’s blog is going to be a little strange. It seems that someone, an attorney—whose name I know, but whose name I shall not mention here—has been making copies of some of my writing and trying to use it AGAINST Elsa Newman.
Now THAT is tacky. I mean really tacky.
Some things in life are tacky and funny. Like the seventh-grade students who used to play games with my last name—“O’Brocken” and call me things like “Ms. Old and Broken.” That was tacky; but when my students used it as a means of connecting with me, I considered it quality tackiness, and I told them so. I accepted their various versions of my name and gave them feedback in the same vein.
On the other hand, taking my writing on behalf of Elsa Newmanand trying to use it against Ms. Newman is definitely NOT quality tackiness. In short, it stinks.
So I wrote and sent the following letter to David Molansky, Elsa’s attorney, and my publishing it here makes it an open letter. I thus hope to clear the air a bit, and I hope to be sure that both Elsa’s attorney and my readers know that I am the one writing all those things. [Yes, Virginia, there really is an obnoxious little, old lady in Amboy, Washington who writes this stuff. And yes, her name really is Aine O’Brocken.]
As an American citizen, I have both the right and the privilege to express my ideas, attitudes, thoughts and supporting facts in my blogs, on my websites or in citizen journalist reports. And I do.
I find it horrifying to realize that some unscrupulous legal lame-brain would copy my material and try to turn it against the very person I am trying to support. This mother, Elsa Newman, has been blamed and blamed again for things she did not do, for things she did not even know about. She has been blamed enough.
I write because I am concerned about a mother who has been unjustly imprisoned while her sons suffer the tortures of the damned at the hands of father who not only molests them sexually, but abuses them in every other way imaginable. I write because I desperately hope that someone in authority will one day see the truth and act on it and Ms. Newman will be vindicated, as she so surely deserves.
Following is my letter to Ms. Newman’s attorney:
Mr. Molansky:
It has come to my attention that some things which I have blogged about Elsa Newman and her case have been copied and transmitted by people who have apparently tried to use those blogs against Ms. Newman or have tried to say that she was somehow responsible for the content of the blogs.
I find myself greatly dismayed by this misuse of my materials.
I have been researching Ms. Newman’s case for nearly a year now. When I write on one of the blogs and mention her name, that does not mean I am citing her as a source. It means simply that I am mentioning her name because I am writing about her case.
In a similar fashion, I often use the expression that I “write on her behalf.” Writing on her behalf, as I am sure you know, does not remotely imply that I am writing something she has told me to write. That would be ridiculous. A blog is intended to be an expression of the ideas, opinions and attitudes of the writer. To “write in her behalf” thus means that I write because I am interested in her case…because I believe she is being met by gross injustice at every turn. In short, I believe she is innocent and unjustly imprisoned. I believe—because of my research, which shows that her sons have, themselves disclosed the nature of their father’s abuses—that her children have been terribly mistreated by their father, including sexual abuse, physical abuse, using the boys in the creation of child pornography and virtually any other kind of abuse the man can think of.
In fact, the more I research this case, the more appalled I become at the existence of gender bias in United States courts today, not just in the case of Elsa Newman, but in literally thousands of other cases. For a mother to state, during the course of an acrimonious child custody proceeding that a child has been abused in some fashion by the father, is for said mother to sign a virtual death warrant for her hopes of retaining any share of custody. I understand that in at least 54% of such cases, custody is awarded to the abuser, a fact which is a disgrace to this country and our supposed “justice system.”
I have actually created a list of some sixty reasons for believing Ms. Newman. I have tried repeatedly to find someone who will take a look at those sixty reasons and help me to do something about the dreadful and completely unjust plight in which she finds herself. To date, no one has seemed interested, although I know there must be person or persons in authority somewhere who could deal with the faults in the case that was presented against her
Back to the question of someone’s citing my material. The particular blog that I have in mind when I say that someone else is using my material is an open letter which I addressed to Dr. Jill Scharff. That letter was posted to several of my blogs, and I, in fact, copied the letter to her, as a courtesy. My research tells me that Dr. Scharff has in hand materials—records from her treatment of Ms. Newman’s sons—which would verify Ms. Newman’s contention that her children were being sexually molested by her then-estranged husband and the father of the two boys. In fact, unless I am terribly mistaken, Dr. Scharff had at one time actually reported such abuse, thus leaving herself open to requests to reveal whatever information about abuse might be found in the remainder of her records. It is not necessary for me—pardon me for employing an overworked phrase—to be a rocket scientist in order to find such information on the net or from sources close to the Newman case.
It is in such a manner that I write of the case of Elsa Newman.
Should it come to your attention just who it is that is attempting to credit my materials somehow to Ms. Newman or to use said materials against Ms. Newman, please be aware that I am not writing as a mouthpiece—for Ms. Newman or for anyone else. The ideas, emotions and opinions in my blogs and in my writings as a citizen journalist are completely my own, and it is, as far as I know, well within my right and privilege to express these as I choose.
This letter and its contents are about to be posted to a variety of sites on the net, according to my usual practice, since I hope to reach not only you, but anyone else who might entertain the thought that I am writing with the voice of Elsa Newman, rather than writing on her behalf and expressing my own thoughts about her case.
God help you to find a way to help Ms. Newman. And God help us all, if someone, somewhere, cannot find a way to right the incredible wrongs that have been done to this mother and her sons.
Sincerely,
Aine O’Brocken
P.O. Box 303
Amboy, Washington 98601
Phone: 360-247-5241
Email: pugbubbe@earthlink.net
Now THAT is tacky. I mean really tacky.
Some things in life are tacky and funny. Like the seventh-grade students who used to play games with my last name—“O’Brocken” and call me things like “Ms. Old and Broken.” That was tacky; but when my students used it as a means of connecting with me, I considered it quality tackiness, and I told them so. I accepted their various versions of my name and gave them feedback in the same vein.
On the other hand, taking my writing on behalf of Elsa Newmanand trying to use it against Ms. Newman is definitely NOT quality tackiness. In short, it stinks.
So I wrote and sent the following letter to David Molansky, Elsa’s attorney, and my publishing it here makes it an open letter. I thus hope to clear the air a bit, and I hope to be sure that both Elsa’s attorney and my readers know that I am the one writing all those things. [Yes, Virginia, there really is an obnoxious little, old lady in Amboy, Washington who writes this stuff. And yes, her name really is Aine O’Brocken.]
As an American citizen, I have both the right and the privilege to express my ideas, attitudes, thoughts and supporting facts in my blogs, on my websites or in citizen journalist reports. And I do.
I find it horrifying to realize that some unscrupulous legal lame-brain would copy my material and try to turn it against the very person I am trying to support. This mother, Elsa Newman, has been blamed and blamed again for things she did not do, for things she did not even know about. She has been blamed enough.
I write because I am concerned about a mother who has been unjustly imprisoned while her sons suffer the tortures of the damned at the hands of father who not only molests them sexually, but abuses them in every other way imaginable. I write because I desperately hope that someone in authority will one day see the truth and act on it and Ms. Newman will be vindicated, as she so surely deserves.
Following is my letter to Ms. Newman’s attorney:
Mr. Molansky:
It has come to my attention that some things which I have blogged about Elsa Newman and her case have been copied and transmitted by people who have apparently tried to use those blogs against Ms. Newman or have tried to say that she was somehow responsible for the content of the blogs.
I find myself greatly dismayed by this misuse of my materials.
I have been researching Ms. Newman’s case for nearly a year now. When I write on one of the blogs and mention her name, that does not mean I am citing her as a source. It means simply that I am mentioning her name because I am writing about her case.
In a similar fashion, I often use the expression that I “write on her behalf.” Writing on her behalf, as I am sure you know, does not remotely imply that I am writing something she has told me to write. That would be ridiculous. A blog is intended to be an expression of the ideas, opinions and attitudes of the writer. To “write in her behalf” thus means that I write because I am interested in her case…because I believe she is being met by gross injustice at every turn. In short, I believe she is innocent and unjustly imprisoned. I believe—because of my research, which shows that her sons have, themselves disclosed the nature of their father’s abuses—that her children have been terribly mistreated by their father, including sexual abuse, physical abuse, using the boys in the creation of child pornography and virtually any other kind of abuse the man can think of.
In fact, the more I research this case, the more appalled I become at the existence of gender bias in United States courts today, not just in the case of Elsa Newman, but in literally thousands of other cases. For a mother to state, during the course of an acrimonious child custody proceeding that a child has been abused in some fashion by the father, is for said mother to sign a virtual death warrant for her hopes of retaining any share of custody. I understand that in at least 54% of such cases, custody is awarded to the abuser, a fact which is a disgrace to this country and our supposed “justice system.”
I have actually created a list of some sixty reasons for believing Ms. Newman. I have tried repeatedly to find someone who will take a look at those sixty reasons and help me to do something about the dreadful and completely unjust plight in which she finds herself. To date, no one has seemed interested, although I know there must be person or persons in authority somewhere who could deal with the faults in the case that was presented against her
Back to the question of someone’s citing my material. The particular blog that I have in mind when I say that someone else is using my material is an open letter which I addressed to Dr. Jill Scharff. That letter was posted to several of my blogs, and I, in fact, copied the letter to her, as a courtesy. My research tells me that Dr. Scharff has in hand materials—records from her treatment of Ms. Newman’s sons—which would verify Ms. Newman’s contention that her children were being sexually molested by her then-estranged husband and the father of the two boys. In fact, unless I am terribly mistaken, Dr. Scharff had at one time actually reported such abuse, thus leaving herself open to requests to reveal whatever information about abuse might be found in the remainder of her records. It is not necessary for me—pardon me for employing an overworked phrase—to be a rocket scientist in order to find such information on the net or from sources close to the Newman case.
It is in such a manner that I write of the case of Elsa Newman.
Should it come to your attention just who it is that is attempting to credit my materials somehow to Ms. Newman or to use said materials against Ms. Newman, please be aware that I am not writing as a mouthpiece—for Ms. Newman or for anyone else. The ideas, emotions and opinions in my blogs and in my writings as a citizen journalist are completely my own, and it is, as far as I know, well within my right and privilege to express these as I choose.
This letter and its contents are about to be posted to a variety of sites on the net, according to my usual practice, since I hope to reach not only you, but anyone else who might entertain the thought that I am writing with the voice of Elsa Newman, rather than writing on her behalf and expressing my own thoughts about her case.
God help you to find a way to help Ms. Newman. And God help us all, if someone, somewhere, cannot find a way to right the incredible wrongs that have been done to this mother and her sons.
Sincerely,
Aine O’Brocken
P.O. Box 303
Amboy, Washington 98601
Phone: 360-247-5241
Email: pugbubbe@earthlink.net
Saturday, September 20, 2008
This woman is Elsa Newman. Why? Why? Why...
...did the Attorney General of Maryland insist this mother wanted to kill her children? She would have sooner died for them!
...did Prosecutor Katherine Winfree patch together a case that made this mother look like she was involved in a conspiracy to commit murder, when there was neither conspiracy nor murder attempt?
...did Stephen Friedman lie in court and say he had heard this mother plan to murder her estranged husband...or her children...or somebody or other?
...did Maryland's highest court say there was nothing to connect this mother to either plot or murder attempt?
...did the state of Maryland put Newman on trial again?
...did Sandra Ashley "suddenly remember" that she had heard a death threat from Elsa some four years earlier?
...did Prosecutor Katherine Winfree call this mother "a delusional witch" and a "nut?"
This woman is Elsa Newman, innocent and unjustly incarcerated at Maryland Correctional Institution for Women.
Monday, September 15, 2008
Notice from the Office of the Attorney General--Maryland
The following is an email which I sent to the office of the Attorney General of the State of Maryland, Doug Gansler. This office has ignored previous emails from me. I finally got an answer, which I have added after this copy of my email.
The response is worthless as far as offering an assistance to Elsa. But at least this time I GOT an answer.
The subject line of my email read, “Another question…”
...about Elsa Newman.
In short, what I need to know is this: do I have an ice cube's chance in hell of success in asking you to revisit this case?
I have other questions as well: Does your office consider it within the realm of professional standards and ethics to call a defendant names such as "nuts" or "delusional witch," as did Katherine Winfree in referring to Newman?
Is it within the realm of professional standards and ethics for a State's attorney to comment about the decision of Maryland's highest court by saying, "They just released the woman who wanted to kill her kids!" I thought the office of a State's attorney would be interested in truth and justice, rather than sound bites.
Is it within the realm of professional standards and ethics for the office of the State's Attorney for Montgomery County to withhold boxes of evidence--over 2000 pages which might have cleared a defendant?
I have been researching the case for close to a year now. Absolutely everything I find leads me to believe that this woman is innocent of the charges in a case where your office, as then-State's attorney, persuaded a jury to find her guilty.
Jurors themselves went so far as to say, after the first trial, that they saw no evidence of child abuse, and had they seen such evidence, they would never have decided on a guilty verdict. And the reason they never saw any such evidence? Dr. Jill Scharff refused to open her records, citing physician-client privilege. People to whom Newman's children had disclosed abuse were ignored. Authorities in the fields of psychiatry and medicine were ignored. Other authorities in the field of medicine refused to report such things as a serious cut over a little boy's eye, received when his father "knocked him off the bed."
Did anyone every try to find Anders Arestad of northern Virginia--possibly Arlington--or elsewhere in the D. C. area. This is a cameraman who has worked on such things as Starquest II--or maybe just an apprentice cameraman. If anyone in the world can testify to the fact that Arlen Slobodow sexually abused his sons, this man can--unless, of course, he is afraid either of Slobodow or of the possibility that legal authorities might discover his own part in the abuse.
Is is standard and ethical practice for one police detective named Q. Edwina Wallace to hold Newman's children virtually captive in an interrogation room from which the younger child was released only because he was afraid to ask Detective Lewis if he could use the restroom, and thus emptied his bowels into his unwear.
Is it professional standards and ethics for Detective Wallace to hold the older boy captive longer--for six hours or more--until he was unable to deal any longer with her badgering and, shame-faced and humiliated, recanted disclosures he had made to others.
Prison is a terrible place for anyone. But for an innocent person, who knows she is innocent, but is unable to do anything about it, prison is pure hell.
Yes...this smacks of anti-Semitism. Just about the only thing they haven't done to Elsa Newman yet is to send her to the "showers" with no soap...no wash cloth...no water, and only gas from the shower heads.
When I made this comment to Jewish friends today, the response was, "well...or starved her." Now that's ironic, because one thing Newman has had trouble with in Maryland Correctional Institution for Women is receiving a special diet which she needs to maintain her health. Periodically that special diet is simply disappeared.
Oh...and do you remember hearing that in the death camps of Nazi Germany the Germans confiscated eyeglasses? That's another thing Newman has difficulty with. She is supposed to be getting new glasses. She has not received the glasses. She has not even heard about them, to the best of my knowledge.
In closing, I venture to ask the same question with which I started: Do I have an ice cube's chance in hell of getting you to revisit this case?
I dare to hope that you will find in yourself enough honor and concern for insjustice that you will attempt to answer all these questions, and especially that final one. I look forward to hearing from you.
Dear Ms. O'Broken, --[Please notice how carefully this woman perused my email—so carefully that when she copied my name, she managed to misspell it.]
Thank you for contacting the Office of the Attorney General. Your email has been forwarded to me for response. The Attorney General is the legal counsel for the State of Maryland. As such, this Office provides legal advice to state agencies, department heads, investigates and prosecutes crimes against the State. The Attorney General does not have authority or jurisdiction to intervene in matters as described in your email.
Although the Office of the Attorney General does not have jurisdiction over this matter, we are aware of the record, including that Ms. Newman's case was twice reviewed by Maryland [which vacated the guilty conviction in the first trial, saying there was NO evidence to tie Newman to any conspiracy. Thus Newman is batting at lease .250] appellate courts. The evidentiary issues that you describe were fully aired. [Pardon my uncouth expression, but bullshit! For just one example of an issue that was not dealt with—the name of Anders Arestad.] Ms. Newman was appropriately prosecuted and convicted after a fair trial. [More or less “ditto” the previous comment—except for the part about Arestad. This whole “fair trial” concept is BS. In a fair trail, the prosecutor would be interested in truth, not spending her time calling the defendant names.]
Peggie McKee
Citizen Response Coordinator
The response is worthless as far as offering an assistance to Elsa. But at least this time I GOT an answer.
The subject line of my email read, “Another question…”
...about Elsa Newman.
In short, what I need to know is this: do I have an ice cube's chance in hell of success in asking you to revisit this case?
I have other questions as well: Does your office consider it within the realm of professional standards and ethics to call a defendant names such as "nuts" or "delusional witch," as did Katherine Winfree in referring to Newman?
Is it within the realm of professional standards and ethics for a State's attorney to comment about the decision of Maryland's highest court by saying, "They just released the woman who wanted to kill her kids!" I thought the office of a State's attorney would be interested in truth and justice, rather than sound bites.
Is it within the realm of professional standards and ethics for the office of the State's Attorney for Montgomery County to withhold boxes of evidence--over 2000 pages which might have cleared a defendant?
I have been researching the case for close to a year now. Absolutely everything I find leads me to believe that this woman is innocent of the charges in a case where your office, as then-State's attorney, persuaded a jury to find her guilty.
Jurors themselves went so far as to say, after the first trial, that they saw no evidence of child abuse, and had they seen such evidence, they would never have decided on a guilty verdict. And the reason they never saw any such evidence? Dr. Jill Scharff refused to open her records, citing physician-client privilege. People to whom Newman's children had disclosed abuse were ignored. Authorities in the fields of psychiatry and medicine were ignored. Other authorities in the field of medicine refused to report such things as a serious cut over a little boy's eye, received when his father "knocked him off the bed."
Did anyone every try to find Anders Arestad of northern Virginia--possibly Arlington--or elsewhere in the D. C. area. This is a cameraman who has worked on such things as Starquest II--or maybe just an apprentice cameraman. If anyone in the world can testify to the fact that Arlen Slobodow sexually abused his sons, this man can--unless, of course, he is afraid either of Slobodow or of the possibility that legal authorities might discover his own part in the abuse.
Is is standard and ethical practice for one police detective named Q. Edwina Wallace to hold Newman's children virtually captive in an interrogation room from which the younger child was released only because he was afraid to ask Detective Lewis if he could use the restroom, and thus emptied his bowels into his unwear.
Is it professional standards and ethics for Detective Wallace to hold the older boy captive longer--for six hours or more--until he was unable to deal any longer with her badgering and, shame-faced and humiliated, recanted disclosures he had made to others.
Prison is a terrible place for anyone. But for an innocent person, who knows she is innocent, but is unable to do anything about it, prison is pure hell.
Yes...this smacks of anti-Semitism. Just about the only thing they haven't done to Elsa Newman yet is to send her to the "showers" with no soap...no wash cloth...no water, and only gas from the shower heads.
When I made this comment to Jewish friends today, the response was, "well...or starved her." Now that's ironic, because one thing Newman has had trouble with in Maryland Correctional Institution for Women is receiving a special diet which she needs to maintain her health. Periodically that special diet is simply disappeared.
Oh...and do you remember hearing that in the death camps of Nazi Germany the Germans confiscated eyeglasses? That's another thing Newman has difficulty with. She is supposed to be getting new glasses. She has not received the glasses. She has not even heard about them, to the best of my knowledge.
In closing, I venture to ask the same question with which I started: Do I have an ice cube's chance in hell of getting you to revisit this case?
I dare to hope that you will find in yourself enough honor and concern for insjustice that you will attempt to answer all these questions, and especially that final one. I look forward to hearing from you.
Dear Ms. O'Broken, --[Please notice how carefully this woman perused my email—so carefully that when she copied my name, she managed to misspell it.]
Thank you for contacting the Office of the Attorney General. Your email has been forwarded to me for response. The Attorney General is the legal counsel for the State of Maryland. As such, this Office provides legal advice to state agencies, department heads, investigates and prosecutes crimes against the State. The Attorney General does not have authority or jurisdiction to intervene in matters as described in your email.
Although the Office of the Attorney General does not have jurisdiction over this matter, we are aware of the record, including that Ms. Newman's case was twice reviewed by Maryland [which vacated the guilty conviction in the first trial, saying there was NO evidence to tie Newman to any conspiracy. Thus Newman is batting at lease .250] appellate courts. The evidentiary issues that you describe were fully aired. [Pardon my uncouth expression, but bullshit! For just one example of an issue that was not dealt with—the name of Anders Arestad.] Ms. Newman was appropriately prosecuted and convicted after a fair trial. [More or less “ditto” the previous comment—except for the part about Arestad. This whole “fair trial” concept is BS. In a fair trail, the prosecutor would be interested in truth, not spending her time calling the defendant names.]
Peggie McKee
Citizen Response Coordinator
Sunday, September 14, 2008
Mazel Tov--I guess
Just last night I came across this site on the internet: Jean Yuscavage's and Arlen Slobodow's Registry on WeddingChannel.com
And then I located a synagogue bulletin with a “Mazel Tov” for their engagement earlier in this year--February of 2008: Jean Yuscavage & Arlen Slobodow on their engagement!
Do you suppose this woman has young children? She’s about the same age as Slobodow, which ordinarily would leave me suspecting that she does not. On the other hand, she’s about the same age as Elsa Newman, which leaves me suspecting that young children could be involved.
And I wondered why the Jewish Community in the Tampa area did not respond to my snail-mail pleas for assistance in the case of Elsa Newman and her sons. Stupid me!
See…there’s this thing about sociopaths: they are absolutely charming people when they want to be. They can woo and win an individual—or an entire community, such as the Jewish community in the Tampa area, and especially at Congregation Beth Am.
Too bad somebody can’t tell this woman something about the web of assault and intrigue and child abuse she’s headed into. But no woman in love ever listens, and I presume she is in love, so I shall make no attempt to tell her what he really is. What’s the use?
And then I located a synagogue bulletin with a “Mazel Tov” for their engagement earlier in this year--February of 2008: Jean Yuscavage & Arlen Slobodow on their engagement!
Do you suppose this woman has young children? She’s about the same age as Slobodow, which ordinarily would leave me suspecting that she does not. On the other hand, she’s about the same age as Elsa Newman, which leaves me suspecting that young children could be involved.
And I wondered why the Jewish Community in the Tampa area did not respond to my snail-mail pleas for assistance in the case of Elsa Newman and her sons. Stupid me!
See…there’s this thing about sociopaths: they are absolutely charming people when they want to be. They can woo and win an individual—or an entire community, such as the Jewish community in the Tampa area, and especially at Congregation Beth Am.
Too bad somebody can’t tell this woman something about the web of assault and intrigue and child abuse she’s headed into. But no woman in love ever listens, and I presume she is in love, so I shall make no attempt to tell her what he really is. What’s the use?
Monday, September 8, 2008
Why, Calvin? Why? Why? Why?
CALVIIIIINNNNNN! WHY ARE YOU DOING THAT, CALVIN? WHY ARE YOU PEEING ON THAT PIG?
Friday, September 5, 2008
ROSIE THE RIVETER GOES MODERN!
For anybody--man or woman, boy or girl--who has been following my work on behalf of Elsa Newman and her children--whom I believe, according to their own disclosures, are seriously abused by the pedophile father who has physical custody of them.
Join me, please. Join this group. Together we are stronger than any individual one of us!
Monday, September 1, 2008
NAZI FASCISM IN THE US?
The ultimate question about Nazi tactics:
What exactly was the first thing that the Nazi machine in Germany did to families when said families arrived in Dachau or Auschwitz or Birkenau or some other death camp?
Come on. Think. This is crucial to what is happening in US courts today. Nazis brought Jews into the camps by the thousand…hundreds of thousands…millions…and what was the first move that those most inhuman of humans made?
Answer: they separated families, men and boys one direction, women and girls another. Children? They were snatched from their mothers’ arms and sent to walk under a stick of a certain height. If they could walk under it, they were too small, useless to Nazi taskmasters and they were killed. If they had to duck to walk under it, they were allowed to live, so they could work or serve or be raped by their Nazi “masters”.
What is the first thing many American courts do today to a family that walks into divorce court expecting justice? Well…some divorces may be amicable, with the two parties arriving at mutual agreement about virtually everything. In these cases, the court is little more than a rubber stamp. This, I think, is a good thing. Reasonable people, able to work through things for themselves and make decisions about all kinds of issues involved in divorce: what happens to the money? What happens to the house? What happens to the children?
But the other cases? The ones that are bitter and acrimonious? The ones that involve nasty custody battles? What do courts do? They separate the families, of course: Woman on one side with her attorney. Man on the other, with his attorney.
And the child or children are made to walk a fine line in between, sometimes with an attorney of their own, called in some places, a guardian ad litem, who often pays them little or no attention and does them little or no good. These children will be placed in the custody of one parent or the other, pretty much according to the whim of the court, and sometimes according to whoever it is that the children’s attorney sides with.
And the fate of these children? The first important thing to note is that none of them will be weeded out by size. In some 54% of these cases, at least, the children are awarded to the custody of a batterer or abuser. See the difference here? The authorities of Nazi prison wanted only those of a proper size to perform labor or service or be the victims of rape.
Not the courts of America. Not the judges of America. Huh-uh. Any child of any size can be useful--to be battered or raped or otherwise abused. Any child!
Why Aine O’Brocken! Are you saying that batters and abusers are given custody of children? Surely not. Our American courts are just and honorable. The welfare of the child is considered first and foremost.
Hogwash!
American courts, judges and lawyers in family cases don’t give a fig for the child/children. Courts tend to take the child/children from the care of whichever parent runs out of money first. Thus, impoverished mothers who have spent literally down to every last nickel they had or could borrow, trying to gain custody of children for whom they have been primary caregivers, stand in dismay as a judge bangs a gavel and sends their babies off to the care of an abuser, who, because he still has some money left, is deemed to be better able to care for said child or children.
Abuse is not an issue in placing children or in ordering supervise visitation. Google the recent Castillo case in Maryland, in which a father was allowed unsupervised visits despite a mother who begged the courts to require supervision. Amy Castillo insisted that the father was a danger to her children.
The result? The three Castillo children are dead, drowned by their father in a bathtub during one of those unsupervised visits.
Google the Elsa Newman case. Elsa is unjustly imprisoned, convicted by a manipulative prosecutor of a crime that did not even exist—conspiracy to commit murder. The crime did not exist, simply because there was no co-conspirator. How on earth to you get “conspiracy” out of that?
Further, Elsa’s children were placed in the custody of a father against whom they have revealed unspeakable abuses—sexual, physical, mental, emotional, spiritual, and any other kind you can think of.
Oh, yes. This fascist attitude is alive and well in the United States of America, where divorce courts divide and conquer--and award a child or children to the parent with more money, no matter if that parent is abusing said child or children.
Is it mere coincidence that Elsa Newman is Jewish? and that she wants her children raised according to their Jewish heritage—either conservative or orthodox? And that their father, although also of Jewish descent, has chosen to integrate into the general community?
Naw, I suppose the questions of heritage has nothing to do with what happens in the courts. It is happening, after all, everywhere, and to women of any and all ethnicity.
And shame, for shame, for shame on an American “justice” system which thus makes a farce of the very term which has so long been an integral part of our national pride.
What exactly was the first thing that the Nazi machine in Germany did to families when said families arrived in Dachau or Auschwitz or Birkenau or some other death camp?
Come on. Think. This is crucial to what is happening in US courts today. Nazis brought Jews into the camps by the thousand…hundreds of thousands…millions…and what was the first move that those most inhuman of humans made?
Answer: they separated families, men and boys one direction, women and girls another. Children? They were snatched from their mothers’ arms and sent to walk under a stick of a certain height. If they could walk under it, they were too small, useless to Nazi taskmasters and they were killed. If they had to duck to walk under it, they were allowed to live, so they could work or serve or be raped by their Nazi “masters”.
What is the first thing many American courts do today to a family that walks into divorce court expecting justice? Well…some divorces may be amicable, with the two parties arriving at mutual agreement about virtually everything. In these cases, the court is little more than a rubber stamp. This, I think, is a good thing. Reasonable people, able to work through things for themselves and make decisions about all kinds of issues involved in divorce: what happens to the money? What happens to the house? What happens to the children?
But the other cases? The ones that are bitter and acrimonious? The ones that involve nasty custody battles? What do courts do? They separate the families, of course: Woman on one side with her attorney. Man on the other, with his attorney.
And the child or children are made to walk a fine line in between, sometimes with an attorney of their own, called in some places, a guardian ad litem, who often pays them little or no attention and does them little or no good. These children will be placed in the custody of one parent or the other, pretty much according to the whim of the court, and sometimes according to whoever it is that the children’s attorney sides with.
And the fate of these children? The first important thing to note is that none of them will be weeded out by size. In some 54% of these cases, at least, the children are awarded to the custody of a batterer or abuser. See the difference here? The authorities of Nazi prison wanted only those of a proper size to perform labor or service or be the victims of rape.
Not the courts of America. Not the judges of America. Huh-uh. Any child of any size can be useful--to be battered or raped or otherwise abused. Any child!
Why Aine O’Brocken! Are you saying that batters and abusers are given custody of children? Surely not. Our American courts are just and honorable. The welfare of the child is considered first and foremost.
Hogwash!
American courts, judges and lawyers in family cases don’t give a fig for the child/children. Courts tend to take the child/children from the care of whichever parent runs out of money first. Thus, impoverished mothers who have spent literally down to every last nickel they had or could borrow, trying to gain custody of children for whom they have been primary caregivers, stand in dismay as a judge bangs a gavel and sends their babies off to the care of an abuser, who, because he still has some money left, is deemed to be better able to care for said child or children.
Abuse is not an issue in placing children or in ordering supervise visitation. Google the recent Castillo case in Maryland, in which a father was allowed unsupervised visits despite a mother who begged the courts to require supervision. Amy Castillo insisted that the father was a danger to her children.
The result? The three Castillo children are dead, drowned by their father in a bathtub during one of those unsupervised visits.
Google the Elsa Newman case. Elsa is unjustly imprisoned, convicted by a manipulative prosecutor of a crime that did not even exist—conspiracy to commit murder. The crime did not exist, simply because there was no co-conspirator. How on earth to you get “conspiracy” out of that?
Further, Elsa’s children were placed in the custody of a father against whom they have revealed unspeakable abuses—sexual, physical, mental, emotional, spiritual, and any other kind you can think of.
Oh, yes. This fascist attitude is alive and well in the United States of America, where divorce courts divide and conquer--and award a child or children to the parent with more money, no matter if that parent is abusing said child or children.
Is it mere coincidence that Elsa Newman is Jewish? and that she wants her children raised according to their Jewish heritage—either conservative or orthodox? And that their father, although also of Jewish descent, has chosen to integrate into the general community?
Naw, I suppose the questions of heritage has nothing to do with what happens in the courts. It is happening, after all, everywhere, and to women of any and all ethnicity.
And shame, for shame, for shame on an American “justice” system which thus makes a farce of the very term which has so long been an integral part of our national pride.
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