Safe Child Act section Additional Useful Benefits by Barry Goldstein

by Barry Goldstein

Last month my article was about legislation needed to stop custody courts from routinely sending children into the custody of dangerous abusers. My meeting with a state legislator led to her request that I prepare a proposal that would be the basis of legislation to reform the broken system. I would like to thank Toby Kleinman for her assistance in drafting this proposal. Immediately below will be my proposal for a Safe Child Act and I will then discuss why I think this would make a difference. You are most welcome to post or otherwise use this proposal and this article in support of efforts to reform the system. In fact I hope many people will take the proposal for a Safe Child Act and ask their legislators to sponsor it. 

Safe Child Act 

Purpose: Improve the Safety of Children involved in Child Custody Cases 



Additional Useful Benefits 

One of the big problems in the custody court has been the reliance on unqualified mental health professionals. Courts originally turned to them based on the popular assumption that domestic violence was caused by substance abuse, mental illness or the actions of the victim. We now know that these assumptions were wrong, but the courts continue to treat a mental health degree as if it provided expertise in domestic violence. Interestingly, the new Department of Justice study found that recommendations from social workers and lawyers worked better for children than those made by psychologists and psychiatrists. This contradicts popular beliefs that a degree based on a longer course of study would provide more expertise. It appears psychologists and psychiatrists are less effective in domestic violence cases because they rely on psychological testing that is not useful in most cases and fail to use a holistic approach. The Safe Child Act would specifically state that graduate degrees should not be treated as proof of domestic violence expertise and the lack of such degrees should not be the basis for refusing to listen to testimony from domestic violence experts. Even the current law provides for qualifying experts based on training and experience, but many judges have failed to follow the law when disqualifying domestic violence experts who usually know more about domestic violence than the mental health professionals routinely relied on. The law would also discourage the use of mental health professionals in cases where there are no legitimate mental health issues. 

The proposal would also mandate early evidentiary hearings in all cases in which there are allegations or evidence of domestic violence. The hearing would be limited to the issue of whether the abuse allegations are true. There would be no need to go to the time and expense of appointing a GAL or evaluator as the hearing would be limited to the factual issue of the validity of domestic violence allegations. If the allegations are true and the non-abusive parent is safe, she would receive custody and the abuser would be limited to supervised visitation. Instead of forcing victims to accommodate their abusers, the law would place the burden on the abuser to change his behavior and convince the court it would be safe for him to have unsupervised visitation. Any further abuse would end all visitation.