Dr. Gardner's ghost still haunts Rhode Island (even after David Tassoni has gone)

As Judge Haiganush R. Bedrosian becomes Chief of Family Court, it is time we banished the ghost of Dr. Richard Gardner, whose coercive tactics in Rhode Island courtrooms have been haunting families traumatized by domestic abuse.

Victims of terror do not present well in court. They are tense, emotional and understandably outraged. On the opposing side, tyrannical controllers can be calm and charming litigants, confident in the damage they have inflicted. Their lawyers, who are often accomplished bullies in their own right, tell astounding lies calculated to trigger a full display of symptoms in the victims.

Psychiatrist Richard A. Gardner designed a stealth weapon in 1985 that he called "Parental Alienation Syndrome." A domestic-violence-denier, Gardner testified for hundreds of fathers and argued that mothers had "alienated" their children against them. Gardner also wrote that sexual relations between parents and children were natural. He told filmmaker Garland Waller that children who report abuse by their fathers should be threatened with a beating. He committed suicide in 2003, but his ghost still haunts our courtrooms. Here are three examples from cases I have been following:

In 2004, Warwick police charged a Family Court deputy sheriff with felony domestic violence when they found his girlfriend handcuffed in their kitchen with a broken jaw and eye socket. Already entrenched in litigation, the deputy sheriff was an often-unruly defendant in the same courtroom where he once kept order. He demanded custody of his ten-year-old daughter, who was terrified of him.

In the corridor during a break, David M. Tassoni, assistant to Chief Judge Jeremiah S. Jeremiah, Jr., told me he was searching for a psychologist who "understood parental alienation." Tassoni found Lori Meyerson, PhD, in a cramped country office and invited her to serve at Family Court, where she testified that the deputy sheriff was a "happy, calm and level person." She had never visited either parent's home when she recommended giving the father sole custody. General Magistrate John J. O'Brien, Jr., praised Meyerson's work and declared this case to be "as close as you can get to parental alienation."

Tassoni told me he was working with Judge Bedrosian and a joint committee from the Court and the Bar Association on a training program to qualify guardians ad litem. Their 2004 course and manual devoted an entire section to Gardner's theory of parental alienation.

Attorney Lise M. Iwon, who is now president of the Rhode Island Bar Association, helped teach that course, though she did not follow its guidelines in writing her report as guardian ad litem in another case. A three-and-a-half-year-old had protested behavior she described as her father's "sausage games" on days they spent alone. A pediatrician's office reported this to DCYF, who ordered the father out of the home. A few months later, the mother filed for divorce.

I asked why Attorney General Patrick C. Lynch had failed to convene a grand jury. He considered the child too young to be believed. Neither DCYF nor the AG used available technology to record this child's "excited utterances" in order to meet standards of evidence. They made no video of her reportedly vivid "reenactment" of an assault. No jury saw the graphic portrait she drew of her father.

Iwon succeeded in getting the girl and her older sister removed from an excellent mother and home. After sixteen months in state custody, the court gave the younger girl to her father and moved the older one from a shelter to a foster home, all at state expense. Iwon's course of action suggested that a Gardner-defense was underway. Like Tassoni's efforts on behalf of the deputy sheriff, Iwon sought psychiatric examiners, and found a pliable group in Massachusetts, where psychologist Bernice Kelly, PsyD, wrote that Iwon, herself, had suggested the possibility of "parental alienation."

In 2007, Kelly's report to the court listed Gardner's "eight symptoms" of alienation. She seemed unaware that the National Council of Juvenile and Family Court Judges had identified this as "junk science" the year before. NCJFCJ had warned judges to strike any report referring to parental alienation from the record because it failed to meet standards of evidence.

This year, as the American Psychological Association prepares to publish the Fifth Edition of its Diagnostic and Statistical Manual, its committee has steadfastly resisted pressure to elevate "parental alienation" to scientific credibility.

Yet Blue Cross and Blue Shield apparently reimburses providers for parental alienation "therapy." In 2007, psychologist Peter J. Kosseff, PhD, testified in Rhode Island that his court-ordered efforts to forcibly "reconcile" two teenagers with their father were not what Kosseff considered "therapeutic." Nevertheless, he billed Anthem Blue Cross and Blue Shield in Connecticut for "miscellaneous medical service" and got paid for those sessions--though they ended badly when the 14-year-old daughter suffered a breakdown and spent ten days at Bradley Hospital, costing the insurer many thousands more.

How long will the ghost of Dr. Gardner haunt Rhode Island's children? I am confident that Chief Judge Bedrosian does not share Gardner's pro-pedophile views. She is now in a position to end his ghostly reign in Rhode Island and to promote the highest standards of evidence in Family Court's handling of custody cases.

But one branch of government is not enough. Will Governor Lincoln Chafee demand thorough reform at the Department of Children, Youth and Families? The General Assembly has mandated that DCYF must, in 2011, start the process toward accreditation.

Will Attorney General Peter Kilmartin use technology and convene grand juries to examine evidence of sex crimes by family members against young children? (Two of the fathers above acknowledged that they were sexually assaulted in childhood, one by his father and the other by his grandfather.)

Children who have suffered from domestic abuse need all three branches of government to work together and unequivocally banish Dr. Gardner's ghost from Rhode Island.


This op-ed is reprinted from
http://www.opednews.com/articles/Dr-Gardner-s-ghost-still-by-Anne-Grant-101219-843.html
and also appeared in The Providence Journal
http://www.projo.com/opinion/contributors/content/CT_annegrant27_12-27-10_JGL9NV5_v13.8712c4.html

Two weeks later, David Tassoni resigned. Here is the Providence Journal report:

http://newsblog.projo.com/2011/01/andrea-has-tassoni.html

RI Family Court mediator quits amid probe of qualifications
4:31 PM Thu, Jan 06, 2011
By W. ZACHARY MALINOWSKI
Journal staff writer

PROVIDENCE, R.I. -- Rhode Island State Police are investigating allegations that a longtime mediator in Family Court may have provided false information about his qualifications when he was hired 15 years ago.

State Police Lt. Raymond Studley, assistant detective commander, confirmed Thursday that detectives had opened an investigation into David Tassoni after court officials tipped off the police that the state worker may have "misrepresented his educational background."

"The court asked us to look into it and determine if there is any criminal behavior," Studley said.

Studley said that court mediators are not required to have a law degree.

Craig Berke, spokesman for the state court system, said that Tassoni resigned on Wednesday. Berke said that Tassoni was hired in 1996.

He said that Tassoni, who made $105,398 annually, was an assistant administrator in addition to his duties as a mediator. As a mediator, Berke said that Tassoni primarily worked to resolve disputes in divorce proceedings.

Family Court Chief Judge Haiganush Bedrosian said through Berke that any mediations that Tassoni participated in "are unaffected by this development.''


ABC 10 News broke the story:
http://www2.turnto10.com/news/2011/jan/06/10/court-mediator-resigns-resume-questioned-ar-351568/

By PARKER GAVIGAN
Published: January 06, 2011
Updated: January 06, 2011 - 6:54 PM
» 19 Comments | Post a Comment
A top court mediator resigned amid questions about his credentials.

David Tassoni worked at Rhode Island's Family Court for 13 years.

Tassoni's resume said he graduated law school and earned a degree from Providence College. From there, he rose through the ranks of state's Family Court, recently reporting directly to the chief judge and making $105,000 a year.

NBC 10 learned neither degree exists.

Paul Labonte's case in Rhode Island Family Court is over. He lost custody of his kids to the state. That's where he met Tassoni.

"You're expecting the people to be professional and be qualified in the positions they hold, and when they're not, it's like you get anyone down here to hear the case," Labonte said.

Tassoni's resume, obtained by NBC 10, says he graduated from Providence College and Southern New England School of Law in 1997 -- the same year he began working for Rhode Island's court system. He worked first as a law clerk intern and then as chief mediator, rising fast to the rank of assistant administrator and making $105,000 a year.

Sources say Chief Judge Haiganoush Bedrosian started to look into Tassoni's education and learned he did not graduate from law school or from Providence College.

Earlier in the week, Tassoni's resume, picture and biography were posted on the website of the Massachusetts-based company, Legal Options Inc.

The site said he had mediated more than 750 divorce and domestic disputes. The site also said that in addition to his family law practice, Tassoni is the domestic mediation instructor for Roger Williams University.

After NBC 10 started investigating, the information about Tassoni was pulled from the website.

Many court employees said Tassoni was good at what he did. Labonte doesn't disagree.

"I thought it was a shame. I really did," Labonte said. "He was really listening to what I was saying as opposed to just being at work,"

NBC 10 tried reaching Tassoni at his home and on the phone, but we were unsuccessful.

State police confirmed there is an active investigation at the Family Court, but they wouldn't confirm whether it involves Tassoni.

A representative for the court said the cases that Tassoni mediated are not affected by his resume problems.

State Sen. John Tassoni, David Tassoni's cousin, said the two men haven't been close and that he learned of the resignation from someone else.

Here is David Tassoni's fraudulent resumé (click once on it to enlarge):



He listed these among his duties:
Family Court Mediation Advisory Board (Chairperson), 2001 to present
Attorney General's Domestic Violence Task Force, 2002 to present
National Association of Court Managers, Governors Ideal System of Care, 2002 to present
Supreme Court Indigent Defense Task Force, 2002 to present
Supreme Court Mediation Task Force, 2002 to 2003
Child Support Guidelines Task Force, 2002
Rhode Island Children's Trust, 2003 to present
Guardian ad Litem Task Force, 2003 to present

Psychiatrist Richard Gardner made his own fraudulent claims that he was "Clinical Professor of Child Psychiatry at the College of Physicians and Surgeons, Columbia University." After his 2003 suicide, his New York Times obituary listed this among his credentials, and Columbia University denied the assertion.

The Hague Domestic Violence Project

The Hague Convention, once intended to help protect children whose parents are citizens of different countries, has become a weapon abusers now use against parents trying to protect their children from domestic violence and sexual abuse.

Visit the website of the Hague Domestic Violence Project by clicking on the title above or pasting this in your browser:
http://www.haguedv.org/

See Time Magazine's article here:
http://www.time.com/time/nation/article/0,8599,2036246,00.html

Judges should lose immunity when they use children to "reform" abusive parents

Son, then father accused of killing children

Lionell Dangerfield, Christopher Dangerfield were supposed to be caring for victims

By Eileen Kelley • ekelley@enquirer.com •

December 29, 2010

This news item is published at Cincinnati.Com
http://news.cincinnati.com/article/20101229/NEWS010701/12300339/Son-then-father-accused-of-killing-children

WALNUT HILLS, OH - Tyrese Short was close to 3 years old when he was handed over to his father.

The boy was supposed to help Christopher Dangerfield, a 48-year-old with a lengthy criminal record, turn his life around.

But Dangerfield had other issues to contend with as well: the prospect of losing another son to the death penalty.

And now in the span of seven months, a father and a son are accused of the same crime: killing children they were supposed to be caring for.

Christopher Dangerfield was arrested in the death of Tyrese, and Lionell Dangerfield has been charged in the death of 3-month-old Zhi Merah Binford, his girlfriend's daughter.

Tyrese was pronounced dead Tuesday at Cincinnati Children's Hospital Medical Center.

Zhi was discovered dead on a couch in South Fairmount on May 31. Her skull had been fractured and her ribs broken. Hamilton County Prosecutor Joe Deters has recommended the death penalty for Lionell Dangerfield, 26.

That case could go to trial in March.

"Like father, like son," Grace Dangerfield, Christopher Dangerfield's stepmother, said Tuesday evening.

Grace Dangerfield, 77, said Tyrese was a happy child and appeared to be no trouble for her stepson, who had been arrested three times in the year leading up to a court awarding him custody of Tyrese. His 12 other arrests include drug trafficking, assaulting a police officer and theft.

"He had troubles," she said, adding that the family hoped that by raising Tyrese, her stepson would act more like a father.

Since Tyrese was born, caseworkers with the Hamilton County Department of Job and Family Services had been involved in his life. That involvement did not stop early this summer, when a Juvenile Court judge awarded custody to his father.

The case file on Tyrese's life is thick.

Included are reports that Tyrese recently suffered a broken leg and was badly burned. He also told a baby-sitter that his father had punched him in the stomach, police told The Enquirer on Wednesday.

Police also said that Tyrese's mother reported that her son's eye had been blackened recently.

Brian Gregg, a spokesman for the Job and Family Services, would not discuss specifics of the case. An emergency meeting on the matter was called Wednesday, the same day The Enquirer reported about the death of another child under the care of the child welfare department, Savon Edwards.

Savon had been on life support for two years after being shaken so badly he stopped breathing Dec. 26, 2008. Savon's caseworkers were implicated for failing to adequately protect him from his abusive father. Savon, 2, died Monday.

Now an investigation is under way regarding Tyrese.

"If we find there are failings at this end, we will take action," Gregg said.

With each recent injury, Christopher Dangerfield had an explanation ready, police said.

Dangerfield called emergency dispatchers from his Walnut Hills apartment just before 3 p.m. Tuesday to say some young kids at the corner store had jumped his son, something they'd done three times before.

It wasn't until deep into the conversation that the dispatcher learned that Tyrese was just 3, not an older child hurt in a street fight.

"He's 3 years old? Who's hitting him?" the dispatcher asked.

Dangerfield again blamed street kids, and then suggested adults were involved, too. Dangerfield said he could see scars on Tyrese's legs and back and that he was barely awake.

The dispatcher walked Dangerfield through CPR chest compressions for his son.

Homicide investigator Sgt. Gary Conner said police have checked all leads, including the possibility that neighborhood boys were involved, but came back with the conclusion that Dangerfield killed his son.

In court Wednesday, attorney William Whalen told a judge that Dangerfield told him the child fell while bathing and struck his head.

Grace Dangerfield thinks her stepson snapped.

She said he had been on medication and has heard her husband, who is Christopher's father, and others in the family say that Christopher has bipolar disorder.

Bipolar disorder can cause severe mood swings that include serious bouts of depression and extremely anxious behavior. People with the disorder may be explosive and irritable, according to the National Institute of Mental Health.

"I think something must have happened with his mind, because I don't think that he could hurt him intentionally," she said. "I didn't picture him as being abusive."

Mothers seek justice for murdered children

To see this original article, click on the title above or paste this into your browser:

http://couriernews.suntimes.com/news/3056166-418/rosenberg-andrea-daughter-patricia-batavia.html

By Denise Crosby

dcrosby@stmedianetwork.com

Last Modified: Dec 31, 2010 02:38AM
This is another in a series on people and events that shaped our communities in 2010.

I don’t pretend to understand a parent’s pain upon losing a child. But I do know what their desperate hugs feel like.

Over the years, I’ve met too many of these hurting mothers and fathers. And in 2010, two of the most memorable women came to me during the month of October, Domestic Violence Awareness Month.

Both had lost beautiful children to men who resorted to murder because they couldn’t stand to lose what they thought were their possessions.

And both mothers came seeking justice.

Justin Boulay, the killer of Patricia Rosenberg’s 19-year-old daughter, Andrea, was getting out of prison in November after serving only 12 years for first-degree murder — and moving to Hawaii with the woman he married while incarcerated.

Riley, Gabriella Ghobrial’s 2-year-old son, had been killed by his own father in a murder-suicide five years ago in Gilberts after a Kane County judge awarded the dad visitation rights, despite Anthony Mangiamele’s repeated threats to harm their child.

Both mothers had been thrust into the media spotlight after such horrendous crimes. And even though years had passed — and both had moved on with their lives —their words, their hugs were evidence the wounds are still as fresh as the tears they shed while talking to me.

Neither had spoken out so publicly before. And in the end, despite their hesitations, both were glad they found the courage to speak.

Ghobrial simply didn’t want others to forget how far from perfect the system still is. And she didn’t want Riley to be forgotten.

With difficulty, she prepared for another Christmas. She worked both the 24th and 25th as a nurse because the holidays are still so very painful. She and her estranged husband had taken Riley to a casino that Christmas of 2004 because her husband had said “her family didn’t deserve” to see the child.

It was just the three of them, she recalls. “It was lonely, but I thought I would be giving Riley a better Christmas the following year. Well, thanks to Judge (William) Weir, I spent it motherless and hurt.”

On Feb. 6, 2005, Riley’s father snapped pictures of his son waving goodbye and labeled the undeveloped roll “Riley’s last weekend.” Then he backed the family’s SUV into the garage, created a makeshift bed for the toddler in the rear of the vehicle and started the truck’s engine with the garage door closed.

About eight hours later, police discovered the murder-suicide along with the film and a barrage of letters Mangiamele had written to Gabriella, blaming her for the child’s death.

The holidays are rough, she told me, but “the true nightmare begins in January, from the 22nd to Feb. 9.”

A national outcry

Patty Rosenberg also lost her child in February — 1998 — when Boulay, Andrea’s estranged boyfriend, lured her to his apartment, then strangled her with a telephone cord, three days before her 20th birthday.

Rosenberg’s Domestic Violence Awareness Month story didn’t keep Boulay behind bars any longer. But the national outcry that followed resulted in harsher parole conditions for the former St. Charles man.

And other tougher legislation may follow.

Like Gabriella Ghobrial, Patty Rosenberg didn’t really want to be interviewed. She even canceled a meeting with me in October because, as much as she wanted to speak out about this topic, her emotions were still too raw.

Later, she changed her mind — after she found out her daughter’s ex-boyfriend and killer was not only going to be released from prison the following month after serving only 12 years for first-degree murder, he would be moving to Hawaii to live with the woman he’d married while incarcerated.

The injustice of it all was just too much for the Batavia woman.

And so we talked. And the story was printed. And the outcry that followed was so swift, so intense, it resulted not only in a barrage of state and national media coverage and a candlelight vigil attended by hundreds, but also that Justin Boulay’s parole requirements were greatly intensified. And there’s even a movement under way to create a registry for murderers, much like the one for sex offenders now in place in this state and many others.

“It was absolutely unbelievable,” Rosenberg said of the masses who came out that cold night in downtown Batavia on the day Boulay was released from prison.

And perhaps just as importantly, the aftermath created a sense of closure for the grieving mother — something that she sorely needed in the years since Andrea Will was found strangled in Boulay’s Eastern Illinois University apartment, yet another victim of domestic violence.

“There never will be total closure until I’m with her again,” Rosenberg said of her daughter. “But I felt healing for the first time. That night (of the vigil) filled an emptiness and a void. And it gave me a voice I never had a chance to use.”

The media exposure also reconnected her with friends she had lost over the years — friends who had fallen by the wayside because they didn’t know how to respond to such tragedy.

“People who had not spoken to me in so long are no longer afraid of my pain,” Rosenberg said.

And on an even larger scale, there is now a growing movement under way on the “Voices for Andrea” Facebook page — started by her daughter’s sorority sisters after Rosenberg’s story was published — calling for a state registry for convicted murderers.

In addition to working on such legislation, Rosenberg wants to see colleges put more emphasis on domestic violence. She wants to see more trained counselors, more support groups and hot lines on campuses.

“Domestic violence is not random. It’s personal,” she said. “And that makes it so much harder for victims to talk about.”

Patty Rosenberg, for the first time, is feeling empowered.

“Before, I was just a victim, too,” she said. “Now I’m becoming proactive.” This “gave me a piece of my life back. And that is a wonderful feeling.”

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