
Institutional Abuse
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An accurate explanation of Family Bridges and other reunification camps:
Family Bridges is a way to do a custody transfer of children to an abusive parent by court order to stop reports of child abuse. It works like this:
A child or children report being abused by a parent. The abusive parent doesn't want more reports of abuse from the children therefore they file for custody. From the judge's perspective if a Family Court case becomes a criminal case the Family Court judge has failed.
Once child abuse reports are present the Family Court judge now has a "high conflict" case. Family court is designed to support abusers. When abusers don't get their way they are violent, they attack judges, lawyers, police. Abusers are also often wealthy and will support big law firms who will then support Family court judges on appeal if the judge rules in their favor.
The moral, logical and correct answer in a child abuse case is for the judge to allow children to stay where they stay safe. But the morally correct answer is guaranteed to make the abusive parent, their social network and family angry. The immoral, illogical and wrong answer is to force the children to be with the abusive parent. Forcing children under the control of abusive parent stops reports of child abuse from getting into the criminal court system. When judges make decisions to ignore or discount reports of abuse and force the children under the control of the abusive effectively stalled.
However there are cases where the law and circumstances make it difficult for a judge to force children under the control of the abusive parent directly.
Enter parental alienation and "reunification camps" like Family Bridges.
Parental alienation sole purpose in Family Court cases is to discount child abuse claims It doesn't come up in cases unless there is no credible evidence of abuse that can be presented by the child or the protective parent. It has no function outside of Family court because it is a third party diagnosis.
There were many legal approaches used to discount child abuse claims in the past but they all failed since those approaches were also used in criminal court and criminal court cases overturned their use. Parental alienation had been used sparingly to force children under the control of abusive parents until criminal court disallowed other approaches. Parental alienation has become the go to mechanism in Family Court recently for discounting child abuse, even though judicial organizations have addressed in other courts.
Even with parental alienation forcing children under the control of the abusive parent is legally difficult. Reunification camps like Family Bridges are the 'solution'. Reunification camps are done by temporary order to force child custody to be transferred to abusive parents by claiming that since children report abuse, the children by the fact that they have reported being abused, therefore have psychological damage that needs correction.
Using parental alienation and reunification camps, the judge gives the abusive parent a temporary court order, typically 90 days, which makes appeals effectively impossible.
The court order forces children to be isolated under the control of the abusive parent. The children are told if they try to contact the protective parent that parent will be put in jail. The judge then involves a therapist in the temporary order to put the protective parent through various 'aftercare' steps before they can see the children. The protective parent pays 10s or 100s of thousands of dollars in material and other costs to the therapist under Family Bridges control. Even after protective parents have paid fees in excess of $200,000 to the aftercare professional, no parent yet has successfully completed the Family Bridges ‘aftercare’ and been able to see their children.
The Family Bridges model for treating the children that are under their control is 'threat therapy', a model created by Synanon, a violent cult that was centered in California.
CEDU is an offshoot of Synanon, both of which were shut down by the authorities however their concepts are still being used in family courts in the states and overseas.
https://www.ucpaudio.com/podcast/lost-kids
Description of the HARM caused to children in these cases- http://www.childrenintherapy.org/PAS/PAS.html
Family Bridges TV report-
https://www.nbcbayarea.com/news/local/no-oversight-for-programs-advertising-they-reconnect-children-with-alienated-parents/64105/
https://www.washingtonpost.com/lifestyle/magazine/a-divorced-father-his-estranged-kids-and-a-controversial-program-to-bring-them-together/2017/05/09/b50ac6f6-204c-11e7-ad74-3a742a6e93a7_story.html
Jean Mercers description of what children endure in these camps-
https://www.youtube.com/watch?app=desktop&v=pD4CTPG-HAI
https://www.rachelwatsonbooks.com/blog1/scotland-leads-the-way?fbclid=IwAR1PsVLWhhA9PgSeF-xOjpVnrTS8qFz0U0gSXmx4www9Zxd3LB2AZy6HKrA
https://stopabusecampaign.org/2020/09/27/life-and-death-in-the-family-courts/?fbclid=IwAR00qPxy3NKHfu_QXi1dnCRgaDNmhulnjICG97m7lytDsQHJr3be8Y9yY5Y
Stop hurting children . . . C.C., N.P.R.
Organizer
T. B.
Organizer
Chico, CA