Help Leilani secure her children’s future

She’s in over her head but refuses to give up on her children. After hearing the whole story, this custody battle has shocked people. Four years in the making and the final result is a plate of garbage served by a bias and incompetent judge. Thousands of dollars already spent and now there is no choice but to appeal this unjust ruling.

Leilani has two children. Her daughter Brooke is 6 years old and her son Bryan is four. Both children were under her custody from birth until the divorce started in June 2018 and Brooke was over two years old. It wasn’t until that time her ex Keith decided he wanted to play daddy as the legal father. He babysat Brooke a number of times when Leilani had to work and couldn’t arrange for a sitter. Keith had already retired from working and was usually available to babysit Brooke when needed. Keith’s service to watch Brooke came with a price $40 for an 8 hour shift or $50 for a 12 hour shift. Yes, he charged Leilani to babysit his daughter. All cashed checks were submitted as evidence in court. Keith refused to watch Bryan and, at a point, was even trying to disestablish paternity of him. He continued that pursuit until a lawyer advised him that he couldn’t separate the children like that.

The reason for the divorce in the first place was because of Keith’s abusive behaviors, controlling ways and his infatuation of manipulating Leilani. It’s unfortunate but both children have already suffered from his abuse in several ways that I will not disclose here. Before dating, Keith had accused Leilani of being a scammer from the Philippines. That’s a rather difficult accusation to prove, considering she was working in Saudi Arabia as a nurse for 9 years already and was doing just fine on her own financially. They did eventually get married and he wanted her to move here to Fairbanks, Alaska.

When Leilani got to Alaska, it all went downhill and it didn’t take long. Leilani was extremely naive, coming from the Philippines and didn’t know how things worked here in the United States. She relied heavily on Keith’s experience. Once marital disagreements/fights began, Keith drafted numerous documents and had Leilani sign them. Already concerned about his retirement funds, he had her sign a document relinquishing her rights to any of his retirement. In 2016 he even convinced her to sign a document that stated he would file for the divorce after two years in which he would be 60.

Keith retired early in 2015 at the age of 57. Once Keith retired, this qualified him to receive services under the Alaska Legal Services Corporation as he would be considered low income. This program gave him unlimited access to a free lawyer for the divorce and custody dispute. This gave Keith an unfair advantage since Leilani applied and did not qualify for any aid. They tortured Leilani through nonsense issues, for example, 16,000 hours of video clips with Keith and the children interacting together. These were taken from the video cameras Keith installed in his house. This wasted time and created more lawyer fees. It was nonstop.

Keith’s pattern of abuse and neglecting children was even an issue in his first two marriages. He was convicted of domestic violence with his second wife. Also, he did not even raise his two daughters from his first marriage; he left them with his sister-in-law. His wife even abandoned the children. Like they say, old habits are hard to break. He has already abused and neglected Leilani’s children. How much worse will it get with his 50% shared custody granted by this so-called judge?

Since the recent ruling, Leilani was surprisingly only granted 50% shared custody. The only thing both lawyers agreed on during the trial was that one party needed legal custody to make decisions for the children. Since the divorce started, Keith and Leilani could never agree on a single thing about the children’s care. Keith even refuses to get medical insurance for the children taken from his precious retirement. Anyways since Leilani’s income is more significant than Keith’s, she now has to pay child support to him. To make it worse, the judge ordered Leilani to pay Keith back child support of over $15,000 and a monthly payment of $446.25. With all the supporting documents at hand, it is evident that the judge made erroneous errors in his calculation. He didn’t bother to act on the reconsideration motion for the child support order sent up from Leilani’s lawyer. During the trial, it was requested that Keith pay back child support from the date of separation up to when he decided to be a daddy and have 50% custody. Keith claimed not to have the money to pay, so both parties agreed to waive all child support payments and start fresh after making the final custody ruling. The judge ignored this agreement or never researched the case history.

The preponderance of the evidence weighs heavily in Leilani’s favor. Her lawyer did not present anything in court unless there was physical evidence to support her arguments. However, there was plenty of accusations and misleading evidence on Keith’s side. The guardian ad litem stated that legal custody should be awarded to Leilani since Keith has so many “red flags.” The judge completely disregarded Keith’s multiple angry outbursts while on trial. It is almost certain that a Court of Appeal panel will see the judge made erroneous rulings on this case. In the middle of the trial, the judge boasted how he gave priority to the criminal cases because that is his background. He said that the civil cases would not get as much attention. Good to see everyone gets treated the same.

Leilani has paid her first lawyer $11,000. So far, she has spent $24,000 and still owes a balance of $46,000 to her recent lawyer. Being in debt so much with her last lawyer disabled her from getting representation for the appeal. She has sought out representation from another source and is now seeking funds for a $30,000 retainer. She has already borrowed against her 401K. She has no collateral for a loan and the payments for other loans are going to be absurd, over $600 for 18 months. She is running out of options and is asking for help for once.

Leilani has been drained financially but refuses to give up on her children’s well-being. This is one of those moments where you know you are right and nothing else matters. To right this wrong it will require more funds than what Leilani can obtain on her own. This is not a lost cause. Please donate now. If you cannot donate, that is fine. Please share Leilani’s story with your friends, family, basically everyone. Time is of the essence. Filing for an appeal has to be done in a very short period of time. Updates to her story will be shared here when things begin progressing.

Thank you all