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F & F Supporter Triumphs in Vicious False Accusations/Family Law Case
Gonzalez’s lawyer, Denise Placencio, argued that West staged the entire incident because of a bitter child-custody dispute.
In an interview, Placencio said the recent December court decision that ordered West to pay Gonzalez should serve as a "cautionary tale" to anyone tempted to make false allegations.
"The truth will come out and there will be consequences, consequences in the custody courtroom and consequences to the wallet," Placencio said.
She said her client faced the possibility of five life sentences in prison as a result of West’s criminal complaint. Gonzalez couldn’t see or speak to his son until October 2008 because of the criminal charges and West’s filing of the request for a permanent restraining order against him.
Score one for the good guys. Louis Gonzalez’s ex accused him of sexually assaulting her, burning her with matches, and other violence, and the whole DV/family law/criminal law machinery swung into action against him. Fortunately he had a strong attorney, Denise Placencio, on his side.
Placencio, a longtime Fathers & Families supporter who has endorsed and participated in our campaigns dating back to the LaMusga campaign in 2004, first told me about this case last year. When she did, it sounded grim. Now, Gonzalez and his 8-year-old son emerge victorious. From False accusation will cost woman $55,000 (Ventura County Star, 1/2/10):
A Ventura County judge has ordered a woman to pay her former boyfriend more than $55,000 after she falsely accused him of raping and brutalizing her in Simi Valley in 2008 during a child-custody dispute...
Gonzalez was arrested on Feb. 1, 2008, and was held in jail without bail until a judge dismissed the charges on April 23, 2008.
[Accuser Tracy] West was Gonzalez’s former girlfriend. West and Gonzalez, senior vice president of a Las Vegas bank, had a child together.
West told Simi Valley Police Department detectives that Gonzalez ran up to her at her home on Feb. 1, 2008, hit her on the head and knocked her unconscious, then dragged her in the house. She told detectives Gonzalez sexually assaulted her, burned her with matches and committed other violence.
The criminal case against him fell apart after his private investigator found 10 witnesses who were ready to testify that they saw Gonzalez in other locations at the time of the alleged attack...
In January 2009, Ventura County Superior Court Judge Patricia Murphy found Gonzalez "factually innocent" of the alleged crimes. The judge found no "reasonable cause exists" to believe he committed the actions...
Placencio said she was disappointed that the Ventura County District Attorney didn’t prosecute West...
This is about as outrageous and clear a case of perjury as you’re going to find–the falsely accused man faced the possibility of five life sentences in prison, and was jailed without bail for nearly three months. It’s disappointing (but sadly not surprising) that the DA declined to prosecute the false accuser.
Girl Sues UK's Child Support Agency: 'You've Bankrupted My Dad'
Great Britain's Child Support Agency is threatening to jail a father and sell his house to satisfy his child support debt. The only trouble is that the girl who's the subject of the support order lives with him.
So what the CSA wants to do is jail her custodial parent and put her on the street. All of which is in her interest, according to the CSA.
In fact, both father and daughter say that paying the amount will bankrupt him, which would of course severely affect her. And the money would go to her mother with whom she no longer lives. Meanwhile the mother has never paid any child support. So the girl is suing CSA.
It seems that 13-year-old Emma Chapelhow is fed up. Her parents, David Chapelhow and Janette Plummer, divorced at some point, with Emma going to live with Janette. David paid child support, but the CSA, unilaterally and apparently without giving David the opportunity to contest the ruling, decided to radically increase the amount based on "lifestyle being inconsistent with income." In the U.S. we call that 'imputed income.' In other words, the state decides that a parent is hiding income because he/she seems to be living a more lavish lifestyle than the income reported would support.
Maybe the CSA based its decision on Emma's pony, Pringle. Who knows? But however it arrived at its conclusion, at some point it presented David with a bill for 43,000 GBP which he says he can't begin to pay. So he started fighting the ruling, which has further depleted his resources. Currently, he and Emma live in a caravan (travel trailer) so they can rent their house to make ends meet.
And the CSA, which seems dead set on bankrupting Emma's custodial father, hasn't so much as peeped about child support from Janette.
All of that has raised the ire of 13-year-old Emma, who's filed suit against the CSA...
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F & F Action Items--Have You Participated Yet? |
Action Item #1: Campaign to Ask DSM to Include Parental Alienation in Upcoming Edition
A group of 50 mental health experts from 10 countries are part of an effort to add Parental Alienation to the fifth edition of the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM V), the American Psychiatric Association's 'bible" of diagnoses. Fathers & Families wants to ensure that the DSM-V Task Force is aware of the scope and severity of Parental Alienation. To this end, we are asking our members and supporters to write DSM. If you or someone you love has been the victim of Parental Alienation, we want you to tell your story to the DSM-V Task Force. To do so, simply fill in our form by clicking here.
Fathers & Families has already physically mailed over 500 of your letters and stories to the DSM Task Committee, and we have many more to go. To learn more about our campaign, click here.
Action Item #2: F & F Submitting Military Parent Cases to Secretary of Defense for Upcoming Report
Are you a military parent who has had family law problems? Fathers & Families is submitting military parents' cases to the Secretary of Defense—to be included, please fill out this form.
Partly due to the efforts of Fathers & Families' legislative representative Michael Robinson, federal HR 2647 mandates that the Secretary of Defense produce a report on child custody litigation involving members of the Armed Forces, as well as international intrafamilial abductions of servicemembers' children.
The Secretary of Defense will submit its report to the Armed Services Committees of the Senate and the House of Representatives by the end of March. If you are a military mother or father whose custody rights have been adversely affected due to your service, we want to make sure your story is included in the Secretary of Defense's report. To submit your story for inclusion, please click here.
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