Photo by Kat J on Unsplash
A landmark bill (A2375B) which creates new standards for those working in a profession that often holds significant influence in the outcomes of custody and visitation hearings has been passed in New York State Assembly, as confirmed by Assemblyman Jeffrey Dinowitz (A.D. 81) on Friday, June 11.
The legislation adds new requirements for child custody forensic evaluators. Under the bill, such evaluators must be New York State-licensed psychologists, social workers, or psychiatrists who have undergone biennial domestic violence-related training. The legislation also tasks the Office for the Prevention of Domestic Violence to work with the New York State Coalition Against Domestic Violence to develop this new training program. Currently, standards for child custody forensic evaluators vary by county in New York State.
The legislation was accelerated by the tragic death of Kyra Franchetti and other young children who have been murdered by a parent who had been granted custody or visitation, despite known histories of violence and abuse.
In the context of the bill’s passage in the Assembly, Dinowitz said the death of any child is a tragedy, but is especially tragic when the death could have been prevented by a better qualified assessment of the child’s safety in a custody proceeding. “I am proud to have crafted this legislation, which reflects a consensus among child safety advocates and family court reformers, and I urge my colleagues in the State Senate to pass this bill as soon as possible,” he said.
The Center for Judicial Excellence, which is a child advocacy nonprofit organization that promotes judicial accountability and child safety, found that more than 700 children nationwide have been killed since 2008 by a parent or parental figure during circumstances involving divorce, separation, custody, visitation, or child support. The organization also found that at least 98 children in 40 states have been killed by a parent or parental figure, after a family court allowed unsupervised contact with a child despite knowledge of a violent history, mental illness, or risk of harming a child.
The legislation was crafted with input from a variety of stakeholders, and reflects principles contained in the 2018 congressional resolution (H.Con.Res.72) which urged state courts to make child safety the first priority of court decisions involving custody and parenting. The bill’s passage also coincides with the launch of a “Blue Ribbon Commission” created by Gov. Andrew Cuomo, following its proposed in his 2021 State of the State address and Women’s Agenda.
The bill passed unanimously in the Assembly. It has not yet passed in the State Senate. The legislation session has now concluded for the summer recess.
Meanwhile, Jacqueline Franchetti, mother of Kyra and founder of Kyra’s Champions, a nonproft which focuses on legislative initiatives on the federal and state levels to ensure children and their safety are the top priorities in family court systems, said she was incredibly thankful to Dinowitz for the unwavering commitment and dedication to the forensic evaluator training bill.
Kyra was killed when she was two years old in a murder-suicide incident by her abusive father during a child custody case in Nassau county. “There was a forensic evaluator in Kyra’s case who failed,” she said. “Child custody cases are life and death situations, and we need evaluators to fully understand the dynamics of family violence, child abuse and trauma. Our children’s lives depend on this.”
Norwood News previously published an op-ed by Renée Barrett on child abuse, some of its causes, which are sometimes linked to parents being under undue economic and other pressures, and ways to help improve situations in which children are at risk. Barrett holds Master’s degrees in childhood education and urban administration.
admin
Welcome to the Norwood News, a bi-weekly community newspaper that primarily serves the northwest Bronx communities of Norwood, Bedford Park, Fordham and University Heights. Through our Breaking Bronx blog, we focus on news and information for those neighborhoods, but aim to cover as much Bronx-related news as possible. Founded in 1988 by Mosholu Preservation Corporation, a not-for-profit affiliate of Montefiore Medical Center, the Norwood News began as a monthly and grew to a bi-weekly in 1994. In September 2003 the paper expanded to cover University Heights and now covers all the neighborhoods of Community District 7. The Norwood News exists to foster communication among citizens and organizations and to be a tool for neighborhood development efforts. The Norwood News runs the Bronx Youth Journalism Heard, a journalism training program for Bronx high school students. As you navigate this website, please let us know if you discover any glitches or if you have any suggestions. We’d love to hear from you. You can send e-mails to norwoodnews@norwoodnews.org or call us anytime (718) 324-4998.
English
Arabic
Bengali
Chinese (Simplified)
French
Spanish
“It has been said that if child abuse and neglect were to disappear today, the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual would shrink to the size of a pamphlet in two generations, and the prisons would empty. Or, as Bernie Siegel, MD, puts it, quite simply, after half a century of practicing medicine, ‘I have become convinced that our number-one public health problem is our childhood’.” (Childhood Disrupted, pg.228).
___
I strongly feel that the wellbeing of all children — and not just what other parents’ children might/will cost us as future criminals or costly cases of government care, etcetera — should be important to us all, regardless of whether we’re doing a great job with our own developing children. A psychologically and emotionally sound, as well as a physically healthy, future should be every child’s foremost right, especially considering the very troubled world into which they never asked to enter.
Trauma from unchecked toxic abuse, sexual or otherwise, usually results in the helpless child’s brain improperly developing. If allowed to continue for a prolonged period, it acts as his/her starting point into an adolescence and (in particular) an adulthood in which its brain uncontrollably releases potentially damaging levels of inflammatory stress hormones and chemicals, even in non-stressful daily routines. It can make every day an emotional and/or psychological ordeal, unless the mental turmoil is doused with some form of lead-ball-and-chain addiction self-medicating.