Chapter 8: Thanksgiving...Weekend of Infamy

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Thanksgiving 2000 was the beginning to my direct experience and enlightenment of how vicious an ex-spouse can be, and how incompetent, prejudice, and gender-biased the family judicial system is in Indiana. The State of Indiana is not alone as all 50 states and local judiciaries are similarly guilty for not following laws and guidelines in family court. Activist judges are nothing new.

My boys, at the time 14 and 12 years old went to visit their mother for Thanksgiving holiday. They traveled 145 miles. Mom was remarried to an attorney, 10 years her junior. The "happy couple" dated each other several years before visiting Las Vegas to take their nuptials. Nothing significant was going on within my house that would have alerted me this visit would have lasting and severe consequences. I had sole custody from 1994 through Monday, November 27, 2000.

The Wednesday before Thanksgiving my eldest called to wish me a Happy Thanksgiving and noted he would call the next day. I never heard from him. Little did I know at the time but his "stepfather" had discussed not returning my boys with the magistrate assigned to our cause number/divorce file. No petition was ever filed yet they claimed orally an "emergency" existed. The divorce file was always an open issue as my ex-wife had access to "free" legal service, so from the time she voluntarily signed over custody to me her "attorney" took sport in harassing me with frequent petitions, only to cancel or withdraw at the last moment. With six years of periodic judicial harassment, no judge, magistrate or attorney saw fit to complain about the ethical impairment, which existed between client and attorney, visa-vie, a personal relationship with client and attorney.

As Thanksgiving 2000 passed, the weekend ensued and no word from my boys. I decided to remain patient and worked at home to keep my mind busy. Sunday night, the sun began to set and my boys had not yet returned. At 7:30 p.m. EST I called my ex-wife's phone number. No answer. I tried again 15 minutes later and her husband/attorney answered. I asked why my boys had not returned yet and he said, "I suggest you contact your attorney." I told him to let me talk to my boys and he hung up the phone.

I phoned the local police (my ex's home town) and they told me to provide them with a copy of my court ordered custody papers and they would remove the boys and return them to me, no questions asked. That evening I spent hours looking for the "missing" paperwork. I have very organized files and all court documents are carefully placed in descending order. No custody order existed in that file!

I left in the early morning hours Monday for the 145-mile drive to the county seat for a copy of the custody order so I could provide the police with a copy. While standing at the counter in the clerk's office the young lady assisting handed me the telephone; it was the magistrate currently assigned to the cause number. He told me to drive to a court building in another location of the county (about 15 miles) and he would have an "emergency" hearing concerning the custody of my boys. He would personally contact the other party. Was this all a coincidence?

Several hours later everyone appeared before a magistrate who admittedly had no family law experience and began floundering with a very sensitive issue. He began treating me disrespectfully and catered to the husband/stepfather/attorney. Welcome to the club! After several hours of discussion and many recesses, so the magistrate could re-group, I was escorted to my car by two bailiffs, without my boys and a new hearing set for December 5th. A Guardian Ad Litem (attorney for the boys) was to be assigned. Before departing the court I was ordered to anger management classes. When I asked why, the magistrate told me I was being combative and needed anger management. In fact, I said very little during this hearing as I new my rights were being violated. (More on this in a subsequent blog)

Ex Parte Proceedings [Code of Conduct, Indiana Rule 14]

Ordinarily, an advocate has the limited responsibility of presenting one side of the matters that a tribunal should consider in reaching a decision; the conflicting position is expected to be presented by the opposing party. However, in any ex parte proceeding, such as an application for a temporary restraining order, there is no balance of presentation by opposing advocates. The object of an ex parte proceeding is nevertheless to yield a substantially just result. The judge has an affirmative responsibility to accord the absent party just consideration. The lawyer for the represented party has the correlative duty to make disclosures of material facts known to the lawyer and that the lawyer reasonably believes are necessary to an informed decision.

Recap: I was ordered to the hearing mentioned above, discovered I no longer had counsel and no petition regarding this hearing was ever filed. No disclosures were made, the magistrate did not allow me just consideration, as I was not offered legal representation. In effect, this was a hearing to cover a kidnapping by an ex-spouse, her husband and in effect, her attorney.

The magistrate in this case was formerly married with children, by his own admission in court. He also offered that he spent twenty (20) years in a leadership capacity with the Boy Scouts of America. The magistrate thought discussing himself was important for some reason. I later found out through multiple sources in the legal community, this gentleman was openly gay. Further, this magistrate is a successful criminal attorney, served in criminal cases on the bench, and had no experience in family law, by his own admission. It came to light he was seeking advice from another judge, a female, on family law matters.

The magistrate was subsequently removed from the bench, some time after he was discarded from our case via a petition by opposing counsel. On a recent Google search I discovered the former magistrate was the outgoing county bar association president. Removed from the bench, then later elected as bar association president.

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