4) My rather bizarre radio interview on His Side with Glenn Sacks with Katherine Baker, who proposes a new crime called "Reckless Sex," under which a "defendant would be guilty of reckless sexual conduct if, in a first sexual encounter with another particular person, the defendant had sexual intercourse without using a condom." To listen, go to Criminalizing 'Reckless Sex'--Safeguard for Women or  New Way to Herd Men Into Jail? (3/6/05).

5) My co-authored column Research Shows False Accusations of Rape Common (Los Angeles Daily Journal, San Francisco Daily Journal, 9/15/04, World Net Daily, 9/18/04)

6) Various enewsletter entries, including here and here.

The Guns of August

This week marks the 92nd anniversary of one of the greatest tragedies in human history--World War I. Some of you may recall that I defended World War I veterans against criticism from feminist Helen Caldicott in my piece Dr. Helen Caldicott Spits on My Grandfather (Cybercast News Service, 3/28/03).

Caldicott is certainly correct that the war was one of the most senseless slaughters in human history, and Lenin was correct that it was an imperialist war. But unlike Caldicott, I believe that men go to war out of a sense of duty and obligation, not bloodlust, as Caldicott maintains. In the column I wrote:

"I have my grandfather's war medals in a small wooden chest, along with two pictures--one of him as a young man in military uniform, and another of him as a grandfather. Also in the box is a poem about the war which he wrote to the woman who would become my grandmother. The poem is simple and about as good as one can expect from an immigrant with an elementary school education and a future as a milkman.

"When the United States entered World War I my grandfather lied about his age so he could join the army, wanting to show his gratitude to the country which had allowed him to escape foreign tyranny. Wounded in the decisive Battle of the Argonne Forest in 1918, he was awarded the Purple Heart and the French Croix de Guerre.

"Last week Dr. Helen Caldicott, renowned feminist and antiwar activist, spat on him.

"In a speech released under the title 'Men: Natural Born Killers' Caldicott told feminist antiwar demonstrators that the male of the human species has unbridled bloodlust, explaining that 'young men rushed off to battle in the first World War. So eager were they to participate in the noble act of killing that they lied about their age.'

"In other words, grandpa didn't enlist out of duty, loyalty or honor, but instead because he wanted the chance to kill.

"Welcome to the world of modern feminism, where everything men do is either privilege or pathology and all events and actions are seen through a sharply focused, anti-male lens."

Read the full column here.

The new cover story Who's Your Daddy? (Metro Silicon Valley, 7/19/06) provides an extended and needed discussion of default paternity judgments. Metro Silicon Valley has a circulation of 200,000 and is one of the largest weekly publications in California. The article has quotes from numerous people involved in the struggle against paternity fraud, including: longtime paternity fraud crusader Carnell Smith; Taron James, the founder of Veterans Fighting Paternity Fraud; Santa Ana family law attorney Linda Ferrer, winner of the Navarro case; myself; and others.

The story centers around the story of "Jim Jones" of Redwood City, who has paid child support for nine years for a child he has never met. According to the article:

"Financial responsibility began when Ethan's mother named Jones as Ethan's father on welfare paperwork. The 1996 Welfare Reform Act requires women to name their child's fathers in order to receive public assistance--a law designed to recoup government welfare costs by garnishing the wages of 'deadbeat dads.'

"Under California law, Jones had six months from the time he learned about Ethan to contest paternity. Unaware of this deadline, and unable to afford an attorney, Jones missed his chance. To this day, Jones does not have any proof that he is Ethan's father...

"Jones' story began 12 years ago in Sacramento when he met a pretty blonde girl named Michelle at a coffee bar. The couple struck up a relationship, hanging out at coffee shops and shopping at the mall. After four months, Jones decided Michelle wasn't the one and ended the relationship.

"Four months later, Jones learned secondhand that Michelle was pregnant--and claiming that he was the father. Jones contacted Michelle, offered to help and began preparing for fatherhood. Several months later the couple had an argument that escalated to the point where Michelle told Jones that the baby was not his. She told him to leave, and he did.

"Two and a half years later, living in Santa Cruz, Jones was visited by a process server bearing a hefty bill--Jones recalls $20,000--for child support in arrears. The bill compelled Jones to begin paying, and ordered his appearance in court to sign or contest the declaration of paternity.

"'I was completely surprised because she told me it wasn't my kid,' said Jones. 'I thought I'd just call Michelle and straighten things out.'

"Jones hunted for Michelle, and did not attend his court hearing--a decision he regrets to this day. By not appearing for his hearing, the court registered Jones, by default judgment, as Ethan's father in the California child support services database. A few months later, Jones' six-month window to contest paternity closed.

"Unaware of the severity of these occurrences, Jones continued to search on his own for Michelle and his alleged son. He called old friends and acquaintances. He took trips to Sacramento to scour old hangouts and neighborhoods where she had lived. At other times, exacerbated and angry, he simply ignored the situation, as it continued to worsen. The government started to garnish wages from his paychecks."

Nice.

The article also discusses AB 252, a paternity fraud law passed by the California legislature in 2004. The article notes:

"[AB 252] is a short-lived law that allows men named as fathers in default judgments two years from the law's enactment to contest paternity via a DNA test."

"...The window for A.B. 252 expires on Jan. 1, 2007...Glenn Sacks...who writes men's rights newspaper columns, says A.B. 252 is better than nothing, but not good enough.

"'The problem is that time is running out,' Sacks said. 'A certain amount of men have been going to court and getting the paternity test and are getting let off the hook. But a lot of guys don't know about this. What should be happening is child enforcement people should be sending notices to everyone saying there is this new law.'

"Child support services don't disseminate this information, say critics, because doing so could mean losing paying fathers, and hence federal funding.

"Indeed, states must name fathers in 90 percent of their child support welfare cases, or risk losing federal money. To comply, states have taken liberally to the use of 'default judgments' when the alleged father cannot be located.

"In Los Angeles County, nearly 80 percent of paternity establishments (in 2000-01) came from default judgments. In California as a whole, a whopping 70 percent were default judgments, according to midyear reports from the California Department of Child Support Services...

"Says Sacks about fathers named in default judgments, 'It might be the right name, it might be the wrong name, it might be someone she thinks is the father but is not sure. Also, it might be Juan Gomez and there are 11,000 Juan Gomezes, and then the correct person is not properly served, and then a default judgment is entered against him for 18 years of child support for a kid he's never met, and in many cases, may not even be his.'"

As an aside, one can see an example of my assertion that there has not been enough outreach on AB 252 from this article, which mentions in passing that "Jones learned of A.B. 252 while being interviewed for this article."

To send a Letter to the Editor about Who's Your Daddy?, click here.

Michael Robinson and the California Alliance for Families and Children worked on AB 252 and also helped prevent the possible depublication of the 2004 Navarro decision. They have done great work on the paternity fraud issue in California.

The Metro Silicon Valley article also discusses the Taron James case, a horrible injustice. In my co-authored column Defrauded Veterans Have Mixed Emotions on Veterans Day (Daily Breeze [Los Angeles], 11/11/03), family law attorney Jeff Leving and I wrote:

"By this point, the six-month window to contest paternity had passed. James could not locate his ex-girlfriend to request a DNA test directly, and the courts offered no alternative recourse. For the next four years, James watched money leak out of his paychecks, while the state intercepted his income taxes. In 1999, with his checks cut almost in half, James declared bankruptcy.

"In 2000, James finally made contact with his ex-girlfriend. 'I approached her friends and family and I said, 'Make me the bad guy; prove me wrong,' James tells about his quest for a DNA test. Finally she acquiesced; the test exonerated James.

"But his battle was far from over. Even armed with this evidence, it took James five years to have a court disestablish paternity. The remedy was bittersweet. 'The judge said I was a clear victim of fraud but he also said that child support services was a victim of fraud too, so they shouldn't have to pay the money back.'"

My view is that since the state helped perpetrate the fraud, probably knowingly in this case, they should be liable for the costs of the fraud.

I've also covered the paternity fraud issue in several articles, including my co-authored Preserving Paternity Fraud (Orange County Register,(10/3/02). To listen to Linda Ferrer and Taron James on His Side with Glenn Sacks, see Appeal Court to LA County: 'We Won't Sully our Hands' Enforcing False Paternity Judgments.

From the Los Angeles Times story It Wasn't the Court Order She Sought
Illegal immigrant seeks order against husband. The judge tells her to get out or be deported (7/20/06):

"A substitute judge hearing the case of an illegal immigrant seeking a restraining order against her husband threatened to turn her over to immigration officials if she didn't leave his courtroom.

"Los Angeles Superior Court Judge Pro Tem Bruce R. Fink told Aurora Gonzalez during last week's hearing that he was going to count to 20 and that if she was still in his courtroom when he finished, he would have her arrested and deported to Mexico.

"In an interview Wednesday, Fink said that the woman had admitted in court that she was in the country illegally and that he didn't want her to get in trouble with immigration officials.

"'We have a federal law that says that this status is not allowed,' Fink said. 'You can't just ignore it. What I really wanted was to not give this woman any problems.'

"He said he thought the couple 'obviously wanted to get back together' and that he was trying to avoid granting a restraining order that would keep them apart for at least a year. He said he also thought the court order might lead to Gonzalez's deportation, because her husband would not be able to continue helping her get legal residency...

"In her initial court petition, Gonzalez alleged that Francisco Salgado, 51, her husband of six years, was 'verbally and emotionally abusive' to her and their two young boys. Gonzalez, who moved into a domestic violence shelter last month, accused Salgado of referring to her with a derogatory term and threatening to call immigration authorities.

"In last Friday's hearing in Pomona, Fink asked Gonzalez if she was in fact an illegal immigrant.

"I'm illegal," she said.

"'I hate the immigration laws that we have,' the judge responded, according to the court transcript, 'but I think the bailiff could take you to the immigration services and send you to Mexico. Is that what you guys want?'

"'Fink then asked Salgado if he wanted his wife deported. Salgado replied he was helping his wife get her legal papers, according to the transcript....At that point, Fink warned Gonzalez to either leave his courtroom or risk arrest.

"'I'm going to count to 20, and if you people have left this courtroom and disappeared, she isn't going to Mexico forthwith,' Fink said, according to the court transcript. 'One. Two. Three. Four. Five. Six. When I get to 20, she gets arrested and goes to Mexico.'

"After Gonzalez left the courtroom, Fink asked Salgado if he wanted to stay, and he said yes.

"Fink then dismissed the case: 'Well, she brought the proceedings, and if she's not here to go forward, I guess all of the requests are denied.'

"On Wednesday, Fink, who has been a family law attorney for 35 years, insisted he was seeking what he thought was an agreeable solution for both parties.

"'What I saw was nothing more than some yelling and screaming between a husband and wife,' he said.

"'I also saw that they really didn't want to not be together anymore.'

"If he had issued the restraining order, Fink said, 'we'd wind up with exactly the opposite of what these people wanted.'

"'The cure could be far worse than the illness,' he said."

Naturally the controversy is over the way the judge treated the woman based on her immigration status. But what interests me about the case is that it's one of the all too rare examples of when a judge actually stands up to a woman who's employing  spurious charges of domestic violence against her husband for personal advantage. In my co-authored column Letterman Case Shows Problems with Restraining Orders (Albuquerque Tribune, 1/17/06) I wrote:

"...it is far too easy to get a restraining order based on a false allegation...in the rush to protect the abused, the rights of the accused are being violated on an arguably unprecedented scale. Many if not most domestic violence restraining orders are simply tactical maneuvers designed to gain advantage in high stakes family law proceedings. The Illinois Bar Journal calls the orders 'part of the gamesmanship of divorce.'

It's interesting too, that women's advocates are now saying--correctly--that Gonzalez would not have been deported because the federal Violence Against Women Act offers a stay of any deportation proceeding for abused women. In a subsequent article here, one immigration attorney noted that the restraining order "could help her on her VAWA case."

This VAWA provision is probably well-intended, but it also serves as a tremendous incentive to make false charges of abuse. For example, an immigrant woman employed these types of charges against Edgar P., one of the hero fathers I've written about.

Philadelphia Daily News Disses Dads

The Philadelphia Daily News disses dads in the Jail Threat Springs $$ (7/20/06):

"In shabby clothes and a hangdog expression, the man reeled off a list of reasons why he had failed to pay almost $16,000 he owed in child support.

"But Ivanoski, a diminutive, silver-haired Common Pleas senior judge with deceptively friendly looks, wanted to hear no more.

"'You're just giving me a song and a dance,' he barked. 'You had the ability to pay when you should have and could have. There's willful, civil contempt here.'

"Two months in prison, Ivanoski sternly decreed. A uniformed deputy slapped handcuffs on the flabbergasted father.

"With a pleased nod, prosecutor Maria McLaughlin stood, left the courtroom and chalked up another victory for Philadelphia Family Court and the Child Support Enforcement Unit, a branch of District Attorney Lynne Abraham's office that McLaughlin supervises.

"'Incarceration absolutely helps us get the money,' said McLaughlin, an assistant district attorney for 14 years and mother of two. 'Otherwise these defendants don't take you seriously. They come down here with the expectation: 'Oh, I'll never go to jail for child-support violations.' Then they find themselves in our holding cells'...

"'Ninety-nine times out of 100, the dads romp around with a woman, she gets pregnant, and that's the last she sees of him. It's the 'free-ride club,' Abraham said. 'Since we don't have the ability to make a father love his children, we at least have the legal authority to make them support their unloved, unwanted children. It's a shame we have to order people to do that.'

"Defendants claiming they can't afford to pay could find their finances shrinking anyway...

"'There are so many innovative ways to collect money,' McLaughlin said.

"Those who ignore orders to come to court are hauled before a judge on an arrest warrant to explain their noncompliance.

"An unswayed judge can toss the offender in prison for up to six months per case.

"But McLaughlin emphasizes that she's not out to fill the jails.

"'All of our defendants hold the key to the jailhouse door,' she said, explaining that judges give every jail-bound deadbeat a 'purge factor'--typically a fraction of the arrears they can pay to walk free from prison. For example, Ivanoski set a purge factor of $1,200 for the deadbeat dad who owed $16,000 to avoid his two-month sentence.

"Even with the threat of jail, Philadelphia is full of child-support violators. Family Court has 121,937 active cases of deadbeat parents, representing $576 million in arrears, McLaughlin said...

"More than half of the defendants sentenced to prison never reach the jail because they 'miraculously' come up with the money' for the purge factor, McLaughlin said."

I'm sure that at times McLaughlin does deal with some irresponsible men, but her description of some of these cases--including the Ivanoski case--seems a little suspicious to me. The guy would rather spend two months in jail than come up with a lousy $1,200? He's either dead broke or he has a strange set of priorities. I suspect it's the former.

Though not as extreme, the Ivanoski case reminds me a little of the Francis Borgia case. In a radio commentary on His Side with Glenn Sacks on the Borgia case I said:

"Here's another story about those evil deadbeat dads from the Chicago Tribune--'Man sneaks razor blade into court, slashes self'

"An Illinois man carried a razor blade through metal detectors and slit his throat after being sentenced to two years in prison for failing to pay child support.

"Francis Borgia, 38, of Metropolis, Ill., was treated at a hospital and then taken to the McCracken County Regional Jail on Thursday.

"Borgia had been sentenced for not paying $7,000 in child support. (Two years in prison for $7,000?)

"'Don't put me in jail; I'm going to kill myself,' Borgia pleaded as he leaned forward and reached into his pocket.

"McCracken County Administrator Steve Doolittle said security at the courthouse will be reviewed to see if another such incident can be avoided.

"Security at the courthouse will be reviewed to see if another such incident can be avoided? Why don't you review this judge and his decisions to see if another such incident can be avoided? Why don't you review the state's laws and family court policies to see if another such incident can be avoided?

"The man is either mentally ill or he doesn't have the money. If he's willing to slit his own throat to avoid jail don't you think if he had the money he'd pay it? Don't you think he'd crack open the moneybags, and hand over the Krugerrands and sell the Porsche and the Beemer? This man is so afraid of jail he'd commit suicide rather than go, and he's going to jail because he can't pay a lousy $7,000. Isn't this evidence that he never had the money to begin with?"

To listen to my commentary, click on Deadbeat Dad or Deadbroke Dad?

I also discussed the Borgia case in my co-authored column Persecuting Low Income Parents (Cincinnati Post, Kentucky Post, 8/26/05). Family law attorney Jeff Leving and I wrote:

"In one McCracken County, Kentucky case, Francis Borgia, a carpet cleaner in Paducah, slit his throat in the courtroom after being sentenced to two years in jail for being $7,000 behind on child support. According to newspaper accounts, Borgia had become a 'deadbeat' after he lost a good paying job working in a casino and could not get a downward modification on his support...Borgia, who survived his courtroom suicide attempt, noted:

"My only 'crime' was my failure to make as much money as the state demanded...I couldn't quite understand why I was treated so harshly. I'm not a deadbeat dad. I'm a broke dad."

To read a letter from Borgia, click on "Child Support Injustice: Francis Borgia Speaks"

As for McLaughlin's comment that "More than half of the defendants sentenced to prison never reach the jail because they 'miraculously' come up with the money," what she can't or won't see is that usually this is not the child support debtor's money. It's grandma's money, it's mom and dad's retirement money, it's the brother's money. The man isn't digging up a fortune in gold coins from his backyard to pay--his parents, friends and relatives are paying the money for him so he doesn't go to jail. I often hear from elderly men and women who tell me they've lost their retirement money in their son's divorces, sometimes because of their child support situations.

Our Side Takes an Unfair Swipe at Custodial Mothers

DiFillippo does make some effort to balance out her story with comments from a fathers' rights activist. The quotes do not represent our side particularly well:

"To some men's-rights activists, mothers are a sneaky lot, using the children to siphon away their exes' hard-earned dough and then forgetting the offspring the minute they cash the check.

"'There is no accountability for how the money is used. They [mothers] use it on hairdressers, fingernails, the new boyfriend,' said Philip Lutz, a Center City father of one who heads Philadelphia's chapter of Fathers' and Children's Equality, which lobbies for equal custody and offers support groups for noncustodial parents."

This is a poor argument. Most divorced or separated mothers aren't wasting child support on luxuries. They have a right to enjoy life, and shouldn't have to account to their ex-husbands or anybody else for every dime they spend. There certainly are exceptions, of course, when the mothers really are wasting the money and the children's needs are not being met. In such cases courts can and should intervene. But the average divorced mother getting $1,000 a month in child support is not living high on the hog any more than the average divorced dad is living it up with his Porsche and trophy wife.

DiFillippo doesn't attribute her paraphrase about mothers "forgetting the offspring the minute they cash the check" but this is also ill-advised. Are we supposed to believe that custodial mothers don't love their children, only dads do?

I don't necessarily blame Lutz--he may not have been quoted particularly well, or DiFillippo might be portraying minor points made by Lutz instead of the major ones. It's happened to me with reporters many times. (For one example, click here).

Matt Dubay's 'Roe v. Wade for Men' Suit Dismissed

In my co-authored column Women Have a Choice--Men Should Too (Saginaw News, 4/2/06) I defended Matt Dubay's "Roe v. Wade for Men" lawsuit. Family law attorney Jeff Leving and I wrote:

"A 25-year-old computer programmer has done what has long been thought impossible--he has united the pro-choice feminist left and the pro-life right. Matt Dubay of Saginaw, Michigan is the plaintiff in a new lawsuit in which he seeks to wipe out the child support payments he is obligated to make to an ex-girlfriend. He says he had made it clear to her that he didn't want to be a father at this time, and that she got pregnant after she had repeatedly assured him that a physical condition rendered her sterile.

"National Organization for Women president Kim Gandy, conservative TV host Bill O'Reilly and numerous commentators from all sides have criticized Dubay's 'Roe v. Wade for Men' lawsuit. Yet when commentators make the arguments against choice for men--'if a man doesn't want to father a child he should have used birth control,' 'men need to take responsibility whether they wanted to have the child or not'--one can often detect a little confusion in their eyes, as if a part of them is whispering 'uh, wait a minute, but couldn't you say the same thing about women?'

Last week the United States District Court, Eastern District of Michigan, dismissed Dubay's suit, calling it "frivolous, unreasonable, and without foundation and seeks to advance a theory that is foreign to the legal principles on which it is ostensibly based." To learn more, click here.

I don't consider Dubay's conduct particularly admirable, and he ain't father of the year; however, he does have a good point. And it is also appropriate to question the conduct of his child's mother, Lauren Wells. Everyone is angry at Dubay for not wanting to pay child support, but why is it that nobody chastises Wells for bringing a child into such an unenviable situation?

The Real Solution for Choice for Men--the Male Birth Control Pill

Like most people, I didn't expect Dubay's suit to go anywhere. The lawsuit was essentially a publicity stunt, and a good one. As I've noted before, the real solution for Choice for Men is the Male Birth Control Pill. I discussed the issue last year in my column Do Women Really Want a Male Birth Control Pill? (Newsday, 4/11/05).

Mike Cox Rejoices Over Dubay's Defeat

Michigan Attorney General Mike Cox, who has clashed with fatherhood advocates on several occasions over the past few years, predictably rejoiced over Dubay's defeat. In his press release Cox Announces Victory for Michigan's Children in "Roe v Wade for Men" Case  he said:

"This is an important victory for the children of this state. Both parents have a clear responsibility for the support of their child, no matter the circumstances surrounding conception. The Court upheld that time-honored understanding today. Michigan will not become the state where parents can opt out of personal responsibility."

In early 2004 Cox launched a billboard campaign which featured a large pair of handcuffs, and boasted of jail time for fathers struggling with child support obligations. We did two His Side with Glenn Sacks shows on it--to listen, go to Michigan Fathers Under Siege (3/7/04) and Showdown in Motown: Michigan Dads vs. Leader of ACES (4/18/04).

That fall Cox announced an even more misguided and asinine billboard campaign--a contest wherein children would draw billboard designs critical of noncustodial fathers who have allegedly not paid child support. Fox News quoted me on the subject as follows:

"Custodial mothers are encouraged to coach their children to make designs critical of noncustodial parents behind on child support. And it doesn't take much imagination to figure out which noncustodial father many mothers will be encouraging their children to denounce."

I and others launched a Campaign to Help Michigan Activists Defeat Anti-Father Billboard Contest, and the Michigan activists did an excellent job protesting Cox's campaign. Cox pulled the contest in response to the protests. To listen to my radio call to action on the issue, click here To read it, click here.

I did two His Side with Glenn Sacks shows on the issue--see Michigan's Top Cop Tells Kids: Denounce Your Daddy (10/3/04) and Fathers Targeted by Cox Speak Out (10/10/04).

PBS broadcast the anti-father documentary Breaking the Silence: Children's Stories on many of its affiliates last October. The film accused family courts of anti-mother bias, attacked Parental Alienation Syndrome, and portrayed divorced dads seeking shared custody as batterers and child molesters aiming to steal children from their mothers. The film was extremely one-sided, and presented a harmful and inaccurate view of divorce and child custody cases.