01 Nelson 02 Michael Jan 03 Ph.D. 04 Psychologist 05 420 1st Avenue South 06 P. O. Box 1535 07 Wisconsin Rapids 08 WI 09 54495 10 715-424-3400 11 715-424-3441 12 Judge James Mason 13 Circuit Court 14 Wood County Branch II 15 unwed 16 01 17 02, Daughter, 6 18 Substantiated child maltreatment (sex abuse) by Father, Wood County Social Services Report 090428 19 DA File 2008WD000380 20 Prosecutor felt he could not succeed, so Wood County Social Services changed report from "substantiated" to "possible" ostensibly to "maintain control" of the case and prevent Father from having unsupervised contact with Daughter, "child in need of protection "CHIPS" 21 Filed Petition for Protection, Mother Admitted and Father No Contest 22 Nelson was court-appointed at the request of Wood County Social Services for the custody case 23 With input from Nelson and continuing litigation, a criminal case transmogrified with therapization into a semi-parental alienation case, with the Mother ultimately put at disadvantage in the civil custody case 24 Summary: Never-married parents separated when child was still a baby. Mother received primary placement; Father was given visitation for 3.5 hours 3 times a week plus weekends, with Saturday overnights. In late December 2007, Daughter returned from a visitation upset and asked to see the doctor, telling her mother that her Father had put on a glove and stuck his finger in her [vagina]. Mother took the child to the ER, where doctor found ambiguous irritation. Social Services and police investigated. Daughter apparently repeated the disclosure to her teacher and later her therapist. Following founded child sex abuse accusations against the Father, the criminal charges later were dropped because (prosecutor's letter), the evidence was insufficient to convict on criminal standard beyond a reasonable doubt. For unclear reasons, Social Services then changed their findings from "substantiated" to "may have happened" and proceeded under a "child in need of protection" rubric, becoming a presence in the parties' civil custody case. Nelson was appointed to perform a custody evaluation. Without evidence to allow a conclusion one way or another, and with limited inconsistent language in his report about being unable to make predictions or determinations of past events, it appears that Nelson's report was the result of confirmatory bias that the allegations likely were the result of the Mother's false beliefs as a result of her having been subjected to sex abuse herself as a child. His report indicates pervasive gender (anti-mother or pro-father) bias or ignorance, and also that he clearly liked the father better as a person, which is unrelated to parenting. Once the criminal charges were dropped, Becky Lee Seigler, M.A., social worker with the Wood County Social Services, apparently took over the case for that agency. She apparently immediately took an oppositional position to the prior positions of Wood County Social Services (who initially substantiated the abuse). Seigler appears to immediately have questioned the veracity of Mother in this case, and advocated on behalf of the Father, intervening to attempt to remove the child's therapist (a psychologist) and wanting "reunification" therapy with the Father even before Nelson's evaluation. She posed the below questions to Nelson as the basis for the custody evaluation, which questions: requested predictions, asked for likelihoods that a crime was committed versus "alienation", included presumptive diagnoses, and inquired about psychological treatments for criminal sexual behavior. The Mother, who initially had had a close friendship and cooperative relationship with Father, even during his courtship and later marriage to another woman, remained convinced that Daughter had been sexually abused, and the Court's response to Nelson's report and the litigation was to forbid Mother from speaking about the subject to Daughter, or allowing anyone else to do so. Supervised visitation was with Father's family members. 1. Does Father display symptoms or behaviors that are characteristic of a sexual perpetrator? If so, how serious or pervasive and how treatable are the symptoms. Furthermore, does he display a likelihood to victimize children other than his own family members and what is the potential for re-victimization? 2. What is Father's ability to be a nurturing parent in particular, with his daughter, Daughter? 3. Could Father benefit from treatment himself? If so, what are your treatment recommendations? 4. What is Mother's ability to be a nurturing parent in particular, with her daughter, Daughter? 5. What is the likelihood that Mother made these allegations or possible suggestions to Daughter that her father victimized her in an attempt to alienate her from her father? Would Mother undermine case planning because she is not supportive of mending the relationship between Father and Daughter? 6. Is Mother that narcissistic that she would place her needs before her child's to "get at" Father? 7. Could Mother benefit from treatment herself? If so, what are your treatment recommendations? 8. What are your recommendations around case planning to help protect Daughter and help the family re-establish a "normal" lifestyle? 9. Which parent do you believe can provide the most healthy and safe home environment for Daughter? QUOTES FROM CUSTODY EVALUATION: "Even when there has been a finding of fact a child has been sexually abused, it cannot be presumed that the child has been traumatized. It is not reasonable to presume that any form of sexual contact between a parent and child would, ipso facto, be experienced by the child as trauma. Certain forms of contact, the most obvious being some form of penetration would be painful and typically would be experienced as traumatic, but licking and other forms of contact might be perceived by young child as pleasurable or as silly rather than horrible. Where no pain or discomfort is involved, what makes various types of sexual contact traumatic is the meaning to the child and emotional significance of the act. When a child is too young to understand what has occurred trauma is not likely to be experienced." "Ongoing assessment and treatment of Mother is indicated. Unfortunately, her belief system appears flawed and will likely be unresponsive to traditional psychotherapy. She may, however, be able to develop partial insight into her tendency to overreact and to misinterpret information. Further, she may benefit from learning that sexual contact need not be traumatic and that treating Daughter as a victim increases her likelihood of taking on the role of victim." "Parent coordination training through which a single therapist knowledgeable in complex custody issues oversees the treatment of Daughter, Mother and Father is indicated. Such therapy would also involve cojoint [sic] post-divorce parent training. The use of a text as Mom's House, Dad's House (Ricci) is also recommended." "Father is emotionally the more stable parent and while he is likely more able to meet Daughter's long-term needs, continued placement with her mother, at least temporarily, is indicated... Should, however, Mother be unable to correct her perceptual inaccuracies and restrain herself from further undermining the father/daughter relationship, a transfer of placement to Father would be indicated, unless the court finds him a perpetrator of sexual abuse... such transfer may in the long run be likely necessitated."