John Bischof
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Dan and Robbin Sacharoff
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Rick Alton
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Adam Hamilton
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ramona messina
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Mike Marcucci
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Gary Jacobs
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Elizabeth Hanna
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Elizabeth Eberle
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Uta Büchner
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Henry Young
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Suresh Kannan
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Matthew Tagley
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Frank Ngo
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Jane Gallagher
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Ken Lewis
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Caron Warren
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William Bernet
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Les Linet
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Phillip Hendrix
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David Moniz
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Melissa Winborn
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Michael Sherber
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Lynn Steinberg 👈
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“ Dr. Lynn Steinberg and Other Family Advocates Celebrate the Defeat of SB616
NEWS PROVIDED BY
Lynn Steinberg
Sep 07, 2022, 23:42 ET
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LOS ANGELES, Sept. 7, 2022 /PRNewswire/ — With the end of the 2021-22 California legislative session, family advocates across the state are celebrating Sen. Susan Rubio's decision to pull SB616 from the docket. SB616, known as Piqui's Law, would have barred courts from referring families in crisis to proven psychotherapy treatments 🤔 that reconnect children and parents who have been alienated, usually during a contentious custody case. It also would have set onerous training requirements for judges and other court professionals.
“SB616 would have legislated the concept of parental alienation out of California jurisprudence and permanently separated thousands of children from a loving parent,” according to Dr. Lynn Steinberg, a family therapist based in Los Angeles.
Parental alienation is when one parent emotionally manipulates a child to speak out against the other parent, often making unfounded accusations of abuse. It is a form of child abuse that can have life-long negative effects.
Steinberg worked with attorney Virginia Griffin Donnell and other team members to spearhead the effort to fight the bill as currently written. They reached out to thousands of family advocates, many of whom are victims of parental alienation, and encouraged them to contact legislators. In response, hundreds of emails and phone calls were made urging elected officials to either amend the bill or, failing that, vote against it.
At a hearing of the California State Senate Judiciary Committee on August 24, Griffin Donnell and others testified against the bill. They were joined in opposition by the Judicial Council, the organization that oversees the California court system. They vehemently opposed the excessive training requirements. The day after the hearing, Rubio announced that she was pulling the bill.
According to Sen. Rubio (D-Baldwin Park), SB616 was introduced “because children continue to be murdered at the hands of an abusive parent during custody disputes.” Dr. Steinberg notes that the provisions in the bill do nothing to protect children.
“To protect children from violence we need the tools to predict future violence,” Steinberg notes. “We must work with psychologists familiar with parental alienation to develop metrics that enable us to best understand the potential threats to a child. In most cases, it is the alienating parent – the one manipulating the child – who is the risk for violence.”
Sen. Rubio is almost certain to introduce a revised version of Piqui's Law in the next legislative session. Steinberg, Griffin Donnell, and other family advocates expect to have a seat at the table to ensure that their concerns are addressed.
“In 2020, we worked with Sen. Rubio's office on SB1141, which added 'coercive control' to California state law.” This is when an abuser isolates a victim from family and friends and deprives them of basic necessities to control their behavior and emotions. “We have a track record of working with Sen. Rubio in the past and we look forward to working with her again in the future,” states Steinberg.
For more information, contact Dr. Lynn Steinberg;
(323) 449-2203;
[email protected]; lynnsteinberg.com or Attorney Virginia Griffin Donnell at
https://griffindonnell.com/.SOURCE Lynn Steinberg”
https://www… prnewswire.com/news-releases/dr-lynn-steinberg-and-other-family-advocates-celebrate-the-defeat-of-sb616-301619952.html
“CA Senator Susan Rubio’s Statement on Piqui’s Law
August 25, 2022
SACRAMENTO, CA – California Senator Susan Rubio (D-Baldwin Park) today released a statement on holding her family court reform bill, Senate Bill 616, Piqui’s Law: Keeping Children Safe From Family Violence:
“I introduced Piqui’s Law because children continue to be murdered at the hands of an abusive parent during custody disputes. Piqui was among those innocent children and one of the reasons behind our national movement to reform the judicial system. Judges and court employees are best positioned to help avoid this loss of life. It is unfortunate that the Judicial Council’s resistance stifled our ability to include stronger protections for victims. 👈 👆
“Despite strong efforts by my colleague, Senator Tom Umberg, Chair of the Senate Judiciary Committee, Piqui’s Law did not achieve our goals. Advocates and I agreed that it was too important to get this law right and decided to continue to work on it. I want to thank Senate President Pro Tempore Toni Atkins, Senate Leadership, and the Governor’s staff for all their support and commitment to me, Piqui’s mother, Ana Estevez, the Center for Judicial Excellence, and stakeholders to craft legislation that makes California a leader in judicial reform.”
https://sd22.senate.ca.gov/news/2022-08-25-ca-senator-susan-rubios-statement-piquis-law“State Lawmakers Consider Bill Banning Controversial Reunification Therapy and Camps
The Davis Vanguard
Posted by Robert J Hansen April 07, 2023
👉 A bill known as Piqui’s Law would prohibit court-ordered family reunification therapy or “camps” as part of a child custody or visitation rights proceeding, that is predicated on cutting off a child from a parent with whom the child is attached, is moving through the legislature.
Authored by Senator Susan Rubio, the intent of SB 331 is to increase the priority given to child custody court proceedings affecting the custody and care of children, excluding child protective, abuse, or neglect proceedings and juvenile justice proceedings.
Scientifically unproven, reunification therapy is a controversial method in which children are removed from their preferred parent or safe parent, often used as a tactic to deflect allegations of abuse or mistreatment directed towards the other parent and cost tens of thousands of dollars.
Abusive parents will often lodge “parental alienation” or “alienation” claims against a safe parent as a legal strategy to cast doubt on their credibility and valid claims of abuse are labeled as “alienation” by the abusive parent.
Once a court finds a claim of “alienation,” the children are removed from their safe parent and forced to reunite with their alleged abusive parent via a reunification camp …
… Children subjected to these abusive programs report being denied food, being assaulted, being drugged, being shamed, and having no privacy as transport agents follow them into bathroom stalls, according to the Center for Judicial Excellence (CJE).
Ally Toyos was 16, she and her younger sister were taken from their mother and flown to Montana where they were subjected to reunification therapy in a hotel for four days by the organization, Family Bridges.
“My sister and I were kidnapped from a courthouse in Johnson County Kansas and transported to a remote city in Montana,” Cable said.
Toyos, Youth Initiative Founder for the CJE, said she and her sister were “held captive” in a hotel and threatened into a relationship with their abusive father through Family Bridges.
The Second Appellate District Court reversed an order, in favor of the mother, that would have sent two children to Family Bridge’s 90-day reunification program last January. …”
“Reunification Camp Survivors Expose For-Profit Industry’s Relationship with Family Courts
November 29, 2022
by Robert J. Hansen
“… Family Bridges claims to be a structured, four-day education experience to help “alienated children” and a rejected parent begin restoring a positive relationship in a relaxed setting.
In the four-day workshop … ‘We were coerced into saying that our safe parent, our mom, had brainwashed us into believing that we were abused,’ Cable said …
… These scientifically unproven “reunification” programs which cost tens of thousands of dollars address the debunked condition “parental alienation,” created by psychiatrist Richard Gardner in 1985.
Before committing suicide, Gardner was a part-time clinical professor of child psychiatry at the College of Physicians and Surgeons at Columbia University …
… His “parental alienation” concept is not recognized by the American Psychiatric Association (APA), the World Health Organization (WHO) or the American Medical Association.
That has not deterred a growing number of individuals who have repackaged Garner’s original concept of “parental alienation syndrome” to simply “parental alienation” or, “alienation” looking to benefit from the financial opportunities it has created within the family court system.
👇
Dr. Lynn Steinberg is one such individual who offers a four-day workshop similar to Family Bridges’ and recently played a pivotal role in the removal of Maya and Sebastian Laing from their grandmother’s Santa Cruz home.
What happened to the Laing children sparked the County of Santa Cruz to reevaluate and look into regulating private youth transport companies that are hired to remove children from their homes …”
https://www.davisvanguard.org/2022/11/reunification-camp-survivors-expose-for-profit-industrys-relationship-with-family-courts/
