As you read this article, you might want to keep in mind all of the PAS deniers (Dallas Morning News, 11/27/09).  They're the ones who say that parents don't try to turn children against the other parent after divorce.  They're the ones who say those parents never succeed in making a child hate the other parent or do the worst possible things to him/her.  (The names in the article have been changed.)

Paul Parks, an attorney and former U.S. Marine, married his college sweetheart, June.   They had three daughters, but separated in 1982 with Paul taking the girls to live with him.  After six years of marriage, they divorced and Paul remarried Kathy.  That lasted only 14 months, and when they broke up, Kathy suggested that June seek custody of the girls and claim sexual abuse by Paul.

That didn't work.  A family court in Dallas found no evidence to support the claim and he and June split custody of the children.  June took them to California and Paul, with his third wife Michelle, followed.  But June renewed the sexual abuse allegations when she filed for sole custody in a California court.  Again, the psychological report to the court cleared Parks and added that the children "may have been coached."

Previously, June had filed criminal charges that, given that two separate family courts had found the abuse claims to be unfounded, seemed to Parks likely to be dismissed.  But Parks and his lawyer hadn't counted on PAS.

Over three years of upheaval in their lives - living first with Parks, then with June, then in foster care and then back with June - the girls' stories about life with father had changed.  In Texas, Dallas County social worker Peggy Nichols had interviewed the girls who were aged six and four at the time.  They denied any inappropriate touching by Parks.  But Nichols and June refused to accept that good news.  They questioned the girls again and again, and by the time the criminal trial in California rolled around, the children took the witness stand and testified to sexual abuse by their father.

He was sentenced to two separate 10-year terms in prison.  He served 2 1/2 years, was paroled and forced to register as a sex offender.  Needless to say, he lost his license to practice law in the process.

That was all 18 years ago.  His two daughters are now adults.  They also now recant their allegations against their father.  When they first contacted him in 2001, they didn't even know he had gone to prison.  Somehow no one had gotten around to telling them that.  June apparently told them that Parks had abandoned them.

But what about their testimony about sexual abuse?

They remembered, but said they did it to please the adults pressing for answers. "Daddy didn't do that," they told Michelle.

Their words rebut the PAS deniers even more than do reams of social science.  They should ring in their ears for all time:

"Somebody had created this story and, over time, we were just coached and coerced to saying a complete lie," Nancy said, according to the court transcript.

Cindy testified that, "After being questioned and asked about it so many times, it's kind of like you feel like just giving in ... They're not gonna listen to me, so I might as well just tell them what they want to hear."

That's what happens when adults use children to destroy other adults.  The children learn what the adults want and comply.  If that means hating daddy and never wanting to see him again, so be it.  If it means telling a judge and jury that daddy touched you here and did this and said that, again, so be it.

Paul Parks is now a free man.  The state has paid him several hundred thousand dollars as compensation for his wrongful conviction and incarceration.  As to his ex-wife June and social worker Peggy Nichols, the article doesn't tell us if they've ever suffered a single consequence for what they did to Paul Parks, or if they ever will. 

This entry was posted on Saturday, November 28th, 2009 at 10:02 am and is filed under Parental Alienation/PAS, False Accusations. You can trackback from your own site.