FAMILY LAW CONSULTANT
ABOUT ME
Welcome! My name is Joe Goldberg and I am the Founder and Principal of Goldberg & Associates.
We provide consulting services to family law attorney's and clients litigating issues that pertain to Parental Alienation and Parental Alienation Syndrome.
After more than 20 years of psychological research on the topic of parental alienation including hundreds of studies, peer review articles, case histories and ongoing research, it is now widely believed by most mental health professionals that parental alienation is a serious form of psychological abuse against a child Parental Alienation Syndrome is also being considered for inclusion in the next publication of the DSM, a file for PAS has already been opened.
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 Listen to Joseph Goldberg's Radio Interview on February 17, 2009 by clicking the play button below.
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In the majority of states Family Law Judges instruct both parents during the Final Dissolution of The Marriage to never speak badly about the other parent (in front of the child) or do anything to poison
the child's affections for the other parent.
Even if a Judge never uses the words " parental alienation " its well understood exactly what the Judge means to convey.
Before I begin to tell you about my own story and experience with P.A.S. I want to point out that there are a number of mental health professionals ( and some political organizations ) that simply refuse to support the converging scientific evidence of P.A.S Many of these dissenting opinions originate from mental health professionals who are practicing outside their area of expertise. Sadly these MHP's are distorting the judicial and public understanding of Parental Alienation.
Dr. Richard Gardner identified P.A.S and wrote that mother's and father's both suffered in equal numbers as "hated parents." He often wrote how P.A.S could not be considered valid when real abuse was involved in the child's relationship with the non-aligned parent.
Conversely, a parent inducing P.A.S. will stage false allegations of abuse against the non-aligned parent in an effort to deflect attention away fromtheir abuse of the child and to further frustrate visitation.
What isn't understood is how quickly P.A.S. can develop in the context of a divorce and how heart wrenching and difficult it is to prove to the court that a child is being abused with parental alienation.
A targeted parent is challenged with every imaginable road block to maintain a relationship with their child. They go through a myriad of obstacles, let me list just a few of the most common strategies used by alienating parents to frustrate targeted parents - obstruction in obtaining the child's medical and educational records, failure to be informed about the child's social activities, false allegations of child abuse,
failing to provide information about the child's medical health, plots to schedule activities during their visitation time, lies to the child that the non-favored parent has abandoned them, financial blackmail, disseminating distortions of fact to other family members and friends denigrating the targeted parent, taking the child to mental health professionals without the other parents informed consent, cutting off the child from having contact with the non-favored parents family members taking the child to an unethical mental health professional that coaches the
child to give false testimony, telling a child to listen to the advise of an unethical family law lawyer, staging events to have the non-aligned parent investigated for sexual abuse, putting the child on psychotropic medication.
A targeted parent is trapped in the position of watching their child go through various stages of emotional abuse. They are fully aware, of efforts by the alienating parent to induce fear in the child that they are somehow "dangerous" or "unsafe to be around."
Since a targeted parent has little or no access to the child, they are helpless in combating the way a child becomes overly empowered. The targeted parent has to fight to block an alienating parent and a Judge from placing their children in positions to testify in court because this only compounds the child's psychological harm, sadly many family law lawyers assisting targeted parents do not understand this very important fact. Many times an alienating parent hires an unethical mental health professional or an unethical family law lawyer that coaches the alienating parent and in some cases the child on what to say to a Judge.
I won't even begin to go into all the machinations of a lawyer to keep the case wrapped up in the legal system for years. What is sad, is the fact that the family law Judge is like Nero who fiddles while Rome is burning.
Most of the time the targeted parent reaches a point where they just give up or they run out of money trying to get the court to intervene, some lapse into emotional distress over the loss of being without their child. Many go bankrupt over the expense of the litigation. People often wonder why do targeted parents put themselves through all of this misery for a relationship with an alienated child, a child that just wants to reject them ?
A "targeted parent" needs intervention from a Judge to put an end to the child's psychological abuse. The targeted parent wants to help explain the child's behavior in a context that validates the way the child was exposed to parental alienation. Most of all this parent that loves the child cannot abandon them when their parenting support is needed at the most crucial time. These parents have a close bond with the child even though that bond has been or is being destroyed by the alienating parent and they know that they need help from a Judge to get a Court Order so that the child can get the psychological services needed for treatment.
MY EXPERIENCE WITH P.A.S.
My case started in 2003 and ended with over 410 docket entries by 2006. I fought one of the most brutal case of parental alienation in Palm Beach County history. In the end, I validated that my former wife was
a child abusing parental alienator.
The Judge constantly referred to her as an alienating parent, he warned her to change her behaviour for the sake of the children and that if she didn't it would lead them into a future of pain and suffering. He was a trial Judge that had many years of experience on the bench in the Family Law Courts. He was a Judge that reviewed my case from the begining to the end. He based his ruling in part on the opinion of a Court Appointed Psychological Evaluator.
My former wife treated my younger daughter so badly and made her so psychologically ill, that to hide her abuse she enrolled her in a Hospital Homebound Schooling Program. She did this to block my access to seeing her and to isolate her from her friends.
In order for the school to accept the child into this program, my former wife had to present a medical record that stated the child had come down with a psychiatric mental illness, My former wife went to
our pediatrician in Boca Raton, whose name is Dr. Jerry Wexler, and she got him to sign a Schoolboard Hospital Homebound Application stating that he was a Psychiatrist treating her with medications. In other
words, Dr. Jerry Wexler, a pediatrican, lied to assist my former wife, filed a false medical record with the child's school and aided and abeited a child abusing parent. He also told the truth of his wrongdoing at the trial and admitted to these facts.
I was never informed by my former wife that my youngest child was to ill to go to school, nor that she was going to be forced by her mother to take all her school classes at home, I found out about this by coincidence, when I contacted the school a day before a school hearing to enroll her in the program. I showed up at the meeting unannounced to try and find out what was going on.
On the day of the school board meeting, I showed up and was asked to sit and wait while the meeting was already in progress. After waiting for about 20 minutes on pins and needles, a school official came out to greet me. She escorted me into a private office to inform me that I was not a welcomed visitor.
She proceeded to tell me that my former wife and my daughter had " a fit " when they were told I wanted to be a part of the meeting. The school officials could not understand my desire to be involved in what was taking place. They tried their best to send me on my way, telling me that my daughter was hysterical at the thought of seeing me and that everyone was in favor of me leaving immediately.
I looked at the school official and said " If I'm not going to be allowed to attend the meeting I insist the meeting be rescheduled, and if I'm not invited into the meeting, the school would be hearing from my attorney. " With that she got up and walked into the conference room to explain my position to the Principal, the assistant Principal and Hospital Homebound School officials. Ten minutes later I was led into a conference room and took a seat.
Although my daughter cried hysterically when I walked into the room, she did eventually calm down. The first thing I asked to see, was the form that my former wife had filled out to get my daughter enrolled.
I looked at the documentation and read that in order to enroll a child for psychiatric reasons, the doctor had to be a PSYCHIATRIST. It couldn't be a psychologist, it HAD TO BE a psychiatrist.
I knew instantly that the signature of the document validated that my former wife was trying to push through a fake medical record to get her enrolled. With all the composure I could muster I looked around the room and said:
"I'm sorry to have to inform you of this but the Doctor whose name is on the form IS NOT a psychiatrist. I don't know how or why he lied about being a psychiatrist, but we can find out if that's what we need to do."
The meeting ended with my taking a copy of the form because I knew that I would need it for court.The falsified medical record submitted by my former wife and signed by this unethical and unprofessional doctor is a part of the court record. In spite of my ability to block this first enrollment with falsified medical facts, that did not deter my former wife from trying again. I found out within a few weeks that she had persuaded a psychiatrist in Boca Raton to tell more lies on her second Hospital Homebound Application. On this second effort, my former wife persuaded the psychiatrist to lie about my child receiving regular psychotherapy 2 times a week when in fact she was receiving none.
All my efforts to prevent my child from being forced into the Hospital Homebound program failed because school officials decided that my child was missing to much school over the parental debate so in the end, in spite of all my protestations they just pushed her application through. I can't begin to go into all the other details about the letters going back and forth between me and the school board lawyers
and the meetings that were held going over the legality of what my child was being forced into. All I can say is I did not give up with out a fight.
As a result of these events my younger child remained in the Hospital Homebound program for 2 years and was not able to see her friends, or attend any regular school classes and the psychiatrist that lied on the 2nd false medical school record application proceeded to put my child on a long list of medications. After
some period of experimentation this doctor selected a drug that is not proven to be safe for children, but
in her view was needed to help the child to sleep ( that's how she told this to my child ).
The drug prescribed was Remeron, the generic form has a different name, Mirtazapine.This drug is still not proven to be safe for children.
After doing some research on this medication I discovered several studies on Mirtazapine. The most dangerous effects of the drug, was that if you increased or decreased the dosage it could cause the patient to have a panic attack. This alarmed and confused me, because my daughter was reportedly having problems trying to extinguish her panic attacks. This doctor told my daughter
that she was prescribing the medication to simply help her to sleep!
I asked myself why would a psychiatrist give my child a medication that could cause a panic attack, and why was she constantly changing the dosage every few weeks? A dangerous drug like this also needed to be closely monitored by the doctor, but in the meantime, the child's mother was in charge of dispensing
the medication. After a while it became apparent to me that all my former wife needed to do was stop the child from taking her medication on or before the days that we were together and the child would nose dive into a panic attack. Keep in mind the fact that during the time that this was going on, my former wife
was trying to build a case that I was the one that was causing my daughter's anxiety ( and the resulting panic attacks ).
In reality my former wife had control of the child's medication and she controlled when the child would or wouldn't get a pill to keep her balanced. How do I know that this wild and fantastic conspiracy was all going on? Well, I tell you what validates it, during a DCF investigation ( Department of Children and Family Services ), they found my former wife guilty of medical neglect in not monitoring the child's medication.
So sadly, in addition to the parental alienation abuse the child was been subjected to, now she
was being abused with medication to keep her confused, frightened and angry at me. Nobody in
the world wanted to stop this more than I did.
I will tell you about one special event to help other people realize just how far my former wife
was willing to go to control the child's mind. One day my daughter had a panic attack while I was picking her up for a visitation. She had been in such a poor mental condition days before the visitation that I had talked to the court appointed psychological evaluator to ask what Hospital I could take her to if things got worse.
I wasn't able to get her to the Hospital in Ft. Lauderdale that I wanted to take her to because she needed immediate help so I got her into a Hospital closer to where I lived. While I was there I talked to the treating physician about transferring her to a Ft. Lauderdale Hospital and she let me go into an office to make the arrangements with the doctors to get her admitted.
While I was on the phone talking to the doctor 4 different police officers barged into the room. Two were SWAT police officers, one was a Boca Raton Sherrif and then a Sargent walked in and glared at me. Several times they demanded that I hang up the phone, but I let one of the police officers talk to the doctor on the other end of the line so they could all hear me addressing my daughters medical needs.
The Sargent got tired of waiting for me to finish the transfer arrangements. He threatened to arrest me if I didn't hang up the phone on the doctor. I explained to the doctor that I was being threatened in the Hospital with arrest if I did not hang up the phone. When the police had my full and undivided attention I was told that they had talked to my daughter's psychiatrist and that I was reportedly refusing to give the child her Mirtazapine ( while she was under the care
and treatment of the doctors in the hospital ) Can you imagine this situation ? My daughter is in another room with her mother, in the hospital, being treated by a doctor - yet I was the one who was refusing to let her have medication she was in need of.
I explained to the Sargent and the SWAT team that the child's medication was in the trunk of my car in the parking lot in the child's unpacked suitcase and that she was perfectly safe in a Hospital. I pointed out to the police that if the doctor in the Hospital needed to give my daughter any kind of medication, they could do it.
I got a cold stare from the police. They demanded that they walk me out to my car to see if I was telling them the truth. In spite of going through all these steps to prove I was honest, the Sargent told me he was filing a report with the DCF that I was a child abuser and that he was going to press charges. Of course the DCF refused to even investigate such a ridiculous charge. ( My 3rd false allegation of abuse - all of them were unfounded )
During the court ordered Psychological Evaluation the doctor doing the investigation interviewed my younger daughter and learned that my former wife had hired as a therapist to coach her to testify against me in court. My daughter told the doctor doing his evaluation ( and I'm just paraphrasing here ) " I'm sick and tired of going over what I need to tell the Judge. "
I also have a daughter that's a year older and as big sisters do she tried to protect her sister from many of the tactics used to target her against me, at first she tried not to cooperate with her mother, and she told the court appointed psychological evaluator that he needed to be more concerned about what was happening to her younger sister than what was happening to her.
During the years of the litigation my older daughter was worn down by her mother to a point that she wrote on her website, " Everything you say will be used as evidence against you. " My daughter thought that I was in a struggle against her because it was necessary to document things in court that involved her. My daughter acted as if I was going after her, as if I were divorcing her, as if I was against her. That
was her distorted belief.
My former wife hired an unethical Boca Raton lawyer that called my daughter on her cell phone while we were in the car driving out of my complex. I glanced over at my daughter as the attorney gave her advice on how to " handle her father ." It was beyond my wildest imagination that this could be going on right under my nose, because there were court orders to not involve the children in the litigation issues.
But that was just the beginning of what this ( sole practitioner ) lawyer was really doing to my children.
Behind the scenes this Boca Raton lawyer was sending emails to my former wife, letters that he wanted my children to copy and paste and email back to me. These letters were full of threats that they would never see me again, unless I backed away from insisting on visitation. They were filled with hateful words, words a father can only read and cry about, words that a parent should never hear. Imagine my shock to discover that they were written by the lawyer. Imagine my shock that their mother could ask them to do something so destructive to their well being. That's what she did ! All of these
facts are supported by court records, the original copies of evidence I still possess.
One time my former wife sent my child to see me for a visitation with a note of instructions that I found in
her belongings, it said "Destroy anything that can be used as evidence against us" Can there be any
way to co-parent with a person so abusive to a child that all you can do is shake your head in disbelief?
Her handwritten note is just another exhibit of evidence in the court records.
The emails drafted by the lawyer are all filed in the court records.
During the time that my attorney was representing me, I was unaware that he was involved in a conflict of interest. Apparently he was best friends with the therapist who was coaching my younger daughter to testify against me in court. He kept this fact hidden from me prior to the trial and throughout the many months of the psychological evaluation. In addition, while my attorney was also representing me he was also retained by this therapist to assist her in her divorce. Most people wouldn't believe this even if they saw it in a
Hollywood movie, that's how insane my own case has been.
In the end, Judge Jeffrey Colbath said that he believed every word that came out of the mouth of the court appointed psychological evaluator. I was awarded 50% custody of the children, make up visitation time for the time I lost over the years to see the children and greater decision making responsibilities than those given to my former wife in regard to the medical decisions over the children.
Judge Colbath made repeated comments about my former wife and her alienating behavior. He referred to her as a parental alienator who he feared if given a chance would try again to use a therapist to try and extinguish my parental custody rights. This did in fact happen and in the 4 years I could have had the
cusdody of my children I saw my older child for a summer visit and my younger child only a total
of 2 weeks throughout the next 4 years. The new Judge that took over for Judge Colbath was Judge Arthur Wrobble- He not only refused to enforce the Courts Order for my time sharing which Judge Colbath said was " written in stone ", Judge Wrobble was booted off the bench.
The comments that Judge Colbath made about my former wife are so significant that I feel its easier to just take them right out of the transcript and put them on the website for you to see just how bad this case really was :
" I do find that mom is engaging in alienating behavior and it is having a successful
effect on the children, particularly ( name of child redacted ). "
" I find that dad's complaints about mom's alienation to be valid ..."
" ... Mom is in fact the fire of this problem."
" I find that mom is more inclined to highlight their father's shortcomings,
than she is willing to highlight his strengths. "
" To the extent that ( name redacted ) may be fearful of her father,
it is in part due to mom's inappropriate exacerbations . "
" I think it's in the best interests of the children that they have
contact with dad uninterrupted by mom. "
" I find that mom is at best benign and indifferent to the children's relationship
with their father and is more often intentionally than unintentionally
impeding the children's relationship with their father. "
" I think that it's in the best interest of the children that to the extent it's possible that
" we keep mom apart and away from the children when they're visiting ( their dad ). "
" I find that it's necessary for dad to get some alone time with
the children without being interfered with by mom. "
" I'll also find that dad has been wrongfully denied visitation, the majority of
the visitation that I find has been missed is due to mom's alienating behavior
on the children and her unwillingness to urge them to visit with father and
rather saying leaving it up to the kids. "
" Mom may not object to or cause an interruption in an appointment
with a doctor that dad has chosen unilaterally. "
"I believe ( the court appointed forensic psychologist who said ) these children have been given power and authority over adults and adult-making decisions, and that is particularly true in the sense of the children's time with dad and the nurturing of his relationship with the children."
"I think it's in the best interests that they have dad in their lives and the sooner that they, the kids get a full dose of dad without mom meddling that his relationship will improve with the children."
" You don't go into giving your version of the story because you're poisoning the kids. You're hurting your kids You're hurting your kids when you do that. I'm stunned at how freely you admit to what you've been involving your children in. I'm just stunned. It's no less stunning than if you said, Well, yeah, I told them to go into the store and steal some candy and, you know, that's the way we get candy at out house. I mean, what you're doing is shocking, and you're immersed in your own problems that you can't see the harm that you're causing the children."
"(Mrs. Goldberg interrupts the judge to say – 'I am asking for my daughter to have therapy (before she starts visitation)" (Judge Jeffrey Colbath says –) "That's up to dad. The biggest impediment to him having a normal, healthy relationship with his children has been you."
"(The children) deserve to think that they've got the best dad in the whole wide world and anybody that detracts from that and steals away that feeling that they've got a great dad is stealing from them, and when you highlight his shortcomings and make them not like him, it is stealing from them. It robs them from permission to love their father, and whether he's worthy of it or not is a separate issue, I think he is. I think he's a pretty good dad. "
"This divorce between the two of you has jilted your good common sense, and if you keep doing the kind of stuff that you have been over the last couple years what happens ( to the children ) is it creates anxiety. It causes all sort of problems that are over your horizon right now. It will cause them not to be able to relate well to a boyfriend or a potential husband down the road ...The way you treat her dad will depend upon that, how that turns out. That is just as true as day follows night, and so you need to look at your behavior earnestly and not because I'm trying to make you feel bad or shame or scold you or anything like that. You just need to give dad a chance, and I'm giving him a chance because I think he's worthy of it."
(Mrs. Goldberg interrupts the judge again to ask — 'When my daughter goes to see their father for visitation on Friday will she have access to her psychologist treating her ...') (Judge Colbath reply's-) "I'll tell you what I've seen. I've seen people use psychologists to interfere with the other parent's time, and by the fact you're asking me that question makes me fearful that you're kind of going to do that, that you're going to say, now (name redacted) if dad doesn't do exactly what you say and you don't like anything you just call the psychologist right away. That's what you do!"
CV INFORMATION
I Graduated from BCC, Palm Beach County, FL and went on to do my undergraduate studies at Florida International University, where I majored in Psychology. I have have sponsored the Safe Child Program at Pine Crest Preparatory School in Boca Raton FL. where my children attend school.
I am the Founder of The Canadian Symposium for Parental Alienation Syndrome, the largest conference
ever organized in the world on the topic of Parental Alienation and Parental Alienation Syndrome
ParentalAlienation.ca
I'm a Consultant for Family Law Attorney's and Targeted Parents only. My consulting work is specific to cases that involve Parental Alienation and Parental Alienation Syndrome. I'm a guest speaker talking about parental alienation on Radio Shows in the U. S. and Canada.
I presently work on family law cases in the United States and Canada. The website for The Canadian Symposium for Parental Alienation Syndrome is
CSPAS.ca
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