Articles Posted in Nassau

On March 12, 1996, the accused mother brought her two-year-old daughter to North Central Bronx Hospital for a neurological examination and psychiatric evaluation on the recommendation of her pediatrician. The child suffered from febrile seizures, frequent ear infections and pica, an eating disorder involving ingestion of nonfood such as paint chips. The director of the hospital’s Child and Adolescent Crisis Intervention Program, which operates out of the emergency room, examined the child and observed the mother’s behavior while she was in the emergency room with her daughter. A New York Family Lawyer said he testified at the Family Court fact-finding hearing she was extremely irritable and hostile toward the child. Specifically, she called the child a bitch; repeatedly referred to the child as a bad child. The child deliberately engaged in disruptive behavior to irritate her mother, such as climbing on the stove, turning on the burners, and setting papers on fire. The mother said that her child barely slept at night, and that she in turn prevented the child from napping during the day to show her what it felt like to stay awake. While at the hospital, when the child indicated she had to go to the bathroom, the mother told her to go ahead and wet herself. The accused mother also said it was a miracle that she had not killed the child; that she had thoughts of killing herself; and that she had an insurance policy that would take care of her other children.

The hospital director observed that, while in the emergency room, the child stayed away from her mother, running and climbing everywhere but the mother made no effort to supervise or restrain her. Based on his observations and examination of the child, he believed that Megan was suffering from various language disorders and hearing impairment, as well as severe hyper-activity. A New York Custody Lawyer said based on the mother’s statement that the child ate lipstick, nail polish and powder, he suspected that she might also have lead poisoning. He informed the mother that her child needed certain assessments or tests, and explained that some of her disruptive behavior might be due to her physical ailments. She denied that the child suffered from any of the physical ailments enumerated and initially refused to consent to any of the tests, insisting that the child did not need them.

The hospital director further testified that the accused mother said three times that she had a weapon on her and made specific threats toward him and other hospital staff. He and the staff became so concerned by her behavior and threats that they were moved to contact the adult psychiatric emergency room to have respondent examined.

The petition contains 10 charges of professional misconduct against the accused counsel. After a hearing, the Special Referee sustained all 10 charges. The Grievance Committee moved to confirm the Special Referee’s report. A New York Family Lawyer said in response to the Grievance Committee’s motion, the accused counsel submits that, although his misconduct adversely reflects upon his fitness to practice law, it does not rise to the level suggested by Grievance Counsel with respect to a final sanction. The accused requests that any further discipline be limited to a suspension of one year, retroactive to the date of his interim suspension.

As set forth in the petition, the accused counsel was on the Family Court Panel of the Assigned Counsel Plan for the Appellate Division, First Department between approximately 1980 and March 4, 1996. As an attorney on the panel, the accused was assigned to represent indigent clients in the Bronx County Family Court.

A New York Custody Lawyer said on or about October 1992, the accused was assigned to represent a client in a Family Court matter in Bronx. During several meetings with that client, in conference rooms at the Bronx County Family Court, the accused man addressed sexually suggestive remarks to the complainant, requesting all the time that she touch his penis.

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On June 9, 2009, the Administration for Children’s Services (ACS) filed a petition against Respondent Mother alleging she had abused and neglected her daughter. On June 8, 2009, a physician at the Medical Center reported that the child was brought to the hospital by EMS after Respondent found the child in an abnormal sleeping position and when he repositioned the child he had an abnormal pulse. A New York Family Lawyer said the child was brought to the hospital at 4:53 p.m. at which time he was pulse-less and all attempts to revive the child were unsuccessful; the child was pronounced dead at 6:30 p.m. The medical examiner reported that the official cause of death for the child is whiplash, shaking and blunt impacts of the head with subarachnoid and subdural hemorrhages. The child’s death has been ruled a homicide.

A New York Custody Lawyer said that, respondent-mother admitted to ACS ESC and Police at the 47th precinct that on June 8, 2009, the child, woke up around 1:00 p.m. and was fussing and crying and didn’t want to sleep. The Respondent mother admitted that she was stressed out and tired and that the Respondent-mother shook the baby forcefully, several times at which point the baby stopped crying and the Respondent mother put him back in bed to sleep.

A New York Custody Lawyer said that, in its Summation dated November 7, 2011, ACS stated that it has presented clear and convincing evidence that Respondent Mother acted with a depraved indifference to human life in causing serious physical injuries to the seven-month-old infant that resulted in his death. ACS stated that it had proven “aggravated circumstances” and that the infant was a “severely” abused child as defined in Family Court Act § 1012 (j) and Social Services Law § 384-b (8) (a), and that Respondent Mother failed to rebut any of the evidence presented by ACS. ACS urged the court to make a derivative finding of severe abuse as defined in Social Services Law 384-b (8) (a) as to the subject child. Further, based on the clear and convincing evidence of the heinous nature of Respondent Mother’s abuse of the infant, ACS stated that the court should terminate its duty to provide reasonable efforts to assist Respondent Mother in reunification with the surviving child.

Prior to the incident, infant plaintiff’s father was known to the defendant’s police officers at the 43rd Precinct, having previously been arrested by them approximately six times for drunkenness, abusive and physical assault upon his family. In July, 1975 he assaulted his wife with a knife, inflicting lacerations which required suturing at the Hospital; a New York Family Lawyer said that she thereafter brought a divorce action, which resulted in further violence by the infant plaintiff’s father and threats by him that he would kill her and the children if she proceeded with the divorce action. A Bronx Order of Protection Lawyer said that, the infant’s mother thereupon went into the Family Court where, she obtained a preliminary order of protection against her husband; thereafter, the order was finalized for one year and, over her strenuous objections, was amended to grant to the father visitation with the infant plaintiff from 10:00 A.M. on Saturdays to 6:00 P.M. on Sundays. After the parties left the courtroom the father attempted to assault his wife and he had to be restrained by a court officer. The Family Court judge was informed of the incident and thereupon directed the court officer to get him out of the building; however, the judge did not rescind his week-end visitation with the infant.

A Bronx Order of Protection Lawyer said that, in accordance with the provisions of the Family Court Act, a “Certificate of Order of Protection” was duly issued to the infant’s mother by the clerk of that court on November 6, 1975 certifying that an Order of Protection had been issued to her, pursuant to which the infant’s father was forbidden to assault, menace, harass, endanger, threaten or act in a disorderly manner toward petitioner and he is to remain away from the home of said petitioner.”

A New York Custody Lawyer said two days later, the infant’s mother took the infant to the 43rd Precinct to accord the infant’s father his week-end visitation. He took the infant and, as he was walking away, he made a death threat against his wife, and the infant, and he indicated to his wife that before the week-end was up she would be making “the sign of the cross” which to them meant that there would be a death. The mother immediately went into the precinct and told the desk officer of the death threats to herself and the infant; she showed the desk officer the Certificate of Order of Protection; she advised him of her fears and told him that she was frightened for the safety of her child and herself and that the Order of Protection protected her from such threats and she requested the police to take her husband into custody for violating said order. However, the police refused to do anything whatsoever. The infant’s father failed to return the infant at 6:00 P.M., as required by the Order of Protection. The mother again went into the station house and she again spoke to the police officer and the lieutenant she again demanded that the police arrest her husband for violating the order and protect the infant; once again the police refused to do anything whatsoever and told her to wait a couple of hours and that “perhaps” the father had taken the infant to a movie. Thereafter, the infant father’s sister entered his apartment. She found him lying on the floor with an empty whiskey bottle and an empty pill bottle lying beside him. She also found the infant, who had been viciously attacked, mutilated and severely injured by her father and she telephoned the police. The father had attacked the infant at about 7:00 P.M. with a fork, a knife and screwdriver; he had attempted to saw her leg off with a saw; she had been slashed from head to toe and she had sustained severe multiple internal injuries. Minutes later police officers from the same 43rd Precinct arrived and they rushed the infant to the Hospital in their police car, without waiting for an ambulance; the infant was immediately taken into surgery and she was operated. The infant was in a coma for several days and she remained in a critical condition for approximately three weeks and was hospitalized until December 19, 1975 she remains severely and permanently disabled. The father was arrested after the attack on the infant and he was thereafter indicted by the Grand Jury, tried and found guilty of attempted murder of the infant and he is now serving a jail sentence for the crime.

The natural parents, never married but lived together from 1967 to 1974, during which time three children were born. In August 1974, after many earlier criminal convictions, the natural father was convicted on drug charges and sentenced to prison for a two-year-to life sentence.A New York Family Lawyer said in 1975 the natural mother voluntarily placed the second born child, who suffers from severe physical and mental handicaps, in temporary foster care. The mother abandoned the two other children and on December 7, 1976 the Family Court placed them in the Commissioner of Social Services custody for 18 months. A Bronx Child Custody Lawyer said that, during his entire imprisonment the natural father (whose whereabouts was then unknown) made no attempt to stay in touch with his family and he testified he heard nothing from the natural mother. Only after the agency, through its own diligent efforts, located him in a Correctional Facility in August 1977, did the natural father learned of the children’s foster care placements; immediately after being paroled, in September 1977, he visited the agency to seek custody or visitation. The three children, meanwhile, had lived in separate foster homes and facilities until summer 1977. The foster parents, had asked the agency for a handicapped child to adopt in 1976. A New York Custody Lawyer said after she had been placed in their home for some two months, the foster parents’ requested that the two other children join her; the children were reunited in September 1977 for the first time since 1975.

A Bronx Child Custody Lawyer said that the agency denied the natural father’s requests for custody or visitation, and he began legal proceedings to protect his rights. On December 1, 1977 he was adjudicated the legal father, and, by agreement among counsel he had two visits with the children, the first in December 1977 and the second in February 1978. Only the oldest child had any recollection of her natural father, having been only one year old when he was imprisoned, and the handicapped child being mentally incapacitated. When these proceedings came to trial the natural father was unemployed, on parole, and living on public assistance with a woman he had known less than a year, who was expecting his child in December 1978. A New York Custody Lawyer said the foster parents live with the three children in a three-bedroom suburban garden apartment. The foster father is employed as a maintenance man; foster mother is a full-time housewife.

A Nassau County Family Lawyer said that the New York Hospital filed a petition pursuant to Section 384-b of the Social Services Law (“SSL”) seeking termination of parental rights and a transfer of custody and guardianship to NYFH; a petition was also filed by the Commissioner of Social Services (“CSS”) pursuant to Family Court Act (“FCA”) Section 1055 seeking an extension of this court’s original placement order entered in the course of a prior Article Ten neglect proceeding; and a petition in the form of a writ of habeas corpus filed by the natural father seeking return of the children to his custody.