'Parental Alienation' and Family Courts: Highlighting the Voices of Abused Mothers

Part 2 of the 2-part series on mothers' experiences in the family courts

Welcome

It’s good to be able to write to you again.

Thank you for all of the kind responses to the interview I most recently published in this space.

This new post is the sequel to the post I wrote previously on an important new academic study led by my amazing colleague Dr Elizabeth Dalgarno and co-authored by myself and four other researchers.

This academic research study focuses on the family court experiences of mothers in Brazil.

What the study shows

The study, which is available free to read for everyone here, shows the serious negative health consequences for domestic violence victim-survivor mothers involved in the family courts.

A reminder of the key facts about the study:

• The basis of the study was online interviews undertaken in 2022, by a female Brazilian researcher, with 13 victim-survivor mothers who had been engaged now or within the last 10 years in family court proceedings;

• These mothers were invited to participate in the study via a Brazilian domestic violence support group;

• The study’s results emphasized how a series of negative health consequences result from fundamental problems in how family courts treat domestic violence and child abuse.

As explored in Part 1, the study also developed a name for the trauma experienced by the mothers in the study — the term is CPIT: court and perpetrator-induced trauma.

CPIT is important because it expands the way we usually think about legal abuse.

In the usual concept of legal abuse:

• An abuse perpetrator is seen as using the legal system to continue their abuse, for example by dragging their ex through the court for many years;

• The trauma is seen as coming exclusively from the ex and their use of the legal system.

However in CPIT, it is both the actions of the ex and the courts (and the persons working within the courts) that are recognised as causing the trauma.

What this post is about

The focus of this second post is how these victim-survivor mothers had been accused of “Parental Alienation” (shortened from now on to “PA”).

This post is going to be highly critical of “PA” allegations made in contexts of coercive control and domestic violence.

This is very much compatible with acknowledging that perpetrators do attempt to turn their children against the victim-survivor parent. This is indeed a frequent tactic of perpetrators and this is discussed elsewhere in a very well read post already published on this Substack.

What the target of criticism is going to be in this post is the use of “PA” in Brazil and its implications for the rest of the world. The situation in Brazil is globally relevant. It gives an indication of what might happen if other countries followed the direction that Brazil has taken.

What has Brazil done? It has introduced laws penalizing people engaged in “PA”. So, what is happening in Brazil is a warning for what might happen if such laws were introduced in other countries, as some campaigners wish them to be.

As we will see, the study that we’ll look into in this post suggests that having a law against “PA” could well be a disaster — both for domestic violence survivor mothers, and for children who have experienced child abuse from their father.

Read on for an analysis of how “PA” allegations in Brazil:

• Have fundamentally disempowered mothers;

• Are linked to DARVO;

• Are linked to coercive control;

• Have been used by perpetrators and courts in a conceptually incoherent way;

• Have been used by perpetrators and courts to silence children’s voices and experiences;

• Are linked to a sexist double standard in Brazilian law;

• Have had deeply negative impacts on mothers’ day-to-day lives.

The post then moves on to my reflections on how “PA” allegations in family courts across the world:

• Are used as a deliberate strategy by perpetrators/fathers;

• Are linked to the persuasiveness and charm tricks used by perpetrators/fathers;

• Mean that mothers are being punished for trying to keep their children safe.

The post closes with a reminder of its central message:

Let’s avoid having a law against “PA” — the example of Brazil shows how it would be a disaster.

How “PA” allegations fundamentally disempowered mothers

The study, by gathering first-hand interview evidence with mothers, showed how, by branding mothers as “alienators”, abuse perpetrators could:

• justify, minimize or deny their abusive behavior;

• attack the credibility and character of the victim-survivor, and;

• turn the blame on the victim-survivor by making counter accusations against them.

The study showed that by branding mothers as “alienators”, perpetrators were able to:

• falsely present the mother victim-survivor as the “real” offender, and;

• falsely present the abuser themselves as the “real” victim-survivor.

How “PA” allegations linked to DARVO

This description of mothers as “alienators” fits with how perpetrators often use DARVO.

As explored in one of my previous posts, DARVO stands for:

• Denial by the abuser that they were abusive;

• Attack by the abuser on the credibility and character of the victim;

• Reversal by the abuser of the roles of…

• Victim and…

• Offender

In DARVO, the real abuser falsely claims:

• I didn’t do what she’s alleging;

• she’s actually the one who’s been abusive;

• it’s her who’s actually the dangerous parent for our kids.

Most abusers use the DARVO strategy to help them to avoid consequences. The main purpose of DARVO tactics is to confuse people and make people doubt their perceptions about a situation of abuse or injustice.

How “PA” allegations linked to coercive control

What’s the basis of the whole dynamic of coercive control? The perpetrator setting up a situation of “do what I say and obey me or face punishment”.

So, against this, what has a victim-survivor done if she has attempted to break free, attempted to protect her child, and has reported the perpetrators’ abuse to professionals? She has disobeyed the perpetrator. What the perpetrator sees here is an enormous act of disobedience, requiring vicious punishment.

As systems currently stand, the perpetrator tragically has a great chance of success in arranging that punishment if they allege that a protective victim-survivor mother is carrying out PA.

With the way that systems currently work, it is likely that they will get the system to viciously punish her. Indeed, quite possibly they will inflict the ultimate punishment on her of losing her beloved children to their abuser.

So, the way that perpetrators are able to use PA allegations is totally in keeping with their long-term pattern of coercive control. This is a pattern that will have been present pre-separation; and it can continue post-separation through the concept of so-called “PA”.

How “PA” allegations were used by perpetrators and courts in a conceptually incoherent way

For some of the mothers interviewed in the study, the understanding of what “PA” was had been stretched beyond all recognition in the courts and perpetrators’ accusations against mothers.

Though there is no agreed definition of PA, the idea’s central concept is one parent influencing a chid to unreasonably dislike their other parent.

However, for some of the mothers in the study, they were accused of PA when the above understanding was not met — for example when their babies were under the age of 1.

The example of one of the mothers in the study, Vitoria, is a case in point — She discussed how she had reported the perpetrator to the police for his (actual) attempts to abduct the child, and how this led to counter-complaints that she was engaging in PA.

How old was the child? See to the end of the quote in italics:

He was supposed to stay at the park, but he left with the child […] Then he went to the police station with his lawyer and she said, “she is crazy, she is disturbed” […] The prosecutor then claimed that I was “crazy”, that my acts “were harming the development of the child”, then the prosecutor diagnosed symptoms of parental alienation syndrome in the child … the child was 9 months old.

How “PA” allegations were used by perpetrators and courts to silence children’s voices and experiences

In the study, the focus was on how the use of PA allegations often meant that courts turned away from investigating the abuse that had occurred, and its impact on the child.

Instead, the PA allegations turned the focus on mothers, falsely reversing the roles of victim and offender.

One of the mothers in the study, Marcia, described how PA allegations led to her being sued for slander:

Parental Alienation was used to disqualify a complaint of sexual abuse against my daughter. It closed the criminal investigation of the sexual abuse and it established a precedent for me to be sued for slanderous defamation and now I am the defendant.

This meant that children’s voices were silenced. As one mother in the study, Renate, put it, “my daughter was never heard”.

In particular, allegations of PA by perpetrator-fathers meant that police-led criminal investigations into child sexual abuse were often closed.

In proceedings where PA had been claimed by fathers, mothers’ reports of child abuse/rape perpetrated by the father did not trigger police investigations.

One of the mothers in the study, Adrianna, reported how her criminal child abuse investigations against the perpetrator father was closed after the family court ruled her guilty of parental alienation:

His lawyer took [the family court’s] decision [of PA] to the Domestic Violence Court and also took it to the restraining order lawsuit at the Child’s Court. Then the Child’s Court judge also closed the child abuse investigation due to the parental alienation court decision.

Evidence possessed by mothers about their own and their children’s abuse by the perpetrator – for example, one of the mothers in the study, Efigenia, had evidence from a medical examination that showed her son had been physically abused by the perpetrator – was ignored. Efigenia described what happened:

It was an open wound and bruised. Do you know? He [son] went through a legal medical examination, he told them what had happened. They [father’s legal team] still tried to claim that it was parental alienation there.

How “PA” allegations linked to a sexist double standard in Brazilian law

In Brazil, the sanctions currently available if PA is “found” can include: a fine, psychological and/or biopsychosocial monitoring (a common outcome for these mothers was being forced into PA assessments and ‘therapies’, often with their or their child’s rapist/abuser), and a change in custody. Indeed, abusive fathers have successfully exploited PA allegations to obtain sole custody and access to children.

Effectively, PA is presented as being more harmful than any other type of abuse. This is reflected also in the harsher outcomes for some of the mothers in this study. These outcomes could include mothers being awarded no contact at all, in comparison to direct contact being awarded to all the fathers regardless of the type of violence or crimes that the fathers had committed.

The Brazilian law around PA identifies a perpetrator and victim, similar to criminal proceedings — yet there is no legal defense for mothers accused of PA, unlike in the criminal proceedings against abusive fathers, where abusive fathers have a right to a full defense.

How “PA” allegations had deeply negative impacts on mothers’ day-to-day lives

Mothers in the study reflected on the extremely negative consequences of being described as an alienator.

One mother, Vania, described the psychological impact she felt every day:

I am still suffering; our suffering remains as long as the lawsuits remain. Life doesn’t go on while we are responding to a lawsuit. You feel as if your life is stuck. As if your life is linked to that … I don’t feel I have freedom.

Another mother in the study, Marcia, described the physical health impacts:

With the alienation claims and the threatening of losing custody … for I started to have anxiety crises, depression, panic attacks … I have fibromyalgia, and it has psychosomatic characteristics, so, nowadays, my quality of life has decreased 50%, compared to what it was at the beginning of that proceeding. I am selling my car now because I can no longer drive.

The catastrophic impacts on mothers’ social reputation were described by another mother, Francisca. As Francisca explained about her own life, these impacts could destroy mothers’ careers as well as their ability to exist socially:

He spread to the whole city that I’m “an alienator”, right. So, my clientele, the work I used to do, everyone disappeared. My friends that worked with me. I also quit dancing, quit doing my performances. Then everyone disappeared from my life. So, I’m disfigured, nobody knows who I am anymore.

Francisca, and women in this position, had essentially been disgraced in other people’s eyes by word of mouth – and all because they had accused the fathers of abusing them or their children. Francisca talked here about being “disfigured”, which is a good way of summing up what had happened to her. Her ability to earn a living was taken away, and her identity was crushed.

Another aspect of Francisca’s experience was that she was of mixed African and European ancestry, and therefore had a lower “social status” in Brazilian society. She discussed how she was interrupted and talked down to by a court-appointed so-called expert in PA:

[It] was an extremely hard experience for me. Since it was both [the PA expert and the father] of them against me, him against me, so I couldn’t say anything, they were interrupting me all the time, and when he started talking, I had to accept it … a conversation with my children’s rapist, the man who raped my children … watching them expose my family, my life, my childhood traumas, for he had told them everything, things concerning my life … It was like a circus. It was like a horror movie. They wanted to humiliate me because of my social status.

Experiences such as those of Vania, Marcia and Francisca are important case studies of what researchers have shown is going on in family courts globally: perpetrator fathers using PA allegations to twist the truth and further victimize victim-survivor mothers.

I will now explore this further.

How “PA” allegations in family courts across the world are used as a deliberate strategy by perpetrators/fathers

Negative family court outcomes for victim-survivor mothers in cases of PA allegations have been found to have happened in many countries around the world. These countries include the U.S., U.K., Australia, New Zealand, Canada, Spain, France and Italy among others.

When courts disbelieve mothers and children in this way, refusing to believe that the perpetrator/father has a history of abuse and still poses a grave threat to their well-being, it is a very serious turn of events. And it is a common one. One of the most important studies in this area is by Professor Joan Meier, who has conducted a comprehensive review of family court outcomes in the United States.

Meier found that, for fathers, claiming to be a victim of “parental alienation” was a strategy that worked in the family courts. Of the family court cases where mothers claimed fathers were abusive but fathers counterclaimed the mother was engaging in “parental alienation,” mothers’ abuse claims were disbelieved 77% of the time.

How “PA” allegations in family courts across the world link to the persuasiveness and charm tricks used by perpetrators/fathers

It has been noted by other scholars that part of the devious skill that abusive fathers have in their PA allegations lies in persuasiveness: a mask of being charming, articulate and well-presented.

Indeed, in discussing this situation, we need to understand that perpetrators often have the ability to control professionals using tactics that are indistinguishable from those they employed to control their victims.

Part of the devious skill that abusive fathers have in their PA allegations lies in persuasiveness: a mask of being charming, articulate and well-presented … tactics that are indistinguishable from those they employed to control their victims.

Partly because of this charm, abusive fathers’ ability to achieve a positive outcome for themselves by directing PA allegations against mothers is often effective even in cases where courts believe that the father had been domestically violent.

If the court believed that the father had been domestically violent, but he meanwhile managed to convince them that the mother was engaging in “parental alienation,” the court was still quite likely to be willing to giving him custody: Meier in her study found that in the United States the rate of fathers gaining custody in those cases was 43%.

This is despite research suggesting that false accusations from mothers in these circumstances are rare. For example, Trocmé and Bala’s analysis of a nationwide Canadian child abuse and neglect study found that false accusations occurred at a rate of 12% in custody disputes (88% of the accusations were true). In cases of false allegations, it was noncustodial parents (usually fathers) who were most likely to make false accusations of child abuse or neglect.

How “PA” allegations in family courts across the world mean that mothers are being punished for trying to keep their children safe

Internationally, mothers and children are put in an extremely difficult situation following family court outcomes.

• They may be jailed for not complying, or for continuing to report that the perpetrator is still abusing the child.

• Children may be left with no choice but to carry on partly or wholly living with the perpetrator/father and be subjected to his ongoing coercive control, despite the substantial harms associated with this outcome.

• A minority of these cases are life-ending: The father goes on to kill the child.

In this situation, the mother has been punished for attempting to protect the children from the domestic violence perpetrator, having possibly already been punished in the child protection system for “failing to protect” their children from him.

Mothers are in a catch-22 situation. Under the child protection systems in many countries, they are punished for “exposing” their children to a perpetrator — yet when a mother complies with the demands of the child protection system and separates herself and the children from the perpetrator, within a few months she may find herself in the family court being punished for trying to keep the children safe. It is an unbearable situation.

Conclusion: Let’s avoid having a law against “PA” — the example of Brazil shows how it would be a disaster

A law against “PA” could well be a disaster for domestic violence survivor mothers, and children who have experienced child abuse from their father. Brazil is one of just a handful of countries to have introduced laws penalizing people engaged in “PA” – and the study shows what can happen.

PA allegations are used as a deliberate strategy by perpetrators/fathers. Abusive fathers do so skilfully and deviously. They have a mask of being charming, articulate and well-presented: tactics that are in-keeping with those they employ to control their victims.

What is the likely result? As systems currently stand, it is terrifying. The perpetrator/father tragically has a great chance of success if they allege that a protective victim-survivor mother is carrying out PA.

Indeed, they can inflict the ultimate punishment on the protective victim-survivor mother — losing her beloved children to their abuser.

Goodbye for now

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