Frank Report is investigating the divorce and custody case of chiropractor Luigi DiRubba and his wife, Anna Maria DiRubba. Luigi has not seen his children in five years.
Anna Maria was married to her chiropractor husband, Luigi, for 17 years. The couple had six children. During their marriage, there were no child abuse or domestic violence complaints.
Luigi
When Anna filed for divorce in 2016, she simultaneously made allegations of domestic violence and child endangerment. DiRubba was removed from their house and arrested.
Over the next few years, Anna Maria had police arrest Luigi five more times. Based on the arrests, the court issued protective orders against him.
Prosecutors dismissed every charge and expunged the records because Anna Maria and her attorney could not provide evidence other than her word.
But as soon as prosecutors dismissed one protective order, she made another criminal complaint and got another protective order.
DiRubba tried to file complaints against his wife for making false reports to law enforcement. But the one-year statute of limitations ran out before the courts resolved the cases.
Anna Maria contacted the Department of Children and Families (DCF) and made allegations of abuse and neglect against her husband. DCF took Anna Maria’s word without interviewing Luigi or the children, and submitted their findings to the courts.
DiRubba was mandated to participate in a domestic violence diversion program if he wanted to see his children with supervised visitation. CT Family Court ordered DiRubba to pay $210,000 annual child and spousal support. After three years, a judge reduced that amount to $110,000 per year. He ordered Luigi to pay his ex-wife’s legal expenses, $135,000, to a court-ordered Guardian Ad Litem and awarded her the house.
He was defending himself criminally and fighting to see his children. It cost DiRubba over $1.5 million.
Anna Maria decided Luigi should not see the children even with a visitation supervisor, according to a 2017 report written by psychologist James Connolly.
Defending himself criminally and battling over the right to see his children, which he supported, cost DiRubba over $1.5 million.
Anna Marie decided Luigi should not see the children even with a supervisor, according to a 2017 report written by psychologist James Connolly.
He wrote, “Anna Maria continues to obstruct Luigi’s visitation with the three youngest children to such an extent that the visits are substantially disrupted… Anna Maria needs to demonstrate from this time forward that she can become an emotionally temperate caregiver for her children who will no longer obstruct Luigi’s access to the children and will cease to infect them with emotional contagion which has the effect of increasing their fear of their father and inducing a desire in them to avoid contact and relationship building with him.”
The court dismissed the report.
In December 2020, DCF reversed its 2016 decision that DiRubba abused his children.
CT State Hearing Officer, Attorney Robin D. O’Shea wrote: “The credible evidence in the record reveals that [Luigi] and his former wife were in the initial stages of a contentious separation and divorce when the Department first became involved with the family in February 2016. Prior to that, there had been no reported concerns to the Department… The reliable evidence also demonstrates that [Anna Marie] fabricated or embellished [Luigi’s] behaviors to suit her own agenda.”
The judge denied DiRubba’s motion to admit the DCF reversal.
Anna Maria refused to allow the children to participate in reunification therapy, and the courts denied three motions by DiRubba to let him engage in reunification therapy with his children.
Recently, Anna Marie sold the house in CT that Luigi bought and paid for, which the court handed her. She moved with the children to Florida. Luigi lost contact with all six children.
It is curious that when there is credible evidence of parental alienation by a mother like Anna Maria DiRubba, CT Family Court does not flip custody to the father.
On the other hand, they quickly destroyed the happiness of three children and their mother, Karen Riordan, when her husband, Chris Ambrose, took all the marital assets and cried parental alienation.
When she’s smiling, the whole court smiles with her – except the parent she is opposing. Marianne Charles knows how to get her way in court – or else.The answer may lie in the attorneys. In the DiRubba case, Anna Marie had the well-connected Marianne Charles, whose word is the command of the judges who sit on her cases.
Ambrose had Nancy Aldrich, whose state senator son sat on the powerful judicial appointment committee.
Riordan and DiRubba’s attorneys knew which side the bread was buttered.
It works that way in CT Family Court, where the dictum “in the best interest of the children” means the lawyers’ own children, not their clients’ children.
In these two cases alone, lawyers, GALs, custody evaluators, therapists, and visitation supervisors had about $3 million to cut up for their efforts to give the children to lying and abusive parents.
While their clients’ children suffer, the children of the court actors have the best of everything.
And why not, like they all say in court, “in the best interest of the children.”
