The characters, names, situations, and events depicted in this post are fictional. Any resemblance to actual individuals, living or dead, or to real events is purely coincidental. This work of fiction is a product of the author’s imagination and is not intended to reflect any specific individuals, entities, or situations from the real world.
By Dr. Winston Sharp, FCP
Family Court Professional
In the custody dispute between Christopher Ambrose and his ex wife Karen Riordan, the strange beliefs of their three teenage children about their father diverged significantly from the family court record.
The Court had to act intelligently to quell the disturbances created.
Our policy at CT Family Court is to foster a collaborative approach that brings together family court judges, healthcare professionals, family law attorneys, custody evaluators, and guardians ad litem.
In this troubling case, Mr. Ambrose worked towards achieving a resolution that prioritized his well-being and conformed with the goals of CT Family Court.
This collaborative endeavor had the potential to gradually guide his children toward embracing the envisioned outcome set forth in the family court’s prior directives, as meticulously outlined in Judge Gerard Adelman’s memorandum and decision.
The customer is king. Chris Ambrose knows how CT Family Court works….
This decision benefits not only the father, but also the professionals involved in his case. His approach contrasted starkly with the mother’s approach. She failed to achieve effective engagement with the professionals.
Consequently, three actions occurred.
First Judge Jane Grossman awarded temporary custody to the father on April 24, 2020, with a no contact order for the mother and the children. This was the hard part, because the children were uprooted from their mother without notice. But the court and Mr. Ambrose persevered. The children were isolated. The mother made homeless.
Judge Jane Grossman took the first bold step. She removed the three children from their mother.
Judge Gerard Adelman
Two years later, Judge Adelman issued the divorce decree, and awarded Mr. Ambrose permanent custody of the children.
He also ensured Mr. Ambrose received all the marital assets. This financial constraint hindered the mother’s ability to continue challenging the decisions of the CT Family Court.
A sickening twist of events occurred one year after the issuance of Judge Adelman’s final orders. The children, in an astonishing display of defiance against Judge Adelman’s clear and decisive directives that severed ties with their mother, shockingly chose to seek refuge with her instead.
This situation required Mr. Ambrose to engage a new attorney and plow through three judges before a just resolution could be reached.
While it’s not my intention to identify the judges who were less assertive in their stance, I want to emphasize the notable exception of Judge Thomas J. O’Neill.
Judge O’Neill said to his colleagues:
When a father purchases custody in our courts and the mother winds up with the children, we are supposed to do something about it. It doesn’t make any difference what you think of the father. He bought custody and we’re supposed to do something about it.
Then it happens we are specifically selling custody using parental alienation. Well, when one of our fathers pays for alienation, and instead of the mother getting alienated, the kids go to her and he’s alienated, it’s bad business to let the mother get away with it. It’s bad all around–bad for CT Family Court, bad for every family court everywhere.
I’m a new family court judge, true, but after Judge Grossman flipped custody three years ago, and then Judge Adelman ran the mother out of the children’s lives and secured the money for Ambrose, which our people gladly took, it should have been finally settled.
Sure, some of my colleagues said it’s not our problem. We delivered to Mr. Ambrosse what he paid for. He got the custody. If he can’t keep the kids, that’s on him.
I disagree.
To let the children go back to the mother, is like asking a dog to catch a rabbit and let it go. It can be done, all right, and sometimes it is done, but it’s not the natural thing.
In issuing restraining orders that prohibited the mother from contacting her teenage children for one year, Judge O’Neill began the process that safeguarded not only the well-being of the customer, Ambrose, but also the financial stability of the CT Family Court and its professionals.
Judge O’Neill’s intervention upholds the values of a well-functioning business. His decision to bar the children from seeing their mother, but without specific orders of where the children will go after they have to leave their mother’s home, was a superb stroke of collaboration with our professionals, while still giving the customer, Mr. Ambrose, a chance to be made whole.
As Judge O’Neill stated:
As a judge entrusted with the welfare of the system, I have to ensure that financial interests remain at the forefront of CT Family Court, unencumbered by motives that might undermine it. In this context, it’s important to focus on profitability first for the professionals who make their living from this court, and that includes ensuring that our paying customers are satisfied and never unduly dwell on the petty dynamics that arise in familial and legal matters. This is best left up to the professionals we serve to guide us.
It’s reasonable to expect that when the time for his reappointment arrives in seven years, our support will be evident through substantial contributions to the CT General Assembly’s Judicial Committee members. This expression of future support is a testament to our appreciation for Judge O’Neill’s service today, and a reflection of our commitment to maintaining a positive relationship with our judges that endures over time.
