[blparent] Story about blind dad in custody battle

[Deborah Kent Stein]

I just received this news story about a bizarre custody case involving a 
blind dad.


----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Deborah Kent Stein" <dkent5817 at att.net>
To: "Deborah Kent Stein" <dkent5817 at att.net>
Sent: Tuesday, August 02, 2011 5:29 PM
Subject: Peter Spitz


>
> Victory! Peter Spitz Reunited With Son After Outrageous Family Court
> Injustice
> August 2nd, 2011 by Glenn Sacks, MA, Executive Director
>
> Peter Spitz and ex-wife Teresa Dickey, soon after they met in 1998.
>
> In one of the most outrageous injustices of our time, Peter Spitz 
> (pictured
> right) was separated from his son and almost lost custody of him after his
> ex-wife shot him in the face and murdered his mother.
>
> Fathers and Families advised Peter, helped him get legal counsel, and also
> publicized his case, and we are pleased to announce that Peter has now won
> full custody of his seven-year-old son.
>
> Special credit and thanks goes to talented Colorado family law attorney
> Brett Martin (pictured below), who took on Spitz's case and won a decisive
> victory-the court decision is here.
>
> We also thank Fathers and Families Board Member Robert Franklin, Esq., who
> covered this case extensively and helped to advise Peter-his write-up of 
> the
> new decision is below.
>
> Together with you in the love of our children,
> Glenn Sacks, MA
> Executive Director,
> Fathers and Families
>
>
> Talented Colorado family law attorney Brett Martin, who took on Spitz's 
> case
> and won a decisive victory.
>
> From Fathers and Families Board Member Robert Franklin, Esq.:
>
> A Colorado probate judge has awarded Peter Spitz full custody of his
> son-Peter emailed me the good news.
>
> Peter Spitz is the former Marine whose wife Teresa, in the small hours of
> the morning seven years ago, shot him in the face as he slept.  She then
> went off and murdered his mother who was living with them at the time.
> Peter, unable to understand what had happened to him, called out to his 
> wife
> for help.  She responded by returning to their bedroom and shooting him 
> two
> more times.  Their son was under one year old at the time.
>
> Peter survived the attack, but was left permanently blind.  Teresa was
> arrested and charged with murder and attempted murder, but in a remarkable
> turn of events, Peter testified on her behalf.  Her defense was that of
> insanity and he took the witness stand to say that she couldn't have known
> what she was doing.  He didn't know it at the time, but he was wrong.  But
> with his help, Teresa was acquitted by reason of insanity and committed to 
> a
> mental facility in Pueblo.
>
> It takes a brave man with a powerful moral sense to go to bat for the 
> woman
> who killed his mother and tried to kill him.
>
> As you might expect, it took Peter a long time to recover from his 
> injuries
> and adjust to his blindness.  During that time, a probate court judge
> rightly appointed guardians for his son.  But astonishingly, once Peter 
> had
> regained his health and adjusted to life without vision, the guardians,
> Donald and Sheila Reynolds refused to give up his little son.   Into the
> bargain, they initiated proceedings to adopt him.
>
> Meanwhile, Teresa repaid Peter's help in her fight to avoid spending her
> life in prison by assisting the Reynolds in keeping his son away from 
> Peter.
> She's gone to bat for the Reynolds and opposes Peter's custody of his son.
> In what must be the strangest development of all, Teresa got supervised
> visitation with the boy while Peter was denied all contact.
>
> Well, all that has now changed.
>
> A few months back, Peter contacted Fathers and Families and I wrote two
> pieces about his outrageous case.  Since he had pending legal matters, we
> were able to connect him with an excellent attorney in the area, Brett
> Martin, who met with Peter and took his case.
>
> Two days ago, Probate Court Judge Timothy Fasing terminated the 
> guardianship
> of Peter's son and gave full custody of the boy to Peter.  That should 
> have
> been done years ago, but better late than never.
>
> According to the judge's order, Peter has full authority over the boy.  He
> can decide with whom he has contact and whom he doesn't.  That means he'll
> allow his son limited contact with the Reynolds and none whatsoever with 
> his
> ex-wife, Teresa unless ordered to do so by a court.  (At trial, Teresa
> admitted to attempting to drown the boy in the bathtub when he was an
> infant.)
>
> Peter reports that his son, who is now seven, was scared at first when he
> and a friend picked the boy up to go live at Peter's house, but he soon
> relaxed and "became his natural chatty self."
>
> Peter told me this about the trial proceedings:
>
>  The judge was extremely critical of both guardians and Teresa, accused
> them of contradictory testimony, aligning together to prevent me from
> fathering (my son), and was surprisingly harsh at the Reynolds by stating
> twice that they placed (the child) at extreme risk by allowing Teresa any
> contact, that it showed a terrible lack of judgment.
>
>  He also dismissed the testimony of the therapist as he said she was
> clearly aligned with the guardians and was not a reliable witness.  He 
> went
> on to say that they presented no credible witnesses.
>
>  Finally, he stated that even with the lower standard of presumption
> (preponderance) of evidence, they failed not only to prove their case but
> that he found that it was , indeed, in (the boy's) best interest to be 
> with
> me.
>
> As I said, this should have happened years ago.  Peter Spitz is a fit
> parent; no credible claim to the contrary has ever been made.  His
> disability certainly has no negative impact on his ability to parent, so
> after he recovered from his wounds, custody of his son should have been
> immediately returned to him.
>
> But it wasn't.  I suppose the Reynolds somehow concluded that "possession 
> is
> nine points of the law," so the boy was rightly theirs.  Judge Fasing
> apparently was intensely interested in how they spent the $600 plus 
> dollars
> the little boy receives from the Social Security Administration due to his
> father's disability.  That suggests their interest may have been more
> pecuniary than parental.
>
> Whatever the case, their outrageous act of parental hegemony, coupled with
> ineffective assistance of counsel for Peter, resulted in his prolonged
> separation from his son.
>
> One interesting sidelight is that the therapist, whose testimony at trial
> Judge Fasing discounted, is employed by an organization called Aurora 
> Mental
> Health.  It just so happens that Don Reynolds does volunteer work at 
> Aurora
> Mental Health.  So apart from attempting to give testimony she was not
> qualified to give, there appears to be a conflict of interest in the
> involvement of Aurora Mental Health in this case.
>
> That's made even clearer by the fact that Peter was convinced to take a
> parenting class offered by Aurora Mental Health.  What goes on in those
> sessions is clearly privileged and not subject to disclosure absent the
> client's consent.  But what do you think happened?  Sure enough, things
> Peter said were reported to the attorney for the Reynolds in what looks 
> like
> a violation of his confidentiality.
>
> That's all over now.  Peter Spitz has at last been reunited with his son.
> The only legal hurdle yet to be cleared is the family court custody 
> matter.
> Peter's only opponent in that case is his ex-wife, Teresa, who killed his
> mother and tried to kill him.  She's since spent seven years in a mental
> institution.  Her claim to custody, if she intends to make one, would seem
> to be unlikely to succeed.  The most I can see a judge giving her is 
> closely
> supervised visitation, and if she gets that, she'll get to pay child
> support.
>
> Speaking of Teresa, Peter tells me that, when he and his friend went to 
> pick
> up his son two days ago, "we were told that she was 'curled up in a ball 
> in
> a corner of the basement' and unable to return to the mental hospital in
> Pueblo, 100 miles away per doctors orders."
>
> Peter Spitz now has his son and his son has his father.  Fathers and
> Families is proud to have helped that happen.
>
> 
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