Pattern of fathers
in Germany separated from their children
December 2006
Maloney Children in Germany, Separated from Father 17
Years
The family
The father, Clarence Maloney, was born in NY 23 Aug 1934, US citizen,
raised in India of missionary parents, PhD in South Asian Studies and Anthropology
(U of Pennsylvania), former professor in universities in USA, author of 10
books on people and cultures of South Asia, working as social scientist and
project manager in international development projects with USAID, World Bank,
other development organizations, and now almost retired; married to Shashi
Maloney (Indian origin), with our children ages 15 and 12. Address 308 Clagett
Drive, Rockville MD 20851, tel 301-315-8075, ct_maloney@hotmail.com
The mother was a German national, born in 1946; she had a psychotherapy
practice. She died in February 2006.
Three children were born: a son in 1981, a daughter in 1982, and another
son in 1987. I raised the children as a loving father until the divorce when
the elder son was 7 ½ years old.
At their request, the names of the mother and children are not given
here. However, I can provide all details and documents.
Marriage
The mother and I married in Dhaka, Bangladesh, in Jan 81, certified by
the US Consulate in Dhaka. I was working in USAID there and she came as a
tourist. She married me only to have children, and did not want a husband,
for which evidence is: 1) letters from 4 persons who heard her say that,
2) her brother's letter to me in 1989 that she has a “feeling against men”,
and 3) her aggressive frequent beating me during the marriage, and 4) her
photo album of the family, omitting all pictures of me till the last page!
It is clear to me now that she married me as a foreigner knowing that according
to Germany legal practice she could throw off the husband, keep the children,
and forbid the father’s access to them.
Actions to keep me out of Germany and away from the
children
I last saw the two younger children in Germany in Dec. 1989. The elder son
came to India and Bangladesh with me for Christmas, with the mother’s reluctant
consent, and in January 1989 I put him on the plane to Germany, as agreed.
We sat in the Dhaka airport restaurant, and he said, “Daddy, promise me one
thing. Will you stay and see me go up the steps into the airplane?” I said
surely, and did so. I got him on the phone one month later, and he only asked,
“Did you see me go up the steps into the airplane?” I said yes. Then the
mother hid the children, helped by the court in Miesbach, and I lost contact
with them for 5 years.
The mother issued a notice initiating divorce on 15.3.89. (despite the very
difficult marriage, I would not have initiated it). I was then in USA and
had no legal representation in Germany. Then I filed for divorce in Bangladesh,
finalized 24.9.91. The Court stated that the mother had absconded with the
children from the family home there. Germany recognized our marriage in Bangladesh,
but would not recognize the divorce there!
On Easter, 1989, I entered Germany to try to slip into Easter church
to be with the children. But the mother saw me and commanded me to “get out
of Germany and never return,” and I could not see the children.
On 28.6.89 the Amtsgericht Miesbach, Bavaria, on the sole representation
of the mother, issued an interim order (F 135/89) that the children will
stay with the mother and I am “forbidden to enter the flat”. The court ordered
that I must pay DM 3478 per month as child support— the mother hid the fact
that she had a medical practice.
On 21.6.89 the Amtsgericht München issued a Haftbefehl (order of arrest)
(München I: 2457 Js 168507/89) but I did not know it. The mother moved several
times and hid the children with the help of the court and Jugendamt (youth
department) as otherwise one cannot hide in Germany. In September 1989 I
entered Germany by train from Switzerland to try to find the children. I
was arrested at the border and put in Stadelheim prison, Munich, for 6 weeks
until I could pay DM 20,000. I was accused of not paying all the money ordered,
accused falsely of planning the children's abduction (about which the mother
had made the court afraid), and by manipulation of the mother falsely accused
of sexual activities. The mother had skillfully made many other false accusations,
that I am a “criminal”, “unstable”, “deviant” in behavior, “attacking” children,
etc. The Munich court ordered me to pay the money and get out of Germany
(though I had a residential permit), failing which I would be put in prison
for 18 months. In that court I had no chance to open my mouth!
I left Germany and took up a job with USAID in Delhi. I immediately paid
DM 8000 directly to the mother through her lawyer “to establish a good relationship,”
but she didn’t respond to my offer, but made more demands and false accusations.
I requested the court in Miesbach to grant joint custody. But on 15.11.89
it issued another order (F 135/89) giving custody to the mother, forbidding
my contact with the children, and demanding that I pay DM 50,000 from sale
of a house in USA in which she earlier had an interest— but this was a false
demand as I had already returned her investment with fair appreciation and
she had signed the house over to me! The pattern of lies was well established!
Within a few months the children were totally brainwashed against me— the
mother was a strong person, former top actress in Berlin, and psychotherapist,
and to live with her the children had to agree with her. She did this by
the known technique of “intensive suggestive questioning” (described in S
Clawer and B Rivlin, Children Held Hostage: Dealing with Programmed and Brainwashed
Children, Chicago: American Bar Assn., 1991). I had no way to contact them.
Under this influence the children (ages 8 and 6) made false accusations about
me to a judge in Traunstein-- while the mother was allowed to sit there to
hear it, and there was no child psychologist present. This became "evidence"
to the court and Jugendamt, but I was never interviewed. So I requested the
Miesbach court in my Application of 8.12.89 and again in a letter of 2.8.94
to order a full family study of these accusations, but it was not done. The
godmother of my elder son wrote to the Miesbach court insisting that contact
between me and the children must be maintained, but the court also ignored
that. It was very clear to me that Judge Edler-Golla of Miesbach from the
beginning only ordered all that the mother wanted. I had asked for joint
custody, but this judge's first words on entering the chamber were: "There
is no joint custody here" (not true).
On 18.12.89 the mother made the Miesbach court afraid that I would abduct
the children— though I had requested joint custody as I did not want to snatch
them. So that court issued another order that I should have no contact with
the children, also not through another person or organization.
I wrote many many letters to Judge Edler-Golla in Miesbach, the
Jugendamt,
and others, but got no reply. A Jugendamt lady visited the mother and wrote
down what she said, without contacting me or even talking to the children.
What a travesty of justice!!!
The court then ordered a Gutachen (study) by Max Plank Inst. which (wisely)
refused to take up such a case. The court then got a so-called “expert,”
Klaus Räder, a court hack, to make it, so I wrote him a 22-page history and
offered to travel to Germany or any place to personally meet him. He did
not reply, but interviewed only the mother—not even the children-- and wrote
down on 14.4.82 only her statements. What a further travesty of justice!!!
The court itself had helped the mother in hiding the children, and I
could not find their location. Only after a delay 5 years, on 6.7.94 the
Miesbach court gave its final order of divorce (F 135/89). I believe this
5-year delay was intentional so that the children would be raised only 100%
German-- in a dispute about children such delay is totally against justice
and a violation of the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child. This order
gave all rights to the mother and refused my requests for joint custody and
even for contact with the children. It repeated some of the misleading false
accusations made by the mother. It finally granted the divorce (disregarding
that I had already obtained divorce in Bangladesh) and ordered that I should
pay DM 3642 per month for child support (the mother had a psychiatry practice
but lied that she had no income). I could not pay this amount, but tried
for some months. Finally I stopped paying as I was not respected as the father.
The mother knew that by this means she could keep me out of Germany.
In April 1995 as I was in transit through Frankfurt airport, I was again
arrested and put in Stadelheim prison, for 4 weeks, till my wife in India
with extreme difficulty could raise DM 20,000. The mother told the Staatsanwalt
(prosecutor) lies—that I had come to abduct the children, that I had tried
to contact people to help me in that, and that I was such a dangerous man
I must stay in prison a very long time!!! (my lawyer was Wilfried Eysell,
of Munich)
Meanwhile I had appealed the order of the Miesbach court. The case came
up in the Oberlandesgericht (high court), Munich, while I was in Germany
in prison. I was told that the judge (Schönfeld Engelhardt) would interview
the children, so I gave him 3 letters with photos to put into their hands—
as I had no contact with them for over 5 years and didn’t know where they
were. But the judge told my lawyer that that the children did not want any
contact with me and did not want to get letters from me, so he returned the
letters to my lawyer! I later read the children's statements to the judge
that they didn't want any contact with or letters from their father-- the
result of total brainwashing for 5 years.
At the Oberlandesgericht hearing, the mother again made the court afraid
falsely that I would snatch the children. She said openly “I don’t want the
father to have any contact with the children till they are grown, then they
might want to know who he is.” The court did not contradict this demand—which
shocked me. This court (2 UF 1203/94, decision 19.5.95) upheld the order
of the Miesbach court, ordered me to pay all money including even alimony,
and denied my request for contact with my children!!
I wanted to appeal to the Constitutional Court, but was told by my lawyer
that it would be no use.
Further efforts
In 1995 after 5 years of not knowing where my children were, I somehow got
their address and other information. I contacted a father’s association,
Väteraufbruch für Kinder in Munich, which delivered a letter to my elder
son in school. But the mother complained to the court that I had tried to
contact them, and said the boy tore up the letter without reading it and
put it in the toilet.
The mother requested the local authorities to change the family name of the
children from mine to her. Despite my vigorous objection, the children's
names were changed- to help them forget their father!
Then I wrote many letters to the lawyers but was informed that nothing has
changed and nothing can be done. I wrote hundreds of letters to the American
Consulate in Munich, judges,
Jugendamt, Caritas, newspapers, former
acquaintances, the children's schools, etc, but got no help, I tried intervention
through the UN Rights of the Child, but found that individual cases are not
taken up. I filed a long application with 44 attachments to the international
Covenant on Civil and Political Rights in Geneva, but the case was not taken
up. The US Consulate called the mother but was put off and made no further
effort. I have a stack of documents representing my efforts nearly 1m high.
Parental alienation syndrome (PAS)
The children were totally poisoned within 8 months of separation to make
false testimony against me, and in the following years have become hardened.
The mother is so strong that they could only live with her by agreeing with
her. After I got their address, all my efforts to contact the children by
letter or another person were thwarted with a vengeance by the mother. They
did not get my letters, or they refused to read them. One time through a
contact I got a birthday letter with $100 put into the elder son's hands.
The mother complained to the court, and said the boy refused the money and
she had sent it to my lawyer. But she lied, as the lawyer did not receive
the money. Several people wrote me repeatedly about the mother's lies and
deception and what she has put on the children.
However, once I got the phone number, I started phoning. When I first got
the elder son, then 14, and identified myself, he just said, “If you call
me again, I will kill you!” He repeated that 4 times, even as he turned 18.
Usually on hearing my voice he just put the phone down. I got my daughter
a few times, but she would never speak to me. I got the younger son a few
times, and earlier we spoke nicely, but later when I would reach him, he
would say “shut up,” ”schwein,” (swine) and “aslo” (ass). When I got the
mother she abused me or slammed the phone down.
In 1997 I asked a German lady acquaintance to try to meet my daughter
at her high school. My daughter told the lady that she had class and would
come in an hour. Then she came out with the mother! The mother shouted, “These
children have no father!” and physically dominated the lady, who could make
no further effort, and wrote to me of the “massive influence” of the mother,
and her “accusations against me which she cannot prove”. I have several other
letters about the mother's constant lying and deception, that she gave false
testimony to courts on other issues, and that she is “raising the children
in lies.”
In 2001 a lawyer in Berlin, Holger Partikel, investigated the case and after
reading all the documents and many inquiries, wrote all 3 children and the
mother asking if there was any reason for them to reject me as father. They
did not cite any, but rather threatened the lawyer! He then wrote them again
asking them to open up and recognize me as father. All 3 answered him only
with vile abuse and threats!!
This is the most severe case of PAS (parental alienation
syndrome) one can imagine.
Richard Gardner, psychiatrist, has clinically described PAS, now accepted
as a defined psychological and behavioral condition, in which a child taught
to unreasonably hate and fear the other parent, then takes it up as a campaign
and claims that his ideas are his own. Gardner pointed out the terrible pain
a loving parent endures when abused thus following the destructive brainwashing
of the other parent (most often the mother), and that such children have
no feeling of guilt about abuse of their own parent. Many such cases are
further discussed in Divorce Poison, by Richard Warshak (New York: HarperCollins,
2001).
Severe PAS has profound and damaging effect, often life-long, inhibiting
such victims from being able to trust and love others later in life. I fear
for my children, as all that I have read about PAS points to negative effects
on their lives.
Condition of the mother
The mother died in February 2006. She was a psychotherapist, but she
had a severe problem herself and had been a psychotherapy patient (of Dr
med Ingrid Lewandowski, Gmund, Tegernsee). Her two brothers, her step-mother,
and my elder son's godmother all broke off contact with her because of her
abusive manner, and wrote me so. She was an intelligent and striking person,
but at times very manipulative and abusive.
She had been a top actress in Berlin for 8 years, and had been married
but without child—her former husband wrote me at length of his terrible experiences
in the marriage. She then went into medicine and psychotherapy. She had married
me when she came as a tourist to Bangladesh, because she wanted children—but
she never really wanted a husband, and married a non-German knowing from
German custom that she could later throw off a foreign parent so the children
would be raised 100% German. During the marriage she had deep depressions,
sometime crying in bed all day. During the marriage, I sought psychiatric
or counseling assistance for the family 3 times, but when those professionals
started to work with her, she would deny that she had any problem and break
off the sessions.
The children and I had a beautiful relationship. Before the divorce, when
the elder son was 7 years old, she wrote me, then on a project in Indonesia,
that he "would suicide himself if you would not come in the next weeks” and
“[the daughter] is very unhappy” because I am away. But the next year she
turned them aggressively against me. Her brother wrote me in 1989 that the
mother “is unable to recognize anybody else than herself.” After the divorce
she wrote 35 long false accusing letters to all my relatives and friends
and even professional addresses too!!! Her intention was to "destroy your
social existence" and "destroy your career" (her words!!). She even contacted
my present wife to try and destroy this marriage. She would abuse whoever
calls the house about the children, and badly abused me when I got her on
the phone. One person wrote me: “Warum gräbt eine Ehefrau mit so tötlichen
Falschaussagen ihren Mann so tief ein, sofern sie nicht selbst etwas zu vertuschen
hat?” “Nimt es mit der Wahrheit nicht genau, auch dann nicht, wenn das Gegenteil
leicht beweisbar ist!!” “Setzt sich über Vertraege und gesetzliche Vorschriften
ohne Skrupel hinweg.” (Why would a wife dig so deeply with false accusation
of her man, except that she herself has something to hide? She doesn't take
up the truth, even when the opposite is more believable! She behaves without
scruple against court decisions.)
Pattern of fathers in Germany
separated from their children
It is now clear to all that Germany systematically conspires to keep foreign
(divorced) parents permanently separated from their children in German, to
make them 100% Germans. It is an international scandal. The German courts
routinely deny parental access, and sometimes order the children’s addresses
to be kept secret, in which they are supported by the
Jugendamt, the
court-appointed writers of “expert” Gutachtens, and the local administration
which changes the children’s family names to make them forget the father.
But the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child (ratified by Germany!) states
that children have a right to their identity and name, and parents and children
have right to enter and leave each other’s countries to maintain family contact.
This has become a substantial issue in USA, France, England, Poland, Turkey,
South Africa, and other countries whose citizens have children in Germany.
Even within Germany, joint custody is seldom awarded, and about half divorced
fathers find it impossible or difficult to be fathers to their children.
Now some 200,000 left-behind German fathers are demanding that the authorities
treat both parents equally. The Justice Ministry and the Ministry of Families
has a staff of radical feminists who feel that fathers have little role in
bringing up children.
I am only encouraged that there is growing international movement with vigorous
internet contact. A group of fathers conducted a hunger strike over these
issues in Berlin, and there was a demonstration against violation of the
UN Rights of the Child before the International Court in Strasburg. There
are several active yahoogroup sites where issues of children in Germany are
discussed and counteractions planned. There is an international outcry on
this issue, which will increasingly embarrass Germany unless this abuse is
corrected.
President Clinton took up this issue when he met with Chancellor Schroeder,
and though committees were set up, there is no progress in recognizing rights
of parents and children. Germany has been fined by the European Court of
Human Rights 4 times in recent years for keeping fathers away from their
children in German and out of the country.
Present situation
After I got my elder son's address from a father's group, we began corresponding-
but it was difficult as most messages from him had some barb. Finally he
agreed to visit me at my house in South India for 3 days, in 2002. When he
came, he was so filled with PAS that he didn't want me to touch him, stayed
in a hotel instead of in my house, didn't want me to circulate a photo of
him and me together, and left after 3 days to visit an old fort. I tried
to explain to him what had happened in this case, but it all rolled of him
like water off a duck's back. He seems to be doing well in his university
science work, but in personal relations I fear that he will have a hard time
in life.
The mother died in February 2006, and he did not notify me, though I
heard it from another source. We have had some correspondence, and in October
2006 he came to USA for a science conference and said he would visit me.
He did meet his 2 half-brothers and 2 half-sisters, but he declined to stay
in my house for more than a day. He still cannot call me Dad.
My daughter is studying medicine and now teaches nurses. She wrote me
two negative letters in 2004, then was silent. After the mother died she
wrote saying she went into medicine only to please her mother and it was
a wrong choice. I invited her to USA to continue her studies, but then she
wrote that she would rather not be in contact with me. I understand that
it is very very difficult for her to deal with what has happened.
The younger son finished high school in 2006 and evidently is beginning
study of science in university. I invited him to join our family in Maryland,
USA, and study here, but he didn't respond. Rather, he wrote that he would
inform me when he wanted me to write to him next!!
I hold the German Ministry of Justice and the
Jugendamt morally
responsible. The German State, as signatory to the UN Convention on the Rights
of the Child, should take responsibility through its family services to try
to correct the terrible PAS and brainwashing that the children have endured
for 17 years. The US consular offices should take this up with the German
Ministry of Justice. The European Court of Human Rights must persist in naming
Germany for its violations of fundamental rights of parents and children.
Germany should be pressured by the European Commission to abolish the Jugendamt,
which was set up during the Nazi period to give the state control over children
regardless of parental interests and therefore is an illegal arm of the state.
As for USA, it should ratify the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child.
Every nation in the UN has signed or ratified it except USA and Somalia!
Further, USA should take initiative to modify the Hague Convention on child
abduction, which now simply induces legal arguments from one country/parent
against another country/parent. It should be modified to establish a preference
for shared parenting as the standard, wherever in the world parents and children
live.
Clarence Maloney, ct_maloney@hotmail.com