Penny Boudreau confessed to the crime and pled guilty to second-degree murder.  She was sentenced to life in prison.  She'll serve a minimum of 20 years at which time she becomes eligible for parole.

Ask yourself why, when there's a father available, she didn't turn to him to take Karissa?  No amount of concern about whether he would be a fit parent can make the decision to murder the child instead a sensible one.  And there's no evidence I can find that he wasn't fully capable of caring for his daughter.

So Penny, if you thought Vernon was such a catch, why not pick up the phone and ask Paul to take over care of Karissa?

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So Bazelon has sought and found a half-dozen or so well-heeled, well-educated single women who have had children either via in vitro fertilization or foreign adoption.  These women also have immense social safety networks.  They have friends and relatives who seem to be committed to helping out with childcare and the myriad organizational requirements that entails.  So, given comfortable incomes and reliable support systems, they seem pretty happy raising children without men around.

There are some problems with Bazelon's scenes of domestic bliss, though.  On the sixth page of her piece, she gets around to admitting that, according to the study she cites, 98% of single mothers believe it's either moderately or very important that their children have a male role model in their lives.  She doesn't mention how it happened that all of the women she interviews fall into the 2% who don't.

And, despite the length of her article, we never really see how these women conduct their lives.  There are a lot of close-in shots of children playing with dolls and mothers sitting around Chick-Fil-A, but little of the nitty-gritty of who's taking care of Lili while Mom's at work, or what happens when she has to work late, has to travel, is sick or a child is sick.  We never see these women at work.  An intelligent space alien reading this article would conclude that single-motherhood is, almost literally, a walk in the park.

Not only that, but the children of these families, while visible, are scarcely discussed.  Again, we see them playing and eating, but does Bazelon ever ask the older ones about fathers or men?  No.  Does she let us know how they do in school or how they relate to their peers?  No.  Does she suggest anything about the potential problems fatherlessness may pose as they mature.  No.  This article is all about the mothers and what they think and feel about raising kids without a father.  They think it's fine.

In fact, it's better than fine.  To have a man around would mean they'd have to "share that authority," i.e. over the kids, and that's a prospect that's "mostly unwelcome."  So we see again the maternal gatekeeper at work.  She's the one who decides how much input dads have into children's upbringing, and in these cases, it's none, regardless of the effects of that on the children.

And that's where Bazelon really runs into trouble.  She tries to branch out from the few women she interviews into social science on the subject of fatherless children.  Because as we know, social science has been quite clear for several decades at least, that father involvement is vital to children's wellbeing, and that it's absence is highly correlated with poorer outcomes for children.

So when Bazelon embarks on her project of convincing us otherwise, she's got a high mountain to climb.  Predictably, she doesn't get far.  To support her thesis that children of single mothers do as well as those of two-parent families, she cites a single study of 38 children of single-parent families.  And apparently it's unpublished since Bazelon provides no link to it and no citation to any publication.

Bazelon tries to recruit Sara McLanahan to her cause, but that's a non-starter.  If she'd read McLanahan and Sandfur's book "Growing Up With a Single Parent," she wouldn't have bothered.  In it, the authors stated that "the evidence is quite clear," that, regardless of race, education, place of residence, number of children in the family and occupation of the parents, children of single parents fare worse than do their peers with two parents.

Her treatment of McLanahan's work might qualify Bazelon for a job dealing a crooked game of three-card Monte, but not making principled social commentary.  In the space of two paragraphs she goes from saying accurately that lack of income is the greatest factor in the poor outcomes of the children of single mothers, to pretending it's the only one.  In fact low income explains about half their deficits and Bazelon prefers to ignore the other half.

Nowhere do we see the "social capital" on which McLanahan and Sandefur place such emphasis in children's outcomes.  Maybe that's because they state that deficits in social capital come about "first and most importantly" by father absence. 

And nowhere do we see the well-reported fact that fathers and mothers typically parent differently, with mothers being more verbal and restrictive, and fathers being more physical and willing to give children freedom to explore.  Much social science suggests that both approaches are important to successful childrearing.

Bazelon goes on to assert that these educated single mothers are better able to address the language and literacy problems so often seen in children of single-parent households.  Who knows?  That may be true although she offers the thinnest possible support for the proposition.  But even if it is, does she seriously expect us to believe that those are all the problems faced by the children of single mothers by choice?  They're not, and if Bazelon knows anything about her subject, she should admit it.  But she doesn't.

Of course, it is entirely possible for a single parent to raise a healthy, happy and successful child.  Bazelon may have found a few who are.  But to suggest, as she does, that all it takes is a good income, good friends and a healthy absence of men to give children an adequate start in life, is arrant nonsense, as huge amounts of social science show.

Maybe if The Times would send a reporter into Harlem or even Queens instead of Princeton, they'd get an idea of how the world actually works.  I won't hold my breath.

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Mediation is the process of turning over a legal dispute to an impartial third party - the mediator - whose job is to seek a voluntary agreement by the parties to resolve their dispute.  If that fails, the case goes through its regular judicial channels, but experience shows that mediation is enormously successful, and that people tend to be happier with its results than they are with litigation.

There are many family attorneys who behave respectably, professionally and with integrity.  There are many who don't.  When one spouse files for divorce, the level of conflict, mistrust and bad feelings in the marriage is often high.  Divorce lawyers can easily use those bad feelings to turn what could be a relatively peaceful parting of the ways into a take-no-prisoners war.  The more conflict there is, the more motions and hearings are required; and the more motions and hearings, the higher the fees. 

But the anger engendered by divorce often far outlasts the legal process itself.  The lawyer moves on to the next case, but the ex-spouses remain at each others' throats.

So mediation, which seeks to - and usually succeeds at - reducing conflict, should be, in my opinion, a mandatory first step in the divorce process.  If spouses begin the process of divorce on the most amicable footing possible, they're more likely to continue that way than if they start with the flame-thrower.

The Minnesota experiment is good for starters, but it intervenes later than it should.  When a divorce case is filed, route it immediately to a court-appointed mediator.  If that resolves the matter, everyone - spouses, children, courts and taxpayers - will be better off.  The only ones to suffer will be the divorce lawyers and who cries for them?

Help, Resources for Dads The National Fathers' Resource Center is a division of Fathers For Equal Rights, Inc. (FER), located in Dallas, Texas, with offices in both Dallas and Ft. Worth. In existence for over three decades, it has services and resources for dads nationwide and is one of the largest and most active fathers' rights organizations in the U.S. www.fathers4kids.org

But that's no surprise for a guy who puts the Abu Ghraibesque picture at the right on his blog and who urges us all to "raise a glass" to the woman who some would argue belongs in prison.

You go girl! 

Help for Alabama Dads The Springer Law Firm has specialized in handling divorce, child custody, and post-divorce modifications for over fifteen years. Contact the Springer Law Firm in Birmingham, Alabama at (205) 933-7070, or email them at Stewartspringer@aol.com.

So, rather than appear in court, Australian Melinda Stratton kidnapped her son and fled the country, or so says this article (The Australian, 2/2/09).  Apparently she's made serious allegations against the father that the New South Wales Department of Community Services investigated and found to be meritless.  Read about it here (The Australian, 2/3/09).

I don't know the facts of child custody in Australia.  If child custody there has "tipped dramatically" toward fathers, it's sure different from the United States where only 16% of child custody goes to dads.  GlennSacks.com has several Australian readers, so maybe they can send us some data on who tends to get custody in the Land Down Under - mothers or fathers.

But let's assume for a moment that every word Melinda Stratton said is true - that the government's "regime of shared parenting has given power to fathers at the expense of mothers."  First, is that a bad thing?  Second, is it reason to violate criminal and civil laws, and deprive your son of his right to a father and his father his rights to his son?  Why not just do what millions of fathers have done over the decades - be the best parent you can be under the circumstances because the wellbeing of your child comes first?

These are not rhetorical questions.  They demand answers, and not just of Melinda Stratton.  Of course few mothers take the radical action of kidnapping their children and going into hiding.  But Stratton's action is just the extreme end of an entire spectrum of maternal power over the rearing of children.  That spectrum includes the behavior of millions of mothers.  It includes everything from the completely legitimate to the criminal.  It includes everything from "Dear, if you fasten the diaper that tightly, it may make a rash," to kidnapping and child injury.

We're coming to find out that one of the major impediments to men's parental rights and responsibilities is the unwillingness of many mothers to make way for them.  For all that mothers complain about fathers' lack of involvement in childrearing, we now have strong evidence that they are a major barrier to that involvement.  That, plus popular culture, plus the family court system, form a triumvirate that pretty much guarantees the sidelining of men in everything related to children, from infant care to custody of teenagers. 

As I've pointed out before, quoting former NOW President Karen DeCrow, if women are to gain power in the workplace, they will have to cede power in the nursery.  And, in her own words, that is precisely what Stratton refuses to do.  So in addition to its denial of rights to her son and husband, Stratton's action militates against women's workplace equality.

Let no one be confused:  actions like Melinda Stratton's not only abuse fathers and children; they strike a blow against sexual equality too.

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In this case the father, Ralph Lowery, Jr. was actually entitled under Illinois law to notice of the adoption and an opportunity to contest it.  That's often not true.  Many states go out of their way to circumvent fathers' rights in cases of adoption, usually via the enactment of putative father registries which they then neglect to publicize.  But here, Lowery supposedly had the right to stand before a judge and try to convince him/her that he should have custody of his child.  At least one court in Illinois said so.

But even that didn't matter.  Lowery never got the chance to convince a judge of his love and ability to care for his daughter.  Why?  Because the mother, Krystal Fulton (pictured) took his rights into her own hands.  She decided to place the child for adoption, telling Lowery that it was stillborn and the adoption attorney that she had been raped by a stranger.  Fulton also didn't tell her own parents about the child until she had been sent to live in South Carolina with her adoptive parents, Mark and Mary Boepple.

As soon as he found out the truth, Lowery hired an attorney in Illinois, where he and Fulton lived, to try to get custody.  The Illinois courts ruled that he had been wrongfully denied notice and an opportunity to establish custody, but South Carolina courts disagreed and ultimately prevailed.

As the Register Star article says "Lowery said he would have never given up the baby if it were his choice and would have loved to raise her."  But in this case, despite what Illinois law says, it wasn't his choice.

What happened in this case happens often when fathers' rights are involved - they're exercised not by him but by the mother.  Krystal Fulton lied to Lowery, lied to the attorney and lied to her own parents, all for the purpose of depriving Lowery of his child.

And if you think that's laying it on a bit thick, consider this:  Fulton said, "I knew what he (her son) had to go through without a dad, and I didn't want that for my daughter."  But of course, had she told Lowery the truth, her daughter would not have been fatherless; Lowery was there and wanted to raise her.  What Fulton doesn't mention is that if she'd given the child up and Lowery had gotten custody, she could well be on the hook for child support.  So she took matters - meaning Lowery's parental rights - into her own hands.

Again, as in all these cases in which the fathers' rights are shoved aside to pave the way for adoption, two terrible wrongs have occurred.  The wrong of lesser importance is that Ralph Lowery's parental rights have been sabotaged by the mother of his child.  That's a terrible wrong, but Lowery is an adult and he can have another child if he wants.

The greater wrong has been done to an unknown child somewhere, a child without parents, a child who needs to be adopted, a child for whom Mark and Mary Boepple would have been a godsend.  But that child will never know the Boepples because they have Ralph Lowery's little girl, a child who had a father who wanted her.

There are always more children in need of adoption than there are adoptive parents.  That means that Krystal Fulton not only took a child from her father, she took parents from a child somewhere who needs them.

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As I've said before, we live in judgmental times.  People in this country are taught fear every day - fear of crime, fear of terrorism, fear of African-Americans, Muslims, homosexuals, you name it.  Juries bring that mindset with them into the courtroom and, when faced with a murdered woman and a young black defendant whom an expert hired by the state swears must have done the crime, they readily convict.  Read about it here (MSNBC, 1/30/09).

In vain does the defendant's lawyer explain that odontology, the "science" of identifying bite marks, is pure junk.  In this case, the defendant was actually missing a tooth that the biter had.  But the "expert" witness said Stinson was the killer anyway and the jury ignored the obvious.

Thanks again to the Innocence Project for setting this man free.  I know Stinson is glad.  But think about it; if you're 44 years old or older, what we're you doing between the ages of 21 and 44, the years we used to call our "prime?"  Did you finish college, marry, start a family, start a career?  Did you learn the mysteries of childrearing?  Did you mature in your career from a novice, to become experienced and then highly knowledgeable in your field?  Did you see your children grow up and go off to college?  Did you begin to mentor younger men or women?

During the time you were doing all that and so much more, Robert Lee Stinson sat in prison and learned the lessons you learn behind bars.  Now he's free, but his prime years were taken from him by a jury taught to fear and a prosecution that cared more about wins ("kills" in the parlance of the DA's office) than about guilt or innocence.

And of course, for those 23 years, the real killer has walked free.  Now that's something to be afraid of. 

To those who say that boys this age aren't injured by their sexual abuse by women, please note that one school official said, "'The child is suffering from psychological issues and is being seen by a counselor.'"

Whatever turns out to be true in the end, it's worth noting that the State of California seems inclined to throw the book at Lopez.  Dozens of charges ranging from aggravated sexual battery to child cruelty to unlawful sexual intercourse with a minor, and bail set at $2 million all sound like taking this one seriously.

Of course we don't yet know what happened or her side of the story.  And the State of California may decide that a few months of probation is sufficient "punishment."  Who knows?  It's far too early to draw conclusions, but right now it looks like the sentencing discount may have been suspended in this case.

Because she's Hispanic?

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I know the Super Bowl is long past.  But we must take our opportunities to celebrate where we can, and this is one of them. 

Friends, we have successfully passed another Super Bowl Sunday without a massive spike in domestic violence, by testosterone-poisoned men against their wives and girlfriends.  Indeed, it seems that the peddlers of that particular myth seem disinclined to continue hawking it to a public that's not buying.  To learn about the birth, short life and timely death of the Super Bowl DV myth, click here.

I'd like to say that it joins a long line of other myths about male perfidy that have been disproved and discarded.  But in fact it only joins a long line of myths about male perfidy that have merely been disproved.  Most are still clung to regardless of facts, logic or common sense.

To cite but a few, only 2% of rape claims are false, men perpetrate 90% of DV, the wage gap is caused by sex discrimination, 24% of women will be the victims of rape or attempted rape during their four college years, divorce makes men wealthier and women poorer, and on and on from nine million women burned as witches in the Middle Ages to contemporary nonsense about Venutians and Martians, the myths hang doggedly on.

They do so because they corroborate the preconceived notions of a lot of people whose worldviews seem to depend on them, and so can't stop preaching the 'men bad/women good' gospel to the rest of us.

So whether you were backing the Cardinals or the Steelers, give a cheer for the death of one of the sillier myths of recent times.

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The article has some good information in it and some misinformation.  For example, it tells us that there's only been one case of parental kidnapping in which the parent didn't regain access under the Convention.  Then it goes on to tell us about two.  And neither is about a third case I wrote about on this blog - the case of British professor Martin Boyle.  So their figures are a bit dicey.

More importantly, it doesn't tell us about cases in which the kidnapping parent simply can't be found, like the mother who abducted her son from Maryland and kept him in Mexico for ten years.  That's also been reported on this site.  The Hague Convention procedures obviously can't affect those cases and the figures in the article don't reflect them.  And the article doesn't mention them, so it's misleading that way.

But it has value.

Help, Resources for Dads The National Fathers' Resource Center is a division of Fathers For Equal Rights, Inc. (FER), located in Dallas, Texas, with offices in both Dallas and Ft. Worth. In existence for over three decades, it has services and resources for dads nationwide and is one of the largest and most active fathers' rights organizations in the U.S. www.fathers4kids.org