Faced with financial struggles, doubt and bias, a Greeley woman is fighting a difficult court battle to protect her young daughter from the man accused of sexually abusing her — her father.
Her story is just one example of the complex nature of Colorado family courts that advocates, lawyers and forensic experts are speaking out about.
Many advocates argue victims, most commonly women, often face injustice when seeking its opposite amid child abuse and domestic violence allegations. Legal workers, meanwhile, find caseworkers, judges, forensic evaluators, therapists and law enforcement officers lack essential training to make accurate determinations in family violence cases.
Mothers in domestic violence situations who report their child has been abused by the father typically face backlash and disbelief, according to Judi-Beth Atwood, a domestic violence advocate for mothers in Colorado. Usually, Atwood said, the mistreatment of women by those involved in the investigation leads to a costly and unjust uphill court battle for victims like Greeley resident Michelle, whose last name is being withheld to protect the identity of the child victim in this case.
“The mother becomes a lot of the time actually not believable and becomes the actual target of the investigation,” Atwood said. “So what’s been happening is that mothers are disbelieved. It’s been known throughout the United States that when these allegations are made, mothers lose custody. Nobody...
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