PA - Venue Shopping

A major characteristic of a Parental Alienator is the use of "Venue Shopping". In order to carry out their campaign, an Alienator needs to find sympathetic enforcement parties to help them limit or stop the access of the other parent(s) to the children.

An Alienator will often have a history of filing reports with a variety of police agencies (local police, Sheriff's department, State police, Homeland Security, Border Patrol, etc) as well as with CPS. They will also repeatedly relitigate custody and visitation, utilizing every court possible.

In our case, Ken Shaw used many of the above tactics in order to harass, intimidate, and develop a fraudulent case against our family.

He began with filing a false report with the Kingston Police Department on December 22, 2012. According to Ken Shaw, a friend of mine showed up at the visit with her two sons (aged 7 and 11) solely in an attempt to kidnap my youngest daughter from him. The Kingston Police never bothered to contact either my friend or me for our side of the story - they considered Ken Shaw that unreliable.

When that attempt didn't succeed, Ken Shaw contacted Homeland Security, claiming that my friend had tried to impersonate a Homeland Security agent. The agency investigated, and considered Ken Shaw so unreliable that they dismissed his allegations.

Next Ken Shaw manufactured false allegations about Jon Massey allegedly staying at my house in violation of an order of protection, and contacted the local police department with his trumped up story. He managed to gain some traction with the assistance of CPS, until we secured judicial intervention from the Family Court judge. The judge stated that if he found out that any of the parties in the family court case were involved in the original complaints or ongoing action he would take punitive action against them, and then lifted the order of protection keeping Jon from the house.

Behind the scenes Ken Shaw continued to file false reports with the Kingston Police Department, usually revolving around incidents in which he had behaved inappropriately (a gross understatement) at visitation. It speaks volumes towards his (lack of) credibility with them that not only did they not bother to contact me at all - which would have been standard procedure if they took a claim seriously - but they eventually told me that I should secure a restraining order against him through the Canadian courts.

When Ken Shaw had no success with filing reports with law enforcement, he turned to CPS both in Canada and the United States. The Canadian agency closed both reports he filed without ever contacting me, indicating that they did not take his reports seriously.

The only agency that took any action was the United States CPS. Yet despite Ken Shaw filing a report that alleged abuse of all of my children, after interviews all of them denied any abuse, except the one child who had been consistently under his control and influence, my youngest daughter.

Coincidentally, the Kingston Police reported to the US agency that they believed that the child had been coached by the father and step-mother and that she wasn't credible or reliable.

Even the initial Family Court judge did not believe the allegations brought forward, and expressed that clearly in court Then he ordered a new psychologist to evaluate the situation with my youngest daughter.

The DSS attorney ended up being sanctioned $1000 because he deliberately ignored the judges orders to have the psychologist evaluate the situation BEFORE any other evaluations and interviews. Rather than comply with the judge, CPS subjected my youngest daughter to multiple additional interviews as well as a psychological exam (by the local psychologist who receives over $185K a year under his contract with CPS) prior to allowing the judge's expert to evaluate her.

The CPS caseworker even acknowledged that she had to order Ken Shaw to stop questioning my youngest daughter, because he admitted that he was constantly questioning her about his abuse allegations.

What is ultimately indicative of Ken Shaw's lack of respect for the court process is the fact that while there was an ongoing action in the United States court, he filed for custody through the Canadian court system, a clear violation of the Hague Convention which dictates jurisdiction in child custody matters.

And of course, while under oath, when questioned about this clandestine filing, Ken Shaw lied and claimed that he "didn't know" that he had signed not one but at least two separate petitions for custody through the Canadian court, all of them alleging abuse by me - something that had never been investigated by the Canadian agency, and that had not yet been adjudicated by the US courts.

It took the US Family Court judge contacting the Canadian court directly to stop Ken Shaw's action.

This venue shopping for a "sympathetic" court is reminiscent of Susan Carrington's case - she was awarded full custody of her children,  but then her ex-husband applied to a different court and seized custody in violation of the UCCJEA (Uniform Child Custody Jurisdiction and Enforcement Act) which is designed to try to prevent just this type of behavior.

As a futher "accessory" the Alienator will shop for a therapist or mental health professional that will provide them with the reports necessary to advance their expedition.

In our case, Ken and Mary Shaw first took my youngest daughter, in the fall of 2012, to a therapist who stated that there was nothing wrong with her other than needing to adjust to the abrupt change in her circumstances.

So then after the December 22 incident, they found a new professional, and on the intake interview they LIED about why they had custody, claiming that my youngest daughter had been taken from me due to physical abuse, rather than as a temporary placement while the Jon Massey case was being resolved.

The notes from the therapist even document that at every session, Ken Shaw would first give a report to the counselor of everything that I had allegedly done at the prior visit(s), then she would ask my youngest daughter about the report.

Ultimately, the final order stated that I would be allowed to send cards, gifts, and letters to my daughter through this counselor. So what did Ken Shaw do next? He removed her from counselling.

These behaviors are very similar to those of Dina Mackney in the Chris Mackney case. She found mental health professionals that would back her up, even though they failed to follow acceptable practices.

CPS engages in the same behaviors - they set up a stable of psychologists, therapists, counselors, and other professionals who provide their mandated service plan requirements. Often this is the sole or primary source of income for these individuals, so they become just another tool to give the documentation that CPS needs.

When an Alienator starts shopping, the only person getting bargains and deals is the Alienator. The other parent(s) and the children lose!

PA - Consider the Source

During the course of this case, CPS relied heavily on the testimony of Ken Shaw to repeatedly inflict personal attacks on the mother.

And Ken Shaw was more than happy to comply. After all, he had over the years developed an irrational hatred of the mother because of her refusal to maintain a relationship with him after she realized that he was a habitual liar, with substance abuse and anger issues.

The man had even told his own parents that she lived somewhere in Canada when he first introduced her to them.

Ken Shaw, at the urging and instigation of his attorney, has continued those attacks to this day, including attempting to throw false allegations out in the chat session of a radio interview conducted with the mother on Friday night. (See the "Here We Go Again" blog entry - episode 3 for details.) It is interesting that although he (or his cohorts) could have called in to the show and had their attempts broadcast live, they realized that their voices would be on air and possibly subject to further action (similar to episode 1).

Meanwhile, for those of you who aren't sure what to believe, maybe the following documentation will help you.

At one of the numerous hearings that was held in approximately April or May of 2013, the Judge ordered that the mother be allowed to bring a third party supervisor IN ADDITION TO her middle daughter when she had visits with her youngest daughter. Both Ken Shaw, and his wife, and his attorney were present at that hearing and heard the order from the judge. They actually objected to the idea and were overruled on the matter, so they were very aware of the judge's ruling and order.

At the very next visitation, Ken and Mary dragged the child out by her wrist and screamed and yelled at the mother, telling the mother that she was not allowed to bring anyone else with her at all.

This was an email sent by Ken Shaw to the mother:

Which demonstrates that he apparently was refusing to listen to and follow direct orders from the judge. After the mother sent him a copy of the court order permitting a third party in addition to herself and her other daughter, his wife Mary sent this fax to CPS (she had also been present in court when the judge issued the order):

It is obvious that either the two of them were gaming the system and pretending ignorance and stupidity, or...they aren't pretending...

This might explain part of the problem. In addition to Ken Shaw admitting that he himself regularly takes lorazepam and other medications for his alleged anxiety at a hearing in February 2014, he disclosed this information about his wife:

However apparently "long-standing mental health issues" that require three different medications are not "psychiatric". 

There is a similar personal admission by his son on social media documenting that he has "long standing mental health issues" in which he apologizes for "hurting anyone". (Although I would attribute the son's problems to the PA that Ken Shaw inflicted on both his sons in regards to his ex-wife.)

In the January hearing, under sworn oath, Ken Shaw gave this testimony:

He uses semantics to try to deny that he lied to the police. In fact, his testimony in front of two separate judges was that the child had told his mother that the dog had scratched her. He also testified that after he "suggested" that it was from the mother (without even seeing it), both of his mother and his daughter changed their story (although his mother, repeatedly cited as a source by Ken Shaw has NEVER appeared to testify).

This is his testimony from a hearing in this matter in February 2014 regarding the same incident:

Not to state the obvious, but a characteristic of lying is that you are unable to consistently report the same thing over and over again, because it is not grounded in reality and true memories. Ken Shaw demonstrated that less than a month later, he was unable to recall his prior testimony.

Next are two excerpts from his testimony - the testimony of an adult, 50+ year old man, about how he talks to and about young girls.

Neither episode is an appropriate way for a father or an adult male to talk about or treat young females.

what comes next is VERY interesting. In the "Gaslighting" blog entry I talked about Ken Shaw making false reports to the local police. Here is his testimony regarding that incident a year later, after initially claiming that he actually heard Jon Massey's voice because he was on speakerphone:

That last line from Ken was him stating that the youngest daughter heard it, not him. That he heard the mother's voice and that the child allegedly said she heard Jon Massey. This is a big change from his insistence a year prior that he heard Jon Massey himself, not only on that occasion but on others.

Another glaring example is the following testimony - which completely contradicts his subsequent reports:

When Ken Shaw made false allegations against the mother as part of his campaign of Parental Alienation, he repeatedly reported that he witnessed abuse. Yet this piece of testimony under sworn oath directly contradicts his reports.

Now here's where it gets interesting. There is this documentation that at the time he got temporary custody, he was $3K in arrears in child support.

And Ken Shaw's own testimony regarding child support and the fact that he stopped paying after his March 2011 support payment:

But somehow, despite the mother getting no moneys from him for support, Ken Shaw and his wife were able to post this to his Facebook page in March 2012.

Yet Ken Shaw claimed that he had "overpaid" the mother $3K, both in statements to CPS and in a formal notarized petition filed with the court.

Starting to see a pattern here?

Let's finish it up with this final piece of testimony from this oh so reliable source (sarcasm fully intended):

Here we have the testimony of this man who has admitted lying to the police, failing to pay child support, documented perjurer has demonstrated his own motives - a custody grab (and a subsequent filing for child support).

I think this speaks for itself!

PA - December 22

A confidante of mine, who was also a mentor to my middle daughter, decided to meet us at the movie theater in Kingston with her two sons - 7 and 11. (She and her mother had also gone to the same church as us - the one in which my youngest daughter was baptized, and her sons went to school with my youngest daughter and had played with her on the playground). She owned property in Canada and had to meet with one of her contractors later in the day about projects on her property. The plan that we had worked out with Ken was to go see Elf, then have lunch at Denny's and then go Christmas shopping at the stores around the theater and restaurant. She and her sons had never seen Elf, and she also thought that my daughter and I might be exaggerating how bad the situation was with Ken.

She showed up a few minutes late, and texted Maura - who went out and led them back to where we were sitting. When the movie ended, I tried to take Amelia's hand to walk her out of the theater, and Ken grabbed her and pushed me away and said "the visit is over". I asked him what the problem was, and he said "the judge never said you could bring anyone". I told him that the judge didn't say I couldn't, and at that point my friend stepped in and said that she would talk to him.

Mary grabbed my youngest daughter and dragged her by the wrist to the other end of the lobby, and my middle daughter took my friend's two sons into the same vicinity. However, whenever my middle daughter tried to talk to and reassure her sister, Mary would grab her by the wrist and pull her away.

I tried to talk to my youngest daughter to reassure her, and Mary pulled her away from me. At that point I told Mary that she was NOT my daughter's mother and that she would NOT keep me from my daughter and I pulled my daughter forward and reassured her and gave her a hug and told her that her sister and I loved her very much. My friend's younger son came over and told her, "Don't worry, it's going to be okay," and gave her a hug also.

Mary then grabbed my youngest daughter and dragged her over to where my friend and Ken were talking and demanded to see ID. My friend showed them her driver's license at which point Mary said "Let's get out of here!" and they dragged my youngest daughter out. We followed trying to get Ken to calm down and continue the visitation but he put my youngest daughter in the car and left.

We tried to file a police report regarding the incident, but they wouldn't take one. Later we found out that Ken and Mary had gone to the police station and claimed that we had stated that we were going to kidnap my youngest daughter, and that my friend had claimed to be with Homeland Security. (Based on a false report Ken filed with Homeland Security, she even had a Homeland Security officer and a Coast Guard officer travel over three hours to interview her, and they found no credibility to Ken's claims at all.)

PA - The Details

For more information on how Ken Shaw was able to get his foot in the door to get started on his destructive campaign of Parental Alienation, please refer to the Jon Massey Case.

A helpful resource to refer to if you are not familiar with PA is the Canadian Article on Parental Alienation.

It is somewhat ironic that this is one of the easiest articles to understand, as Ken Shaw is a Canadian citizen who has engaged repeatedly in false allegations and attacks on US citizens, and has been supported and endorsed by a United States Family Court and CPS branch, as well as a New York State based police department.

The attacks by Ken Shaw are definitively bullying, and almost a form of terrorism. Ken Shaw is pursuing the ideological goal of punishing myself and my family, and securing monetary benefit to himself. He has not restricted his actions to myself and my children, he has also involved multiple other US citizens, and engaged law enforcement and the courts in Canada to further his goals.

If you read the article cited above, all four factors of PA are present in our case.

Ken Shaw repeatedly used Contact Denial and Access Blocking to limit my ability to spend time with my youngest child, often despite court orders to the contrary. That included coaching her to hang up during court ordered phone conversations and walking out of court-ordered visitations either at the onset or before time was complete. We have witnesses and documentation regarding all of this, that CPS and the Family Court refused to hear. On visitation, Ken Shaw would continuously interrupt my conversations and activities with my youngest daughter and attempt to impose his will on her - telling her what moves to make in board/card games, what books to pick out to read at the library, etc.

The second factor, Unfounded Abuse Allegations, was also present. Ken Shaw began making allegations that I was abusing my youngest daughter within a few months of being given custody by Family Court. The irony is that he was "supervising" each and every one of the visitations where this allegedly occurred. The agency he initially reported to, the Kingston Police Department, not only took no action - they told the CPS investigator in Jefferson County and the Watertown Police Department that they believed that the child had been coached! Yet because these reports came in almost a year after CPS had commenced a case against us (see the Jon Massey Case), CPS proceeded against me full speed ahead. What is most telling is that Ken Shaw claims that he "witnessed" some of the alleged abuse and that he did nothing at the time. To be more specific, he claims that he witnessed an episode (or more) of abuse in the beginning of February, yet he never tried to report it to CPS until April. When Ken Shaw called his report in to CPS, he claimed that I had abused not only my youngest child, but also her two older sisters (who both denied all of it). Even the original Family Court judge stated that he "was very skeptical", that he "saw this happen in contested custody cases far too often", and at that point he wanted an outside psychologist to do an evaluation. Ken Shaw even went so far as to tell two other people that I had molested all my children, one of my friends, several of my students, and that my father had molested me. Additionally, Ken Shaw's testimony at hearings in January and February of the following year was so unbelievable and included his admissions that he lied to the police about at least one incident, as well as an episode in which he repeatedly lied at the hearing to a judge about another matter, CPS REFUSED to call him as a witness at the actual trial. On the other hand, I had people accompany me to each and every visitation, and I had also carried an audio recorder around during visitation - until CPS objected and the judge ordered recording stopped, and the witnesses and recordings can verify that I did not abuse or otherwise violate any court orders regarding my daughter. I find it rather coincidental that the abuse allegations did not even begin until after the CPS worker was informed that placement of my daughter in Canada was a Hague Convention violation as there was no allegations against me that constituted an imminent threat of danger to her.

Addition - April 2, 2015:
In reviewing all the documentation that we have, I just located some very important pieces of paperwork regarding Ken Shaw's false allegations. 

The first is a report from the Canadian version of CPS that he made on December 28, 2012. He claimed that I was being emotionally abusive to my youngest daughter during the visitations. The Canadian CPS report clearly states that they weren't going to act on his claims, and closed the case. This is critical, because later on, when he opens a case with the US CPS division and when he testified at two hearings, one in January 2014 and a second in February 2014, he claims that my youngest daughter told him (or his wife - depending on the version he remembers at the time) on the night of December 26, 2012 that I had sexually molested her in a hot tub (while he was present and watching us, as well as there being three lifeguards, my middle daughter, a family friend, and several other families, one of whom shared the hot tub with us.) Yet in the report of December 28, there is no mention of anything about sexual abuse.

Then there is a second letter from the same agency indicating that they once again became involved with Ken Shaw's "family" on February 19, 2013. This was a few days after a visitation in which Ken Shaw screamed and swore at my middle daughter and I in the middle of a crowded movie theater. Once again, in the letter dated April 22, 2013, the agency states that the Kingston Police are not making any charges based on their interviews with my youngest daughter. As a point of interest, the police never even bothered to contact me for my version - which indicates how strongly they felt the reports were false. The Canadian CPS agency once again closed the case, also without ever contacting me.

Factor three is Deterioration in Relationship Since Separation, and it follows that since Ken Shaw had done everything that he could to interfere with and damage our relationship, this occurred. From birth until the false allegations of Ruby, my youngest daughter had lived with me in the same house, going eventually to the same schools, and had regular contact with her siblings - every day with my middle child and Ruby, at least once a week with her older brother, and at least once a month with her oldest sister. But due to the actions of CPS and the judge, she was no longer allowed ANY contact with her oldest two siblings, and her contact with my middle child was limited to when I was allowed to see her. She was ripped away from her friends (who live in houses on either side of ours, her school that she had attended for three years, and her pets) by the actions of the judge and CPS. The judge decided (as a result of Ken Shaw's deliberate vicious attack on my middle child at a visitation in 2013) that my middle daughter would no longer be allowed any contact. And as a result of Jon's wrongful conviction and subsequent suicide, the judge terminated all my visitation.

Finally is the Intense Fear Reaction which has been repeatedly witnessed by those who were accompanying me to visitation. However, my youngest daughter was not responding to me with fear, but rather to Ken Shaw. This was huge - my youngest daughter has always been eager to please and very compliant - which got her in trouble a few times at school for "following the crowd". What was witnessed repeatedly by the multiple individuals who accompanied me to visitation (including a psychologist who was hired by the court) was that my youngest daughter repeatedly looked to her father and/or step-mother for permission to answer questions or to engage in activities in a way that indicated worry and/or fear. When Ken and/or Mary Shaw moved suddenly or began to speak, she would flinch or get a startled and scared look on her face. But CPS did everything they could to discredit all my witnesses at trial, even the psychologist that had been hired by the court and was considered an expert in these matters in much of Central New York.

Additionally, Ken and Mary Shaw made it clear that they were stalking the social media profiles of everyone who came with me on visitation - often continuing with this behavior long after the visitation.

I'm sorry that I can't give more specific details at this time, however we are heading into appeal and have found that after every hearing and trial, the testimony of the prosecuting witnesses changes to reflect what they have learned from the previous court action.

If you had never heard of PA (Parental Alienation) before - the link at the beginning of the article is a good starting point, as well as the link given in "PA - The Most Recent Chapter".

PA - The Most Recent Chapter

For a view on how we got to this point, visit the Jon Massey Case.

As a result of the direct actions of CPS, the DSS attorney, Ken Shaw's attorney, and Ken Shaw, the judge's disposition specified that the only contact that I was allowed with my youngest daughter was to send letters, cards, and gifts to her through her counselor.

Given Ken Shaw's track record for ignoring the orders of the judges in this case, even when they are written orders, I had to wait until I had a copy in writing to start sending anything to my daughter.

I sent out the first package for her November birthday, and received no response or acknowledgement from the counselor (supposedly a "professional") that it had been received.

So before Christmas I made a phone call to the counselor to check on the status of the first package, and whether or not the counselor still saw my daughter - and received no return call. A few days later I made a second call, thinking that the first had been overlooked.

At that point, apparently the counselor called the DSS attorney, and he contacted my attorney. The DSS attorney informed my attorney that the counselor was no longer employed by the agency in question and that I was to send packages directly to the agency where my daughter allegedly was receiving counselling. I have a letter from the DSS attorney to document.

This whole process took several weeks, so I put together a Valentine's day package and sent it off in plenty of time for her to receive it before Valentine's day.

Imagine my surprise to have the package returned by the agency with a letter explaining that they "were not in a position to accept or forward the item".

The DSS attorney states in his letter that I can send items to the agency, the court order specifies that I am allowed to send "letters, cards, and gifts", and the agency claims that I am not allowed to do so.

So apparently Ken Shaw has either taken my daughter out of counselling to prevent me from contacting her at all, or he has presented the agency with "documentation" that I am not entitled to send her anything.

This is known as Parental Alienation, and Ken Shaw is a master at it. In forthcoming chapters of PA I will describe how he has used this with his other children in the past. He is also a master of deception in other areas and the blog will document how this is a pervasive behavior pattern with him and not just isolated to this case.

Stay tuned, this isn't over yet.