Changing Your Name Or The Name Of Your Child In Court - Lift: Fill & Download for Free

This answer is a rough one to read, so bear in mind that I’m responding to a request for a ridiculous outburst in court. Because of client privacy issues, all names have been changed, and I will never, ever share the real names with anyone except for the management team in my firm.During my time as an attorney, I’ve represented parties in what California calls “Juvenile Dependency.” This means it’s a case where a child has been abused, neglected or molested, and the judge in the courtroom assigns cases to the attorneys based on whatever method he or she chose to put in place in court. At the time I was assigned to this case, I had been practicing in this field for a good 10–12 years of my 21 years practicing law. I arrived in the courtroom and the judge told me, “Good Morning, I have a case for you.” I asked for the paperwork, which generally has a social worker’s narrative on the basics of who what when where why and how. I’ve read thousands of these reports, and after practicing that area of law for so many years, one becomes convinced that they’ve seen it all and nothing is shocking. Let’s put it this way, I read the book called, A Child Called “It” and shrugged thinking, “I’ve seen worse.” and thought the author whines a lot.As I read the report for my new case, my jaw dropped. I could not believe what I was reading. This case involved a large family of aunts and uncles, cousins, siblings, parents and grandparents all engaging in sexual intercourse with each other. The children didn’t see anything wrong with it, they laughed and thought it was hilarious. One child explained to the social worker, “It ain’t bad, there’s no outsiders doing us, it’s just family and it’s how we do each other.” What finally brought the case to the authorities was a teenage boy in the family was home, and an uncle had taken him, tied him to the footboard of the bed and was in the midst of sodomizing him. His brothers came home saw what was going on and laughed hysterically, pointing at the boy, holding their stomachs from laughing so hard, and laughing that the uncle just kept going on with no problem until he was done. The victim was upset, and crying about the event the next day at school, so was sent to the school psychologist where he spilled the beans.The parents were charged with failing to protect their children, sexual abuse, emotional abuse, physical abuse, etc., and they asked to set the matter for trial, denying all allegations. In preparation, there was a lot of work to be done. There were physical assessments, forensic examinations, education assessments, psychiatric evaluations, witness statements, victim statements, police reports, etc. There was absolutely no way I would allow myself to do a poor job on this case, it truly was the worst incest case I had ever seen in my life, so I really put everything I had into protecting these kids, and doing endless work on it.Finally, the trial started, and no settlement could be reached despite showing the parents all the evidence we managed to put together, which was astounding. The trial took a good 6 days to hear, which, because of the lower threshold of the evidence required in Dependency matters, (clear and convincing as opposed to beyond a reasonable doubt for you legal types) was a tremendously long trial. When closing arguments were being made, I put together the allegations made, the witness statements, the supporting evidence, I applied the law to this and asked the court to find these various allegations true. The way I put it together it was like mental yoga, but I made each argument as cleanly and concisely as possible. However as I made my arguments, one of the grandmothers was sitting behind me in the audience, and as I put the arguments together and articulated my points, she continuously stated aloud, “You a lying bitch!” “That’s not even true!” “Judge, she’s lying.”Each time she did that, she broke my concentration, and I was concerned I might miss stating a relevant fact, presenting a statement a witness made, or not making an accurate citation of the applicable laws. If I lost this case, I would take up an appeal; if I won, the parents were sure to appeal, so a complete and tidy record had to be made. There’s no retrying this case. Worse, the children may be returned to the household and suffer further abuse. I asked the court to instruct the audience to respect the decorum of the courtroom, which in other words, was to ask the grandmother to shut the hell up. Despite the court’s instruction, Grandma kept providing her commentary, and the court kept obliging her.Out of frustration, I stated, “Your Honor, I am still being distracted and interrupted by a family member in the audience, it’s very difficult to continue with these constant interruptions, so I’m asking the Court to order silence.” The Judge looked at me, smiled and said, “Ms. Ackman, you are a very good attorney, and you will just have to tune her out and keep going. Your record will show what it will show.” I sucked in my breath, and continued my closing argument by firmly saying, “Your Honor, this is a very serious case. The witnesses have testified, and the experts have written reports affirming that this cycle of incest, random intercourse and sodomy has continued for six generations of this family’s history…”Again, Grandma jumped up, leaned forward on the railing that separates the working part of the courtroom from the audience, and declared, “Judge, the lawyer LIES! It’s only been 5 generations!” Again, my mouth dropped open, and I was about to lose it. Unbelievable! She nailed the coffin shut for me, yet in my irritation, I said, “Well, I’d suppose that makes it better for my client, Your Honor.”The ridiculousness of having to try a case, handling it like delicate verbal surgery all while wanting and needing to protect these children was securely wrapped up in a nice little package by Grandma’s breaking of decorum in court.The judge then stopped everything and had a discussion on the record with Grandma. (Which does take place in Dependency court very often. These courts, because they focus on child protection have a lot of leeway. Most judges will sacrifice form to get to the bottom of the issue because child safety is involved.) She started by saying, “Mrs. ABC, you say it was 5 generations while Ms. Ackman and I counted 6, can we go through these to make sure I have it right?” Mrs. ABC went through the whole generational line of who did what to whom, counted everyone up at the end and said, “I guess she was right, it was 6 after all. I didn’t think the kids were a generation.”Meanwhile, Mom and Dad looked at Grandma like they wanted to choke her. In turn, Grandma thought she was helping her son and his wife by correcting me, when they wanted the whole thing to be dismissed. Both parents’ attorneys made some rubbish argument about for the intercourse count to be sustained, the act had to be for sexual gratification, and here there was no sexual gratification involved, it was just goofing around and playing. The children weren’t traumatized because they saw it as one of those funny things family, but not outsiders do to tease one another. I swear, if I wasn’t holding my trial binder so tightly, I would have been throwing punches in the air.In the end, the court sustained all the allegations the county levied against the parents, even changing some of the wording to make the language more damning to the parents. The parents were ordered into a long and difficult rehabilitation program for both victims and perpetrators of sexual abuse. The children were detained from their parents and placed in separate special foster homes (There were four children involved, I agreed to represent only one child, anticipating a conflict to emerge, which did when we found out the children were performing sex with each other. It’s impossible to protect a perpetrator’s best interest while also representing the victim. This is called a legal conflict.) to protect them from each other. There could be no other children in the home where the children reside, for everyone’s safety. They received individual therapy for what’s gone on in their lives and received supervised visitation with their parents and sibs until the therapists and social workers felt it was appropriate to come back to court to ask the judge to lift the monitor.All of this fell into place because Grandma felt the need to jump up in court and loudly correct me on the number of generations this horrific conduct took place. If that’s not a ridiculous outburst, (“It was only 5 generations!”) I don’t know what is. How that was going to make things better for the little ones, I will never know.

This happened about 60 years back. My mama (maternal uncle) was about 8 years old. He was kidnapped from outside the home, while playing with his friends. My nana (maternal grandfather) was already no more. My nani (maternal grandmother) was illiterate and had 3 daughters (including my mother), other than the son who was kidnapped. No male member in the house left after that kidnapping. Now, you can see the plight of the family. They desperately searched for my mama for several years. That was a different age, not the internet age of today. Whenever somebody gave some clue that he saw someone resembling my mama in some remote town, my nani would request some relative to go and search. This continued for several years. Till date, my mama has not been found. Nobody knows why he was kidnapped, whether by those running the beggars-racket or some criminal-racket. If alive, he would be about 68 years old today and nobody would be able to recognize him. Today, my mother is about 80+ years; both her sisters and her mother (my nani) have died. Even, by mistake, if someone mentions about the kidnapping of my mama, tears would start flowing from my mother’s eyes. That incident is etched in her memory. Permanently. She cannot forget it.That’s not all. After I was born, at a very young age, I got to see the worried faces of my mother and nani. So, since very early age, I heard about this incident hundreds of times. And, it perhaps helped me once. When I was about 8 years’ old, I accompanied my father by bus to the district headquarter. He had to handover some important documents at the residence of his boss, and had to immediately return by the last bus. It was already dark. In order to save time for catching the last bus, my father hired a rickshaw, and asked that rickshaw puller to wait outside the house of his boss. He left me too outside the main gate of the house. It was just a 2-3 minute work. Within a minute or two of my father having gone inside the house, the rickshaw puller lifted me and he forcibly started putting me in the rickshaw. The incident of kidnapping of my mama came to my mind at the speed of light. It scared me. I instantly shouted loudly. My father and his boss came out of the house hurriedly and that rickshaw puller ran away throwing me on the ground. I got saved from being kidnapped!I hope you see the context of my narrating these incidents as an answer to this question. Most of mob-lynching incidents in India in last two months have taken place on the rumours of child-lifting gangs.[1]The above two incidents took place decades earlier. However, India has not changed till date.Are you aware that every year about 2 to 3 lakh persons go missing from India? Most of these are kids. In most of these cases, the police would not even register FIRs.In 2012, I had filed a PIL in the Supreme Court in the name of the NGO, Lokniti Foundation, and argued it on various occasions in last 6 years. This PIL was for introducing DNA Profiling for cross-matching missing persons on one hand, and traced persons & unidentified dead bodies (UIDBs) on the other. For 6 years, the Government (and CBI) kept opposing this PIL on one ground or another, even though earlier they were themselves contemplating somewhat similar but had failed to take any action. Finally, on 1st May this year (2018), the Government assured the Supreme Court that it would table a DNA related Act in the monsoon session of Parliament. On the basis of this assurance given by Government, the Supreme Court disposed of my PIL. [Read the order.]A few days back, there was a news report that, finally, the Central Cabinet has approved the DNA Technology (Use and Application) Regulation Bill 2018.[2] I hope that, as assured, this Bill will be tabled in Parliament in the coming monsoon session and will be passed by Parliament. Of course, there would be the hurdle of the privacy brigade that this Bill has to clear.Why I am writing all this?Well, the fact remains that a large number of children are kidnapped every year from different parts of India. The number is not small, it is expected to be more than 2 lakh children kidnapped every year. Unlike the regular FIRs, there is no proper record with police of these kidnappings. Why? Because, many of such kidnappings are shown by police as “missing” children, wherein no FIR is needed. Disgusting as it may be, it is a harsh fact.During my tenure as DCP in South Mumbai, I had rescued several girls from prostitution racket. On many occasions, I personally asked some of those girls the names of their parents, their village / city. Most of them did not know. In fact, many of them did not know their own real names. Why? Because they were kidnapped as a child. They had no memory of their early age.So, how DNA Profiling can help? DNA Profile of every individual in the world is unique. Even twins have different DNA Profiles, unless they are identical twins. Further, DNA Profile does not change with age.So, what we wanted in the above PIL was preparation of DNA profile of all missing persons on the one hand; and, DNA profile of all traced / rescued persons and unidentified dead bodies (which are about 40,000 every year) on the other hand. A software can then automatically match them. Using this method, lakhs of rescued / traced persons can be united with their relatives. Tens of thousands of unidentified dead bodies can be identified and investigation conducted to know the reason of their death, which in many cases is murder. Moreover, if a person at least knows that he or she was kidnapped some 20-30 years back but is still in the net of prostitution racket or begging racket, he can give his DNA at the designated centres which can then help him/her getting united with relatives.So, justice can be done in many ways. This whole scheme was only on voluntary basis for those who are willing to give their DNA details. No compulsion. So, no privacy violation. And, this scheme was prepared in consultation with one of the premier scientific lab in the public sector, would have cost some 20-30 crore rupees per year only.For those who are not aware, DNA Profile of a missing person can be found from the clothes, comb, shoes, tooth-brush, etc., used by him/her before being getting kidnapped, etc. Secondly, DNA Profile of such missing persons can also be found from the blood sample of his/her siblings or parents. These are scientifically proven facts.At long last, the Government has agreed to implement the DNA profiling system. Provided the privacy-industry does not create further hurdles. Provided the Parliament passes the law.I have written all this, not by way of digression from directly answering the question, but by way of offering a solution to the mob lynching problem. This may not be a perfect solution, but is a part of the solution. It may not prevent future kidnappings of children, but it may help detect past cases of kidnapping / missing children. And, I can vouch from my police background that detection of an existing case generally helps in prevention of future cases, directly or indirectly.Let me come back to the original question. Most of the mob lynching cases in India, that took place recently, are due to rumours of child-lifting gangs operating in different parts of the country. Some of the rumours may actually be rumours, spread by WhatsApp messages. But, the fact remains that about 2 to 3 lakh children are kidnapped every year in India. Trust me on this – I have done enough research on this issue.In addition, we are aware that many kids are kidnapped for ransom too.And, I have no hesitation in saying that the police is mostly ineffective in all such cases.So, there is an actual fear in the mind of parents, relatives.Look inside your own heart. As a parent, as a brother / sister, you would not like your ward or sibling being kidnapped by someone.This fear operates in the minds of people in India. This is further compounded due to the fact that people have little faith in the Government and the police authorities.So, the moment there is a suspicion, people act immediately. They would nab the person and start beating him. Beating a person, beyond a limit, leads to death. Mob lynching. Unfortunate, but harsh fact of life.From my experience as a former police officer, I can tell you that even the best of persons can lose temper and start beating the opponent on slightest of provocation.Do you remember Shah Rukh Khan incident in Wankhede Stadium? Look how a superstar behaved?[3]Remember, another superstar, Saif Ali Khan, beating up a foreigner in a five-star hotel in Mumbai?[4]Recall Navjot Singh Sidhu, beating someone in road rage case, and that person died in the incident? Recently, our Hon’ble Supreme Court fined him with a princely sum of ₹ 1000 (and no imprisonment) for that incident that caused a death!!![5]The point is, even the best of persons can lose their temper when provoked. You can well imagine what would happen when ordinary persons, the common men and women, find that someone is trying to kidnap their child.Usually, it starts with beating the suspect. But, sometimes, it leads to death. As it happened in Navjot Singh Sidhu case too.Let me tell emphatically that I AM NOT SUPPORTING OR JUSTIFYING mob-lynching.I am merely analysing the “Why” part of your question. Why is there mob lynching in India?By all means, we must punish those responsible for mob-lynching as per the provisions of law, giving them benefit of right of self-defence, wherever (and if) applicable.I know some of you may not be satisfied with my answer. Some of you may be expecting me to utter a few words about “cow-brigade” or the beef-related incidents. Perhaps, that might have been the motive to ask this question.Well, while most of the recent mob-lynching incidents in India relate to fears of child-lifting gangs, I know some incidents have taken place due to suspicion of a person carrying or storing beef or allegedly smuggling cows for the purpose of killing them. If my information is correct, over last 4 years or so, about 10 to 20 such incidents might have taken place in India relating to this issue too.Before I answer that, let me refer to you a news report that I saw last week. Well, the heading of the news was: “Give me atom bomb, I'll wipe out Holland : Pakistan's rising Islamist politician Khadim Hussain Rizvi”.[6]Frankly speaking, after reading the heading, I felt that the newspaper has mistakenly mentioned Holland instead of India. Why would a Pakistani politician think of wiping out Holland?But, when I read the full report, I realised that he was thinking of wiping out Holland, due to some proposed competition of cartoons depicting the Prophet.Using atom bomb to wipe out the whole country because some stupid persons in that country wanted to hold a competition of cartoons?This is not a hollow threat. On 7 January 2015, 12 persons were killed and 11 persons injured in the office of Charlie Hebdo weekly newspaper in France because it had published a cartoon of the Prophet.[7]Do you get the message? This is extent to which people can go if you try to play with their emotions, their faith.In India, there are about 100 crore Hindus. Many of them consider cow as their mother. A few of them can resort to beating up a person carrying beef or smuggling cows with the suspicion of killing those cows.Let me tell it emphatically again that I do not support the mob-lynching for any reason, whatsoever. I believe that let the law take its course.But, what I am trying is to analyse the reasons.In the public transport buses, I have often seen written in Hindi, which translates to: “Passengers are themselves responsible for safety of their belongings”. So, we should try not to do something which can harm us. We should not play with the emotions or the faith of others.Mob lynching is absolutely unlawful. It is a crime. I condemn it whole-heartedly. Persons guilty of mob lynching need to be punished according to law.However, what I have tried to do in my answer is to analyse the reasons for mob lynching, as a student of criminology. Why does it happen?Nobody can understand it better than me who still finds tears in the eyes of his 80+ years old mother, 60 years after her only brother was kidnapped who continues to be untraced till date.Footnotes[1] Centre asks States to check mob lynching fuelled by child-lifting rumours[2] Cabinet clears DNA database on crime[3] Transcript of Shah Rukh Khan's Wankhede fracas - Times of India ►[4] https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/entertainment/hindi/bollywood/news/Saif-Ali-Khan-arrested-for-assaulting-South-African-businessman-released-on-bail/articleshow/11997481.cms[5] Road rage case: Sidhu acquitted of culpable homicide, fined Rs 1,000 for 'causing injury' - Times of India[6] https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/world/pakistan/give-me-atom-bomb-ill-wipe-out-holland-pakistans-rising-islamist-politician-khadim-hussain-rizvi/articleshow/64930191.cms[7] Charlie Hebdo shooting - Wikipedia

This answer may contain sensitive images. Click on an image to unblur it.Yes, I witnessed child abuse for my entire childhood. I know about it very well first hand.I was raised in a small town, Bloomsbury, New Jersey. My father was a partner of a general store named Sheets & Gardner along with Don Sheets. With my father being so well known in town, he was also highly respected.We lived in a row home on Willow Avenue and at the time I had five siblings. From the day I was born, my father did not like me at all for some reason and that I will never know. For my entire childhood, I was often physically and mentally abused. When I was younger, I was mostly just mentally abused. What my father would do is, take away everything he could that I enjoyed doing. One popular punishment my father would give me was, when I would be accused of something, I could not leave our property for a month and my father never backed off of a punishment for as much as a day even if it was proven that I didn't do what I was accused of.I loved to fish and there was a river directly behind our house. I don't remember how young I was but I must have been very young at the time. My mother would allow me to go fishing providing I wore a life jacket, and there was at least one adult there fishing. I also had to stay where my mother could see me at all times.I would go along the bank of the river looking for old fishing line a fisherman would leave there plus hooks and sinkers. Once I would find a roll of very tangled line, I would sit there and untangle it and then tie it to the end of a stick. I would then add a hook and sinker. At times when I couldn't find a sinker, I would search for a small stone that I could tie on my line. I must say, I did catch fish with my homemade setup.One day as I was there fishing, an older gentleman appeared and was fishing on the dock just over from me. All the sudden he said, "Jesus Christ! Your old man owns a Sporting Goods Store and you don't even have a fishing pole? I will go to my car and get one for you." I was in my glory. I finally actually had my very own fishing pole.When I returned to the house that day, I immediately placed my new fishing pole in the right-hand corner of the shed so I knew exactly where it was and I could easily grab it when I wanted to go fishing. I was ecstatic and that night at the dinner table I bragged about now having my own fishing pole.The next day as always, when I walked in the front door from school, I went right out the back door to go fishing. I opened the door to the shed and reached for my fishing pole but it was gone. I instantly started crying and when I went in the house telling everyone that my fishing pole was gone, my father said, "See that! You never take care of anything and that is exactly why I never gave you a fishing pole." I knew my father took my fishing pole but there was no way I could accuse him because I would have paid dearly for that.After I was able to be down at the river by myself and I had another fishing pole I would take my blankets and pillow down to the river and fish until very late in the night and then sleep there. Providing it wasn't raining, I would do this every night. When sleeping down by the river there was one rule. I had to stay right there all night and not go walking around town.It was still early in the summer and one morning when I walked into my house after sleeping down by the river my father said, "You are done sleeping out for the entire summer!" As a rule I would never question my father as to why on anything but this time I did and his answer was, "When I went to the post office this morning, someone told me they saw you running around town late last night." I then said, "Who saw me running around town?" My father replied with, "Well, no one really saw you running around town but I think you were so you can't sleep out for the rest of the summer!"My father and his partner delivered Sunday papers around town every week and if for some reason one of them weren't available on any given Sunday I was required to help. One Saturday Night my father told me that I was needed to help delivering Sunday Papers the next morning. I already had plans to camp out in a friends back yard so I asked my father if I could still camp out providing I take an alarm clock with me. My father insisted that I would oversleep and if I was to be late, I would be punished. I assured him I would not oversleep and would be on time so I went and camped out.My alarm didn't go off and I was 20 minutes late at arriving at the store. I was bitched out for the entire morning about how I am not responsible and how it is important that I be punctual, especially when me being late had an effect on another person. As usual, my punishment was a month in the yard. After I was finally free again and I went to visit my buddy that I had camped out with, his father said, "When you slept in the yard that night, early in the morning I saw a car pull up outside. Your father slowly walked right up to you and picked up your alarm clock!" That did not surprise me one bit.In the town we lived, every year all the kids would go "Tick Tacking" just before Halloween. Mainly we would just soap the windows of the houses and throw corn on the porches. My father had a brand new pickup truck and one morning as I was sitting at the kitchen table eating my cereal, my father came in the front door, walked up to me and with a flat hand across my face, flipped me backwards off of my chair. He said, "You have a lot of balls writing your name on the door of my new truck in soap!"I insisted that I didn't write my name on my father's truck in soap but he insisted I did. I was told to clean the soap off of the door of his truck and I was grounded for 30 days. Every morning there was a group of us that would stand out in the schoolyard waiting for the bell to ring telling us to go inside. That morning I mentioned what happened with my father's truck. Bob DeWire who is my brother-in-law today said, "Dale, I am really sorry. I wrote your name on the door of your father's truck and I will go down to his store right after school and tell him I did it."That evening when my father came in from work he said, "Bob DeWire came into the store today and told me that it was him who wrote on the door of my truck but still, don't think that is getting you out of this because it was your name so you are still grounded for a month!"Every year we went to my grandparent's house for Thanksgiving. My grandmother had a very large kitchen table, big enough that it seated 6 adults and 8 kids. There was always a rule in my house that when eating, you eat everything on your plate. On one particular Thanksgiving, I put too much food on my plate and when I said that I couldn't eat it all, my Father said, "You will eat everything on your plate." All of the women went out to the kitchen to clean up and there I sat.My father sat on one side of me and my uncle on the other side. As I was eating, my uncle said something to me and when I looked at my plate after that, there was a pile of food on my plate that I didn't put there. When I stated that I didn't put that on my plate, both my father and my uncle insisted that I put that food on my plate. Soon my father got my attention and when I looked at my plate again, there was another item on my plate. Again after I said I didn't put that item on my plate, both my father and my uncle insisted that I put it on my plate.Items kept being added to my plate as I sat there eating. Soon I looked at my plate and there was a pile of Chow-Chow on my plate. My father ate Chow-Chow often and I couldn't stand the smell of that stuff so I knew I couldn't eat it so I made it known that I could not eat that. Since I protested, they were now demanding that I eat the Chow-Chow. I put one fork full of Chow-Chow in my mouth and I instantly vomited all over the kitchen table. The women out in the kitchen heard me vomit and they came running in the dining room.I can't believe I had the nerve to do it but I told my grandmother everything that had happened. When it came to my father and my uncle, my grandmother totally ruled and man did she tear into them. She went up one side and down the other of them and made them both apologize to me. I think back about that and I bet it killed my father inside to have to apologize to me but he did.My father had a new home built and I was about 10 years of age at the time. As time went by I became more and more afraid of my father. Due to this, every time his car pulled in the driveway, I would go in the large walk-in closet in my bedroom and sit in the dark. I felt safe there. Over a long period of time, in total, I spent hundreds of hours in that closet.Being in that closet, I had a lot of time to think and even at that age, I was thinking at a more mature level than would be normal for one so young. One thing I thought about often was that one day when I have kids, I want them to come running to the door to greet me rather than hiding in a closet. I also told myself that I would never hit my kids for any reason.I am getting ahead of myself here but I want to tell of the results from my days of thinking in my closet as a young child. I raised three boys and I never as much as patted any of them on the butt and I will tell two stories of how I corrected my children.I had a coin collection on the top shelf of my bedroom closet that my grandmother had made for me. One morning I woke up and I instantly noticed that my coin books were out of place so I quickly went downstairs. I knew that the only one that could reach those coin books was my oldest son but I didn't want to come right out and accuse him so I said, "I want everyone of you to empty your pockets onto the kitchen table." My oldest son laid a pile of silver quarters on the table. I said, "You go to school so you aren't late but I want you to come straight home after school so you and I can have a talk." When my son came in from school that day, I had him sit straight across the table from me. I looked at him and said, "Do you have any idea how hurt I am? I have always considered you my best friend and I never dreamed that you would steal from me. Do you know how bad it hurts when your best friend steals from you?" By this time he was crying from feeling bad that he hurt me. I said, "You can earn my trust back but it is going to take a while. Going forward can I expect that you will never steal from me again?" As he was sobbing, he told me that he was sorry and would never steal from me again and I knew right then, he would never steal from me again. I gave him a hug and told him that I love him.My boys would sit on the living room floor right in front of the television every night. Their bedtime was 9:00 and one night when my wife told them it was bedtime, they just sat there. My wife again told them it was bedtime and got no response. I sat in my recliner and I didn't say a word. Finally at 9:36 I said, "I want all three of you to turn around and look at me right now!" After they were all looking at me, I said, "You all know your bedtime is 9:00 and your mother has been telling you to go to bed since 9:00. Here we are 36 minutes later and you still weren't listening so you are going to spend one hour on your bed for every minute you didn't listen. You come in from school at 3:00 and with your bedtime being 9:00, that is six hours of your punishment each day. Due to that, you will come in from school for 6 days and go straight to bed. You will be called down to have supper and then go straight back to bed.That punishment was given to my boys when they were rather young and going forward, no matter what my wife would tell them to do, they would do it immediately. I feel my way of teaching my kids to be obedient was much better than taking physical action to correct them.My father used nothing but wood to keep the house heated and he kept a lot of wood in the basement. One day he swept up around the wood piles and told me to clean up the pile he had swept up and take it back to the woods. I forgot! Shortly after that I went to my father's store and the first thing he said to me was, "Did you sweep up that pile in the basement?" I said, "I forgot but I will go home and do it right now." My father said, "While you are at it, I want you to take everything out of the garage, sweep the garage floor, hose the garage out and put everything back in the garage neatly. (we had a large double garage) When you finish that, take everything out of the basement, clean the floor real good and put everything back in the basement in a neat order. After that I want you to mow the lawn and make sure you do all of the trim. After that weed the garden and I better not see any weeds at all after you are finished. If you don't have all of that completed by the time I get home, you are going to get a beaten like you have never had in your life"When I went home and told my mother what he said, she knew it better be completed by the time my father got home and she knew I couldn't possibly complete it by myself. She rounded up two of my sisters and one of my brothers and we all worked our asses off that day but we got it all completed before my father arrived home. Once he came home, he never mentioned anything about all he told me to do.I was now 11 years of age and my mother worked. The older kids bus came before mine so at that time before school, it was just me, one of my one older sisters, one younger sister and me at home. My father did everything right on schedule and every morning he would return from the post office as I was eating my breakfast.Often my father would come in from the post office, walk in the kitchen, give me a straight hand across the face flipping me backward off of my chair. There was a breakfast bar right behind me and I would hit the back of my head on that before landing on the floor. Every time I would hit the floor, he would say, "You know what that was for!" I never knew what it was for but I wasn't about to question it.This part is going to be long but I want to include all of the details. One night my father and Harry Stopp went out to pick up a freezer. I was in my father's store that night and Ray Crisman came in. He looked at me and said, "What's your old man doing tonight?" I said, "He and Harry Stopp went out to pick up a freezer." Ray said, "They didn't go out to pick up a freezer. Every time your Old Man goes out with Harry Stopp, they go out to get drunk!" I insisted they went to pick up a freezer but Ray insisted they went out to get drunk.I believe it is important to tell you that at the time, I was in 6th grade and very small for my age. The next morning my father came in from the post office and gave me the flat hand across the face just like he had done many times before but this time it was different. That was only the beginning.As my father was kicking me in the face, head and back he was saying, "You have a lot of balls going down to my store last night and telling everyone I went out and got drunk with Harry Stopp last night!" As I insisted that I didn't say that, the beating continued. He lifted me over his head and threw me to the floor. Once I hit the floor, he again kicked me in the face, head and back. After he lifted me over his head again and throwing me to the floor, he said, "I am going to beat you until you tell me the truth and when you do tell the truth, I am going to throw you right through that picture window!" Due to that, I couldn't even lie and say I did it to get him to stop.My father again lifted me over his head throwing me to the floor. After that he continued to kick me in the head, face and back until there was blood splattered all over the kitchen. Blood was all over the floor, front of the refrigerator, front of the kitchen hutch and front of the breakfast bar. When he finally stopped, I was instructed to get a pile of towels out of the linen closet and clean up every bit of the blood. Then I was to take the towels to the laundry room and wash them. I was also grounded for a month. I was also told that if I were to tell anyone what he did to me, I would get it twice as bad.When I went to school that morning, several of my friends told me that I looked like I got beat up really bad. I insisted that I was just really tired. When my mother came in from work, I told her what happened and she was really upset about it but she was afraid of my father so there wasn't' anything she could do. All she did was give my father the cold shoulder for quite some time.The next night when my father came home from his store, he said to me, "Ray Crisman told me that you really didn't say that but I believe you did so you are still grounded for a month.The beatings and being grounded continued and now I was 17 years of age and I had a girlfriend. Her and I determined that if I were to get her pregnant, it would get me out of the house before my father would kill me so that is what we did.After my girlfriend was pregnant, I told my mother one day when my father wasn't home. My mother said, "I don't want you anywhere near this house when I tell your father." The next day I walked in the door and there stood my father. I can remember exactly everything he said to me. "What are you going to do now that you have your girlfriend knocked up? I raised 7 kids and you are the only one that turned out to be no good. You are a bum! You have always been a bum and you will be a bum for the rest of your life. You will never have an education! You will never have a good job. You will never own a home and your marriage won't last even a year. I hope you plan on going out and getting a full-time job right now because I am not supporting you and your family."We got married on May 28, 1972 and I got a job working at a truck stop 12 hours a day, 7 days a week.My father was the secretary of the local Rod & Gun Club and was the head of the committee for a 20 week club and the day before Labor Day, everyone that purchased tickets to the 20 week club were permitted to go to this big picnic the day before Labor Day! On Labor Day, there was always a big party at my father's house with all the leftovers from the 20 week club picinic. All of the committe members were invited to this picnic.So I was married in May and I went to the 20 week club picnic in September. My hair was a little long but not ridiculously long and my father came up to me and said, "I don't want you to come to my picnic tomorrow unless you get a haircut. You look like a bum." I went over to my mother and told her that I wouldn't be at the picnic the next day and why. My aunt Betty was sitting there and she said, "Come to my house tomorrow morning and I will cut your hair."About two hours later, I went up to the bathroom and my father happened to be in there. I said, "Dad, I will be able to come to your picnic tomorrow because Aunt Betty is going to cut my hair. He cocked his arm back and punched me right in the face and said, "I don't care if you get a haircut or not, I don't want you at my fuckin' house." I flew backward against the wall and hit the floor. Once I got my bearings, I got up and went to get my wife and we left.I had endured both physical and mental abuse from my father all of my life and I expected it to stop once I was married so I drove straight to my father's store and used the phone to call the state police and file charges against him. I don't know how but word must have got out about me calling the state police because my oldest brother and some of my father's friends showed up and were all giving me a rash of shit for calling the police on my father. The state police showed up and took my statement and I again got a rash of shit from my father's friends after the state trooper left.The night we had to appear in court, I got there early and asked to go into the judge's chamber. I told the judge that I was not there to have my father pay a fine or go to jail, I just merely wanted the judge to tell my father that the beatings must stop. There were a lot of people about my age in court that night for things such as robbery, drunk driving, assault, etc. and the judge held my father's case for last. The judge proceeded to ask my father if I had ever been arrested for any of the many things other young men were in the courtroom for that night and my father's answer to every question was "No." The judge then said, "I think it is about time you realize that you have a darn good boy here and if I ever see you in my courtroom again for laying a hand on your son, I will sentence you to the longest amount of jail time that I can by law." The judge then had me and my father shake hands. I know it killed my father to do that.After that I still went to my parent's house to visit my mother often and for a good two years as soon as I would arrive there, my father would go in his office and close the door until I would leave. After my father finally had the nerve to stay out of his office when I could go there, no matter what subject I would bring up, my father would argue with me but if I visited and someone else was there also, he would treat me just as good as he treated the other person.As the years went by and my mother passed away, I never went to my father's house again. I also didn't go to my father's funeral when he passed. I figured that if I didn't want to see him while he was alive, I didn't care to see him once he was dead either.Due to the way my father treated me all of my life, I didn't expect him to put me in his will at all. This was often discussed with some of my siblings and a few of them told me that if my father didn't treat me fairly in his will that they would all chip in some of the money they received to make it fair.When my father passed, he had just over $1,000,000 in his savings and portfolio. In his will he stated that his assets would be divided equally between his 7 children but half of Dale Gardner's share would be given to Janet Gardner. (Janet Gardner was my ex-wife that I had been divorced from for 20 years at the time of my father's death) He just had to get that last zinger in there when he left this earth. My father lived in New Jersey and I now live in Tennessee and I doubt I will ever go to New Jersey again but if I do, I will take the time to stop at the cemetery and piss on my father's grave. I feel I owe that much to him.My how things change when the money is right in front of someone. When I asked my siblings about giving up part of their inheritance to make it fair, I was told that if my father wanted me to have more than I did get, he would have given me that amount.When I was about 18 years of age when one day my mother told me that she and my father had a will drawn up and at that time he didn't want to include me in the will. She told me that she said, "We have 7 children, not 6 and we are going to include Dale in our will."After my father's death I learned that my father had a new will made up while my mother was still living and by the way the will was worded, it was easy to see that my mother had nothing to do with that new will. It was worded that if he were to pass before my mother, all of his assets would go to her. If my mother were to pass first, the will was to be just as I described above.As an adult I felt that I had no residual from my horrific childhood but I was wrong. Later in life I had a manager that would do everything she could to make me look bad but I was determined that she would not break me but one day I had a nervous breakdown. My wife found me a good psychiatrist and my psychiatrist determined that my manager was treating me mentally in the same manner my father treated me as a child. Being treated in that manner by my manager was unknowingly bringing back memories of my childhood and made it so I would often forget things. My psychiatrist diagnosed me with some sort of amnesia disorder from this.About 5 years ago I was under a lot of stress and one day when my wife and daughter came into the bedroom to wake me from a nap, I didn't know who either of them were or where I was. They took me to a local hospital and when I was admitted, my blood pressure was 280 over something. As soon as they were able to get my blood pressure stabilized, I was transferred to St. Thomas Hospital in Nashville Tennessee and I was in there for 5 days. It was determined that I had a very severe bout of my amnesia disorder and the doctor assured my wife that I would regain my memory but it would be little by little and over a long period.That was so frustrating for the longest time because there were often things that I knew I should know yet I didn't so I was constantly looking up various things online. It was about a year before I regained my full memory.I have had anxiety all of my life and for that I was prescribed valium for over 40 years. Though I was prescribed 3 per day, it was rare that I would take more than one in a week. A few years ago I was told that Valium could no longer be prescribed and I have learned that there is not one thing available that can be prescribed for anxiety that actually works.For those that have read this long story, I thank you.