By final decision, the District Court 1 and the Bucharest Court ordered the decay of parental rights for severe psychological abuse, in the form of parental alienation, abusive behavior, by serious negligence in fulfilling parental obligations and serious achievement of the child's best interest, endangering their health and development and for neducational eglijence.
- Parental alienation is a form of severe psychological abuse on the minor produced by one parent to negatively influence the child's relationship with the other parent.
- This phenomenon is recognized by the definition given by Law no. 217/22 May 2003 to prevent and combat family violence and psychological violence. From a scientific point of view, on February 1, 2016, the recognition and the need to combat parental alienation was achieved by recognizing the protocol signed by the Institute of Judicial Psychology and the Romanian Association for Common Customs, a protocol to which the College of Psychologists in Romania, by a provision, published on February 25, 2016.
- The current regulation of Law no. 272/2004, amended by Law no. 123/10.05.2024, consecrates extremely clear legislatively that parental alienation (“parental alienation”), is a form of psychological violence, which is ascertained by psychological evaluations, being a reason for sanctioning the alienating parent with the loss of parental rights.
At the time of adoption of Law no. 123/2024, the courts have long been sanctioned for a long time, including the loss of the minor's house.
The decay of parental rights for parental alienation, as a psychological abuse, represents a premiere, Especially since the substantive court pronounced this solution prior to the legislative modification by Law no. 123/2024. We are therefore, once again, in the situation in which the legislator, one step ago, has only detected the jurisprudential solutions at the legislative level.
Identified and described since the 1990s by American psychologists (see M. Walsh and JM Bone-Parental Alienation Syndrome: ANGE-OLD Custody Problem, 71 FLA. BJ 93 (June 1997); Douglas Darll, PH.D (1997)-“Three Types of Parental Alienators”; Controversies Regarding Parental Alienation Syndrome.
In general, the purpose of alienation is to gain custody or to keep the child custody by the alienating father, without the involvement of the alienated father and by excluding it. The activity for the purpose of alienation can be extended to the family of the alienated father, as well as his friends and close friends.
In the jurisprudence of the courts, but also in the ECHR jurisprudence (see, in this regard, the decisions pronounced in Cause Micnheva vs Bulgaria from 2.09.2010Cause Zavrel vs. Czech Republic from 18.04.2007 etc.) it was often found the violation of art. 8 of the Convention, noting: “Specifically, in a definition given in the specialized literature, the alienation means that, through thoughts, actions and actions and verbal or non-verbal manners, a child is emotionally abused (“his brain”), “) to determine that the other parent is an enemy or to suggest to the child or to the child. At the alienated father are restricted or the alienator tries to control the activities that the child will do when he will be with the other parent. the alienation.”. In that case, they arehold that “Against the background of the psychic immaturity of the minor and lack of experience, the alienating father, deprives the child of the possibility of discerning between good and evil, the child being influenced and manipulated”.
Parental alienation is found by psychologists following a psychological evaluation ordered by the court.
Definitely, it is not a parental alienation if the minor refuses to see the parent or spend time with him, because he was the victim of an abuse of any kind from the respective parent, and this is proven by the evidence administered in the process. The courts have always emphasized in the judgments these aspects and the distinction between parental alienation and situations in which the child does not want to spend time with the parent, because he was assaulted or endangered or had another improper behavior (attempted suicide in the presence of the child, etc.). Unlike such cases, in the hypothesis of parental alienation, the child cannot objectively justify the refusal to see with the alienated father.
In the analyzed case, in which the court ordered the decay of parental rights, Father Alienat had not seen his child for 2 years, without any objective justification.
In the specialized literature, it has been established that the obsessed alienation parent usually has a cause: attracting the child on his side, so as to fight together in a campaign to destroy the relationship with the other parent.
The forms of manifestation of the parental alienation syndrome (alienation) were identified, among these manifestations the following situations are found:
– the alienating father conditions the child, gives him care according to the behavior he claims;
– Father Alienator withdraws the affection due to the child when he does not participate in the denigration campaign;
– The alienator father has unrealistic expectations from the child; It is not natural to claim one child to cooperate at the denigration campaign against the other parent. The risk is that it will become confused, tense, frustrated.
– the premature responsibility of the child – he is claimed to memorize a wide variety of shortcomings suffered from the parent, to bring him false accusations of abuse.
– the child's over-protection; He is made to believe that any contact with the other parent is dangerous, he paints the other parent as a true monster. Creates anxiety to the child and emphasizes the child's dependence on the alienating father.
The difficult mission to identify the parental alienation returns to the psychologist, and the courts have the mission even more difficult to take the right measures, in the minor's interest.
But it is not sufficient, in practice it has been found that parental alienation leaves deep traces on the child and, as a result, to remove the effects of alienation, trauma therapy is required, but either few specialized psychologists in this regard, or these are too eager to do such therapy. At one point, an expert psychologist specialized in parental alienation expressed very plastic, comparing the situation of the alienated child, escaped from the nightmare of this severe psychological abuse, with a man escaped from the camp – He is afraid of everything around him, he is afraid of leaves too!
There is certainly a lot to do, but the first decaying solution for parental rights for parental alienation should be an alarm signal for alienating parents, to stop, to think twice before continuing on this road that does not bring them anything, but especially their children, because today are the abusers!
An article signed by Cătălina Dicu ([email protected]), Senior Partner – Stoica & Associations.
Article supported by Stoica & Associations
