Field report: Family court in America

Allegiance to The System rather than The Constitution risks losing The Republic

Since last summer I have quietly been involved as an observer (and crime victim) in a family court case in the USA. When proceedings involve a minor there is a natural caution in how much one says in public about what is going on. That said, the public interest insists that the rights and wrongs of these institutions are shared. We are in a silent unrestricted war, with both metaphysical and physical theatres, that pits the righteous against the wicked. Lawfare is a key cultural battleground, seizing state authority to impose the will of one man upon another. This warping of legitimate power for cruel ends wages covert war on targeted individuals and the people as a whole.

My key takeaway is that these family tribunals routinely operate outside of the Constitution, which both empowers the state and protects the people. The American Constitution is a legal covenant between the government and people, being outside of politics, and all are subject to it. Constitutional law takes principles from divinity and translates them into the realm of men. When these constraints on power are broken, courts operate outside of their godly remit, and reflect the personal will of the men in robes, not the unifying spirit of the law. The absence of juries hands inappropriate power to judges, which is wielded capriciously and with impunity.

Between the hearings I attended last autumn and this week, the following constitutional protections have been broken:

• Due Process (14th Amendment): Parental rights were removed without proper notice, hearing, or legal jurisdiction.

• Equal Protection (14th Amendment): Courts applied double standards, favouring one party while punishing another for protected conduct.

• First Amendment Retaliation: Protected speech was reframed as extremism and used to justify punitive legal action.

• Denial of Confrontation (6th Amendment principles): False testimony was accepted without adversarial challenge or cross-examination.

• Suppression of Reserved Rights (9th Amendment): Natural parental rights were disregarded under colour of discretionary authority.

• Jurisdictional Overreach (10th Amendment): A state court acted beyond its legal authority under interstate custody law.

• Unlawful Seizure (4th Amendment): A child was removed from lawful custody without warrant, probable cause, or valid court order.

• Full Faith and Credit Failure (Article IV): The court refused to recognise the legal authority of another state in direct violation of interstate constitutional obligations.

In other words, it was a catastrophic constitutional failure built on jurisdictional fraud, procedural abuse, false filings, judicial overreach, wilful blindness by the court, and suppression of evidence. Serious crimes — parental kidnap, custodial interference, perjury, domestic financial abuse, subornation of perjury (you learn something new every day), even cyberstalking — all were ignored despite being admitted to on the stand under oath. Instead, the targets of the criminal conduct were blamed, in a reversal of the victim and offender. There was obvious judicial bias and double standards. Nobody in the system wants to rock the boat, or admit serious error.

A single text message from a parent being subjected to narcissistic reactive abuse, following the alienation of the child, was used as a pretext to nullify a standing custody order, and give de facto immunity for felonies. The theft of custody was then hardened into the earning of custody with time and manipulation. However, there is no stability for the child when built from deceit, only the illusion of stability, since it is legally unsustainable and morally indefensible. Eventually the lies wither and the liars are exposed. It is accountability season for crime cartels and racketeers, whether criminally corrupt or institutionally complicit. This case is no exception.

The situation in this case closely fits that described in a brief from the State Department “Navigating the Unique Complexities in Familial Trafficking”. Specifically:

• The perpetrators held positions of trust or authority within the family structure.

• The victim was conditioned to believe the abuse was normal, necessary, or deserved.

• The trafficking occurred under the guise of parental or legal authority.

• The victim was used as a means to exert control over another family member.

• The family system enabled isolation, emotional manipulation, and control of the victim’s environment.

• Outsiders, including legal actors, were misled by the appearance of stability or legitimacy.

• Attempts by the protective parent to intervene were met with institutional resistance or retaliatory action.

• False narratives were deployed to justify removal, silence dissent, and preserve the abuser’s power.

• The trafficking was concealed by legal mechanisms and supported by individuals in positions of influence.

There will be a time to share the gory details, but for now I am sticking to the general picture, as this pattern is repeated for thousands of people every year. What I witnessed was indistinguishable from state-sponsored child kidnapping, and endorsed by not just one, but two separate judges. Notionally these adjudicators were of different political leanings, one Democrat and one Republican. I have come to realise there are Patriots and Traitors — with nothing much between. A Patriot will put the Constitution ahead of their own personal career interest and that of the judicial body’s image, being willing to sacrifice comfort for principle. A Traitor is anyone who falls short of this in breach of oath, even briefly, so as to destroy the Constitution.

It is easy to focus on the judges, but the issue also includes the officers of the court. A republic is not won or lost on grandiose battlefields, critical as they may be to its founding or defence against foreign adversaries. In the long run, it is the willingness of its officials to submit themselves to divine will over self-will that sets the longevity of liberty. It is the seemingly respectable family man, in a robe or suit, who fails to uphold the law in favour of some procedural game that determines whether you are a nation of laws or men. It may be a ruthless attorney who will do anything to aid his client to “win”, however unethical. Or it could be the honest lawyer who shies away from controversy to avoid offending a judge. Either way, freedom withers a little.

This claim on the outside of the building did not match my experienced reality on the inside. One problem is that attorneys who are successful at trial are the ones who help their clients to get their own way. These in maximal self-will are not necessarily those who make good judges, where the spirit of the law is more important than perfect mastery of the details of process. I would rather have a patriotic judge who makes technical mistakes that get turned over on appeal, but who respects the Constitution, than a brilliant manipulator who never sets a foot wrong in terms of procedure, automating treason as best he can. Yet the former will in the eyes of the current system seem a failure compared to the latter.

Sustaining a constitutional republic is not a singular encounter with the enemies of freedom. Rather, it's a lot of small encounters, in many venues, including the lower courts. A fantasy exists that the Supreme Court is the most powerful court in the land, but it is not. It is the last resort to fix the problems in all of the small courts — where the real power exists via sheer volume — and there are a lot of problems in the small courts. The “bad guys” are not just the obvious felons and frauds. Sometimes it is the judge in a rope who refuses to uphold the law and address criminal behaviour. Sometimes it is the fathers and stepfathers and grandfathers and uncles (or the moms and grandmothers and stepmothers and aunts) who are willing to use a child in order to obtain a desired outcome.

In this particular case, the civil rights violations are grave, potentially including Deprivation of Rights Under Color of Law (18 U.S.C. § 242, 42 U.S.C. § 1983), Conspiracy to Deprive Rights (18 U.S.C. § 241), and Conspiracy to Violate Civil Rights (42 U.S.C. § 1985). At least one of the judges, if not both, appeared to aid and abet familial child trafficking from the bench. This is extremely serious, especially when it declares “open season” for the state-sanctioned kidnap of children of whistleblowers and dissidents, or those of their partners. This severe level of misconduct belongs in front of US Marshals or a US Attorney — and maybe the Civil Rights Division of the U.S. Department of Justice. I trust military intelligence are watching closely, too.

Executive Order 13818 — “Blocking the Property of Persons Involved in Serious Human Rights Abuse or Corruption” — is intended to remedy this kind of systemic failure of the judicial system. There is a declared national emergency on human rights, and it does not only apply to foreign persons — it also includes US citizens. I don’t think those involved quite appreciate the fire they are playing with. When you sit on the bench and use your authority to strip parents of their civil rights, and place children with acknowledged criminals who steal children, you may reclassify from a protected civil judge to an unprotected violator of international human rights norms. In this case, to justify a child abduction, one counsel weaponised war crimes and national security programs. These courtroom tactics involve extreme personal ruin risk.

I have accidentally found myself in a prominent public role in the civilian side of a fifth-generation war zone. After years of unseen combat experience, these war memorials are not abstract or distant to me; I suspect someday that veterans of information and psychological warfare will also be treated with respect. There are real casualties to lawfare, with victim lives ruined, children led astray, and wrongdoers who deserve millstones. I feel the strain myself. The judges in family courts have a thankless, difficult, and sometimes unpleasant job. Socially engineered conflict breaks up families and generates societal strife, and they are exposed to horror stories daily. I grasp that imperfection comes with the terrain.

Based on what I have seen so far, the family court system is broken beyond repair. The Constitution is last, manipulated procedure is first. Children are metaphorical beasts to be chopped up between their custodians, with judges as butchers. It probably has to be burned to the ground and rebuilt. Juries have to bring the public conscience back into the critical determination of parental fitness and custody where it is contested. The administrative details can be left to the professionals. Gross abuses such as in the case I attended are the result of adjudications being done out of sight; those who elect these judges might be shocked at some of their orders. Having an anti-corruption campaigner with a global audience sat in the gallery is a rarity: there will be a moment to expose the criminals I saw, and publicly hold all to account.

The leaves are just starting to appear here in Tennessee