A federal court on Monday granted permission for a lesbian mom to sue the right-wing organizations and attorneys who allegedly helped her ex-partner kidnap their daughter.
The case of Janet Jenkins and Lisa Miller is only one of the unfortunately many custody cases in which a biological parent tries to deny custody to a former same-sex partner and nonbiological parent, claiming that the latter is not really a parent to the child. Their situation took an even more tragic turn, however, when Miller kidnapped their daughter and fled the country in 2009.
Jenkins and Miller had a civil union in Vermont before having their daughter Isabella in 2002, and although the girl was born in Virginia, the family moved back to Vermont and lived there until the women’s relationship ended. Miller, the biological mother, then moved to Virginia with Isabella. Shortly afterwards, she began to identify as a born-again Christian, said she was no longer a lesbian, and obtained legal counsel from the conservative Christian legal group Liberty Counsel. A series of court battles determined that Vermont had jurisdiction in determining child custody, and that while Miller had primary custody, Jenkins was granted visitation rights.
Miller was repeatedly held in contempt in both states for failing to enable Jenkins’ court-ordered visitation. Ultimately, the Vermont court ordered that Jenkins be granted sole custody because of Miller’s continued refusal to allow the girl even to visit Jenkins. Jenkins, however, was willing to allow Miller to continue visitation. The judge felt that giving Jenkins custody was the only way to ensure Isabella would continue to have contact with both parents.
Miller then fled to Nicaragua in 2009 rather than show up at the court-appointed time to transfer custody of Isabella. She was aided by Philip Zodhiates, a conservative Christian businessman who runs a direct mail company serving anti-Semitic newspapers, and several of his contacts.
Jenkins filed a civil lawsuit in 2012 against Miller, Zodhiates, and others accused of assisting in the kidnapping, but the case was put on hold in favor of criminal prosecutions against some of them, explains The Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC), whose attorneys are among those representing Jenkins.
Three of the co-conspirators were tried and found guilty of international parental kidnapping and conspiracy: Zodhiates and Mennonite pastors Kenneth Miller and Timothy Miller. (None of the Millers are related.) Zodhiates was sentenced yesterday to three years in prison. Kenneth Miller was sentenced in February 2016 to 27 months in prison. Presumably Timothy Miller will be sentenced soon.
Last fall, Jenkins asked the U.S. District Court in Vermont to allow her civil case to move forward, and, SPLC explains, “in light of new evidence adduced through the criminal prosecutions, to permit them to name Liberty Counsel, Liberty University, as well as Liberty Counsel lawyers Mat Staver and Rena Lindevaldsen, as defendants. On Monday, the court issued a 61-page order granting that request and lifting the stay.”
SPLC outlines some of the reasons for naming those defendants:
Sarah Star, Jenkins’ attorney, says that evidence at Zodhiates’ trial shows a flurry of communications that she argues implicates Zodhiates’ daughter, Victoria Hyden, who is an employee of Liberty School of Law, where Liberty Counsel’s Mat Staver worked as dean for years; Miller’s Liberty Counsel attorney, Rena Lindevaldsen, who took over as Liberty School of Law’s dean when Staver left in October 2014; and even Liberty Counsel as an organization.
They remind us, too that “There is still an active arrest warrant out for [Lisa] Miller.”
Beyond the legal tangle of the case, however, there remains a personal heartbreak. A girl is about to turn 15, and as she becomes a young woman, she remains torn from a mother who loves her. The New York Times reported in 2012:
Her time in Nicaragua has often been lonely, those who have met her say, long on prayer but isolated. She has been told that she could be wrenched from her mother if they are caught. She has also been told that the other woman she once called “Mama” … cannot go to heaven because she lives in sin.
I have written about this case for over a decade now, and am angered and saddened each time. I cannot imagine what Jenkins must be feeling. I hope she and Isabella will eventually be reunited and reconciled. In the meantime, I wish her well in her pursuit of justice.
