Every judge in the land is activist, you see, what with the way they read the law and stuff:

WASHINGTON – The Supreme Court has declined to step into a lesbian custody dispute between a woman who has renounced her homosexuality and her onetime partner.

The justices on Monday turned down an appeal from Lisa Miller, the biological mother of an 8-year-old girl. Miller wanted the court to undo a Virginia court decision allowing Janet Jenkins visitation rights with the girl.

Lisa Miller is still on the lam, of course.

This comes on the heels of the Vermont Supreme Court granting full custody of the kidnapping victim, Isabella, to her mother Janet Jenkins.

[h/t Joe]

It’s too bad Isabella Miller-Jenkins’ other mother, Lisa Miller, is apparently a kidnapper. The Vermont Supreme Court has weighed in on the court order which gave Janet Jenkins sole custody of her daughter:

The Vermont supreme court has unanimously granted custody to a lesbian who has been battling to become the guardian of the young girl she and her former partner raised together.

The ruling is in favor of Vermont resident Janet Jenkins, affirming a 2009 court order giving her sole physical and legal custody of Isabella Miller-Jenkins. Lisa Miller, Jenkins’ former partner, is still missing with their 8-year-old daughter, according to Gay and Lesbian Advocates & Defenders, which argued on Jenkins’ behalf before the supreme court.

This story is just so sad, and shows the childish lengths fundamentalist Christians will go to to defend their fantasy-based worldview.

Traditional values!

The Lisa Miller/Janet Jenkins saga continues, as the case was argued before the Vermont Supreme Court, with Lisa Miller and Isabella, of course, still likely out of the country:

(Dillon) This is the second time that the Supreme Court has heard arguments in a bitter child custody battle between two women who were former partners.
But the case took a new turn in January, when Lisa Miller – who now lives in Virginia – failed to appear to hand over the child in a court-ordered custody swap.
Miller’s lawyer is Rena Lindevaldsen. She says she hasn’t heard from her client in months and doesn’t know where she is. And she told the state Supreme Court that a Vermont trial judge was wrong to award custody to Miller’s former partner.
(Lindevaldsen) You’re switching from the first time anywhere in this nation from a fit biological parent that individual’s child and switching to somebody who has been declared to be a parent who is not that child’s biological or adoptive parent.
(Dillon) But associate Justice John Dooley challenged the lawyer on a number of points. First, Dooley asked: what about men whose children were conceived through reproductive technologies.”
(Dooley) “So I take it your position would be the same to a father, to a husband, for whose spouse was impregnated by artificial insemination – he could not ask for custody in a proceeding if they went through a divorce? Is that right?”
(Lindevaldsen) “Unless of course he adopted the child in the meantime.”
(Dillon) But Dooley said because the couple had been joined in a Vermont civil union the child did not have to be adopted in order for Jenkins to be considered a legal parent.
Then Chief Justice Paul Reiber weighed in. Reiber brought up the issue of Lisa Miller’s contempt of court citations. The Virginia woman faces arrest because she defied a court order and disappeared with the child.
(Reiber) “You said a few moments ago that your client, your referred to her as a “fit parent.” Hasn’t she had seven or eight contempt orders issued against her?”

That’s the trouble with anti-gay fundamentalists trying to be heard in courts of law. Since everything they believe is preposterous nonsense, it doesn’t tend to go well for them.

(h/t Kyle)

The plot thickens:

An 8-year-old girl at the heart of a long-running child custody fight between former lesbian partners may have fled to Central America with her birth mother, a lawyer for one of the women said.

The girl, Isabella Miller-Jenkins, and her birth mother, Lisa Miller, failed to appear for a court-ordered custody swap in January and are believed to have flown to El Salvador last September, said attorney Sarah Star, who represents ex-partner Janet Jenkins.

Star said a Virginia police officer told her that Miller and the girl flew to El Salvador’s capital, San Salvador, from Juarez, Mexico, which is across the Rio Grande from El Paso, Texas.

“This is obviously horrifying,” Star said Thursday. “Isabella’s not in school. She’s most likely in a country that is not as developed as the U.S., and (Jenkins is) worried about her. She’s worried she’s not in a safe environment. As far as we know, Lisa Miller doesn’t even speak Spanish.”

In case you’re new, you’ll remember that Isabella Miller-Jenkins is the daughter of Lisa Miller and Janet Jenkins, who decided to bring her into the world when they were a couple. They later were joined in a civil union, until Lisa Miller suddenly went off the deep end, converted to fundamentalist Christianity, and decided that, because of her newfound homophobia, therefore the law did not apply to her. Because of her violation of numerous court orders for visitation, Lisa Miller was to hand custody of Isabella over to Janet Jenkins in January of this year.

Lisa and Isabella have now been missing for six months.

If you’re a Central American reader or have family or friends in the region, and happen to spot these two, please contact the National Center for Missing & Exploited Children.

(h/t Melanie Nathan)

Here:

It was January 1 when Linda Wall said she knew for sure her friend Miller and her seven-year-old daughter Isabella had gone into hiding.

“Unbeknowing [sic] to any of us… she was doing something behind the scene,” Wall said.

(…)

“I am supposed to be the number one suspect because I was so involved in this and I don’t know where she is,” Wall said.

(…)

The last time Wall says she had contact with Miller was in late September. Up to that point, she believes Miller was working behind the scenes on her escape. It’ a decision they support.

“I do support what she’s done,” Wall said. “When the law is wrong, what’s a person to do?”

Likening the situation to the underground railroad during slavery, “Was it Harriet Tubman who risked her life for the underground railroad for the black community? Maybe I am committed to this for the children I might be that one voice.”

Linda, I’m “unbeknowing” whether you’re ignorant of history or getting caught up in lies, but I should point out that the comparisons to Harriet Tubman and the Underground Railroad run the risk of being revelatory, since Harriet Tubman decidedly did know where the Underground Railroad was, since she personally helped a number of slaves escape. What other historical figures do you identify with, Linda? Miep Gies, perhaps?

All of these comparisons are silly, obviously, because all Lisa Miller is doing is trying to “protect” her child from her other loving mother, Janet Jenkins, who has a legal and moral right to be in Isabella’s life.

The fact that Wall’s and Miller’s interpretations of reality are straight out of a C.S. Lewis fever dream should have no bearing on what they’re allowed to do in actual reality.

(h/t Kyle)

About time.

(h/t Right Wing Watch)

Because they don’t know where she is.

Huh?

How bizarre.

Kyle at Right Wing Watch adds:

Correct me if I’m wrong, but that sort of ruling doesn’t seem to provide much incentive for people to abide by court orders now does it? In fact, it sort of seems to do exactly the opposite.

Why does the judge need her specific location in order to hold her in contempt? You know where she isn’t? His courtroom, where she’s supposed to have appeared.

Wayne mentioned yesterday that the Janet Jenkins/Lisa Miller saga would be featured on Nightline last night, and now we have that video. Kyle at Right Wing Watch notes that the Liberty Counsel is still conspicuously silent on the case of their erstwhile star client.

Instead we get known windsock Peter Sprigg, speaking as a representative for PFOX.

Lisa Miller and Isabella have been officially missing since January 1, but neighbors say they haven’t been seen since September of last year.