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’s 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.
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.
I wrote the other day about Alan Chambers’ bizarre talk at the Liberty University G-H8 summit. In case that left you wanting more, here’s Rena Lindevaldsen of Liberty Counsel* speaking for almost ten minutes about how, if Fundamentalists have to abide by the law in our secular society, it’s somehow a violation of their freedom of religion. Uh huh. Just to clear things up: religious freedom doesn’t include the right to lord your beliefs over other peoples’ lives. Note that every complaint Rena has about non-discrimination laws involves conservative Christians feeling the need to use their religious beliefs as a club to hurt other people. THAT is the freedom our opponents fight for. They’re not fighting for the right to believe and worship as they please. They have that, and they’ll always have that, because no one has ever threatened to take it away!
No, these people are simply children who refuse to learn to play well with others, and if I was their preschool teacher, I’d have a really hard time passing them.
Anyway, Rena goes over the Religious Right’s Greatest Hits:
1. Catholic Charities wouldn’t abide by the law in Massachusetts, so they cried victim when they freely chose to close their doors, thereby throwing children under the bus.
2. The photographer in New Mexico who broke the laws of the state of New Mexico when she refused to photograph a same-sex wedding. Was she a photographer working in a religious institution? Oh hell, of course not! She just thought she should be able to deny her services to any groups/people she doesn’t like, much in the way restaurants denied service to African Americans before the law compelled them to do differently.
3. The couple running the bed and breakfast in Vermont who opened their space for weddings and parties, oh, except that one time when (!!!) a homosexshul couple wanted to have their wedding reception there, so they said no, and used their religious bigotry as an excuse to deny that service.
4. The YMCA had to allow gay couples to have family memberships! OH NO! The sky is falling, and it’s like lions are personally eating Rena Lindevaldsen’s flesh!
What tedious whiners!
Anyway, here’s the video, if you want to watch it. She moans and groans about transgender people, GLSEN, Kevin Jennings, PFOX and some other bullroar. But again, notice that NONE of the so-called “religious discrimination” she whines about involves their actual religious freedom. It’s ALL about religious people being denied the right to their own self-appointed moral pedestal over the rest of the population.
They’re really batting a thousand down there. A third judge has ruled in favor of adoption rights for gay couples, calling Florida’s adoption ban unconstitutional:
“There is no rational connection between sexual orientation and what is or is not in the best interest of a child,” Miami-Dade Circuit Judge Maria Sampedro-Iglesia. She also called the anti-gay adoption law “unconstitutional on its face,” and that it could not be enforced.
“The permanent interests and benefit to all members of the adoptive household will be promoted by the adoption,” Sampedro-Iglesia wrote. Alenier “is a fit and proper person to adopt the child and has adequate resources and facilities to care for the child.”
Judge Sampedro-Iglesia’s ruling comes after a judge in Key West, Monroe Circuit Judge David J. Audlin, declared the law unconstitutional, after Audlin’s allowed a gay Key West lawyer, Wayne LaRue Smith, to adopt a boy he had been raising in foster care and Miami-Dade Circuit Judge Cindy Lederman approved the adoption of two half brothers by a gay North Miami foster parent, Frank Martin Gill, after she too said the law was unconstitutional.
When judges all over the state are calling a law unconstitutional, it probably is! Just a thought. Also, it becomes hard to throw accusations of “judishul activizm” when judge after judge after judge declares a law unconstitutional.
Still throwing those accusations, though, is Liberty Counsel’s Mat Staver.* It’s so sad when Christian Right attorneys try to “do law”:
Mathew Staver, founder and chairman of Orlando-based Liberty Counsel, called Sampedro-Iglesia’s ruling “evidence of judicial activism’ that violates state law.
“A judge is not a legislature onto oneself,” Staver said. “Judges don’t have the ability to write laws any way they desire. They have to follow the rule of law, and this judge did not.”
That’s right, Matthew! Judges are not legislatures! Judges are charged with interpreting the law in light of, in this case, the Florida Constitution, though, which is where things get confusing, so I’ll go slow for you! If judges’ jobs were simply to “follow the rule of law,” regardless of what the Constitution said, then their branch of government wouldn’t really be very important, now would it? But, you see, Matthew, the judicial system** is set up to act as a check on the legislature, so that if the people’s representatives pass unconstitutional laws, like the anti-gay adoption ban, then, in theory, the judges are charged with striking those laws down.
Civics is so confusing, I KNOW!
*SERIOUSLY, where is Lisa Miller?!
**Do they teach the “judicial system” at Liberty???
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.
The Only One Mommy Facebook group was created by Liberty Counsel attorney Rena Lindevaldsen and ex-gay activist Debbie Thurman to affirm the illegal activities of ex-gay activist Lisa Miller against daughter Isabella Miller-Jenkins and former partner Janet Jenkins.
Since 2004, with the help of Liberty Counsel, Miller has violated repeated court orders in Vermont and Virginia to respect Isabella’s visitation rights with Jenkins. And since Jan. 1, Miller has violated another court order requiring her to transfer custody to Jenkins. Instead, Miller abducted Isabella and went into hiding — presumably somewhere among fundamentalist churches that are allied with the Liberty Counsel.
The Facebook group’s activities in support of this kidnapping are now a legal liability — as is the Facebook group’s efforts to silence dissenters who care for the welfare of Isabella and Jenkins, not just Lisa and the Liberty Counsel.
So now Thurman has announced the hurried closure of this public group and the creation of a new, secret, invitation-only group. In a message to group members today, Thurman said:
Dear Folks,
I am letting you know about a major change. Only One Mommy is going defunct ASAP and will be replaced by a new group (still to be named) that will be created by Linda Wall. We want all members to know about the change so you can have the option of sending Linda a message (her FB profile is under Linda Marie Wall) to join the new group ASAP, if you wish to.
Linda Wall is the leader of Lighthouse Policy, a Virginia antigay fundamentalist project which rejects morality, freedom, civility, and religious freedom in favor of a Christian Right war against infidels, abortion, and homosexuality. Her project affirms the abduction and justifies it with Miller’s court-disproven defamations against Jenkins. Please contact Ms. Wall and politely challenge her efforts to aid and abet child abduction — and please consider reporting this activity on behalf of kidnapping to Facebook.
Vermont Family Court Judge William Cohen has given ex-gay activist Lisa Miller 30 more days to appear in court with her 7-year-old child or face a contempt of court finding and possible arrest, according to The Roanoke Times.
Since 2004, Miller has violated repeated court orders to permit visitation by her ex-partner, Janet Jenkins. Late last year, Miller was finally ordered to surrender custody of their daughter to Jenkins, to ensure that their daughter Isabella enjoys her right to know both parents.
Miller violated the custody order on January 1 and disappeared with Isabella, who is now on the missing-children’s list of the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children.
Miller’s lawyers at the Liberty Counsel claim not to know their client’s whereabouts, but one of the Liberty Counsel’s attorneys created a Facebook group which supports Miller’s abduction of Isabella and subsequent disappearance.
Since 2004, Miller has violated repeated orders to permit visitation by her ex-partner Janet Jenkins. First, Miller sought refuge in Virginia from Vermont’s family court system, which has jurisdiction over her former union with Jenkins. When Virginia’s Supreme Court effectively ruled last year that Vermont has jurisdiction, Miller continued to violate court orders defending the visitation rights of Isabella and Janet.
Miller’s illegal activities left Vermont with no choice but to transfer custody to Jenkins, effective January 1. Then, it seems, Miller began plotting to go into hiding with Isabella — with the affirmation of Liberty Counsel attorney Rena Lindevaldsen and ex-gay activist Debbie Thurman. The latter pair’s Facebook group affirms the apparent kidnapping as a fundamentalist “Christian” act of “civil disobedience.”
A hearing will be held Friday in Vermont to discuss next steps.
Oh, Maggie Gallagher. Always trying to walk the thin line between outright bigotry and putting on a smiley face for the camera. Right Wing Watch posted comments Maggie made on the case to the Catholic News Agency (link apparently broken for the moment):
In a Monday e-mail to CNA, Maggie Gallagher, president of the National Organization for Marriage, made general comments about the case.
“I have sympathy for the pre-eminent claims of natural parents versus legal parents, when the natural mother is a fit parent (which nobody has denied in this case). But we have to be a nation ruled by laws, even when those laws may be unjust.
“Let this act as a warning call: Don’t enter civil unions with people if you do not want to give them legal rights over your children. And do not give much faith in the ‘best interest of the child’ standard to protect your child. If the best interest of the child conflicts with fashionable legal norms, courts will not care what is in your child’s best interest.
“It cannot be in Lisa’s daughter’s interest to be forcibly moved to Vermont away from the only mother she has ever known. This case is a tragedy all around. I cannot endorse what Lisa Miller has done, but I understand it, and pity both women and most of all this child. I wish Lisa’s partner had the wisdom of Solomon, but I cannot blame her either,” Gallagher told CNA.
I’m not sure if she intended to, but Maggie Gallagher seems to have conceded our legal point: Lisa Miller and Janet Jenkins decided to have the child together. It wouldn’t matter whether it was a straight couple with a child linked biologically to both mother and father, a straight couple with a biological link to just one parent, an adopted child, or whatever else. Maggie actually (accidentally) gave some good advice: if you’re going to bring a child into the world with your legal partner, you both assume responsibility for that child.
Now, some of what she said was drivel, of course. This has nothing to do with “fashionable legal norms” and the courts are not ignoring the child’s best interest, not by a long shot. And obviously, referring to Lisa Miller as “the only mother [Isabella] has ever known” is convenient, since it has been Miller’s refusal to comply with court ordered visitation that has removed Janet Jenkins from the child’s life.
But I wanted to note the concession. Again, Maggie may not realize it, but she sort of just said we were right.
The 
