In one of the most shocking murders in recent history, a 10 year old boy caught in his mother's vicious alienation campaign shot his father in the back after his father came to pick him up as part of his post-divorce shared custody arrangement. Judy Jones, a long time friend of the victim, Dr. Rick Lohstroh, an emergency physician at the University of Texas, has set up a website in his memory. According to Jones: "[Rick was] a very loving and devoted father. He was a compassionate man who devoted his life to saving the lives of others....he had been through a very contentious divorce with his ex-wife, Deborah Geisler, who had made allegations of physical and sexual abuse. Those abuse allegations had been proven false by several police departments, CPS, and a voluntary lie detector test taken by Dr. Lohstroh.
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Over 'Femiphobe' Theory
January 3, 2005
The audio archive of Sunday evening's show--The 'Wimp Factor': Leftist Psychologist Says Conservative Men Are 'Femiphobic'--can be found here.
I was quoted in a recent article about the nightmarish Lohstroh case--see Advocates say father's death a case of alienation syndrome (Houston Chronicle,12/29/04, Atlanta Journal-Constitution, 1/2/04). In October we devoted a show to this case, wherein a 10 year-old boy caught in his mother's alienation campaign shot his father in the back after his father came to pick him up as part of his post-divorce shared custody arrangement. The most chilling part of the show was when we played recordings of Lohstroh's ex-wife threatening to bring false changes of child abuse against him. To listen, go to The Lohstroh Case: Alienating Mother Pushes 10 Year-Old Boy to Kill Father (10/31/04).
To write the Houston Chronicle about the article and the issue, click on viewpoints@chron.com.
Doug Darnall, who recently appeared on His Side (see Spontaneous Reunification, 12/19/04), was also quoted in the article.
The Associated Press has an interesting article about the problem of divorce among families separated due to one spouse's military service--U.S. Army tries to save war-torn marriages. One thing the article ignores is the role of anti-father family court bias in these divorces. Most divorces involving children are initiated by women, and the expectation of obtaining custody is one of the major factors which facilitates the divorce (see my co-authored column Can Abolishing Sole Custody Curb Divorce?, New York Sun, 10/2/02). I can guarantee that if these women weren't sure they would get custody of their children and all its attendant power and privileges they'd be more willing to be patient with their marriages to deployed servicemen.
The current system does a miserable job of protecting the family rights of deployed soldiers and sailors. For more information, see my columns The Betrayal of the Military Father (Los Angeles Daily News, 5/4/03) and Defrauded Veterans Have Mixed Emotions on Veterans Day (Daily Breeze [Los Angeles], 11/11/03), and my co-authored column Military Service Costs Some Men Their Children (Honolulu Star-Bulletin, 3/16/04). As I've noted several times on the air, it amazes me that we have tens of thousands of fathers marching through Iraq and Afghanistan getting shot at and our government can't lift a finger to try to protect their rights to their children.
I was quoted in a recent Seattle Post-Intelligencer piece on fathers being separated from their children around the holidays--see Holidays can fuel child-custody woes (12/24/04). I discussed the same subject and the modern assault on fatherhood in general on the Al Rantel Show on KABC AM 790 in Los Angeles on Wednesday.
Attention dads and daughters--Dr. Linda Nielsen's Embracing Your Father: How to Build the Relationship You Always Wanted with Your Dad gives practical, no nonsense advice and ideas on how fathers and daughters can communicate more honestly and be more comfortable with each other. Dr. Nielsen is a psychologist whose advice has helped hundreds of fathers and daughters strengthen their relationships. To listen to Dr. Nielsen on His Side, go to "Why Girls Need Fathers" (5/23/04).
If you own a business or professional practice and are interested in advertising on the show, please contact Advertise@HisSide.com. To support the advertisers who support His Side, go to His Side Advertisers.
To learn how to have CDs of all His Side shows for six months mailed to you, click here.
As always, all information about the show can be found at HisSide.com. I welcome your comments and suggestions.
Best Wishes,
Glenn Sacks
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PAS INFORMATION
Dec. 29, 2004, 1:39AM
Boy made into cause by group
Advocates say father's death a case of alienation syndrome
By ANDREW TILGHMAN
Houston Chronicle
RESOURCES PARENTAL ALIENATION SYNDROME
Although it has not been accepted as a true disorder, many parents and other advocates say Parental Alienation Syndrome can be caused by actions such as:
• Taking a side: Asking a child to choose one parent over the other.
• Passing the blame: Telling a child that the other parent is responsible for financial problems.
• Collecting tidbits: Using a child to spy on or covertly gather information about the other parent.
• Causing a split: Cultivating secrets, special signals or words with special meanings designed to alienate the other parent.
Source: Douglas Darnall, Ph.D, author of Divorce Casualties
A 10-year-old child accused of fatally shooting his father this summer has become a national poster boy for a controversial and unofficial psychiatric disorder: Parental Alienation Syndrome. Parents and others seeking formal recognition of the so-called syndrome have latched onto the death of 41-year-old Rick Lohstroh, who was killed on Aug. 27 outside his ex-wife's Katy home. After a bitter divorce in 2003, Lohstroh was picking up his two sons for a visit under a joint-custody agreement when the 10-year-old shot him from the back seat of the car, police said. Since then, advocates have pointed to Lohstroh's death to illustrate that acrimonious divorces can prompt an angry parent to turn a child against another parent.
"He's become a martyr for Parental Alienation Syndrome," said Dr. William Narrow, who heads the American Psychiatric Association's research and classification division, which determines whether disorders are formally recognized as legitimate mental illnesses.Parents and others have flooded Narrow's office with e-mails in recent weeks, urging the APA to include Parental Alienation Syndrome in its diagnostic manual, Narrow said. Concern of fathers' group While the syndrome has been cited in many divorce cases and custody battles across the country, Lohstroh's case is the first in which advocates suggest that PAS led to a death.
The emotional harm that embittered parents can inflict on a child is a long-standing concern for fathers' rights groups, which frequently complain that family courts unfairly favor women in cases of divorce, custody disputes and child-support litigation. "What happens in these PAS cases is so cruel and demented," said Glenn Sacks, the host of a nationally syndicated radio show called His Side, which focuses on fathers' issues.
Lohstroh was the topic of one of Sacks' shows in November. "This case is so shocking and over the top that, now, people are starting to pay attention to Parental Alienation Syndrome," Sacks said in a recent interview.
Medication's side effects
Prosecutors have charged Lohstroh's son with murder in the juvenile justice system. The boy, whose name has not been released because of his age, remains in a Harris County juvenile detention facility. Other factors are expected to complicate the case, including family members' statements that the boy began taking Prozac shortly before the shooting. Prozac is an antidepressant suspected of inducing suicidal or homicidal thoughts.
The boy's grandparents, Richard and Joanne Greene, of Columbia, S.C., are suing the maker of Prozac, Eli Lilly and Co., in a Galveston court. They contend that the company neglected to warn doctors and patients of the medication's risks and potential side effects, especially in young patients. During Lohstroh's bitter divorce from Deborah Geisler she alleged that Lohstroh had sexually abused the boy. Lohstroh, an emergency room doctor at the University of Texas Medical Branch in Gal-veston, adamantly denied the charges. Two polygraph tests indicated that he did not abuse his son, police said.
Social workers in Harris and Galveston counties investigated the complaint and took no action.
Parental Alienation Syndrome is one possible defense that attorneys could present at the 10-year-old's trial, legal observers said. A judge has barred attorneys and others directly involved in the case from speaking publicly about the pending trial. No trial date has been set.
"Jurors are going to want to know what on Earth could possibly possess a 10-year-old boy to pull the trigger on his own dad," said defense lawyer Brian Wice, who is familiar with the case. "The defense is going to have to find somebody that the jury can hate more than this 10-year-old boy. "And that role might be filled by the mom."
Discussion of PAS began in 1985, when Dr. Richard Gardner, a controversial child psychiatrist from New Jersey, introduced the term.
Most mental health professionals do not believe PAS meets the formal criteria for a syndrome, which is a cluster of symptoms with a single underlying cause, Narrow said. As a result, he said, it is not likely to gain acceptance as a formal psychiatric disorder anytime soon. "It's something like road rage," he said. "Just because somebody thinks that a syndrome is out there doesn't mean that, scientifically, it would meet the criteria for a disorder."
Psychiatrists usually are very conservative when adding disorders to their official diagnostic manual, largely out of concern for how they may be used in the courtroom, Narrow added.
"The APA is generally very cautious," he said. "The potential for misuse is very great." Nevertheless, some psychiatrists testify in court about the significance of unofficial disorders such as PAS. Judges and jurors in divorce or custody battles often consider allegations of PAS, although it is not recognized by all psychiatrists, said Pamela George, a professor at Houston's South Texas College of Law. "Judges take this sort of thing very seriously when they consider what is in the best interests of the child," she said. "I have seen judges tell a mother, 'You have taken such incredible steps at alienating the child, I am going to give the child to the father.' "
andrew.tilghman@chron.com
RESOURCES
PARENTAL ALIENATION SYNDROME
Although it has not been accepted as a true disorder, many parents and other advocates say Parental Alienation Syndrome can be caused by actions such as:
• Taking a side: Asking a child to choose one parent over the other.
• Passing the blame: Telling a child that the other parent is responsible for financial problems.
• Collecting tidbits: Using a child to spy on or covertly gather information about the other parent.
• Causing a split: Cultivating secrets, special signals or words with special meanings designed to alienate the other parent.
Source: Douglas Darnall, Ph.D, author of Divorce Casualties