So Gitana are we not now back where we were before, that in order to amend this RO Terri needs to testify?
I'm just not understanding how this can happen if Terri won't answer questions. :waitasec:
I don't know how she plans to modify the RO without addressing the allegations in some manner. Maybe she plans to say, "I cannot address the allegations due to the fact that I am obviously the focus of a criminal investigation into those allegations but it is in the best interest for Baby K to have at least supervised visitation with her mother and former primary, stay-at-home caregiver. So I am asking for supervised visitation."
Kaine could also simply agree to supervised visits, and perhaps he will. He knows by now that TH won't talk or testify.
Otherwise, if Kaine says, "No, my allegations still stand. I think even supervised visits would put our kid at great risk." Then we are back to square one. TH would either have to answer the allegations or take the fifth. I suppose the judge could see the dilemma and order supervised visits without hearing new facts or any testimony, with the thinking that supervised visits are safe enough even if the allegations are true. I don't know. We'll see and I am very interested to see what happens next. We could learn a lot.
Wow. I didn't realize that. So basically, the MFH plot allegation in the RO is legally just...hearsay? Not permitted in a criminal court? Civil court?
Wow. This gives me a whole new thing to go think about--thank you!
Hearsay can be objected to in any court. I get it in often anyhow, through declarations, or even on the stand through testimony. The opposing party can object but often they don't and even if the judge on his or her own rules it's hearsay and not to be considered, I know they have already
heard it or read it and that it must have an effect.
However, if a case is built solely on hearsay with nothing to back it up, then it would be reversible error for the court to make ruling based only on hearsay. I don't think Kaine has any evidence, really. I think he just has hearsay from LE and they will not testify or submit their evidence because it would compromise their investigation to do so. So I don't know what he would have done had TH contested the RO and forced him to come up with evidence. Maybe as Desquire suggested, put TH on the stand and ask her questions about where she was and what she did that day (in a cross-examination style as an adverse witness) and force her to plead the fifth, which the judge could hold against her but still, they would be stuck with hearsay allegations and TH's silence and I really don't see how the court could make a ruling against TH based on that without great grounds for appeal. All of this is a very novel dilemma for the court.
Another way, I guess would be if Kaine explained his dilemma to the court and requested a sealed child custody evaluation but I don't think TH could participate in that because I think (crim lawyers, help me out here) that LE could subpoena the evaluation report as part of their criminal investigation. Child custody evaluation reports are automatically sealed from the public anyhow but confidential medical records and eval reports often come in during criminal trials. I'm not quite sure how that works. Anyone? In the meantime, I'll ask my law partner.
The evaluation would look into all the allegations and the evaluator can access all sorts of records. The evaluations are not bound by the rules of evidence so they can and do review hearsay statements but they really look for verifiable allegations. I just don't know what Kaine planned or if he actually has anything that he can actually submit without objection.
I don't think it can mean that. It doesn't make any sense to me, frankly. Kaine would know that he'd look very bad if he'd make something like that up about LE, and I don't think he'd want that in the middle of a missing child investigation. What would he gain anyway? Maybe he'd enjoy trashing Terri's reputation but it could very well eventually lead to ruining his own reputation if a source figured out that this was a bunch of BS. He couldn't have been sure that Terri wouldn't contest the RO and he wouldn't have to produce his LE witnesses which he couldn't have done if it was just a lie.
It'd be an amazing coincidence if LE didn't share the information with Kaine and he just magically happened to leave with the child and file for RO inventing a MFH plot coinciding with LE doing a MFH sting. I suppose the MFH sting would be a fact since there apparently is a 911 call about it.
Clearly, LE let Kaine know about what they found. That's the whole reason he filed for disso and an RO. LE would be remiss if they found out about a possible MFH plot but did not let the potential victim know.
