How Do You Seek Political Asylum From Family Court?

While writing an article on moms fleeing the US and seeking political asylum I met Andrea. This mom had to protect her girls from a father and abuse that the family court would not. The article is on https://NoncustodialMothersDay.blogspot.com. We have information on Editable.com if you are thinking about seeking political asylum in Costa Rica

Transcript

SPEAKER_02 0:00

Welcome to the dark side of family court. I'm your host, DK. I'm a family court coach. Today I have Andrea here with us, and she had to put um she had to get political asylum and get out of the U.S. I wrote an article about this, and she's willing to talk about this. And um I also on editable will have information if you're interested in seeking political asylum as well. So welcome Andrea. How are you doing today?

SPEAKER_01 0:30

I'm doing fine. Thank you for having me on.

SPEAKER_02 0:33

Thank you for coming on. I was so excited. Um, when I was writing this article, I didn't think anybody actually has um uh file political asylum. So to find somebody, I was very excited, and then all my moms were really interested in it. Um so thank you so much for being here. Um, we really need your information and would love for you to tell us your story and how you got this to happen.

SPEAKER_01 1:00

Absolutely. Um from what from what has happened to me and my children, all I can say that it was by the grace of God and a divine intervention, if you will. Um this was something that was definitely not planned. It was just, you know, uh the situation that my daughters and I were in, it was a very dangerous situation, and we were um, you know, we didn't have time to think, we didn't have time to to sit down and go through the logistics. It was just like we had to go. Like right now, you need to go or it's going to get worse and something's gonna something bad's gonna happen. So um, you know, my daughters and I, we have been victims of judicial and police corruption stemming from Illinois to Arizona. Um, I have tried several times to file orders of protection to protect my daughters. And, you know, every single time, I mean it's only been twice, but with those two times, neither one of those orders were honored appropriately and executed, like you know, there wasn't any any repercussions of their dad violating those orders. It was always you're the problem. And you know, my kids were completely overlooked. The the things that they were reporting, the things that they were, you know, saying it just it just didn't the kids don't matter right because they're safety and protection.

SPEAKER_02 2:38

Well, men men think, oh, this is just a piece of paper, and then you go in front of the the judge and the judge slaps them on the hand and gives them a $50 fine, and they're just kind of laugh. Like, I can do whatever I want, I'll pay $50 to go smack her or do whatever he wants to do. You don't have an issue with that.

SPEAKER_01 2:52

Exactly. And you know, the thing that really alarmed me was that back in Illinois, and I've been I was fighting this fight since 2023. I mean, I was the one who initially filed for the order of protection in Illinois. He went and filed a retaliatory order of protection with false allegations, added all three of my kids, and the judge granted him an order of protection, even though I had filed one first.

SPEAKER_02 3:22

Right.

SPEAKER_01 3:22

And they honored his order of protection over mine for some reason I don't understand. And you know, in Illinois, you are not supposed to uh grant conflicting orders of protection, but they did anyways, the judge did that anyways.

SPEAKER_02 3:40

They're also so because I had a personal protection order, and it's interesting because the guardian man lightem in my case helped write the domestic violence manual, and they're not allowed to have unsupervised visitation, let alone custody. And they gave them custody, but I aren't but I learned that the Guardian Man Lightham had sold him custody. Um, so when I learned that, everything made sense. So much, so much made sense when that happened. But yeah, and and here's the thing: whenever there is hearsay and you don't and they don't have to prove it, they'll just lie and say whatever. That right there is a red flag that they have sold custody to him. Exactly. That's one of the red flags, yeah. I hear music in the background. You got a kid playing music?

SPEAKER_00 4:23

Yeah, I'm so sorry. That was my cell phone. Oh, I'm still technically I'm still technically on the clock, so let me put my cell phone away. I don't want it to be making a ruckus.

SPEAKER_02 4:33

I thought maybe you had one of the kids who were playing music or something. It's cute little tone.

SPEAKER_00 4:38

Yes, my apologies.

SPEAKER_01 4:41

Um, and yeah, to touch to to go back to what you were saying as far as selling custody, that did happen in my case. So let's fast forward. So, pretty much the Guardian Ed Lightham on my case, she's known to be highly corrupt. Um, she indeed and in fact sold custody to my ex because she then, let's fast forward a year or two, at the Arizona Order Protection. You know, the whole reason of me getting that order protection was because there was a DCFS investigation for the sexual abuse of my daughters. And I wasn't the one who who initiated that DCFS investigation. I took my daughters to their pediatrician in Arizona, and the doctor was or the pediatrician was the one who initiated that CPS investigation.

SPEAKER_02 5:30

Okay, so right now um I need to make a disclaimer. I always tell women do not take your children to a children's hospital. They are they're taking so many kids from a children's hospital, and it doesn't matter which one it is. If you are in the U.S., do not go to a children's hospital. Okay, go ahead.

SPEAKER_01 5:46

Okay, so let's fast forward um to when the DCFS investigation is over. Uh, of course, the the police in Illinois didn't have enough evidence to prosecute him for his crimes, even though you know there was a forensic interview and all of that. So let's fast forward to the order protection hearing. The judge, or she wasn't even a judge, she was a commissioner. She did not allow the allegations of the abuse that had occurred to be presented at the hearing because they did not occur in Arizona.

SPEAKER_02 6:20

Okay, so hold on. How does a commissioner do anything? Like a county commissioner?

SPEAKER_01 6:28

Uh, this was the uh superior court in Arizona, I believe it's called the superior court. Yeah, she was a commissioner, she's not even a judge. She's a com now, the j a judge granted me the order of protection in Arizona with my kids listed on there. Now it was a commissioner at the hearing. And you know, before before the parties were even heard and the hearing even started, the first thing she brought up was um, we're not gonna allow allegations one through three to be entered into this hearing because they did not occur in Arizona, they occurred in Illinois.

SPEAKER_02 7:02

Okay, so I've heard of county commissioners and I've heard of city commissioners, but I've never heard of a superior court commissioner.

SPEAKER_01 7:10

Yes, and I do have her name as well.

SPEAKER_02 7:13

And um well, I'm gonna be looking that up. Hey, where where were you in Arizona? Were you in Phoenix?

SPEAKER_01 7:20

Yeah, I was in Avondale, Arizona. That's where I had initially filed, that's where the police investigation went on, where the forensic interviews took place, where the DCS um investigation went on.

SPEAKER_02 7:31

You didn't go see Sheriff Lamb.

SPEAKER_01 7:34

No, I I I literally I had DCS on me because of this investigation. I literally had to call, I don't even remember what sheriff I spoke with, but they were just dragging their feet when it came to the forensic interview and the the case worker on the DCFS investigation. She's like, you need to call the sheriff and we need to get the schedule ASAP because it's taking too long. And you know, hindsight, I didn't really realize what was going on, but during that time, my ex was violating that order of protection, calling my kids and telling them to lie to DCS that I was the one that was abusing and making everything up, calling me crazy, that I'm out of my mind, that you know, just the whole typical abuser playbook, you know. Right. So um, so I had about five witnesses at that order protection hearing that were willing to testify to witnessing my children um uh pretty much verbalizing their abuse, telling them about their abuse, what happened, and being witness to, you know, it got pretty it got pretty icky there for a while. Like my youngest daughter, she was asking me to perform certain sexual acts on her. Um she was constantly, yeah, she was constantly touching my part of it. And um both of them, uh my my my 10-year-old at the time, she literally pulled all of her hair out at school in the front of her head. I picked her up and she had a huge bald spot in the front of her head. And this was all due to him violating the order of protection, calling my 10-year-old and threatening that if you talk, because she had a forensic interview set up as well, if you talk, the this is gonna be the repercussion. Right. But she's threatening her.

SPEAKER_02 9:24

Right, gonna threaten to her mom. Yeah, we know how they're their protocol, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 9:29

Right. So just to fast-forward things, um, after that, that order protection was removed because all the order protection that was put in place in first in the first place was to protect my children during a DCS DCFS investigation, and the allegations on there were for were for the abuse that occurred to them. Well, that order protection was dismissed. He then goes to Illinois. The judge would not give him an order that would give him the judge in Arizona or the commissioner in Arizona did not give him an order for me to return the kids. She told him you would have to go to Illinois to get that order. So that's exactly what he did. He went to Illinois and he obtained another ex parte. And he was trying to have me served with that ex parte because I hadn't been served. Well, during that time, he lied and said that he returned to Illinois, in which, in fact, he did not. He was still present in the state of Arizona and proceeded to call DCFS on me for neglect because my my oldest son was trying to coerce the girls out of the house so that he can then just pretty much just kidnap them, take them.

SPEAKER_02 10:39

Right.

SPEAKER_01 10:40

And you know, and these two girls are terrified. Um, they're both receiving uh trauma therapy at school. The school was the one who put them in trauma therapy because of their behavior. So here I am trying to protect my two youngest from my oldest and my ex, who's still present in Arizona, and I'm sitting here having to pretty much just hide. And, you know, during that time, my 16-year-old son was there at the house and he's coming in and out as he pleases. We have no idea where he's going. Of course, we had an idea that he was meeting up with my ex somewhere at a hotel. So at that point in time, DCFS gets involved. I have the police calling me nonstop, coming up to my door, trying to serve me. I didn't answer the door. I literally had to rush me and my girls out of the window to the backyard so that we could, you know, hide. And I called my attorney. I said, Look, I was like, I am going through a really hard time right now. He obtained a new order in Illinois. And she's like, Well, you gotta get out of there. You can't stay at that house. So, you know, I I then go to a domestic violence shelter with my two girls. I let them know the situation, they accept us right away. Um, but during that time, he then proceeds to call DCFS on me for neglect. And pretty much what happened was it backfired because DCFS, seeing all of the therapy paperwork, re-interviewed the girls and and and then intervened and opened up two investigations on him and even took custody away from him. And that wasn't enough. He then proceeded while I was at the domestic violence shelter, he then proceeded to break into my house. And with that, and left a note threatening me. Where are my effing daughters? You deadbeat ass mom, you know, just a bunch of terrible stuff. And at that point, that's when I made the decision. The police are not gonna help me, the court system here is not gonna help me. Right, I have to protect these girls. This was my only option, and that's when I proceeded to come to Costa Rica. That was the decision, and it was last minute. I left my house fully furnished. I mean, I wasn't even able to get rid of anything, the house was just left as is. I packed up my mine and my daughter's things and we left. That was it. I wasn't gonna have any more.

SPEAKER_02 13:14

Okay, so now how did you uh get the um political asylum?

SPEAKER_01 13:19

Okay, so and like I said, it was an act of God. It had to have been because as soon as I set foot in Costa Rica, my Uber driver, um he was just kind of asking us questions, anyways. Long story short, we find out that his wife is actually an immigration attorney, and he asked us if we needed help. And I was a little bit reluctant and hesitant, but I said, you know what, yes, because we're here, we're gonna need some kind of help.

SPEAKER_02 13:49

Right.

SPEAKER_01 13:49

So she then proceeded to she said that she needed to look at all of my evidence, everything that I had police reports, forensic interviews, DCFS records, therapy records. She needed the whole thing. Um, so I I provided her with everything. I gave her everything, and it took her, she told me that it would take her two weeks to look at all of my documents to be sure that I had a case that I would be able to stay here safe with the girls. So um after two weeks, she came and she told me, she said, it's over. It's over, you're safe. You don't have nothing to worry about.

SPEAKER_02 14:33

Oh wow.

SPEAKER_01 14:35

Yep, those were her exact words.

SPEAKER_02 14:37

Now I've done some research because I wrote an article about it, and I'm gonna put some information on my editable account, which is for people who want to be pro se, and I'm gonna put information up on there, and they're saying you know that you've got to take documents and they have to be turned into, you know, their language. Is it Spanish that they speak there?

SPEAKER_01 14:56

Yeah, so yeah, so they do have to be translated and apostled, and that came like we we had to pay her, of course. We had to pay her um to do all of that for us. So yeah, they're very strict here in Costa Rica. Um, I was granted expedited refugee status because of the girls, the the danger that they were in, and I had proof of that. Um, now in anybody else's case, um it would have taken, if it wasn't for my attorney, it would have taken at least a year for me just to be be interviewed at the immigration office. It would have taken a year, right? Maybe longer.

SPEAKER_02 15:34

So they're saying not to just go to they say not to just go there because there's things that got to take place. But like like in your case, like you just have sometimes you just have to get up and go there, and you know, um if that's what you have to do, you have to do it, and you have to go to, I believe it's the um consulate, maybe. I'm not sure. I have it all in my article, so if anybody's interested, they can just read that article. Um, but yeah, it's important that they take the document, documentation and everything with them as well, because they're gonna need that, you know, birth certificates and all that good stuff.

SPEAKER_01 16:05

Everything, yeah, everything that you have, birth certificates, those security cards, um, any any and all evidence that you have to show that United States failed to protect your children, anything, text messages, I mean any and everything. Even, you know, I even presented the letter from the the the um domestic violence shelter that I had stayed there. I had even showed proof of that, that I was there from this date to this date, and then that's when I, you know, fled.

SPEAKER_02 16:35

Right, right. Um, and that's why documentation is very important as well. Um, so how are the girls doing now?

SPEAKER_01 16:44

So, since we've been here, we've been here in Costa Rica for uh I would say a year, and they are healing. They're they my oldest is in um therapy here in Costa Rica because we're we were awarded expedited refugee status. That also means that we are we are um able to have insurance here as well. So they both have been interviewed here by professionals. Um actually, a judicial action was opened up against their father here. The police are investigating as well, but they're doing great, they're flourishing in school, they're learning Spanish, they're you know, they're they're they're coping very well and they're getting used to life here. It's very slow. It's very, it's not really fast-paced like United States.

SPEAKER_02 17:32

Right, right. Uh, well, good. I'm glad to hear that the girls are doing good and that you were able to get out of there and and able to do that safely. And um, you know, I think more women are probably gonna have to do that. I remember um when my ex was getting testy of my kids, and I had to, for some reason, I just had my daughter, and I was sitting in the car. I had like a half hour before I had to turn turn her over to him, and I was contemplating on running. I was like sitting in the car, and I thought, you know, that's gonna make her life worse, it's gonna be terrible, people are gonna be after me, you name it, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. And so I was like, well, I'm just gonna turn over and I'm gonna fight. And then he got custody, and then they were concealed for me, and they're all grown now, and I don't get to talk with them. Um, but yeah, so if people, I mean, you know, this is happening everywhere, and if this is an option that people need to take out, I want to be able to provide them with that and be able to do that if they absolutely need it.

SPEAKER_01 18:30

Yes, absolutely. And for the women out there that are in that position, because it's sad, you know, my oldest is completely alienated from me. He was successfully able to be manipulated by my ex. So I don't have any contact with him. I have no contact, I have no idea what's going on in his life. Um, you know, I know it's a hard decision to make, but if you have the evidence and you have the means to do it, like you know, we we had to have the money to come down here. You know, I didn't come down here the most conventional way, but it I made it happen. We made it happen by the grace of God. And I would, you know, I had help. I was helped. So if you have, if you need to make that decision and you know, you want your kids to be okay and heal and not have to worry about it, then yeah, you have you have to do what you have to do as a mother.

SPEAKER_02 19:23

You have to, right, right. It's just sad that it's getting to the point that this is what we're gonna have to do. And it's interesting because Arizona was the first one that came out and started talking about the family court system and what's happening and what's going on, but it's slow, and um, I don't really like what they're doing. I accidentally stumbled across this Maximus who's supposedly coming up with like a plan on what to do, and basically their plan is to take um Title IV money and use that to give fathers access. And it didn't say anything really about mothers, it was talking about fathers, you know. And I'm like, once again, you know, we're kind of left out of the whole picture. And um, so I have an article on that that I wrote, and um, you know, I just want people to be aware on they're trying to make changes, but they're not really making changes for moms.

SPEAKER_01 20:09

No, they're not, no, and they're selling custody left and right, and you know, it it's disheartening to learn that some of these judges actually get a bonus to give dad custody, whether he's abusive or not. I mean, and we're my ex, we're talking about an ex an ex-con felon here, right with with a with, you know.

SPEAKER_02 20:30

So one of the things I think it is, is I think that because with Title IV, that goes into their 401k, and I think they want money now, they don't want to wait till they retire. So I think that they're selling custody because they can get the money now. And um, I talk about that, and then in 2020, I was listening to um her name was Amazing Polly, and she started talking about um no touch torture, and I have a mental health degree and I work in behavior health. So I started digging into that and discovered that they're using torture on moms in order to give dads custody.

SPEAKER_01 21:02

Yeah, they they draw it out, they draw it out, and they mentally drain you. They'll mentally drain you. That's what happened to me during the custody. And the guardian at Lightum, she actually showed up to testify on behalf of my ex at the hearing. Yeah, she actually showed up to testify against me.

SPEAKER_02 21:18

Yeah, mine said that he was a great dad, and when she said that I looked around, I'm like, I've got a personal protection order, he's stolen my car, he's beating my car, and he's threatened this and that. And I was just like looking at her and I was like, something's not right here. And um, and then eventually I discovered that she and her husband sold my ex-custody because her husband's the vice president of a bank. And then I also have a picture of her husband who's the vice president of the bank with my ex-spouse's uh company CEO. So yeah, and I think this brotherhood of locomotives or brotherhood, um, because the um which is the brotherhood of locomotives is the union he's in, and there's the brotherhood um with uh government agencies, and I think it's the brotherhood in these unions that are part of all of this.

SPEAKER_01 22:04

Absolutely, yeah, they're all connected, they're all in bed with each other. I mean, the attorney that I had employed in the beginning of my case, he literally called me for a consultation to get a background, bragged about being best friends with opposing counsel's uh attorney, and that I had no case and then proceeded to cuss me out and tell me good luck. Yeah, you're not gonna get your kids.

SPEAKER_02 22:29

Wow. Wow, that's amazing. My gosh, it just takes all kinds.

SPEAKER_01 22:37

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 22:38

Yeah, so I I don't know what they're gonna do about this whole thing, um, what's going on, but they're not moving quick and fast enough as far as I'm concerned. Changes need to happen and they need to happen now, and that doesn't seem to be happening, so I don't know what parents are gonna do, but um they're not doing anything because they're making all kinds of money off it.

SPEAKER_01 22:57

Yeah, it's uh it's definitely for profit, not in the best interest of the child. It is definitely a kangaroo court, right? Um, you just never know what to expect. And I mean, as soon as that guardian linems paid off, as soon as they're paid off, those third party, those third parties included in the court, as soon as they receive that money, I mean, it's over with. You you just don't even have a chance, especially in smaller towns like me. I'm from a smaller city. Everyone knows everybody. All of the family law attorneys are all connected, and they all know the judges. So, I mean, uh, my ex, he actually employed a a criminal law attorney for family law, which tells you a lot. That's very telling, right there.

SPEAKER_02 23:37

Right.

SPEAKER_01 23:37

Um, yeah, it's just it's just been it was a battle for three years until enough was enough. I'm not gonna, I'm not going to, you know, I took that risk. I took the risk and I said, hey, you know, me as a mother, I have to do what I have to do, and thank goodness everything turned out, you know, in my favor, and we have the protection. And, you know, regardless of what happens in the United States, because there's things that could happen there, you know, legally wise, I mean, here I'm protected, I'm under non-refoulment. So Costa Rica will not, you know, hand me over.

SPEAKER_02 24:12

Right, right. Well, I am glad that all worked out, and I'm glad that the girls are doing okay and that they're healing. Thank you so much for coming on here and telling your story so that um if any moms out there who need to do this, you know, know a little bit more about what it is they need to do and how to do it. Absolutely. Thank you so much. All right, thank you, Andrea. You have a wonderful day, and this is the dark side of family court. Thank you for um coming on today and listening to our show.