ALLISON FOLMAR RESTORES PARENTAL RIGHTS AND SAVES CHILDREN FROM ABUSE
When Detroit, Michigan, attorney Allison Folmar received a call at 2 a.m. that a mother had barricaded herself in her house in a 10-hour standoff against Child Protective Services (CPS), a SWAT team, a tank and other law enforcement—all to protect her 11-year-old daughter, Ariana, from Risperdal—Folmar’s immediate response was, “I’ll represent her!”
A criminal defense attorney since 2000, Folmar was in a new realm, and she needed facts—facts that Citizens Commission on Human Rights (CCHR) provided. Risperdal, she learned, an antipsychotic drug, has irreparable side effects, including mania, aggression, diabetes, gynecomastia (breast growth) in males and death in the elderly. In the case of Ariana, whose behavior changed following an immunization, mother Maryanne Godboldo took her to a medical center where Ariana was prescribed Risperdal to which she had severe negative reactions. With a doctor’s help, Godboldo weaned her daughter off the drug.
Ariana started to improve, but CPS would not accept her being taken off the dangerous drug. Obtaining an illegal order rubber-stamped with a judge’s name who had never read it, CPS attempted to remove Ariana from her home, precipitating the 10-hour standoff. Godboldo was eventually tricked into giving over her child with promises that Ariana would not go to a psychiatric facility, which is exactly where Folmar found her. “It is something I never want to see ever again, another child in an institution like that,” says Folmar. With facts in hand, Folmar went to court, got Ariana released from the psychiatric ward and, after numerous court battles, all charges against Godboldo were dropped. But Pandora’s box had been opened. Folmar was flooded with calls from distressed parents whose rights to choose the best medical route for their children had also been violated. Kim Gee from New York was one such case—also with her daughter taken by CPS for refusing to give her Risperdal. Gee says, “Allison knew I had a little girl who was unlawfully seized for a bogus reason. She goes, ‘Oh no Girl, we are gonna get your daughter back!’ And I’ll be darned, that is exactly what happened.”
After the Godboldo case, Michigan issued new guidelines making it illegal for CPS to intervene when a parent chooses not to administer mind-altering drugs to their child. Judges are also now required to read the documents that have their signatures on them.
TAKING ACTION
Electroconvulsive Therapy Still Happening
Electroconvulsive therapy (ECT) still happens today, administered to an estimated one million people worldwide annually and promoted as being a “new safer” form. Anything “safer” about it is cosmetic, with patients now anesthetized so the effects of the grand mal seizure induced by 460 volts of electricity to the brain is only shown by a tremor in the person’s feet. But nothing can reduce the real damage: cognitive and memory dysfunction, memory loss, brain damage and death.
All the while, in its 80-year existence, the US Food and Drug Administration has never required clinical studies that prove ECT is either safe or effective. As one biomedical engineer put it, “To say that your brain needs a 460-volt electric shock is like saying your computer needs a lightning strike.”
CCHR is on a crusade to stop this barbaric practice. Learn more and sign our petition at cchrint.org/electroshock.
PUT AN END TO THE ABUSE
As a nonprofit mental health watchdog, CCHR relies on memberships and donations to carry out its mission to eradicate psychiatric violations of human rights and clean up the field of mental health. To become part of the world’s largest movement for mental health change, join the group that has helped enact more than 180 laws protecting citizens from abusive psychiatric practices.
