Stop The Responsible Fatherhood Bill

"All I ever wanted was supervised" a repeated phrase amongst family violence survivors.  The Family Court has come under recent scrutiny over unsafe contact and the controversial use of Parental Alienation Syndrome a diagnosis that has not been accepted by any scientific organization globally.  The bottom line is that children are ordered by the court to attend access visits where the parents are abusive.  If the mother objects, she risks losing the children altogether.  That is the state of not only the Family Court in Australia, it is an international problem.  

Until recently, there were few groups that were advocating for children and far too many groups advocating for such forced contact.  "Pro Contact" culture is really just being polite.  "Contact No Matter what" Cult, is more appropriate considering the facts that there is no limit as to who they wish children to have contact with.  

Cult definitions coined from 1920 onward^[1] refer to a cohesive social group and their devotional beliefs or practices, which the surrounding population considers to be outside of mainstream cultures. The surrounding population may be as small as a neighborhood, or as large as the community of nations. They gratify curiosity about, take action against, or ignore a group, depending on its reputed similarity to cults previously reported by mass media. -Wikipedia

Bizarre punishments against mothers are initiated by the courts if they do not comply without consideration for the impact that the children suffer.  

Some of these punishments include:

"Isolating The Child From The Protective Parent"

"Orders inhibiting the Child From access to Counseling"

"Removal of The Mothers Passport'

In cases where the parent has a mental health condition that is one of the leading causes of homicide, the protective action is often minimal.  Some orders are for the parent to take their medication and see their doctor, but left entirely to the device of the patient and the potential victims are left restricted by the court order and helpless to what might come about.  The Court evaluators who make the decisions that the judges often solely rely on are often untrained for these cases, but overtrained in the area of "pro - contact' and too well understand the terms of "maternal gatekeeping" "Alienation" and "False Memory Syndrome".  They believe that the child is not unsafe in relationships with sex offenders if they "just accept it" without the interference from mothers.  

This is due to the fact that in the early 80s, Dr Richard Gardner coined the term, "Parent Alienation Syndrome" and travelled the world with the help of Association of Family and Conciliation Courts(AFCC).  Many conferences were held indoctrinating lawyers, psychologists and judges into the belief that children are better off with abusive parents.  This belief was also supported by the international Child Emancipation, a lobby group for pedophiles.  

Cases where there is not enough evidence to support Family Violence are often referred to as, "False Allegations" and in most cases the victim is required to pay costs to the alleged perpetrator. This goes against studies that support the notion that in 95% of child abuse cases are true.  Clearly it is the interference that the victims receive during the court processes that leads to the lack of evidence that is able to be provided.  

Like the German Lebensborn organization, they said, "Best Interests" but the intention was to reintroduce laws that tie women to men and diminish any concerns regarding child abuse and violence against women.  The current family law regime reduces the value of children and mothers compared to men and promotes the cycle of violence continuing through to another generation.  Like a genetic disease, our children have been infected with family violence.  

The German Lebensborn organization was similarly cruel in its time.  In the context of the German welfare system, it was considered that it was the "best interests" of the child to be German.  By abducting babies of other origins for German families, "Best Interests of the child" was created to serve the purposes of racial intolerance.  Today in the context of Family Law, "best interests of the child" refers to the amount of time spent with a parent no matter how abusive they may be. 

Although there have been more efforts to protect mothers and children affected by family violence with the Violence Against Women Act and the introduction of the Protective Parent Bill, PAS is still alive in the US court system and have progressed to a point where they are supporting it through the "Responsible Fatherhood Bill".  Like best Interests, it is aimed at enforcing contact with fathers regardless of the rise to epidemic proportions of murder suicides.  In sect 2, "Findings" it states that the reason to provide fathers with billions of dollars in funding is due to:

6) Children who live without contact with their biological father are, in comparison to children who have such contact--

(A) 5 times more likely to live in poverty;

(B) more likely to bring weapons and drugs into the classroom;

(C) twice as likely to commit crime;

(D) twice as likely to drop out of school;

(E) more likely to commit suicide;

(F) more than twice as likely to abuse alcohol or drugs; and

(G) more likely to become pregnant as teenagers.

(7) Violent criminals are overwhelmingly males who grew up without fathers.

  

The findings stated here is derived from a confirmitory bias. If you look deeper into the research, it becomes obvious that:

Children were economically abused by the fathers and the state for withdrawal of financial support of children.  It is in fact written in the convention on The Rights Of The Child:

 

Article 26

1. States Parties shall recognize for every child the right to benefit from social security, including social insurance, and shall take the necessary measures to achieve the full realization of this right in accordance with their national law.

2. The benefits should, where appropriate, be granted, taking into account the resources and the circumstances of the child and persons having responsibility for the maintenance of the child, as well as any other consideration relevant to an application for benefits made by or on behalf of the child.

 

The "Violent males who grew up without fathers", were in fact infected prior to the separation by witnessing the actual violence.  According to Amy Coha:

• Boys who witness domestic violence are more likely to batter their female partners as adults than boys raised in nonviolent homes. Of the children who witness domestic abuse, 60% of the boys eventually become batterers.
• Sixty-three percent of boys age 11-20 who commit homicide, murder the man who was abusing their mother. In 50% of the time, if the wife (mother) is being physically abused, so are the children.

Teenage pregnancy is an old sexist phrase that draws the need to look at the pregnant women as the problem.  Contraceptives apart from the condom are directed at her as entirely responsible for the pregnancy.  According to Rape Abuse and Incest Network(RAIN):

Girls ages 16-19 are 4 times more likely than the general population to be victims of rape, attempted rape, or sexual assault.

 

Victims of sexual assault are:⁷

3 times more likely to suffer from depression.

6 times more likely to suffer from post-traumatic stress disorder.

13 times more likely to abuse alcohol.

26 times more likely to abuse drugs.

4 times more likely to contemplate suicide.

The fact that in some states, the perpetrator can apply to the Family Court to stop the abortion and continue these attacks on her suggests that women and girls are considered by the state as objects rather than human beings.  If such a bill were to pass, it would be a greater violation to the already eroded human rights of women and children.  

From The Times

April 10, 2009

Openness of family courts is a ‘con trick’

Frances Gibb, Legal Editor

Jack Straw has been accused of a confidence trick over plans to open the family courts to the media.

John Hemming, a Liberal Democrat MP, has warned that although the Justice Secretary’s new rules will allow the media to attend family court proceedings for the first time, reports cannot be published without the judge’s permission.

The media, groups campaigning for justice for families and the English public had each been taken in, he said. “Whether it is by Jack Straw or by forces of reaction in the judiciary – we have all been hoodwinked.”

The reforms will take effect from April 27 under rules that have just been published. Mr Hemming, who, with The Times, has been in the forefront of the campaign to open the family courts, said that the reforms brought some benefits, in that parents or children could tell journalists or their MP about court proceedings, but he added: “It remains that publication can only happen with the permission of the judge.”

RELATED LINKS

• When stakes are high, parents must be heard

• Bloggers excluded as family courts opened

• Times wins battle over secrecy of family court

In an interview with The Times in December, Mr Straw appeared to imply that the media would be allowed to report on cases as long as they did not name the parties or publish their personal details. “It will be open to parties to apply to court for specific reporting restrictions. But my hope is that the courts are reluctant to grant these,” he said.

Last month a senior family judge said that the media would continue to be denied the ability to report on the detail of cases. Sir Andrew McFarlane, a High Court judge, said that only reports of the “gist of proceedings rather than the detail of an individual case” would be allowed. The present reporting regime would remain in place and would be “unamended to accommodate the insertion of the media into the courtroom”, he said.

Sir Andrew added that the Government was not intending to ease restrictions to “give the green light to the reporting of human interest stories”. Because of the need to protect the identity of children, he said, the media would “face tough sanctions” if they reported the detail of any case. “The reporting will be about the system, rather than substance.”

Sir Andrew, a family judge who made his comments to a conference

held by Resolution, the family lawyers’ association, said that the changes would help to prevent ill-informed and inaccurate reporting. But he concluded: “The brave new world postApril . . . seems to be far more sophisticated and restricted than may at first sight have been understood by some journalists, the public at large and, for that matter, the legal profession.”

Announcing the reforms in December, Mr Straw stated that courts would retain powers to restrict attendance and what could be reported.

Sir Andrew said that journalists would face difficulties when confronted with a parent complaining about a miscarriage of justice. “Under the new scheme, the journalist is in no better position than they are now to evaluate the validity of the complaints that they are hearing.” He also said that when care and criminal proceedings were being held in parallel, a journalist would be unable to “report any of the substance of the care proceedings other than possibly the outcome, once the proceedings have fully concluded”. In a case involving serious injury or death, such as the Baby P hearing, the journalist who was privy to the case would not be able to report any detail.

Mr Straw strongly denied any intention to mislead. He said that the intention was to legislateto rationalise reporting restrictions but it would take primary legislation. He said: “It is nonsense for anyone to suggest that there has been any dubiety in the Government’s position. Time and again I have said that we will bring the current highly restrictive rules against reporting in respect of the High Court and county courts into line with the rules for family proceedings courts.

“Alongside the formal changes to the court rules, I have also wanted to ensure a change in the culture and practice of all courts – the High Court, county courts, and magistrates’ courts – towards greater openness, and I am confident that the overall effect of these changes will be to achieve that.”

FAMILY COURT RALLY & PETITION Sunday 3rd MAY 2009

FAMILY COURT RALLY & PETITION Sunday 3rd MAY 2009

Global

Basic Info

Type:	Common Interest - Beliefs & Causes
Description:	In memory of all the children who have died at the hands of their parents following Family Court involvement....RIP And the children who continue to be forced into contact with violent or sexually abusive parents by the Family Court of Australia.

Contact Info

Email:
Office:	PARLIAMENT HOUSE
Location:	Every Capital City, Australia

Recent News

The death of so many of our country's children at the hand of their parents have shocked us all.

But have they shocked Australian politicians enough to make them review and amend the way the Family Court of Australia deals with children where domestic violence or sexual abuse allegations are made?

We hope so.

We are organizing this petition and a rally to be held in every capital city in Australia.
PLEASE SIGN THE FOLLOWING PETITION

http://www.gopetition.com.au/petitions/family-court-of-australia-amendments.html

Parents (and their family) currently involved in FCA dispute will need to wear red hoods or scarves to disguise themselves so they can't be identified for legal reasons.

Red will signify the blood of Australian children being shed by FCA orders which force children to have access to, or shared care with parents who are violent or sexually abusive.

Please read the discussion forum to see what you can do, the latest updates on the organizing, and more information about the protest.

Importantly, please sign the petition and send it to your networks, personally asking them to pass it on. This is how we CAN make a difference.

We already have media interest and dozens of volunteers helping with this. Be part of an event that will help save children's lives.
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This is an extract of a letter sent to the Attorney General's Dept recently. It was forwarded to me by Prof Freda Briggs.
You might find the list of incidents at the end of the extract, pretty amazing. I did.

"Since the reforms of 1996 and 2006, there is a palpable reluctance by the courts to reduce contact between parents and children, even when there is ample evidence that one parent has engaged in behaviours congruent with domestic violence or 'intimate terrorism' as described by the AIFS study where category C is ascribed to the most severe form of interpersonal violence. This is also in spite of The Family Law Act 1975, (Cth) s60B, (b) and (c). Justice Wall from the UK has stated that,

"I was concerned to read in a number of places in the files that reliance was placed on the proposition that it may be safe to order contact where domestic violence had been perpetrated on the mother, but not on the child. In my judgment it needs to be recalled that Drs Sturge and Glaser pointed out that domestic violence involved "a very serious and significant failure in parenting- failure to protect the child and failure to protect the child emotionally (and in some cases physically) - which meets the definition of child abuse. It is, in my view, high time that the Family Justice System abandoned any reliance on the proposition that a man can have a history of violence to the mother of his children but, nonetheless, be a good father."

"However, in Australia the reasoning seems to indicate that the judiciary continues to believe that a parent who has been physically violent to the other does not indicate that they are a danger to the children of the marriage. For example;

"However, on the father's own admission, he has acted in ways that would bear the description of "domestic violence". This includes putting his hands around the neck of the mother. It may be also that other conduct, though falling short of physical assault, but which was aggressive and angry, would also fit that description. He was probably controlling and dominant in the relationship with the mother. This might also fit the description of domestic violence. As well, he was a times physically domineering in applying physical discipline to [the 18 month old child], such as straddling her on the bed and holding her head or face to ensure her attention. All of these behaviours are indications of an approach to relationships and parenting, less than optimal, in times past. As well, it is clear enough that he has not been alert to crossing personal boundaries."

This father continues to have unsupervised contact with this child. 

The causal factors between the dynamic of domestic violence, its range of indicators and the dangers this behaviour poses to the children of the marriage continue to be ignored by the judiciary, report writers, the legal practitioners and even the police department. This has resulted in the growing list of deaths of children from a family of origin where domestic violence can be ascribed as the feature of the breakdown in the relationship. Fears for the safety of children are ignored. Consider the following sample:

• 1996 - January 25: Peter May shot and killed his three children, Lisa eleven, Andrew eight, and Natalie seven during a contact visit. On the same day, he also killed his wife and her parents. May's history of domestic violence and links to the Men's Rights Agency was commonly known and reported,
• 1998 – October 23: After Ronald Jonkers lost custody of Aaron DeBaugy 5, Ashlee seventeen months and David seven, he poisoned them by carbon monoxide in their car on a contact visit in Perth,
• 1999 – August: WA four young children were gassed along with their father Mark Heath after a family court dispute,
• 2000 - Rhonda Bartley was shot dead by her ex-partner in Berri while attending a court ordered contact handover of their baby daughter,
• 2001 - September: Mikaylah Green eleven weeks, Taylah Pringle eleven months and Jackson Merrott six, were smothered by their father on a contact visit in Sydney,
• 2002- Ana Hardwick 35 is strangled by her former partner after the family court granted her custody of their eleven and eight year old children,
• 2004 – April 26: Jessie Dalton nineteen months and Patrick Dalton thirteen weeks were smothered by their separated father Jayson Dalton after a family court order to him to return the infants to their mother Dionne, 
• 2005 – 4th September: Robert Farquharson killed his sons Jai ten, Tyler seven, and Bailey two, by driving them into a dam in Winchelsea, south-west of Melbourne on Fathers' Day contact visit,
• 2008 – May 9: The body of three year old Imran Zilic, was found after his father threw him down a mine on an access visit,
• 2008 – January 3: Christopher McEwen raped and then killed his daughter Rhiannon McEwen on Bribie Island on New Years Eve. The matter of the children's residency was before the Family Court in 2004 where the father was given residency of all three children. It is not known to this writer if it was by consent. However, this father was cleared by a psychiatrist to leave a Brisbane hospital's mental health unit just nine days before he allegedly raped and murdered his ten-year-old daughter. Queensland Health did not report the man – who had spent two weeks as an involuntary patient in the hospital's mental health unit – to the Department of Child Safety. Given this man's mental condition, the question is how in 2004 was it that he obtained sole custody of his four children aged between six and ten?
• 2009 – January 29: Arthur Freeman unbuckled Darcey from her seat in the family Toyota Land Cruiser on the West Gate Bridge about 9.15am and threw her over the edge and into the Yarra River 58m below. She died in hospital four hours later. The tragedy occurred one day after the Freemans had reached an agreement over access to Darcey and their two other children, Benjamin six, and Jackson two, following their separation in 2007. "
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Find out more at Facebook:

http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=69087938967

Their Silent Cries...

Above is a picture of a child ghost in the movie The Grudge.  The Movie was made by a director that wanted to portray the rage from women over the years from crimes against women especially domestic violence.  In the movie, the mother had a crush on her teacher and records it in her journal.  Her husband discovers her secret crush and breaks her neck in a fit of rage.  As she is dieing, her voice box is damaged as she lays on the floor watching her husband drown her son.  She cannot scream or cry in pain.  The only sound that leaves her mouth is a chilling croak.   

In real life, these victims don't come back to make others feel the pain that they endured and it is often why they become our forgotten voices in a landscape of systematic failure.  Perhaps we will look back to this point of history and wonder why indeed these children were forgotten and why something was not done sooner.  Whilst Anonymums focus is on mothers and children's rights, we have not forgotten fathers either.  We are against groups that encourage violence and child abuse and use excuses such as contact to justify their means to incite terror and silence those who speak out against it.  Unfortunately fathers are represented by undesirables who wish to destroy  all barriers to maintaining abusive control over children and mothers.  Research on homicides has already revealed that some of these fathers and mothers will harm or even kill children to punish their exes.  Homicide stats state that most of these are fathers and whilst fathers Rights groups would prefer to distort these facts and portray that mothers are the major offenders, it simply is not true especially in the dynamics of family violence.  

What we cannot deny is the consequences of history where we have thousands of years and establishment of a world dominated by men.  In the last hundred years, women have begun to have rights in nearly every area and become recognized as equals to men in both home and public life.  Along with women's rights came children's rights that were established by women who knew all to well the dehumanizing status as "property" and seeked to change that area as well.  In the late 70s domestic violence began to peak and later became recognized as a deadly backlash against women and children's rights.   Mens movements began to form as the ones we know today persuading the public that we have too much equality that men are now victims of the woman's movements.  Statistics prove that this is simply not true and their advocacy is disastrous when a majority of their members claim to have been falsely accused of child abuse and domestic violence.  Few horrors that have hit the public have not been untainted by the mens movements attempts to conquer public conversation on violence prevention with the old "fatherless" "false allegations" "It was her fault" "Parent Alienation".  Their arguments have often halted and diverted most public enquiries into victims of child abuse and domestic violence.  Last year, a father abandoned his three year old at a city railway station after murdering her mother.  Her name was dubbed, "Pumpkin" as the story became a world wide issue and a grave reason why more needs to be done on protecting victims throughout the Family Court processes.  Around the same time, Karen Bell lost her three children because she had to go to family court before she could even protect them.  Ingrid Poulson lost her children for the same reasons.   Dionne Dalton warned the family court that the children were in grave danger, but the Family Court handed the children over to the father.  In the next court case, he applied for shared parenting but accused her of being a negligent mother.  The court awarded the father unsupervised weekend access and the next day he killed the children and then himself.  The men blamed the death on not having shared parenting laws and ignored the risks involved.  The freeman's had also raised concerns for two years and just recently lost their only daughter after the father was awarded shared care.  The incident was on Melbourne's west Gate Bridge in front of many motorists and became a worldwide tragedy.  The Family Courts response was less than humane as they attempted to divert responsibility by stating that they were not aware and that the courts documents were "stolen" from the chief justices car.  

Whilst this was going on, a mother named Melinda Thompson is one of 126 mothers on the run from the family courts being hunted down like an animal because she fears for the safety of her children.  How many children does it take before we have some serious changes?

Add your voice to our petition at:

http://www.gopetition.com.au/online/22705.html

Diana Bryants last lot of Excuses... When is the Family Court going to Take Children Seriously?

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TRANSCRIPT

Losing the Children

Liz Jackson tells a compelling and intimate story of a family's tragic breakdown.

Date: 16/08/2004

LIZ JACKSON, REPORTER: It was a shocking and seemingly incomprehensible act, but one that is far from unique. In the small, bleak hours before dawn on Anzac Day morning three months ago, a Brisbane man took the lives of his two small children. Jessie was 20 months, Patrick was 12 weeks. Their father, Jayson Dalton, took this footage of the children the night before, after what he told them was a bad day for Daddy in the Family Court.

JAYSON DALTON (ON HOME VIDEO FOOTAGE): We had a bad news today about the courts. Yeah, you're going to miss Daddy, aren't you?

LIZ JACKSON: It appears it was some hours after he had drugged the children that Jayson Dalton wrote a suicide email to his estranged wife Dionne and then took his own life.

OWEN PERSHOUSE, FOUNDER, MENDS: What he did was monstrous. What he did was crazy. What he did was evil. But it's too easy to just say the person's bad or mad and leave it at that.

DIANA BRYANT, CHIEF JUSTICE, FAMILY COURT: If it happens, you go over the case and think, "I did what I could. There was nothing to indicate this would happen." But emotionally, of course it affects us. We're all human. I think it affects everybody. We all live in the shadow of this happening to us, unquestionably.

LIZ JACKSON: And what's it saying to us, that phenomenon?

OWEN PERSHOUSE: "Do something. Do not ignore this."

LIZ JACKSON: Jayson Dalton appeared to be a father who doted on his children, especially his little girl. As the Government declares the need for major reform of the family law system, Four Corners tells the intimate story of what led to this tragedy. It's a story that confronts the issues of family violence, and the bitter battles for custody in the wake of family breakdown.

(HOME VIDEO FOOTAGE OF DIONNE GETTING READY FOR HER WEDDING PLAYS)

LIZ JACKSON: Dionne Dalton likes to be organised, and wanted everything on this day to be just right. In a few hours time, she would be marrying Jayson Luke Dalton. Her husband-to-be's stepmother, Evelyn Dalton, is a hairdresser, and she'd flown over from Western Australia to help prepare for the big day. Jayson and Dionne picked her up from the airport.

EVELYN DALTON, JAYSON DALTON'S STEPMOTHER: He gave the impression then of...very caring, very tender. He was proud of her. You could see it. Like I said to him after I met her, "You've hit the jackpot, mate. Good on you."

LIZ JACKSON: Dionne had met Jayson after he'd contacted her through an Internet chatroom site. Eight weeks after their first date, they were living together. Six months later they were engaged.

DIONNE DALTON: I was just so ecstatic that he'd proposed to me. I thought, "This is the man I'll spend the rest of my life with and have children with."

LIZ JACKSON: Dionne had been married before, but this was not going to stop her getting married in white.

(FOOTAGE OF DIONNE PREPARING FOR HER WEDDING CONTINUES)

WOMAN 1: Do you want any more gold to wear? Got enough?

DIONNE DALTON: Should I take my watch off?

WOMAN 1: Yes.

WOMAN 2: Yes.

WOMAN 1: Brides don't wear watches.

DIONNE DALTON: How will I tell the time?

WOMAN 1: Don't worry about it.

WOMAN 2: That's what Jayson's for.

DIONNE DALTON: Oh, mate.

WOMAN 2: That, and he looks decent in a black suit. (Chuckles) The only reason. He's just there for colour.

DIONNE DALTON: We're not relying on Jayson this week.

LIZ JACKSON: There'd been a small incident with Jayson a few days before which no-one really wanted to talk about.

EVELYN DALTON: Jayson and Dionne came to pick us up from the motel. Dionne was driving and Jayson was a passenger, and I looked at the windscreen and I said, "Did someone throw a rock at the screen?" And he never lied to me, he was always honest, and he said, "No, I put my fist in it." And I just said, "Oh," and I said no more.

DIONNE DALTON: I can't remember what it was over, but he...he just punched the windscreen and the windscreen shattered. It was the first time I'd really, really seen him get really aggressive. The alarm bells were ringing in my head, but I just thought, "No, I can't pull out of this wedding three days before we're due to get married."

LIZ JACKSON: Dionne was Jayson Dalton's first serious girlfriend, and he held the view that marriage was for life.

EVELYN DALTON: It was always in his mind, and he used to voice it, that he was only going to get married once. He didn't want to be divorced like his dad, and he wanted children. That was the whole package.

LIZ JACKSON: Everything went smoothly as the two families were joined together, but not everyone was happy. Dionne's mother, Julie Wherritt, hadn't liked Jayson from the day that she'd met him, and found herself sidelined at her own daughter's wedding.

JULIE WHERRITT, DIONNE DALTON'S MOTHER: I knew from the first time I met Jayson that Jayson was a control freak. Jayson had to have control. He was a perfectionist and he had to have everything going the way he wanted it.

LIZ JACKSON: Dionne's bridesmaid increasingly shared Dionne's mother's doubts - a groom who chose the bridesmaid's dress?

SHARYN WRIGLEY: Jayson came with me to choose the bridesmaid's dress. He chose the colour and he chose the dress. I had no say, and on the day of the wedding, he decided the hairstyles, and, uh...he was a very... Then the true colours just started coming out. He was a controller.

LIZ JACKSON: But who could really care, as long as the couple were happy?

After the honeymoon, they moved into the house that Dionne had bought before they were married - a weatherboard in the Brisbane suburb of Kelvin Grove. Dionne remained estranged from her mother and began to see less of her friends.

DIONNE DALTON: I'd been so close to my mother and my family, but I took his side, and that's basically when the rot set in. From that time, we just didn't have any contact, really, with Mum.

SHARYN WRIGLEY: All of a sudden, Dionne wasn't allowed to have her friends. Dionne wasn't allowed to go out. Jayson made sure that I wasn't going to be someone who was taking Dionne out Saturday night and Friday night.

LIZ JACKSON: After the wedding, they saw very little of Jayson's immediate family as well - his father and stepmother lived in Western Australia. He was an only child, and his parents separated when he was eight. He started off living with his mother, but it didn't work out.

Val Dalton is Jayson's father's cousin.

VAL DALTON: He, uh...would go into rages and so on. He, um...he did that with his mother when he was living here at the coast, and he was expelled from a school. I believe he threatened a teacher and, um, so he went back with his father.

LIZ JACKSON: When his father enrolled him at Mount Isa High School, he specifically asked that Jayson not be taught by women, to avoid the problems he'd had at his last two high schools.

Mollie Dalton is Val Dalton's sister.

MOLLIE DALTON: From accounts by his father, there does seem to have been a problem. There seems to have been a kind of anger that often surfaced in him and sometimes led to, um, you know, violent actions or speech against... particularly against women.

LIZ JACKSON: Four months into the marriage, Dionne was pregnant.

DIONNE DALTON: We were both just so elated and so, just, shocked and surprised because we had been trying for about four months and when it did actually happen, we just ecstatic at the thought that we were going to have a baby.

MOLLIE DALTON: They seemed to, uh, talk together a lot about what was to be done, though we wouldn't have always spoken to Dionne in the way that Jayson sometimes did. He had a rather abrupt way of speech sometimes.

DIONNE DALTON: We were still going along quite well, but he was just verbally abusing me.

LIZ JACKSON: What sort of things?

DIONNE DALTON: Oh... Words I don't want to repeat. A lot of swearing, using the F word, using the C word and every second word was "F this, F that, F this, F that." And it just demoralised me totally when he would speak to me that way because I decided that I was doing everything in my power that I could to do what he wanted.

LIZ JACKSON: While Dionne was pregnant, Jayson decided that they would start a business - a shop that would boast the largest collection of door handles in Australia. Up until the day she went into labour, Dionne ran the shop, while Jayson continued his job with a mining company.

DIONNE DALTON: It was really hard on me and he was hard on me as well, just making sure that we met figures and he got the achievement...he achieved the goals he wanted to achieve.

LIZ JACKSON: On September 12, 2002, Jessie Caitlin Dalton was born.

DIONNE DALTON: The day before, he'd had a huge argument with me and it put me into stress and the next day they induced me. But he was very apologetic to me that night.

LIZ JACKSON: From the moment she was born, Jayson was besotted. She was a delightful baby, but business was business.

DIONNE DALTON: He just kept on at me the whole time, trying to pressure me and get me to go back to the business and leave hospital.

LIZ JACKSON: When Jessie was one week old, Dionne was back at work three days a week, taking Jessie with her.

DIONNE DALTON: It was like I was on autopilot. I did that for six months until Jessie got to the stage where she was crawling around and needed some stimulation. So we put her into day care two days a week.

LIZ JACKSON: By this time, Dionne says that Jayson had started to hit her.

DIONNE DALTON: The first time he did it to me I was just absolutely terrified. I said, "Why did you hit me? What did I do to deserve that?" He said, "You didn't do as you were told. If you had done as you were told, it wouldn't have happened." I said to him, "But I didn't do anything wrong. I just did what I was supposed to." "You didn't do it the way I wanted it done."

LIZ JACKSON: His temper was increasingly bad. Here Jayson is getting Dionne to video a car he believes has cut him off.

(HOME VIDEO FOOTAGE PLAYS)

JAYSON DALTON: Zoom in on the bloody thing there.

DIONNE DALTON: I'm just nervous, OK?

JAYSON DALTON: Just zoom in!

DIONNE DALTON: Alright.

LIZ JACKSON: But she was not thinking of leaving.

DIONNE DALTON: I'd always said that if anyone hit me I'd leave a relationship straightaway. But at that stage, because I had Jessie, I was too scared to go anywhere else. I thought, "I've frozen my family out of the picture." So they weren't there for me anymore and I had no one else to trust.

LIZ JACKSON: In April 2003, Jessie was christened. Jayson's stepmother, Evelyn Dalton, came over from WA for the service.

EVELYN DALTON: That was all very nice. We had a nice time. Uh, we came home and Dionne changed clothes and I noticed some bruises on her arms. And I said to her, "What happened here?"

DIONNE DALTON: And I just broke down in tears and told her about what had been going on.

EVELYN DALTON: And she said then he was very controlling. He was starting to push her around. I knew that it wouldn't stop there. It would get worse. It does.

DIONNE DALTON: And, um, anyhow, that night she confronted Jayson about it, when I'd gone to bed.

EVELYN DALTON: I spoke to him and said, "You know, you don't do this. This is not on." I also said to him, "If you continue in this manner, you will lose everything that's near and dear to you. The thing that you will lose will be your wife and children." And I said, "If you've got any feeling for me, you'll lose me." So we had a...not a... I probably... I said more than Jayson. Jayson didn't have a real lot to say because he knew he was wrong.

LIZ JACKSON: A few weeks later it was Mother's Day and Jayson wrote Dionne a card from Jessie.

(HOME VIDEO FOOTAGE PLAYS)

DIONNE DALTON: Thank you, Jessie. That's really nice.

JAYSON DALTON: Oh, Mummy's crying now. (Laughs) Why, what did she say, Mummy?

DIONNE DALTON: I can't read it, 'cause I'll cry again.

JAYSON DALTON: You'll cry again? Did it say something about that Jessie can't wait till she can say that she loves you all by herself?

DIONNE DALTON: That's right.

LIZ JACKSON: By now, Dionne was already pregnant with Patrick.

DIONNE DALTON: I fell pregnant with Patrick on May 5, 2003. The reason I remember the date is because I hadn't wanted to have sex with Jayson. Jayson had forced himself on me. Um, I'd said to him at the time, "Jayson, you don't hit someone that you love. I don't want to have sex with you." And he was just very, very sullen and he was very, very angry. And, uh... Anyhow, he forced himself on me and, um, it was...it was a nightmare. And a couple of weeks later I found out I was pregnant.

The whole time I was pregnant with Patrick, he was hitting me and it was just getting worse and worse up until that... the first time I called the police.

LIZ JACKSON: On Dionne's account, it came to a head one night in November 2003 when Jayson lost his temper.

DIONNE DALTON: The next thing I knew, he threw the microwave at Jessie and I as we sat on the lounge chair. And I'd had enough. I just rang the police straightaway and they came out and they took him away to the watch-house. It took eight of them to take him away. The neighbours had all come out that night because there were police cars everywhere. And, um, he just... As soon as he came back, he said to me, "Do you want to stay together?" And he was very apologetic.

LIZ JACKSON: The police obtained an interim domestic violence order to protect Dionne. One month later, just before Christmas, Jayson punched a hole in the French doors of their house and threw a broom at Dionne. He later admitted that 'regrettably' the handle had caught her on the back of her head. He took off with Jessie.

DIONNE DALTON: I was just out of my head with worry about where he'd taken her and what had happened. And, uh, anyhow, a police inspector came and he pulled me aside and said, "Look, this is escalating, this violence, and you've really got to do something."

VAL DALTON, JAYSON DALTON'S COUSIN: I offered to go over. And Dionne said, no, the police were there with her, but... And I rang back several times. Then she said "No, he's home now. Everything's alright. We'll work it out. I'll go to my mother's."

LIZ JACKSON: Val and Mollie Dalton called around in the new year. Dionne was by then over eight months pregnant. By now, both families knew that there were allegations of violence, that Jayson was subject to a domestic violence order and that he'd already breached it once.

MOLLIE DALTON, JAYSON DALTON'S COUSIN: We knew that there were allegations of it and Jayson himself admitted that he had hit her. He said, "To my shame, I have hit her." And he said, "I'll never forget that. I should not have done it." And he said, "But I am trying to be better. I am turning over a new leaf." And he did try to manage his anger.

VAL DALTON: Whenever I spoke to Dionne alone, she said that they had worked things out, that they would work things out. And, um, I said, "Well, you don't have to put up with violence." Um, and I believe that very strongly.

LIZ JACKSON: Patrick James Dalton was born on 24 January, 2004. Dionne was back at work again within five days. The business was struggling.

VAL DALTON: Dionne could barely walk to go up their tall front stairs. We said, "You shouldn't be at work." She just laughed and said it had to be done.

LIZ JACKSON: But Dionne had decided she'd had enough. She wanted out from the marriage. She made plans to leave at the end of April when Jayson would be away. But after a bad row on March 4, she packed her bags and fled to her mother's.

JULIE WHERRITT, DIONNE DALTON'S MOTHER: She was in tears and she said, "He's just told me that it's on tonight." And she said, "I'm just so scared, Mum." And I said to her, "Just come."

DIONNE DALTON: He said, "Tonight's the night. It's on. It's going to happen tonight." So I packed up the car and I packed up Patrick. I went and picked Jessie up from day care and I took off to Mum's place.

LIZ JACKSON: It took 1.5 hours to drive down to her mother's place on the Gold Coast. In that time, Jayson rang Dionne's mobile phone 76 times.

DIONNE DALTON: The phone just kept ringing and ringing and ringing and ringing. And it just didn't even stop for a minute. It was just like that the whole way down until I turned it off. And at that stage, it was at 76 calls.

LIZ JACKSON: Were you afraid?

DIONNE DALTON: I was terrified, petrified. I didn't know what he was thinking, what he was going to do.

JULIE WHERRITT: Dionne handed me Patrick and was getting the bags out and Jayson pulled up out the front.

DIONNE DALTON: I was so scared because I thought he would really hit Mum.

JULIE WHERRITT: I had Patrick in my arms and I just turned to say, "I've got your son here, Jayson. You don't want to hurt him." And he took a swipe at me. But he only hit my hand.

DIONNE DALTON: He just wanted to get me outside and Mum wouldn't let me go outside with him on my own until the police came. But by the time the police turned up, he had gone.

LIZ JACKSON: Six days later, Dionne and her mother went to see a local solicitor. Dionne wanted to add names to the domestic violence order to keep Jayson away from her family and children. Ros Byrne took her instructions.

ROS BYRNE, LAWYER FOR DIONNE DALTON: She did talk about the physical violence. But to me, my recollection is it was more... The concern was the emotional abuse she was being subjected to.

LIZ JACKSON: Did you get the impression she was afraid of him?

ROS BYRNE: Oh, she was terrified of him. Absolutely terrified, yeah. Terrified of him and what he would do.

LIZ JACKSON: Dionne had it fixed in her mind that Jayson had guns, so the police went round to Kelvin Grove to check. They searched the house thoroughly, but none were found. Jayson was, however, taken away to spend the night in police custody for having breached his domestic violence order for the second time with his threatening behaviour at Dionne's mother's house. His family were now worried about Jayson's mental state.

MOLLIE DALTON, JAYSON DALTON'S COUSIN: He was very, very distressed. He was also angry. Uh, he spent a lot of time crying and saying over and over again, "I just want my wife and family back."

DIONNE DALTON: I was saying to him, "No, I'm not coming back ever. This is it. It's over, Jayson. We can't get back together." And he'd say, "Oh, don't say that. Just say six months. Give me six months to prove myself. Don't say we'll never get back together."

LIZ JACKSON: Jayson phoned his father in Western Australia. He was in a state. Michael Dalton is a Vietnam veteran, so he rang the Veterans Counselling Service in Brisbane.

VAL DALTON, JAYSON DALTON'S COUSIN: He wanted Jayson to be put in hospital. He felt that Jayson... Jayson had evidently spoken to him on the phone and he was very upset, over the top. And he wanted Jayson to be put in hospital.

LIZ JACKSON: It appears that Jayson was counselled at least three times by the Veterans Counselling Service over the following weeks. At the same time, he enrolled himself in a 12-week program for separated men. Their website reads, "Separated men needn't lose their shirt, their kids or their life."

Owen Pershouse is a founder of the program.

OWEN PERSHOUSE, FOUNDER, MENDS: I heard reports that he was extremely sleep-deprived, he wasn't sleeping very well, that he'd been depressed and maybe was given medication but he didn't take it - which is quite common in the clients that we deal with - but in any event, was, um...was not coping.

LIZ JACKSON: When the police released Jayson from overnight custody, midday on Thursday, 11 March, Dionne and her mother jumped in the car with the children and drove away from Julie's house.

JULIE WHERRITT, DIONNE DALTON'S MOTHER: The police talked to us and they said, "He's going to be so angry when he comes out of...when we let him out, that we think you need to get to a safe house. We can find you one, or if you know somewhere to go, go there."

DIONNE DALTON: I knew that he'd be absolutely aggro at the fact that he'd been in jail that night and that he'd be after some type of revenge for what had happened.

LIZ JACKSON: As the family headed out for a cousin's place in the country, a five-hour drive away, Dionne's own mental state collapsed. Over the next 24 hours, she became manic and delusional. She ended up in the Acute Mental Health Unit at Toowoomba Hospital with what appears to have been postnatal psychosis. Julie and Dionne's sister Tammy took over care of the children. Jayson found out what was happening.

VAL DALTON, JAYSON DALTON'S COUSIN: When I spoke to him about it, he said, "The children will either be with their mother or with me." And I said, "It's very difficult for a father to look after two little children, two little babies." And, um, he said, "They will either be with their mother or with me. No-one else. Julie doesn't have the right to them."

LIZ JACKSON: Dionne's solicitor received a fax late on Tuesday, 16 March, telling her that the following morning, Jayson would be applying to the Family Court to have Jessie and Patrick reside with him.

ROS BYRNE, LAWYER FOR DIONNE DALTON: I was mystified to see it, because there hadn't been any suggestion up till that time that there was any issue about the children. And the children were being cared for by Dionne's mother.

LIZ JACKSON: The court case the next morning lasted just 14 minutes. There was only one brief reference to Jayson's domestic violence when Dionne's solicitor informed the judge, "there are domestic violence issues". Just those five words, no further information. Jayson had made arrangements to care for the children and the judge took the view that while Dionne was unwell, "the next most logical person to care for the children...is the children's father." He ordered that the children be delivered forthwith to Jayson.

ROS BYRNE: The big problem with this case was that Dionne wasn't available, wasn't able to swear an affidavit because she was in hospital. So I was going on the information that I had been given by her over the phone and in a conference which lasted about half an hour.

LIZ JACKSON: Dionne's solicitor broke the news to Julie.

ROS BYRNE: Oh, she was horrified. Absolutely horrified. She said, "The children should be with me. I'm able to care for them. I'm not working."

JULIE WHERRITT, DIONNE DALTON'S MOTHER: I said, "What would you do, Ros, if these were your grandchildren?" And she said, "Oh, please don't ask me that question," and I said, "Well, I'm going to run."

ROS BYRNE: I said to her, "As a lawyer, I can tell you what I would do in your situation, but as an individual, I don't know what I'd do. As a lawyer, my advice to you is to bring the children back, because you don't want the police to become involved."

LIZ JACKSON: Julie and Dionne's sister Tammy headed back to Brisbane, taking the children with them. They stopped and called the Federal Police to confirm the advice they had from Dionne's solicitor. They were told if they could make it back before the court closed, Julie could try herself to get the judge to reconsider his order. So now they drove as fast as they dared. They made it to the Family Court with just minutes to spare.

JULIE WHERRITT: I was so tired and I was so drained, and they said, "No, it's you going for the custody, you have to talk." This was just so far out of my comfort zone to even be in there.

LIZ JACKSON: Julie spilled out to the judge everything Dionne had been saying to her about Jayson's anger and violence, but she had nothing on hand to prove if it was true, and there was no evidence of violence to the children.

JULIE WHERRITT: He said, "You've told me that he's been violent to his wife, but you haven't really told me... He's been a hard father, OK, but he hasn't really been violent to his children." And he said, "They stay with him until she is well."

ROS BYRNE: I remember her sister saying that the children would be dead in a couple of days. That's what her sister said. I remember her shouting that out.

EVELYN DALTON, JAYSON DALTON'S STEPMOTHER: I sat down and wrote a fax and faxed it off to...one to the Coolangatta police, one to 'Today Tonight', one to '60 Minutes' and one to 'A Current Affair'. And in that I wrote that Jayson had just received custody of his two young children and he was on his second or possibly third domestic violence order, and I couldn't understand really why. And I felt that if something wasn't done about this, that it would just only end up in tragedy.

LIZ JACKSON: Jayson looked after Jessie and Patrick for the next five weeks, until the case could be argued again, when Dionne was better. His father, Michael Dalton, had come over from WA and helped him with the job. No-one now denies that they cared for the children well. Jayson took time off work and spent lots of money on new clothes, toys and lawyers - borrowing heavily to meet the costs. But he was coming apart at the seams.

VAL DALTON, JAYSON DALTON'S COUSIN: He was crying all the time, 16 hours a day. He wasn't sleeping at night.

MOLLIE DALTON, JAYSON DALTON'S COUSIN: He kept a very meticulous diary. He noted down everything that happened and the order that it happened, and what people had said and if necessary, where they were standing when they said it.

VAL DALTON: Everything that went on, like people's expressions, the way you might hold the baby and feed the baby, or play with Jessie, and all phone calls - he started to tape his phone calls.

LIZ JACKSON: Dionne came out of hospital after 10 days, and Jayson allowed her access to Jessie and Patrick for the last two weekends before the case was listed back in the Family Court. When he handed over the children at Southport police station, Jayson had a tape recorder hidden under his shirt so he had proof if allegations or threats were made. Val Dalton went with him.

VAL DALTON: He had his little tape recorder taped, and he was absolutely driven by whether Dionne had looked at him, whether, um, she... Like, handing the baby to her himself, did she look at him? And he would play that tape recorder over 20 times on the way back, and I believe he played it again 20 times in the afternoon.

LIZ JACKSON: Jayson started documenting mosquito bites that Jessie got on access visits as evidence that he was the better parent. Dionne wanted the children back, but Jayson was hoping the court would order a shared care arrangement for the children to spend four days with him, then three days with Dionne, backwards and forwards every week. His family tried to tell him that shared care wasn't a realistic outcome.

MOLLIE DALTON: Because it was, um... He had no communication with Dionne. He had several DV orders against him with some additions to them, and he wasn't allowed to approach her house, and he also didn't really have a lot on his side of the case, because he'd been, as you know, accused of domestic violence, and there was truth in that. So he hoped against hope, I think.

LIZ JACKSON: Jayson was now missing sessions of his separated men's group, which met at this church hall on a Thursday evening. Daryl Sturgess was the group's facilitator. When Jayson did turn up, he kept himself to himself.

Did you feel he was guarded?

DARYL STURGESS, FACILITATOR, MENDS: Oh, yes, most certainly. Yes.

LIZ JACKSON: Only a few of the men who were in Jayson's group could be filmed, as most have cases coming up in the Family Court.

MAN: I knew his court case was coming up. He had high hopes for a good outcome because he had looked after the children for so much. I tried to counsel him that he might only get what everyone else gets or worse.

LIZ JACKSON: Daryl Sturgess says he didn't know that Jayson had applied for shared care of the children.

DARYL STURGESS: If that is what he did, it would fit my formula of wishful thinking.

LIZ JACKSON: The court case was brought forward to the Friday before the Anzac Day weekend. Jayson's father had already booked to fly to Mount Isa for a veterans' reunion. Jayson went to court with just his lawyers. Dionne had her family and friends.

DIONNE DALTON: I remember sitting in court, praying to God to just let me have the kids, let me have the kids. And I was... My solicitor had said, "Dionne, you'll be fine. You just sit there and smile at the judge."

LIZ JACKSON: The judge adjourned the court to read Jayson's affidavit. Dionne's doctor had said she was well enough now to care for the children, but Jayson had other concerns as well. The judge described them as follows. "She's a poor mother. She doesn't look after the kids. They're filthy. They come back with dirty nappies. She doesn't care for them." Both sides, of course, made allegations about the other parent, many of which were disputed. It was hard for the judge to assess who was telling the truth, but he had this problem with Jayson's case.

JULIE WHERRITT: He said, "But if you're so concerned about what a terrible mother she is, why do you want her to have them three days a week?" He said, "That doesn't follow."

LIZ JACKSON: At midday on Friday, 23 April, the judge made an interim order that Jessie and Patrick would reside with Dionne and spend one weekend every fortnight with Jayson.

DIONNE DALTON: We were just all so excited about the fact that we were going to get the kids back that weekend. When I did get custody, Jayson stormed out of the court and I didn't think much more about it.

LIZ JACKSON: You weren't at all worried about the impact that might have on Jayson?

EVELYN DALTON: No, I didn't think of that, actually.

LIZ JACKSON: Anyone talk to him afterwards?

OWEN PERSHOUSE, FOUNDER, MENDS: I spoke to him on Friday afternoon.

LIZ JACKSON: What did he say?

OWEN PERSHOUSE: I asked him how he was going, and he said, um...he said he was fine. He said that he'd lost the case - that's the way he framed it. He made some mention that his character was brought into some disrepute in some way in the court. I'm not sure of the details of that, but I mean, that's the nature of the court.

LIZ JACKSON: Jayson rang his father in Mount Isa. He was reportedly extremely emotional and angry, swearing and nearly incoherent. The judge didn't understand, and Dionne was trying to destroy him. His father later told police, "He just went berserk."

OWEN PERSHOUSE: Let's be real. During separation, normal people become abnormal, and people that are a little big dodgy to start with can become quite dangerous.

LIZ JACKSON: Val and Mollie were at Kelvin Grove looking after the children when Jayson returned from the court case.

VAL DALTON, JAYSON DALTON'S COUSIN: He was sad and flat, but he was distraught about it, and then he picked up Patrick out of my sister's arms and he said, "He's my son," he said. "He's my son. I have the right to see him grow up. If they go to their mother, I won't even see them on their birthdays and Christmas." And he said, "But they're my children."

MOLLIE DALTON, JAYSON DALTON'S COUSIN: "Somebody else might be there who doesn't even know them and that they're not related to, and I'll have no say in their lives and I'll just be working." So he was very unhappy about that aspect of it, and we tried to point out to him that it wouldn't always be as bad as that, but really, I mean, we had to agree with him - it wasn't looking good at all from his point of view. This was his last failure, I guess. Um...he'd lost the business, or at least it was going down the drain, he'd lost his wife, and then with the verdict in the Family Court, he'd lost custody of the children for most of the time.

LIZ JACKSON: Val and Mollie agreed that one of them would go with Jayson on Sunday afternoon when he was due to hand the children over to Dionne. And then they left him with Jessie and Patrick. That night, Friday night, he took this footage.

JAYSON DALTON (ON HOME VIDEO FOOTAGE): We all love each other, don't we? We had a bad news today about the courts. Yes, you're gonna miss Daddy, aren't you?

LIZ JACKSON: The following day, Saturday, Jayson was alone with the children. These are the last photos he took on that day.

(JESSIE AND PATRICK SMILE AT CAMERA)

On Sunday morning, Anzac Day, Val and Mollie tried to ring Jayson. There was no reply. Dionne and Julie went to the dawn service.

DIONNE DALTON: We were just so elated about the fact that, you know, we were going to have the kids back, and then, um...anyhow, we were making preparations all day, vacuuming their bedroom and getting everything straightened out, and putting cots in, and change tables, and all sorts of things.

LIZ JACKSON: On Sunday afternoon, Jayson failed to show at 4:00pm at Southport police station - the time the judge had ordered for the handover to occur.

JULIE WHERRITT: It got to 4:05, and Dionne said, "Come on, we're going into the police station." I said, "No, no, don't panic yet. Give him a chance, give him a chance."

LIZ JACKSON: By 5:30 in Brisbane, it was getting dark. Val and Mollie went around to Kelvin Grove. They still hadn't been able to raise a reply from Jayson, nor could his father, his friends, or the police. The lights were off, but Jayson's car was in the drive. They rang and told Jayson's father, who rang the police.

MOLLIE DALTON: And they went into the house, and they found them all there, all on the big bed in the main bedroom, and they were all deceased.

LIZ JACKSON: Dionne was still driving up from the Gold Coast. No-one wanted to break the news on a mobile phone.

DIONNE DALTON: I was praying to God all the way up that they would be OK, and anyhow, as soon as we got to Kelvin Grove Road and we came down the crest of Kelvin Grove Road, I saw the, um...all the lights and everything, and I just knew in the back of my mind that the kids were gone. Anyhow, we pulled up on the other side of the road, and I ran across Kelvin Grove Road to where the police were, and I just collapsed in a heap. And, um, I said to them... I said, "Are they alive?" And they said, "No, they're both dead, and so is Jayson." And...and it just broke me up how he, um... I just couldn't believe that he'd actually done that to me, and taken the kids. He knew that the only thing I cared about were my children. My beautiful children who I'd had were just gone out of my life in that one single moment, that one simple, selfish act.

LIZ JACKSON: Jayson wrote a suicide email, which was sent at 8:30 that morning. He would have the last word. Subject - "Goodbye Dionne." It reveals little more than here was a man who could not see, even in this last terrible act, that what he was doing was wrong. "I never wished we could have gone through this way. I was being fair the whole way through. I believe the children would have been truly affected, and you know Jessie adores me. I love you more than I can say, and had forgiven you up until Friday. Lots of love from us all, Jayson, Jessie and Patrick."

MOLLIE DALTON: Well, we had the wake here after Jayson's funeral and cremation ceremony, and I was amazed at the the number of men who were saying, you know, "This all goes back to fathers not having equal rights as far as custody of the children is concerned." They'd say, um, "You know, the fathers should have justice."

LIZ JACKSON: Cases like Jayson Dalton's are used by aggrieved fathers groups to argue that the Family Court is biased. This is the agenda that greets the new Chief Justice of the Family Court, who began in the job just six weeks ago. She can't comment on particular cases, but rejects the general argument.

DIANA BRYANT, CHIEF JUSTICE, FAMILY COURT: Everyone who hasn't got what they achieve on the one side is going to be critical of that decision. And that ignores the fact that there was another side that was being put to the court. And you talk about people at the wake, and all the men said this. If you had an objective observer who asked all of the women in those cases what they thought - whether they thought the decision was fair or not - I'm sure that you would get a different response.

DIONNE DALTON: I don't even blame Jayson. I mean, he was a very sick man, and if I start laying blame on people, it's not going to achieve anything. It's not going to bring the kids back.