Legal Internship

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About Mommy's Heart, Inc.

Location:

930 Fifth Avenue, 4H, New York, NY 10021, US

Mission Statement

Mommy’s Heart, Inc. is a 501 (c) 3 nonprofit organization, which provides free legal representation and mental health services to fit mothers and children, who have been subjected to intimate partner violence and have been victimized by the abuses and civil rights violations of the family court system.

Description

The family court system lacks essential domestic violence training and disproportionately favors men over women, allowing alleged abusers to weaponize the court system and use the child as a pawn to perpetuate the torture of their ex partner, who is often punished for speaking out about the abuse. In a 2019 study conducted by George Washington University Law school professor Joan S. Meier, mothers, who reported child abuse, lost custody of their children to their abusers 30 to 50 percent of the time. Custody litigation can cost hundreds of thousands of dollars and has depleted many families of the necessary resources to fight and protect the best interests of their children. High conflict custody cases further exacerbated by family court abuses and civil rights violations make finding competent legal counsel with expertise in this area that much more expensive and challenging. The stress of navigating a very dysfunctional family court system corrupted by special interests stacked against the protective mother and the safety and well-being of her child is traumatizing in and of itself, especially when that mother has just escaped an abusive partner and is now faced with the fear and possibility of losing her child to her abusive ex. Counseling and other therapeutic and supportive services by licensed mental health professionals are essential to helping these women validate their experiences, cope, heal, and maintain their emotional and psychological strength while combating a parent's worst nightmare.