ecommendations for a high-profile case
Unlike the private judge involved in Pitt/Jolie’s divorce who was disqualified as a result of improperly disclosed business dealing’s with Pitt’s attorneys (Los Angeles Times, 2021), it is in a practitioners best interest to not align in anyway with either party in a family court situation. The high-profile nature of some cases may spark a natural feeling of awe as observing the inner-workings of a celebrities personal life may be interesting and captivating as a layman, however, as an officer of the court, such feelings cannot be allowed to influence the results of assessments or evaluations.
Juvenile Forensic Assessments
I would conduct a civil family assessment with the child and each parent one on one. Doing this would be to assess the body language and behaviors between each group. The importance of this would be to take note of any drastic personality changes or body language differences that would be relevant in conjunction with the ongoing home visits and other evaluations.
Guidelines for effective communication
As a mental health counselor (MHC), or other qualified practitioner serving the courts as an evaluator, the main duty is to the court itself and not any of the family members or participants in the case (Patel, 2014). In their article, Patel & Choate are explicit when discussing the importance of neutrality in family court and in issues of court mandated custody decisions. When conducting child custody evaluations (CCE), the evaluator is performing a duty to the court and is acquiring information for the judge to have relevant information to form a ruling regarding the best interest of the child. In order to do that, the evaluator has strict guidelines of practice they must follow or have an increased risk of having their evaluations compromised or be brought to court themselves for ethics violations; some of these guidelines include, not providing guidance, not offering counseling to someone they have evaluated as well as not evaluating someone they counsel or have counseled (Patel, 2014). For a high-profile case, it would be wise to not acknowledge the fame or notoriety of either parent, to avoid personal preferences, etc, when conducting assessments and all evaluations, and overall to uphold the expected level of neutrality and professionalism.
References:
California high court refuses to hear Brad Pitt’s appeal in child custody battleLinks to an external site.. (2021, October 28). Los Angeles Times. to an external site..
Patel, S. H., & Choate, L. H. (2014). Conducting child custody evaluations: Best practices for mental health counselors who are court-appointed as child custody evaluatorsLinks to an external site.. Journal of Mental Health Counseling, 36(1), 18–30.
