Family Court Appointed Psychologist Charged by State Attorney General's Office

July 31, 2007

Dear NJCCR Member Mothers, Fathers, Stepparents, Grandparents, Friends and Family Advocates 

The New Jersey State Attorney Generals office has officially charged Psychologist Marsha Kleinman of Middlesex County NJ, with multiple counts of malpractice. This development was made possible only through the cooperation of one of our members with the State Attorney General’s office.

Ms. Marsha Kleinman is a court appointed Psychologist who has routinely been awarded custody/evaluation cases throughout NJ. She has been involved with the removal of children from their parents by utilizing methods that are considered highly unethical and abusive toward children.

Ms Kleinman was charged with multiple counts of gross and/or repeated malpractice on behalf of the child. Additionally, the charge included misleading the family court by not reporting all the facts that were reasonably available.

NJCCR is calling for the immediate suspension and a permanent revocation of her license to practice. Additionally, Ms. Kleinman's ability to be unsupervised around children should be limited indefinitely.

This kind of abuse should not be taken lightly. It is the most severe kind of abuse when a person of trust is given the power and control over a child's future, and that person exploits the child's trust and dependency to be able to substantiate personal biased opinions.

Mental health exploitation of a child will damage that child for life.

We expect criminal charges should follow this complaint and question why they have not already been filed.

This kind of behavior is not acceptable toward any child or parent, and certainly our Child Protective Services should not risk exposing any other child to Ms. Kleinman’s practices until this case is adjudicated.

It is unfortunate that Ms. Kleinman, was allowed to continue to practice unmonitored during the years of investigation and thus, there is no way to determine how many other children and families she has adversely affected or abused.

It is the New Jersey Council for Children's Rights position that Ms. Kleinman be immediately suspended from seeing any child until this case is adjudicated.

NJCCR views zero tolerance policy for child abuse and actual domestic violence to also apply to court appointed professionals.

For the safety and well being of all children and families, NJCCR urges careful discretion to be used by all parents when choosing to expose your children to a mental health professional.

Other individuals whose children have been exposed to Ms. Kleinman’s practices have already contacted NJCCR. Please contact New Jersey Council for Children's Rights immediately by email to abuse@njccr.org  with information of any person who currently or in the past has used Ms. Kleinman's services during divorce proceedings and has been victim to unsubstantiated accusations of child abuse or the like through her treatments.

The New Jersey Council for Children's Rights believes that children have the right to both parents regardless of their parents' marital status and as such advocates for shared parenting and the protection of children from predatory professionals that surround the divorce industry.

It should be noted that this case is not about a child being sexually abused by a parent, but about the misuse of psychological "experts" during divorce litigation and their ability to mislead the courts and effectually destroy the family’s potential for a positive post divorce environment with both parents involved in the child’s life. 

Unmonitored, court appointed custody "experts" have tremendous leverage when it comes to custody matters. An unbiased opinion from a court appointed Psychologist is essential to the proper workings of our current family court system. Left unmonitored and loosely regulated only puts our children at further risk of abuse.

The real question here is how many other cases has Ms. Kleinman performed in this fashion and what we as citizens can do today to protect our children and make sure that this does not happen again. Every one of Ms. Kleinman's past evaluations must be investigated and the cases re-opened for findings of potential fowl play.

New Jersey Council for Children's Rights is calling for our State legislature to establish a "Family safety Act" for the protection of children from the predatory practice of child psychology and for oversight of psychologists that are used in family court through independent family centric organizations such as NJCCR.

NJCCR is committed to working with our legislators in establishing these safeguards for protection of NJ families and children.

NJCCR is calling for funding this initiative so these types of problems can not only be fully investigated and documented across the family court system, but also prevented in the future.

Sincerely,

Michael Argen

President, NJCCR

Parental Alientation

V.U. v L.U. (2006)

NJ Unpublished Appellate Decision

09-22-2006