Father, a U.S. Marshall, had been given sole custody of two daughters in the divorce and mother was ordered to pay child support.
Instead, the mother left Colorado to "find herself."
After a five year absence, mother returned and filed for sole custody. Father defended by going into court pro se . Mother had a lawyer.
Immediately evident was Magistrate Marilyn Leonard's prejudice against pro se parties. Marilyn Leonard behaved like a bully and a shrew (as evidenced on the audiotape) when dealing with the father's objections and presentation of evidence:
• At times she literally screamed at the father;
• At other points in the hearing she made psychological findings and qualified them only on the basis that she, herself, was a parent and had read Dr. Spock.
When father was before Magistrate Marilyn Leonard objecting to mother's demand for sole custody, the magistrate decided without evidence that the father was trying to deprive the mother (ex-wife) of a relationship with the two daughters — even though the mother had left her daughters for five years and had contributed nothing to the care and support of the girls during that time.
Upon the mother's return, the father had originally been willing to give mother unlimited visitation and even forgave an unpaid child support debt (that isn't allowable under law since the child support belongs to the children, not the parent). But then the daughters said they did not want to visit mother anymore due to objectionable behavior, including sexual abuse of the girls by mother's new boyfriend.
The mother then sought a hearing before Magistrate Leonard to require that the girls visit with her against their will. Without any review of the record, Magistrate Leonard threatened to grant the mother sole custody (as opposed to visitation) simply because " she could."
Magistrate Leonard decided, unilaterally and without evidence, that it was impossible for the daughters "not to want to see their mother" and the father "must be poisoning the girl's minds."
The father provided Magistrate Marilyn Leonard the court record from the divorce proceedings but she refused to look at that record. If she had, Magistrate Leonard would have found that the girls did not want to have overnights with their mother because they had previously been sexually abused. And similar behavior was happening again during visits with their mother and her boyfriend.
Instead of reviewing the reasons why the girls did not want overnight or unsupervised visits with mother and her sexually-abusive boyfriend, Magistrate Leonard decided that the father "made" the girls say that they did not want to visit their mother.
By her outrageous actions and conduct Magistrate Marilyn Leonard exposed the girls to the same trauma of sexual abuse they had suffered before.
Magistrate Marilyn K. Leonard is no longer in Jefferson County. She has been promoted to district judge in the 18th Judicial District. She is now harassing pro se litigants in Arapahoe County and almost certainly maintains the same anti-male biases and prejudices.
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