Opinion by Peter Young
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The opinion piece below is a response to an opinion piece published on October 13, 2024 in the Sentinel. This provides the reader with the other side of the story, as well as the final piece The Montana Sentinel will publish on this situation. Let the reader decide.
On October 13, 2024, the Montana Sentinel ran an article titled “Gallatin County Judges Put Children In Abusive Homes.” Ostensibly, the article was about alleged fraud and abuse within the 18th District Court of Montana. In reality the article was an egregious attempt to defame me.
My ex-wife, Michelle ReBecca, was quoted extensively in the October 13th article. She has spent the last 7 years fighting me in and out of court over the care of our minor children. Unfortunately, the Montana Sentinel did not contact me prior to publishing the article and thus several false claims were asserted without challenge, the worst of which is that I am a “court-documented” abuser. This is
simply not true and the assertion is libelous.
If I were to claim in court that I can fly or that my ex-wife is a witch, it would not make either statement true. Merely making allegations that are documented in court gives them not one ounce of credibility. This is just common sense.
Nevertheless, the October 13th article repeatedly presents one-sided, unproven allegations as if they were facts. Our court battle has been lengthy and involved numerous professionals. Not one of the professionals involved has ever found me to be abusive or agreed with Michelle’s claims that I was abusive. That list of professionals includes a judge, a standing master, two guardian ad litems, two family counselors, several individual counselors, and a parenting evaluator. While I am convinced all the professionals involved in my case came to the right conclusions, my primary goal in writing this response to the article is not to defend the reputation of the 18th District Court. My goal is to defend my good name and reputation.
For nearly twenty years I was a husband who did his best to love his wife. Tellingly, Michelle never accused me of abuse until after a Guardian ad Litem (GAL) report was released in May of 2018. That report found that Michelle engaged in severe parental alienation.
The October 13th article makes some ridiculous claims regarding parental alienation, including that the ideology is “universally discredited.” Clearly parental alienation is not universally discredited because the GAL report documented the extreme examples of Michelle’s parental alienation and subsequently, not one professional assigned to our case found the report to be in error.
I can assure you parental alienation is real and is profoundly abusive to children. After she left our marriage, Michelle taught our five children that I was, among other things, a devil, satan, tyrant, predator, sorcerer, murderer, and not a true father but merely a sperm donor. The complete list of pejoratives she has called me in court, in counseling sessions, and out loud with our children present is much,
much longer, but you get the idea.
Elizabeth Peterson is quoted in the October 13th article, claiming only a “sick individual” would embrace parental alienation. What is really sick is a mother telling her own children their father is nothing more than a sperm donor, a blood line, and a devil. If you were still a young child, would you want to be told you’re the son or daughter of a devil? Does that sound comforting?
Like many of the readers who visit the Montana Sentinel website, I love freedom and strongly believe in limited, constitutional government. I don’t want courts that legislate from the bench or engage in fraud or abuse. And the last thing I wanted was the courts involved in the life of my family. But looking back in hindsight, it was a blessing the courts got involved.
The GAL report released in May of 2018 was a bombshell, not just for shedding light on Michelle’s outrageous parental alienation, but also by exposing the abusive cult influence of her beloved “Uncle Robert.”
Over several years “Uncle Robert” used his mastery of persuasion and psychology to brainwash Michelle, her parents, and eventually me and our children. He taught us Jews conspired to control Christians worldwide, casinos were the true churches in America, and in order to discipline our children we needed to crush them. And to protect himself from questioning eyes outside of the cult, he inculcated an
atmosphere of paranoia, secrecy, and isolation.
So when I questioned “Uncle Robert” about his teachings, I fell out of favor with my wife and her cult leader. They then turned on me, teaching my children I was the devil and not a true father but merely a sperm donor. They did this to open the door for “Uncle Robert” to fulfill the role of father to our children and thus crush them with his own perverse form of discipline.
“Uncle Robert” checks all the boxes when it comes to the signs of a small cult leader, including his desire to blur the lines of the nuclear family and thus assume the role of father to all under his control.
Michelle says she wants to expose what she considers to be the problems with Gallatin County and the family court system. Fine. I fully support disclosure, transparency, and honesty with government officials operating in the light rather than the cover of darkness. But that is not her agenda. Her agenda is to attack me for exposing her parental alienation as well as her abusive cult leader “Uncle Robert.”
It is for these reasons that I wrote my memoir Stop The Tall Man, Save The Tiger. I stand behind every single word of it. I wrote it not to besmirch Michelle but to expose “Uncle Robert” and bring awareness to the existence of small cults. Don’t believe me? Read it for yourself. I promise not to "shove it down your throat.”
