The Middletown Press (Middletown, CT)
Fotis Dulos may appeal custody ruling of children
STAMFORD — Fotis Dulos is considering an appeal of a judge’s ruling granting his motherinlaw temporary custody of his five children.
“This is a travesty of justice,” his divorce lawyer, Rich Rochlin, said Friday. “We are evaluating his appellate options.”
Judge Donna Heller on Thursday handed down a ruling granting Gloria Farber, Jennifer Dulos’ mother, the right to intervene in her daughter’s contentious twoyear divorce case that will at least temporarily keep her five grandchildren in her care.
In the ruling, the judge noted how Fotis Dulos has been charged with tampering with physical evidence and hindering prosecution in connection with Jennifer Dulos’ disappearance. His girlfriend, Michelle Troconis, faces the same charges.
In the criminal case, Fotis Dulos’ lawyers filed a motion on Wednesday to have the charges against their client dropped, claiming the police did not have enough evidence to link him to the charges.
Rochlin blamed the prosecution for costing Fotis Dulos access to his children.
“Fotis misses his children deeply,” Rochlin said in a statement. “The irresponsible manner in which the state has proceeded against him is costing his children the chance for a real relationship with a man who loves them deeply.”
A message was left with Farber’s lawyer, Anne Dranginis.
Farber has been caring for the five children since Jennifer Dulos was reported missing on May 24.
The judge ruled that she has demonstrated a required “parent-like relationship” with the children, ages 8 to 13, who have been staying at her 1,500squarefoot New York City apartment with their fulltime caregiver since the disappearance.
The children are healthy, entertaining themselves and taking school lessons, Michael Meehan, a guardian ad litem appointed to represent their interests, found during a visit last month, the judge noted.
“The guardian ad litem testified that he was satisfied with the care that Ms. Farber was providing to the children,” the ruling says.
The judge said “a grandmother such as Ms. Farber has demonstrated that her relationship” with the children satisfied the law’s requirements to intervene in the case.
Farber also had to show that granting custody of the children to Fotis Dulos would be detrimental to them, and that it would be in their best interests to remain with her.
The judge ruled in her favor on both counts.
The judge noted that at a June 11 hearing in the case, after Fotis Dulos, through a lawyer, asserted his Fifth Amendment rights against selfincrimination, “the court indicated that it would draw an adverse inference from the defendant’s invocation.”
The ruling said Fotis Dulos hasn’t had regular unsupervised time with the children since January 2018, after Meehan testified that Fotis Dulos’ actions have harmed the children psychologically, and that he had asked the children to lie for him.
Judge Heller’s ruling also revealed that Farber has been paying the mortgage and property taxes on the Farmington property where the family used to live. Fotis Dulos still lives at the Jefferson Crossing property, which he had shared with Troconis before they were arrested last month.
Farber, who is also suing Fotis Dulos for allegedly reneging on business loans, has her own property listed as collateral on the mortgage, “so she paid these expenses each month to keep the Farmington property from going into foreclosure,” the ruling says.
Farber has also been supporting the family financially in other ways, including paying the children’s tuition at New Canaan Country School.
Police said Fotis Dulos and Troconis were seen on surveillance footage in Hartford disposing of garbage bags that contained items with Jennifer Dulos’ blood on them the night she was reported missing. Police said they believe Jennifer Dulos was the victim of a “serious physical assault.”
Heller has not yet ruled on a motion filed by Rochlin and Norm Pattis to suspend the divorce proceedings because Jennifer Dulos is not able to participate.
In their court filing to dismiss Farber’s motion to intervene, Rochlin and Pattis argued the family court had no jurisdiction for the grandmother’s request and that she failed to demonstrate that she had a "parentlike" relationship with the children.
Farber's attorneys responded last week, stating the motion to dismiss incorrectly cited which principle of law would apply to the case, and the argument, based on the subsection of law that defines visitation for third parties, didn't apply, since Farber had custody of the children and wasn't seeking visitation.
Dranginis and her colleague Kelly Scott also noted that the subsection of law Fotis Dulos’ attorneys applied only could be invoked when a "fit" parent was opposing the thirdparty visitation.
“The defendant is not a fit parent and there is more than ample evidence on which the court can base that determination,” Dranginis and Scott wrote in their response.