http://www.telegram.com/article/2009...MN01/910040388

Sunday, October 4, 2009


Custody order doesn’t resolve parent’s pain
Dianne Williamson


Armed with a court order, Joshua Hubert thought he would finally see his
baby Friday when he tracked the child’s mother to an apartment off Grove
Street.

Valerie Zawalich had disappeared with the child in August, Mr. Hubert said.
On Sept. 16, he received a temporary order from Probate and Family Court
granting him sole legal and physical custody of the 20-month-old boy.

“She doesn’t have her own place and she’s been staying with different
friends,” said Mr. Hubert, 27. “She got mad after our breakup and she uses
our son against me.”

On Friday, after finding Ms. Zawalich’s current address through friends and
her Facebook account, Mr. Hubert parked across the street and waited. When
he saw his former girlfriend walk outside to the car, he called Worcester
police. An officer arrived and Mr. Hubert explained the situation. He handed
the cop the custody order signed by Probate Judge Ronald W. King.

“The cop went inside, came back out and said there was nothing he could do,”
Mr. Hubert said. “He had an incredible attitude. I called the police looking
for help and I got none. And I’ve done everything I’m supposed to do.”

Mr. Hubert and his lawyer, Nicholas Plante, are charging that police took no
action because Ms. Zawalich worked until recently as a Worcester police
dispatcher. In a letter Friday to Chief Gary Gemme, Mr. Plante said he’s
concerned that Ms. Zawalich “is benefiting from inside baseball and that the
department is protecting one of its own.”

Meanwhile, Ms. Zawalich fled after the officer left and Mr. Hubert again
doesn’t know where she is.

Mr. Plante said the situation is especially galling because Ms. Zawalich
abused the restraining order system in August, when the city scheduled a
disciplinary hearing against her for allegedly posting police records about
Mr. Hubert’s friends and family on the Internet. A few days before Mr.
Hubert was due to testify Aug. 10, she slapped him with a 10-day restraining
order, which prevented him from attending.

Nonetheless, Ms. Zawalich was fired Aug. 17. She didn’t return to Probate
Court for a hearing to extend the restraining order, and it was vacated.

Mr. Hubert and Ms. Zawalich had a five-year relationship that ended this
spring. He said he and his ex-girlfriend had shared custody of the child but
never went to court. Shortly after their breakup, Ms. Zawalich began posting
confidential police records about his family and friends from information
culled from the Worcester police database, he said. This summer, she told
police that he had broken into her apartment and stolen a Coach handbag, and
he was arrested shortly thereafter.

Mr. Plante said he spoke Friday to a deputy police chief, who dubbed the
custody issue a civil matter. Mr. Plante disagrees.

“If a parent takes off with a child she doesn’t have custody of, that’s
parental kidnapping,” he said. “This woman abuses the restraining order
system and then kidnaps her child. We finally find her and the police let
her leave. Now she’s on the lam again with her kid. Do we want route
officers making calls about when to enforce a court order? Under what
possible authority does this woman get to keep this child? This isn’t a
joint custody dispute. She has no rights to the child.”

Mr. Plante also questioned whether police would have acted differently if
the genders were reversed. “If my male client was inside with the baby, and
the female was out there with a court order, would the police say there was
nothing they could do?” he asked.

Late Friday, in a brief conversation with Ms. Zawalich before she hung up
the phone, she said she had gone to court that afternoon and obtained a new
restraining order against Mr. Hubert. If that’s true, Mr. Plante said, she
may have obtained one in District Court rather than Probate, where the
custody order was issued.

“My client hasn’t seen her in months, so under what scenario could she get a
restraining order?” he asked. “The good news, at least, is that she’ll have
to provide an address.”

A dejected Mr. Hubert, meanwhile, wonders when he’ll be reunited with his
child.

“I thought I was finally going to see my little guy,” he said. “Who do I get
help from now?”