Timo Miller website raising funds for defense of man who helped Lisa Miller evade court order to transfer custody
A Vermont court ordered a change of custody after Lisa repeatedly defied the court orders providing for visitation between Isabella and her other parent, Janet Jenkins. After the last hearing in the case, but before the court issued its ruling, Lisa fled the country, allegedly with Timo Miller’s help. She and Isabella remain in Nicaragua.
The Timo Miller website compares Lisa to a mother goose who will “fight to the death to protect her young.” It describes same-sex couples raising children as follows:
Since God has not intended for two men or two women to raise children as a family unit, they can’t produce children on their own. This creates a problem in their agenda to create the perception that homosexual behavior is normal. Thus they resort to adopting children or using artificial insemination from a male donor in the case of a lesbian relationship. Can you imagine being a child growing up in the middle of such an environment?
According to the version of events on the website, Lisa “realized the emptiness of her lesbian lifestyle” and “the danger that lifestyle posed for her young daughter.” So she “repented of her immoral ways” and sought to make a new life. “Unfortunately for little Isabella,” the website continues, “the lesbian activists decided the situation was an opportunity to further their agenda. They filed lawsuits on behalf of Janet Jenkins (the former lesbian partner) to force visitation rights and eventually gain custody of Isabella in an attempt to prove that their “civil unions” have parental rights.”
One of the many things wrong with this version is that Lisa herself filed to dissolve the couple’s civil union and requested custody, with visitation rights to Janet. The website describes Lisa’s losses in the Virginia appellate courts as those courts “wash[ing] their hands of the situation because of some legal technicalities.” Those “technicalities” are the laws explicitly designed to prevent parental kidnapping by giving control over custody litigation to the state that issues the initial court orders. When Lisa filed in Vermont, she gave that court the power to decide Isabella’s custody and visitation. That’s not a “technicality.”
The website puts references to Janet’s parental rights in quotes (i.e., “parental”) and then says the accusations against Timo Miller beg the question of how “a biologically unrelated individual who has not gone through the adoption process” can even have parental rights. “Most states have specific prohibitions banning homosexual marriage,” it continues, “helping to prevent a situation like this from occurring.” If this turns out to be his defense, it will get him nowhere. In numerous situations, legal parentage does not require biology or adoption. And laws banning access to marriage for same-sex couples have never been interpreted to prohibit parenting by same-sex couples. (Some states do not allow both partners to be legal parents of their children but that’s entirely separate from whether they can marry.)
The case summary page on the website concludes: “Will you stand beside Timo as he faces the accusations against him? Will you pray for him and his family? Has God blessed you with the ability to help financially?”
Miller won’t be able to build a defense around his religious convictions, but it looks like that’s what her’s going to try.