Attorney at law Verla De Peiza wants women imprisoned when they defy the courts and refuse to allow fathers to see their children.
Speaking at a forum at the Lloyd Erskine Sandiford Centre on Thursday night on the topic Paying Child Support And Can’t See The Children, De Peiza said the Family Law Act was skewed against men.
“We have to find a way within our legal system to have an accommodation for men and have it as stringently enforced as when the men do not pay the maintenance,” she said.
“This is the thing. There is no punishment for the lady for not giving over the child even though there is a court order stating that the child is to be handed over at a particular time, but there is a punishment called prison for a man who does not pay maintenance but I feel it should be equally applied because it is a court order.
“If a woman has a court order saying that every other weekend the father should have access to the child but refuses to comply, I believe that woman should be just as open to punishment, at the highest incarceration, as a man who does not pay the maintenance,” De Peiza said.
