The Pima County Superior Court has cut ties with a Tucson supervised-visitation agency that hired, without proper vetting or disclosure, a man previously convicted of attempted murder.
Little Tree Family Services employed 63-year-old Lamont Griswold, who was convicted in 1989 of stabbing his ex-wife 11 times, severing her larynx and leaving her unable to speak above a whisper. He served 25 years in an upstate New York prison. From behind bars, he repeatedly filed lawsuits against his victim, seeking visitation rights to their children, contesting their divorce and costing her thousands in legal fees, the Associated Press reported in 1994. Griswold was repeatedly denied early release and once told a prison guard that he would “go get” his ex-wife — using an expletive to describe her — once he was free, according to a report from an NPR member station in Rochester.
Griswold’s role at Little Tree was to provide “supervised parenting time” — overseeing and taking notes on visits between parents and their children — for families involved in a custody dispute. But Marilyn Daniel, who owns Little Tree, didn’t disclose to the court that Griswold was supervising visits, nor did she provide the necessary fingerprint clearance for him from the Arizona Department of Public Safety, said Krisanne LoGalbo, spokeswoman for the Pima County Superior Court.
Committing a violent crime is among the offenses that would preclude someone from receiving a fingerprint clearance, said a DPS spokeswoman.
The court doesn’t hold formal contracts with the agencies providing supervised visit services, but since 2012 it had included Little Tree on a referral list of its recommended agencies, which is distributed to families, LaGalbo said in an email.
Little Tree has been removed from that list, and family law judges have been advised to remove the agency from any active cases, she said.
When questioned by the court, Daniel, who is 70, initially denied she had anybody else working with her, LoGalbo said. Police records describe Griswold as Daniel’s boyfriend.
Before employing Griswold, Little Tree should have put him through a vetting process, which would include ensuring he has no conflict of interest with those visits he oversees, has no arrests related to crimes involving children and has fingerprint clearance from DPS, LoGalbo said.
By failing to do so, Little Tree violated the stipulations in the agreement that agencies must sign and submit to the court in order to be recommended to families who need supervisory services, she said.
Supervisors — paid or unpaid — must also meet qualifications that include experience in behavioral health, family violence, parental conflict and preparing observation notes and reports.
The court’s decision to stop recommending Little Tree to families was prompted by a Star inquiry about Griswold.
In multiple emails, Daniel did not respond to questions about why she did not disclose Griswold’s role in her agency to the Superior Court, but she said the story was based on “lies.” She did not respond to requests seeking comment from Griswold.
