A commenter on an article about the latest diploma mill travesty gets it right. It’s easy to find out if someone’s educational claims are fraudulent. In this case, involving a Saratoga New York pretend psychologist who’s been running around ruining people’s lives, “State Police were notified about [Steven] Feldman’s suspicious credentials by a person referred to Feldman for evaluation by a Family Court judge. That man researched Feldman’s credentials and came across evidence that one of the schools, Hamilton University, is not an accredited institution.”
Right. See, if you’re a divorced man desperate, let’s say, to retain custody of your kids, you’re very motivated to find out whether the person who gets to decide – or at least powerfully advise – on that question is qualified to do so. You do the research — which involves a couple of Google clicks — and you find out the guy’s a fraud. “Feldman allegedly claims to have college degrees from Richardson University and Hamilton University, diploma mills once located in a former Motel 6 in Evanston Wyoming.”
Hamilton’s fakery is especially easy to discover — it was the featured diploma mill in congressional testimony and in a 60 Minutes special a few years ago.
But the Public Defender’s Office and the County Family Court (both of which chose to employ Feldman) don’t care. When it comes to the welfare of Saratoga’s children, any lying piece of shit will do.
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Steven Feldman faces four felony charges: grand larceny, scheme to defraud, falsifying business records and offering a false statement.
June 6th, 2010 at 8:46AM
It must say, somewheres on that checklist (the one that everyone defers to but no one’s ever seen), ‘graduate of an accredited institution.’ No?
June 6th, 2010 at 9:10AM
MattF: Well, that’s a problem too, because diploma mills set up their own bogus, legitimate sounding accreditation entities in order to say that they’re accredited. All diploma mills boast that they’re accredited.
High-profile frauds like Hamilton are extremely easy to catch by Googling. Other diploma mills, though, can almost as easily be discovered by going to this list.
June 6th, 2010 at 12:28PM
In Minnesota most of the judicial districts no longer have the resources to provide child custody evaluations. If the parents want to obtain an evaluation, they have to find (and agree upon) a qualified person and pay for the evaluation.
The desperate financial circumstances of our state judicial system is just one consequence of the “no new taxes” policy of Governor Tim Pawlenty (who is now running for president). He constantly proclaims that we have to “live within our means.” Yes, but first you have to determine your priorities; then you can determine the amount of revenue you need to accomplish those priorities.
June 7th, 2010 at 11:33AM
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