Coming Between Parent and Child Can Be a Risky Move

It happened to me once, and it’s probably happened to you too. In my case, I was seated in a restaurant near a man and his son, who couldn’t have been more than 6 or 7. The man was berating his son and squeezing the boy’s arm so tightly that I could tell it was hurting him. Not to mention making my blood boil.

That’s all I did, however. Sit there and stew. After a few moments of deciding whether to get involved in “someone else’s business,” I opted for non-intervention, rationalizing that it was parent-child business, but not at all certain that I’d made the right decision.

On Aug. 15, 1991, Rosie Finocchi didn’t look the other way. Today, her spur-of-the-moment involvement has had a life span of nearly 18 months . . . and counting.

Finocchi, now 39 and owner of a manicuring business in Huntington Beach, has been an avid ice skater and has won several adult titles. She was training at a rink in Paramount on that August day in 1991 when she went into the locker room and, according to Finocchi, saw a mother of one of the skaters yelling at her daughter, as well as kicking and hitting her.

Knowing the mother somewhat, Finocchi said she told her to stop striking her daughter, who was then 13. According to Finocchi, the mother then turned and hit Finocchi in the face with her fist.

From there, the situation degenerated into charges and countercharges, with Finocchi pressing for payment of her medical bills and the girl’s family claiming that Finocchi was unwarranted in meddling in parental disciplining. The mother denied striking her child to the extent that Finocchi alleged, and also denied striking Finocchi.

The parents have questioned Finocchi’s motivation as well as her version of events. After the incident, the family sought a restraining order against Finocchi, contending that she began harassing their child. Finocchi denies that, saying the request for the order was the family’s retaliation for her notifying police about the alleged abuse.

Robert Petrokovsky, the family’s attorney, said, “The only story I ever heard was that (the mother) was holding her daughter by her arm and scolding her--it could have been loudly, I don’t know--because the daughter had smarted off to a coach. Which, in my opinion, is something that warrants at least a scolding and, from my childhood, might have gotten me a slap somewhere.”

Petrokovsky noted that both police and child-abuse agencies looked at the case and decided not to prosecute.

“It’s hard to believe that even in a private, closed changing room or restroom the kind of child abuse it sounds like Ms. Finocchi is claiming could have taken place,” Petrokovsky said. “We’ve all seen parents hit their kids on occasion when they’re talking fresh. My understanding is that there weren’t bruises of the sort that lead one to believe there was a serious beating going on.”

Sindee Kain-Kirker, the Los Angeles County deputy district attorney who reviewed the file, said she decided in favor of an “office hearing” instead of prosecution. “I felt there was enough evidence to file a case, but I thought it’d be better handled in an office conference” in which parties are spared court appearances. “In effect, it’s a warning” to parents, Kain-Kirker said of the office conferences.

Kain-Kirker said she has no doubt that Finocchi was struck by the other woman, based on investigators’ interviews with Finocchi’s doctor.

I asked the D.A. whether Finocchi stepped over the line in intervening in a mother-daughter matter. “What would I have done if I saw a mother kicking and hitting her child?” Kain-Kirker said. “I would have done the same thing. . . . When do you interfere? I think Rosie may be more sensitive to the subject because she wanted to become a pediatric nurse. She may be more attuned (to such matters) than the average person.”

Gean Okada, the Los Angeles County sheriff’s deputy who investigated the case, said, “My investigation indicated there was--I won’t say felony child abuse--but enough for child abuse charges and a battery assault against the mother” for hitting Finocchi. Okada said that the daughter essentially confirmed Finocchi’s account of events, and that misdemeanor charges might well have been filed if the mother hadn’t gone to parenting classes as part of the prosecutor’s arrangement.

What about Finocchi’s intervention? I asked Okada. “We don’t get involved as a society at all,” Okada said. “What do we do, we turn back. . . . The way I look at it, if the mother was doing the same thing to another adult, she could have been arrested. The way we look at it here is there’s a fine line between what people think is discipline and what is assault, basically. If you hit a child with a belt, people call it discipline. If you take that same belt and hit another adult, that’s felony assault.”

So far, Finocchi has been largely upheld in court. Just last week, a small claims court judge awarded her $2,000 to cover medical costs stemming from the punch she says she sustained. A written statement from Finocchi’s doctor said that he examined her a week after the incident and that she still showed “tenderness over the right cheekbone. . . . My assessment is that the patient suffered a contusion to the right temple area and her headaches are secondary to the injury.”

The mother says she will appeal the small claims court finding.

In addition, another judge turned down the family’s request for the restraining order against Finocchi.

Finocchi did lose an attempt to get the family to reimburse her for the time she spent going to court in the matter.

On balance, you’d have to say that Finocchi has been vindicated.

“I saw (the girl) getting beat up. I wanted that to stop, that’s all,” Finocchi said. “I did the right things. The police, the child and the doctor all backed me up and I still had to go through with this with (the mother) and she’s still maintaining it didn’t happen.”

Being vindicated, however, may have little to do with whether Finocchi thinks her moment of intervention was worth the subsequent travail.

Was it? I asked her Tuesday.

“As far as doing it again (intervening),” Finocchi said, “how could you not?”