Role of the Expert Witness in Establishing the Relationship Between Maternal Mental Illness & Criminally Charged Behaviour
Presented by: Gina Wong, PhD and Diana Lynn Barnes, PhD
6 Hours / 6 CEs
On Demand | Self-Paced Professional Training
This on-demand professional training program on Role of the Expert Witness in Establishing the Relationship Between Maternal Mental Illness & Criminally Charged Behaviour is presented by Gina Wong, PhD, and Diana Lynn Barnes, PsyD.
This intermediate program is designed for mental health professionals interested in the intersection between maternal mental illness and the criminal justice system. Foundational theories relevant to motivations for maternal filicide are advanced. Utilizing actual forensic cases, training includes the clinical development of a maternal filicide case from initial contact through completion of the written report. Specific assessment and evaluation tools are summarized.
This program promotes a deeper understanding of the relationship between psychosocial history and future risk for maternal filicide. Attendees will become familiar with developing a reproductive road map in explaining a woman’s state of mind at the time of the commission of the filicidal act.
This program also focuses on the applied practice of principles specific to the field of maternal filicide. Didactic approaches are augmented by the inclusion of experiential learning through discussion of actual forensic cases.
Program Materials (not included with purchase)
Strongly Recommended
Wong, G., & Parnham, G. J., (Eds.). Infanticide and filicide: Foundations in maternal mental health forensics. American Psychiatric Association Publishing.
Foundational Texts: Recommended Resources
Barnes, D. (Ed.). (2014). Women’s reproductive mental health across the lifespan. Springer International Publishing.
Spinelli, M. (Ed.) (2003). Infanticide: Psychosocial and legal perspectives on mothers who kill. American Psychiatric Publishing.
Maternal mental Health and Its Application to Forensics: Training the Expert Witness series overview
More psychiatric admissions are around the childbearing years than at any other time in the female life cycle. Women’s reproductive mental health is a highly specialized field of study with an increasingly critical role in the arena of criminal justice. This four-program series introduces participants to the foundations of maternal mental health as it applies to forensics and women who are criminally charged for harm to their child/children. Each program furthers the current empirically based understanding of maternal mental health forensics as well as promotes accepted standards and protocols in this emerging specialty. This series advances fundamental clinical, legal, and sociocultural perspectives in addition to encouraging critical dialogue in this evolving field. Basic diagnosis and assessment, the role of the expert witness as pertains to evaluation and report writing, as well as advanced training in expert testimony, are included. Case analysis and discussion are integral parts of the didactic learning inherent in this program.
Learning Objectives
Upon completion of this training, participants will be able to:
- 1 Describe the distinctions between the clinical role and the evaluator role
- 2 Describe various evidence-based theories pertaining to multiple motivations underlying maternal filicide
- 3 Identify the seminal research that lays the foundation for judicial thinking in forensic cases related to maternal filicide
- 4 Describe the discordance between laws of insanity and the mental health understanding of psychosis
- 5 Describe the neurobiological impact of complex and developmental trauma on the development of postpartum psychosis
- 6 Describe the steps involved from intake to completion of a written report
- 7 Identify the integral components of a thorough report
- 8 Describe the process of document review to inform the clinical evaluation
- 9 Describe the significance of psychosocial and psychiatric history as risk factors for maternal filicide
- 10 Explain the origins of a woman’s mental illness around childbearing through the creation of a reproductive roadmap
- 11 Describe assessment tools specific to women charged with childbearing-related crimes
Presented By
Gina Wong, PhD, Professor at Athabasca University
Dr. Gina Wong, Ph.D., is a Registered Psychologist in Alberta, Canada, and a professor at Athabasca University. She specializes in perinatal and reproductive mental health and has researched perinatal mood and anxiety disorders from narrative perspectives. She educates, consults, and trains in the field, which includes working with provisional psychologists to develop this specialization. Dr. Wong is the Vice-President of the Postpartum Support International Canada that launched on World Maternal Mental Health Day in 2022. She also specializes in maternal mental health forensics and serves as an expert witness in Canada. Dr. Wong is actively involved in developing a competency-based model in becoming a perinatal mental health expert witness. She has published 4 books which include editing Moms Gone Mad published by Demeter Press (Wong, 2012) and co-edited Infanticide and Filicide: Foundations in Maternal Mental Health Forensics published by the American Psychiatric Association (Wong & Parnham, 2021). Dr. Wong received the 2023 Media Award from the Psychologists’ Association of Alberta for exceptional contribution to portraying psychological knowledge to the public; the 2022 Canadian Counselling and Psychotherapy Leadership Award; and the 2022 Psychologist of the Year Award from the Psychologists’ Association of Alberta for her work in racial justice and perinatal mental health.
Presented By
Diana Lynn Barnes, PsyD, Forensic Expert in the specialized area of maternal mental illness
Dr. Diana Lynn Barnes, Psy.D., PMH-C, LMFT practices in Los Angeles, California. She has been a forensic expert in the specialized area of maternal mental illness for over 20 years. She is frequently retained by legal counsel on cases of pregnancy denial and neonaticide, postpartum psychosis, and infanticide; as well as child abuse and neglect where a child/children may have been harmed. She is on the editorial advisory board for Forensic Scholars. Dr. Barnes has been specializing in women’s reproductive mental health for over 25 years and has widely published on all facets of women’s mental health around the child-bearing years. She published the guidelines for the assessment and treatment of perinatal mood and anxiety disorders for the Perinatal Advisory Council of Los Angeles. She is the editor and contributing author of Women’s Reproductive Mental Health Across the Lifespan, published by Springer in 2014. She is a past president of Postpartum Support International and currently sits on their Advisory council. In 2015, Dr. Barnes was appointed as the mental health consultant to the California Commission on the Status of Maternal Mental Health and in 2016 to the California Maternal Mortality Review Panel. She currently Chairs the Special Interest Group on Forensics and Maternal Mental Health for the International Marcé Society. In 2009, Dr. Barnes received a Lifetime Achievement Award from the Eli Lilly Foundation for her extraordinary contributions to the field of maternal mental health and child-bearing-related mood disorders. She maintains a private practice in the greater Los Angeles area.
Training Outline
Key topics covered in this training include:
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Develop a reproductive road map in explaining a woman’s state of mind at the time of the commission of the filicidal act.
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Focus on the applied practice of principles specific to the field of maternal filicide.
CE Sponsorship Information
Palo Alto University, Continuing & Professional Studies (CONCEPT) is approved by, recognized by, or maintains sponsorship provider status with the following boards and agencies. We maintain responsibility for all content in our CE/CPD programs. For more information, visit here.
American Psychological Association (APA): Approved sponsor of continuing education for psychologists.
Association of Social Work Boards (ASWB): Approved continuing education provider (ACE program, Provider #1480), 11/22/2023–11/22/2026.
Canadian Psychological Association (CPA): Approved to sponsor continuing education for psychologists.
National Board for Certified Counselors (NBCC): Approved Continuing Education Provider (ACEP No. 7190).
Palo Alto University, Continuing and Professional Studies (CONCEPT) is approved by the American Psychological Association to sponsor continuing education for psychologists. Palo Alto University, Continuing and Professional Studies (CONCEPT) maintains responsibility for this program and its content. Palo Alto University, Continuing and Professional Studies (CONCEPT), is approved by the Canadian Psychological Association to offer continuing education for psychologists. Palo Alto University, Continuing and Professional Studies (CONCEPT), SW CPE is recognized by the New York State Education Department’s State Board for Social Work as an approved provider of continuing education for licensed social workers #SW-0356 and the New York State Education Department’s State Board for Mental Health Practitioners as an approved provider of continuing education for licensed mental health counselors. #MHC-0073. Palo Alto University, Continuing and Professional Studies (CONCEPT) has been approved by NBCC as an Approved Continuing Education Provider, ACEP No. 6811. Programs that do not qualify for NBCC credit are clearly identified. CONCEPT Professional Training, #1480, is approved to offer social work continuing education by the Association of Social Work Boards (ASWB) Approved Continuing Education (ACE) program. Organizations, not individual courses, are approved as ACE providers. State and provincial regulatory boards have the final authority to determine whether an individual course may be accepted for continuing education credit. CONCEPT Professional Training maintains responsibility for this course. ACE provider approval period: 11/22/23-11/22/26. Social workers completing this course receive (clinical or social work ethics) continuing education credits.