Jeff Diamant and Angel Butler Diamant Assist in Passing of HB3783 Banning Intensive Reunification Therapy in Texas
Jeff Diamant, lawyer, and Angel Butler Diamant, High Conflict Divorce Consultant, were engaged late this session of the Texas Legislature to assist in the development and promotion/lobbying for ground-breaking legislation banning intensive reunification therapy and providing added protections for victims of domestic violence, passed in the form of HB3783. The two were instrumental in the drafting, review and comment of drafting and lobbying for the recent HB3783, introduced following, and closely mirroring, HB3515.
HB3783 bans intensive “reunification” therapy programs and installs important controls over limiting a court’s ability to order a person who is a victim of domestic/family violence, abuse or sexual abuse to participate in counseling with the abuser upon the presentation of credible evidence of the abuse. Mr. Diamant was the only lawyer who testified in the House Subcommittee in favor of such legislation and one of only two invited testimonies in the Senate Subcommittee who heard HB3783. His testimony can be seen below, in full. Angel Butler Diamant put her first efforts toward this legislation as far back is 2022 in meeting with the Bill sponsor/author for HB3783, providing documentation and language assistance for the later-introduced bill.
Click the image to read the full text of HB3783
The Bill has several critical components that are game changing for Texas families suffering from false claims of “parental alienation” designed to misdirect a court’s attention from the ongoing abuse to put the burden on the protective parent instead. The Bill:
Bans “therapeutic” interventions that isolate a child from their community, contain no-contact orders preventing contact between a parent or family member and the child, involve multi-day stays, involve transportation by force and other related now-prohibited actions;
Provides clear protection from Immersion Therapy, Reunification Camps/Therapy and similar “experimental interventions”;
Prevents temporary or permanent changes in conservatorship for purported “reunification” therapy;
Prevents a victim of domestic/family violence, abuse or sexual abuse from having to participate in counseling with the abuser upon the presentation of credible evidence of the abuse;
Took effect immediately for both existing and new cases; and’
Constitutes grounds for a modification if a family is under such an order currently.
HB3783 was voted in unanimously in both the Texas House of Representatives and Texas Senate.
Testimony of Jeff Diamant on HB3783 in the Texas Senate Committee on Jurisprudence.
Testimony of Jeff Diamant in the Texas House of Representatives Subcommittee.