The Children’s Corner
enced developmental trauma requires an
understanding of the science behind the
child’s behavior. How can a child relate to
or trust a mental health counselor or foster parent when the child has difficulty with
attachment, dissociates when confronted
with stress, and has low self-esteem, all of
which are adaptive responses to trauma
within the child’s brain? Perhaps equally
important, how can professionals working
with children impacted by trauma help the
parents of those children with their own,
untreated trauma? It may be very hard to
appreciate that a parent may also be a victim of past child abuse and neglect, which
has created maladaptive changes in his or
her brain structure, perpetuating a cycle
of multi-generational abuse. If juvenile justice professionals, mental health and educational providers, and parents understand
the neurobiology of trauma, we will be able
to make a difference in these important
cases by helping children overcome their
adaptive physiology and using science to
keep children safe.
____________________
Kerry A. McDonald-Cady, Esq., is Windham County Deputy State’s Attorney. She
was recognized in 2012 by the Justice for
Children Task Force for her exemplary work
handling child protection and juvenile justice cases.
____________________
1
Michele Olvera, Challenges in Sexual Assault
Investigations: What We Can Learn from the
Neurobiology of Trauma, Vt. Network News, at
www.vtnetwork.org/wp-content/uploads/VermontNetworkNewsSpring20142.pdf.
2
Robert M. Reece & Cindy W. Christian, Child
Abuse Medical Diagnosis& Management 801 (3d
ed. 2009).
3
Bessel A. van der Kolk, M.D., Developmental Trauma Disorder: Towards a Rational Diagnosis for Chronically Traumatized Children, 2005
Psych. Annals 8, at http://www.traumacenter.
org/products/pdf_files/preprint_dev_ trauma_
disorder.pdf.
4
Reece & Christian, supra note 2, at 798.
5
Id.
6
Id. at 895-796, 808.
7
Bruce D. Perry, et al., Childhood Trauma,The
Neurobiology of Adaption and Use-dependent
Development of the Brain: How “States” Become “Traits,” 16 Infant Mental Health J. 280
(1995).
IN MEMORIAM
Jesse M. Corum IV
Jesse Maxwell Corum IV, born December 19, 1950, died June 27, 2014, in Brattleboro. He grew up in New York, Europe,
and Vermont, graduated from Guilford College (N.C.) in 1973, and attended Vermont
Law School. He began practice in 1977 as a
deputy state’s attorney in Brattleboro and, in
1981, became an associate at Gale, Gale &
Barile. Within a year he was made a partner.
He came to be the senior partner of Corum
Mabie Cook Prodan Angell & Secrest, PLC.
He served as an acting judge in district, superior, and family courts in Windham County.
He served as president of the Vermont Trial
Lawyers Association and was involved in numerous civic activities in the greater Brattleboro community. He is survived by two sons,
a daughter-in-law, his mother, a sister and
brother and their spouses, two granddaughters and ten nieces and nephews.
Richard I. Damalouji
Born December 19, 1961, in Annapolis,
Maryland, Richard I. “Rick” Damalouji, 52,
died suddenly on June 1, 2014, in Huntington, Maryland. He earned his B.A. from Randolph-Macon College in Ashland, Virginia, in
1983, and his J.D. from Vermont Law School
in 1988. After law school he settled in Addison, Vermont. He began his legal career as
a staff attorney in the Office of the Defender General and for the seven years prior to
his return to Maryland in 2013, he worke