Wasilla teen battles tribal law to get son back

Editor’s note: The name of the 16-year-old father of the toddler in this story has been changed to protect his identity since he’s currently serving time in the Mat-Su Youth Facility for alleged domestic violence against the child’s mother. He could not be reached by the Frontiersman to allow permission to use his name nor respond to allegations against him.

WASILLA — Tiane Knott, 17, has been living amidst domestic abuse and dysfunction for most of her life. Growing up in a home plagued with alcoholism and domestic violence in her native village of Galena and in Wasilla, it became the norm for her.

So it’s not surprising the delicate, dark-haired beauty ended up falling in love with an Aleut boy from Port Heiden who also grew up in a similar environment.

“I’m not sure what it is about him,” Knott said when asked why she sticks by her fiancé despite his alleged tendency to be violent with her. “I guess it’s because we understand where we both came from. We have that in common.”

They also have an 18-month-old baby boy named Traves in common. Knott says her fiancé, Dustin, was rough with her even when she was pregnant at 15.

But, she still loves him.

“I can’t help it,” the Athabascan said softly Thursday at Burchell High School as she nervously twisted her engagement ring.

And like the generation before him, Traves has become caught up in the same dysfunction as Knott and Traves’ paternal grandfather, Emil C. Christensen, battle over who should be raising Traves after Knott had Dustin arrested in early December for allegedly assaulting her again.

“It breaks my heart,” she said, her eyes welling with tears. “I can’t believe this is happening. I was just starting to get my life together.”

Although the relationship between Knott and Dustin’s side of the family had been strained for the past few years, those tensions and the reality of tribal power came to a head when Dustin’s father and a Wasilla police officer knocked on Knott’s mother’s door a few days before Christmas to take Traves away to Port Heiden.

It was about 6 p.m., Dec. 22, 2010, and Knott was getting ready to cook dinner. She’d already bathed and dressed Traves and his three cousins, she said.

“The cop came in and I went out to talk to Emil to find out the answers to questions I wasn’t able to ask him before in court,” Knott said Friday as Burchell life coach Michelle Overstreet sat next to her for support. “I wanted to know why he was doing this and how he thought it was helping anyone. I told him it’s devastating me and my whole family. It’s making everything harder for us. He said it was putting Traves in a safe place. He never said he was taking him out of an unsafe place.”

Knott said the police officer then got in her face and accused her of being too argumentative and told her she was close to going to jail.

“I wasn’t even raising my voice,” she said as tears streamed down her cheeks. “I was crying and trying to keep Traves from being taken away from me. I‘m his mother. It wasn‘t right. I didn‘t do anything wrong.”

Within minutes, however, her crying baby boy was being handed over to his paternal grandfather and his wife, Diane Christensen, as they strapped him into a car seat to begin his trip back to the Aleutians.

She hasn’t seen him since.

What’s most disturbing to Knott and Overstreet is the fact that Christensen, 49, has a long record of assault charges against him in Palmer, Anchorage and elsewhere in Alaska between 1996 and 2006 and was still able to convince the tribal court in Port Heiden to allow him to take his grandson from Knott without any documents or proof of her being an unfit mother.

“How can that happen?” Overstreet said angrily. “They didn’t have one scrap of evidence against Tiane, yet were still given permission to come here and take her son away and give him to someone with a history of abuse. It’s so disturbing.”

Knott and Overstreet believe that because those making the decisions in Port Heiden are either related to Emil Christensen or have close associations with him, the cards are stacked against Knott — a teen mom who can’t afford her own attorney.

“Next to the definition of ‘nepotism’ in the dictionary should be a picture of this family,” Overstreet said. “If you’re part of the family, you’re in. If you’re not, it’s game over. You’re history.”

They also think the Christensens did this to Knott to punish her for getting Dustin locked up.

“The part that didn’t jive for me was you did protect your son when Dustin was violent, so they can’t claim you didn’t keep him safe,” Overstreet told Knott. “You had him arrested and I think that’s part of what they’re mad about. I think in their minds, that means you’re not part of the family. You’re an outsider because you ratted him out for being violent.”

Reached by phone in Port Heiden, Christensen said although he couldn’t talk about the case much, he feels he’s doing what’s in the best interest of Traves and Knott.

He said he only wants to keep Traves for a short time, until Knott can get back on her feet.

“It’s not our intent to keep Traves away from her,” said Christensen, a successful fisherman. “We just want to be sure he has a safe and healthy environment.”

He wouldn’t discuss why he didn’t feel Traves was in a safe place with his mother.

Asked about his own record of assault and driving under the influence, Christensen said he’s changed since then.

“I’ve done a lot of work to get back to where I am now,” he said. “I see my son is following a similar pattern of my life. Maybe I’m overly sensitive about it because I know what I put my kids through. I think he’s working toward a good direction, though. You don’t know how agonizing this has been for everyone involved. These decisions were not made irrationally.”

To Knott and Overstreet, however, the whole situation couldn’t be any more irrational. That’s why they’re both writing letters to Rep. Don Young, Sen. Lisa Murkowski, Sen. Mark Begich, Gov. Sean Parnell and the director of the Bureau of Indian Affairs to try to get their help not only for this case, but all future custody cases involving tribal law and the National Indian Child Welfare Association.

Called the Child in Need of Aid law, Knott is determined to do whatever she can to keep other parents from going through what’s she’s forced to endure now — waiting for the past six weeks for a tribal court to rule in her favor when there’s not a level playing field to begin with.

“I want to set some boundaries on it, some limits,” said the teen who used to dream of having her own hair salon and is now thinking of becoming a lawyer. “Tribal sovereignty can be used in the right way, but they’re using their power in the wrong way. Just because you want a kid doesn’t mean you can just take it from its mother like that.”

Contact K.T. McKee at kate.McKee@frontiersman.com or 352-2252.