Im an attorney first.
I never considered myself anything but a legal counselor and a defender of truth and justice for the public. However, my job in the County of Los Angeles Bureau of Family Support, a branch of the District Attorneys Office, I had to re-evaluate my skills oddly enough as a social worker or a talk show host delving into the private lives of ordinary people.
In my role as a prosecuting Deputy District Attorney, I am called to establish child support or enforce child support obligations for children, who have been abandoned by either or both parents. Its an ugly subject--the abandonment of young helpless and innocent small children. Like a talk show host, I am forced to deal with broken families and hear horrific stories of abuse, neglect, hatred and utter anguish and suffering. The stories are real and the pain resonating from each case could hold, I believe, an Oprah audience captive and move them to laughter and tears. I have been told by many friends that my stories are quite intriguing and that I should write some kind of memoir so that the public can see the moral decay of our society that I deal with on a daily basis. Here are a few stories I think may fascinate you as they have my friends and colleagues.
My first memorable case was with a military defendant. He had a one night affair or fling with a woman he just met at a bar before he was to be shipped out to his assignment in Germany. He finished his tour of duty nine years later to return to the United States to a Complaint by the District Attorney Office to establish support for a nine- year-old-boy. His son. The genetic test confirmed that he was in fact the biological father of a child he never knew he had. In court, as I reviewed the genetic results with the defendant, he started to weep as he told me how robbed he felt for having found out so late that he had a son. The mother never contacted him while he was away on military assignment. I had this grown man crying uncontrollably at the loss of all those years he could have bonded with his own flesh and blood. It is a true tragedy. Feeling rather uncomfortable out of a legal situation and now dealing with human family tragedy, my legal knowledge was no help in resolving this situation. I had to summon my personal skills as an ordinary caring human being. The mother had arrived in court with the grandparents and the minor child all dressed up in his best clothes. The little boy was told that in this dingy county courthouse is where he could finally meet his father. I negotiated with both the mother and the father and had them agree to a visitation schedule so that the father could get to know his only son. It was awkward as I marched the father in the hallway to where the boy was standing with his mother and his grandparents in a protective huddle. I asked the little boy what grade he was in and what sports he played. The boy loved baseball. So then, I introduced him to his father and said that his father would take him to ball games. I told the boy that his father was not in trouble with the District Attorney, but that his father was a good man who wanted very much to meet him. I admonished the boy to stay in school and be good and be like his father. The boy reached out to hug his father for the very first time. The entire family started to weep with joy as the boy was finally united with his father. Wasted time, but at least they could salvage the future together.
My recent adventure in court was dealing with a Jerry Springer type of case. Before I interviewed the defendant, I carefully read the file to find out that there were two mothers on this case! The mother and father recently divorced with one child of the marriage, an eleven-year-old girl. Promptly after the dissolution was finalized the father had a major sex change operation to become a woman. The defendant was over six feet tall and over two hundred pounds, and the defendant was formally a heavy machine operator for a construction company. The defendant came to court wearing a purple pant outfit, womens shoes, jewelry and make up. The defendant, to me, was still obviously very masculine and not very feminine looking at all. The defendant insisted that I refer to the defendant as a woman and told me that I would be sued for sexual discrimination and harassment if I continued to refer to the defendant as a man. The defendant wanted to cease child support, while he was unemployed because no construction company would hire a formerly male now female heavy machine operator. It was the defendants voluntary choice to become a woman, jeopardizing his ability to earn a living and thereby precariously leaving the minor child without support. I had to take this case to court before a judge.
Before I took the case to hearing, I interviewed the mother on this case. I imagined an unflattering picture of the mother before I met her because of the freakish nature of the former father. I was surprised to find a lady who was quite attractive. Without provocation, she told me the entire past, almost like she was confessing to a priest or a shrink. In a way, I sometimes allow witnesses to unload their sordid stories and relieve their burdened minds. I believe it helps them tremendously to know that someone is listening to their troubles. When she met him he was a regular motorcycle riding, beer drinking, tattooed and bearded construction worker. Masculinity exaggerated. Shortly after the marriage, she states that he refused to sleep in the same bed and at nights she heard him go into the garage. One day she found a box of womens clothing in the garage and concluded initially that her husband was having an affair. But she realized, as she held up the size 42 dress and looked at the size 13 shoes, that her husband was secretly dressing as a woman in the garage at night! Finally, after eleven years, the two divorced and the father decided it was at last his time to stop ignoring his needs to be the real woman he felt he was. To him, it didnt matter that there was a minor child with needs for support. I dare speculate that this child will need extensive therapy for the rest of her life to cope with the shock of it all.
I drive home from court, sometimes and I think, no one would believe me if I told them some of the cases I deal with everyday. But I will offer that I dont have a fraction of the creative imagination to fabricate these scenarios. It is, sadly, a sign of the timeswhere children are forgotten that they are the hope for the future. We must not let this moral decay continue, but we as a society must invest in our children, support them,

Helan Bang has been a Los Angeles Deputy District Attorney since 1996. Ms. Bang was born in Los Angeles to immigrant parents and grew up in the sleepy suburbs of Simi Valley. She graduated from U.C. Berkeley with a degree in Political Science-Economy. In 1995 Ms. Bang graduated from Lewis and Clark Law School in Portland, Oregon. As a law student, she clerked for the United States Attorneys Office and worked in a legal clinic for lower income families. Upon graduation from law school, Ms. Bang moved back to her native Los Angeles and began her career as a prosecutor for Ventura County District Attorneys Office. On her free time, she swims competitively and coaches swimming to children. Ms. Bang is also involved with her church at Young Nak English Ministry.