Jesse James’ ex-wife loses bid to have daughter visit her in halfway house

Sandra Bullock, right, and Jesse James arrive at the 16th Annual Screen Actors Guild Awards Jan. 23 in Los Angeles. James and his porn star ex-wife are involved in a custody dispute over their daughter. (AP/Matt Sayles)

ORANGE – A porn star in a child custody battle with ex-husband Jesse James and his actress wife Sandra Bullock was today granted daily phone calls with her 6-year-old daughter – but not visits – while doing time in a halfway house for violating parole in a tax-evasion case.

Janine Lindemulder, who now goes by her new married name, Janine Aikman, lost custody of her daughter Sunny when she was sent to federal prison in October 2008 for tax evasion.

The child now lives with her father – the West Coast Choppers founder who stars in his own series on Spike TV – and Bullock, who was not in court for today’s hearing.

Family law Commissioner Thomas Schulte refused to order James to bring his daughter at least once to the Portland, Ore., YMCA facility where Aikman is spending four months for violating her parole by marrying a convicted felon she met while staying in another halfway house.

He did, however, increase phone contact between mother and daughter from three days a week to daily calls.

Aikman claimed James had been denying her thrice-weekly court-ordered phone calls with their daughter.

But James told the commissioner that his ex-wife was granted the right to call her daughter on Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays at 7:30 p.m., but often misses those times and sometimes demands to talk to the girl when she is in school.

James also claimed Aikman has missed four out of the five last scheduled visits with their daughter, including a court-ordered Christmas sleepover she fought for and won in December.

“She texts at least twice and up to 20 times a day, demanding to talk to Sunny,” especially in the days leading up to a court hearing, James said.

“[But] sometimes she’ll go a week at a time where she doesn’t make a call.”

James, who acknowledging that he has listened in on the calls, said he usually has to “counsel” his daughter afterward.

“Her mom has no filter on what she tells her about prison,” he said. “There’s a lot of conversation about prison or jail and things that I don’t think a 6-year-old can comprehend or process.”

Sunny loves her mother, but alternates between looking forward to seeing her and being anxious about it, James said.

Both sides agreed the best time for phone calls would be between 6:30 and 7 in the evening, and Aikman was told she can speak to her daughter for at least 10 minutes during that time frame each day.

Schulte said it was especially important to keep up phone access while Aikman serves the rest of her sentence, but it appeared Sunny was “well-bonded” with both parents and could survive the time away from her mother without harm.

He also cautioned Aikman to avoid difficult topics when talking to her daughter, such as conflicts between her parents.

It’s important, Schulte said, that both sides develop long-term plans for their relationship with their daughter and work through their differences for her sake.

The commissioner advised both sides to arrange for joint counseling so they could meet once or twice a month and work out their differences in private with a mental health professional. That way, Schulte said, they could avoid airing their conflicts in a public courtroom.

He said he was “quite impressed” with the way both sides have worked through the custody battle so far, despite the publicity.

Tags: child custody, Janine Lindemulder, Jesse James, OCLNN, Orange, Sandra Bullock, West Coast Choppers

This entry was posted on Monday, February 1st, 2010 at 1:41 pm and is filed under Courts-Crime, Local News . You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.