Judges throughout Colorado once relied on Shannon McShane’s custody recommendations, but the lies she made to those judge as a court-appointed parental evaluator and her retaliation against a parent who exposed her deceptions landed her a sentence of four years in prison.

Denver District Court Judge Alex Myers on Monday rejected attempts by McShane and her lawyer to allow her to serve out a sentence of community service for her guilty pleas to three-criminal counts related to an elaborate fraud on Colorado’s family court system.

The defense portrayed McShane — who also goes by the name Shannon Terrell — as a well-meaning individual who lied about her credentials to boost her self-esteem, while she struggled with various psychological conditions, ranging from extreme depression to anxiety and excessive use of alcohol.

The judge, instead, agreed with the prosecutor, Senior Assistant Colorado Attorney General Gwenn Sandrock, that a prison sentence is warranted for what the judge termed “pervasive” deceit and criminal conduct

Colorado’s parenting evaluation industry profits as bitter child custody cases thrown into chaos

“You effectively infiltrated our justice system here in Colorado through your deception,” the judge told McShane. “You manipulated the trust of families and abused the power that you were given. The impact you’ve had cannot be understated.”

The judge rejected a request from McShane’s lawyer, Julia Stancil, that he delay the start of McShane’s incarceration for about a month to allow McShane time to get her affairs in order. The judge instead directed her to be taken into custody immediately following her sentencing, saying she already had been given ample time to prepare.

McShane, 58, pleaded guilty in April to retaliation against a witness and attempt to influence a public servant, both felonies, and a misdemeanor perjury count.

The judge imposed a sentence of two years in prison on the two felonies and a 12-month jail sentence for the misdemeanor perjury count. He ordered her to serve the sentences on the felony counts consecutive to one another and the misdemeanor sentence concurrent with the other counts. He also ordered three years parole for each felony count following release from prison.

McShane is one of three former parental evaluators now barred by the Colorado Court Administrator’s Office from accepting court appointments to make custody recommendations in the wake of investigative reports into the parental evaluation industry by The Gazette. State lawmakers also have moved to place new regulations and training requirements on the parental evaluation industry in Colorado following investigations by The Gazette that found evaluation reports marred by bias, incompetence and shoddy work that at times put children in deadly peril.

McShane was investigated by the Colorado Attorney General’s Office following an investigative report in The Gazette about how McShane had sent dozens of custody cases in chaos amid allegations that she had falsified her credentials.

She eventually was criminally charged with 15 criminal counts.

Families accuse ex-Colorado Springs evaluator of tainting bitter custody case with biased testimony

Her indictment charged her with falsely representing to state agencies and then to judges and magistrates overseeing custody disputes that she had a doctorate in psychology from the University of Hertfordshire in England. She used her faked doctorate to obtain Colorado licensure as a psychologist, certified addiction counselor and licensed addition counselor.

She then used those licenses to gain employment as a court-appointed evaluator who made custody recommendations in high-conflict custody disputes. Her licensure also allowed her to gain employment at the Colorado Department of Corrections and the Colorado Mental Health Institute in Pueblo.

As state regulators and court administrative officials began to investigate claims against her, McShane surrendered her Colorado state licenses to work as a psychologist and addiction counselor in July 2023. Licensing boards for those professions had suspended her licenses in the previous month.

She then obtained a psychology degree in Texas, stating in a statement on one attorney listserv that she planned to continue her work as a parental evaluator in that state after she moved there. She has since surrendered her Texas psychology license, as well.

Families involved in custody disputes in Colorado, as well as at least one magistrate in the state overseeing one particularly troubled case, have characterized her custody recommendations as bizarre and including unsubstantiated allegations against parents not grounded in reality.

“There have been very few cases in recent years that have touched so many judicial districts, so many agencies, so many counties and so many individuals,” said the prosecutor, Sandrock. “An incarceration sentence would send a message that this type of behavior cannot be tolerated and will not be tolerated.”

Chad Kullhem, a parent who discovered her deception, reported her to state regulators and then himself faced retaliation from McShane, who then called his employer to falsely accuse him of “cyber-stalking” her.

Kullhem told the sentencing judge that he feared he would lose both his job and custody of his two boys, then aged 3 and 6. In one email to the lawyers on the custody dispute, McShane compared Kullhem to a murderer she claimed to have counseled that she said had put his victims through a woodchipper.

The indictment alleged that McShane also wrote a letter to then-Chief Justice of the Colorado Supreme Court Brian Boatright, falsely accusing Kullhem of producing “a multitude of questionable documents” during Kullhem’s custody dispute. She also falsely claimed in a March 2023 attorney listserv that Kullhem had showed up at her house.

Kullhem said McShane also had sought to isolate him, telling him that he should leave his new girlfriend and should stop talking with friends and family members. He said she falsely called him a “gaslighter, an alienator, a classic abuser,” when he actually was the protective parent. He added that she exacerbated his two boys’ PTSD, leaving them shaken after one painful meeting with her.

“She has affected countless families, people too scared or too defeated to speak up,” Kullhem told the judge. “The psychological damage she has inflicted is real. It’s deep and in many cases it’s permanent.”

A tearful McShane apologized to Kullhem and told the judge “no matter what the sentence is, I’ve already given myself a life sentence.” She said she will be seeking forgiveness and seeking to make amends for the rest of her life.

“To all these parents, having been in a difficult divorce myself, I get it,” she said. “I’ll be doing life. I wake up thinking about this. I go to sleep thinking about this, and I was suicidal for a very, very long time.”

Colorado parental evaluator faces scrutiny over handling of high-conflict custody cases