The ex-wife of 1950s crooner Paul Anka is challenging a court ruling that says she cannot see her own son without the singer’s permission.
Anna Aberg, 46, was told that her ex-husband, 76, would had sole custody of their 11-year-old son Ethan after the relationship between the boy and his mom fell apart.
‘The judge basically said, “I’m just going to let Paul Anka decide,”‘ Aberg told The New York Daily News.
‘That’s unconstitutional. I have a right. Even if I was a murderer, I should still get to see my kid with supervised visitation.’
Dispute: Model Anna Aberg (left) is disputing a court decision that gave her ex-husband Paul Anka (right, acting in Gilmore Girls) full custody of their son, barring her from seeing him
In 2008 Anka – who was made famous by songs such as ‘Diana’ and ‘Lonely Boy’ in the 1950s – married Aberg, who was his personal trainer; they divorced in 2010.
In June of this year a Ventura County, California judge ruled that Ethan would be given over completely to his father, and that there would be no guaranteed visitation or therapy.
Custody: Anka, 76, has custody of Ethan, 11, to the chagrin of Aberg, 46 (all pictured in 2012). She says Anka poisoned her son’s mind against her during his two years of custody
He said that in the two years he lived with his father, the boy’s relationship with Aberg had deteriorated to such an extent that a therapy course was ‘doomed to failure’.
But Aberg, who filed the appeal on August 24, says that her ex-husband turned their son against her.
They had shared the boy’s time in a 50-50 agreement until January 2015, when she was told in a legal letter that he wanted to give her just one weekend a month in winter and two in summer, she said.
The alternative, the letter said, was to go to court.
The following month – amid claims from Anka that his ex-wife was ‘mentally ill’ she lost physical custody of her son at the suggestion of a mediator, the Daily News reported.
‘The false allegations started pouring in one after the other,’ Aberg added. ‘The court never found me guilty of any of them, and still I lost custody of my son.’
Just months before, she said, she lost custody of her now-14-year-old daughter from another marriage after she was ‘almost arrested’ on Mother’s Day based on a ‘false allegation’ that she scalded the girl.
‘I was never found guilty of it,’ said Aberg.
An attempt by DailyMail.com to contact Mr Anka’s lawyer was not immediately successful.
In March the judge said that a court expert said that while Aberg could be ‘harsh,’ there wasn’t any evidence of abuse on either side.
Happier times: The couple (pictured in 2009) married in 2008 and divorced in 2010. Aberg says Anka lied about her being mentally ill and abusive towards their son
Neither Paul nor Abergwere ‘without fault’, he said, which ‘puts them in company with almost 100 per cent of all parents.’
Instead, alienation was ‘the elephant in the room,’ he said, and no contact with Aberg was too much – but when family therapy fell through, he changed his tune.
‘A court order at this time requiring that [Ethan] spend time with his mother, who he presently despises, risks trying to put a round peg into a square hole,’ he wrote in April.
‘At some point, Ethan’s stated preference to live with his father may be in his best interest, however objectionable that is to [Aberg].’
Two months later he ruled in favor of Paul.
‘“I understand that this sounds crazy, like a bad movie, but it is the reality,’ she said, adding that she believed the judge ‘delegated’ the job of making court orders to her ex-husband.
‘That is illegal and the reason for my appeal,’ she said.
Famous: Anka became famous in the 1950s and 60s with songs such as ‘Lonely Boy’. DailyMail.com has reached out for comment