Now, unemployed and struggling to get by in the wake of the recession, Nika finds herself in the midst of a prolonged legal battle for custody of the little girl she and Stephanie once considered their own. Without a job, Nika can’t afford to pay last month’s rent, let alone the $20,000 of legal fees she had incurred in the legal struggle with her former partner.

Nika Maynard, an unemployed Canarsie resident (courtesy photo)

The odds seem stacked against Nika, who describes herself as a 37-year-old “tomboy” who prefers shopping in the men’s department. Potential employers are at times uncomfortable with her masculine appearance, Nika says, even though her high cheekbones and long, tied-back cornrows make it impossible to mistake her for a man.

Further complicating the job search is an injury from a devastating accident that requires her to use a cane as she gingerly limps to the subway for interviews. There’s urgency in her voice when she says, “I need a job.” Quietly forceful with a gentle smile and tired eyes, Nika knows that only dogged determination will get her what she needs.

It all started in 2002, when Stephanie’s sister, living in Grenada, had more children than she could afford and offered the couple her newborn baby. The birth mother signed a contract, forfeiting all rights to her child, and Nika and Stephanie brought two-month-old Jada to a new home back to Brooklyn.

Content merely with having a child at a time when many same-sex couples were denied the right, Nika hardly concerned herself with the details of the arrangement. The contract was signed, but official adoption papers were never drawn up. It wasn’t until two years later, when her relationship with Stephanie soured, that she grew alarmed.

By then Nika had hired a lawyer and filed adoption papers, but a particularly ugly breakup with Stephanie stalled the process. After moving in with a new partner, Stephanie decided that as the child’s aunt, she should have more rights to the child and that she didn’t want Nika to be a part of Jada’s life at all.

The custody battle has been in legal limbo for six years. According to Nika, the case is the first in New York City between two women, neither of whom has legal custody of their child. Her lawyers tell her that it has taken so long to reach an agreement because these kinds of cases are rare, Nika says.

The custody battle may have ended much sooner had the judge granted Stephanie, Jada’s blood-relative, full custody of the child. But Nika says that Stephanie’s claim to Jada based on the blood relationship did not hold up in front of the judge. According to Nika, he informed their lawyers that neither woman is legally more entitled to the child.

Nika pulls out her phone and smiles at a photo of Jada, a sparkly-eyed eight-year-old grinning back. The fight for her daughter has been emotionally taxing. Some friends have even suggested she let Jada go for the time being, but Nika can’t imagine giving up.

“Stephanie and I were only five years together, and now we’ve been going through this fight for almost seven years,” Nika says softly. “I still couldn’t do that.”

At times Nika is overwhelmed by the confluence of such difficult circumstances in her family life while going through the daily struggle to find a job, with no end in sight.

“Everything is happening all at once,” she says. “And I’m going through it all alone.”

Nika Maynard (courtesy photo)

Life hasn’t always been so out of control. She once enjoyed a stable income. For five years she worked as a personal chef and household manager for a wealthy family. It paid $43,000 a year, a good salary for someone without a college education. She enjoyed cooking Caribbean food for friends and had previous experience catering parties. The job provided enough money for Nika to buy a car, and a respite from anxiety about paying bills on time.

But when the wealthy family moved away in October 2010, Nika found herself without a job in a depressed economy.

“Things changed drastically,” Nika says. “I just want to be able to live comfortably, but I’m basically struggling to make it day by day.”

Nika takes care of Jada every other week, and although she wants custody of Jada full time, she recognizes that her days without her daughter allow her to dedicate herself to the job hunt.

“All of my evenings with her we do homework until 8 or 9 at night,” Nika says. “When I don’t have her, that’s the time I really devote to myself. It’s working out well for me now, but when I get her permanently I will need a job.”

Nika sends out several resumes a day, but has only found temporary work so far. For the time being, she makes ends meet with smaller jobs, like proctoring law school exams and as a precinct worker at election time. Part of her difficulty in finding a job, Nika says, is that employers tend to make judgments about her the moment she steps into the interview room. She said most employers probably don’t interview many 30-something women who show up in a suit and tie sporting a cane.

“I’m aggressive, tomboyish,” she explains with a wry smile. “I’m a little discriminated against.”

If employers take note of Nika’s cane, they probably fail to connect it to the conspicuous five-year gap in her resume. Both resulted from a horrific car accident a little over a decade ago. The crash sent Nika flying thirty feet from the car to an impact that crushed one of her feet and damaged her spine. Doctors said she would never walk again, but Nika slowly regained the ability over the five years she stayed at home after the accident.

Her time out of the job market haunts her employment search to this day. Nika fears that most employers reject her out of hand when they see the five-year gap.

Despite these setbacks, Nika has found a new approach to rejoin the workforce. She recently started working towards her bachelor’s degree in Computer Information Systems through Devry’s online program, which allows her to attend school while caring for her daughter and looking for a job. For Nika, computers offer the promise of a job that comes with a desk, a chair, and rest for her injured foot.

But until her desk job comes through, Nika will take any opportunity that comes her way. She can rattle off a list of city exams she completed last year and several jobs she’s taken on. With a daughter to feed and rent to pay, she works even if it’s painful and the only guarantee is the promise that the job will eventually end.

At the US Open last August she took a position as appetizer chef for two weeks. Forced to leave her cane in the corner, she worked on her feet for hours at a time.

“I thought I’d rather be in pain and sacrifice because I needed the money. I couldn’t do that permanently on an everyday basis,” Nika says.

And Nika needs money now more than ever. In June both her roommates lost their jobs and were forced to move out of the three-bedroom home Nika rents in Canarsie. Nika can’t afford to pay for the entire house and has yet to find new roommates. She is behind on the rent, and owing money makes Nika anxious.

She uses food stamps to put food on the table for Jada, but her income is high enough to make her ineligible for unemployment benefits.

“A lot of times people have their partner to rely on, but when you’re by yourself not receiving unemployment and you have a child, it’s really hard,” she says.

Despite the depressed job market, Nika finds glimmers of hope in every piece of good news she receives. Just last week she opened her mail to find her score on the 911 operator exam, a test she hardly remembered taking last year. Nika scored high and was placed on a list for job openings. Hopefully these kinds of jobs will sustain her until she finds long-term work.

“I guess it could be worse,“ Nika insists, her voice trailing off. “I just need a job.”

Faces the Unemployed in Brooklyn:

Bernard, a former dancer trying to find a second career

Grace, a nurse who lost her job when St. Vincent hospital closed

Michael, out of work and 30 years old

Lance, a MBA educated Bensonhurst resident who was laid off at 64 years old

Rick, who recently moved to Brooklyn from St. Louis, Missouri

Adam Wright, who is accused of raping a 12-year-old girl in 2002, was tried in Kings County Supreme Court yesterday. (Photo: Esteban Illades / The Brooklyn Ink)

A criminologist presented DNA evidence today in the trial of Adam Wright, linking him to the rape of a 12-year-old girl in 2002.

The DNA sample provided by Wright, 43, was collected in 2005 in relation to another rape case, criminologist Noelle Umback told the courtroom in Kings County Supreme Court. It wasn’t until three years ago that technological advancements allowed the swab taken from the victim to be sorted and matched to Wright’s DNA, she said.

The victim was not present at the trial. She took the stand last week, and was questioned by Wright himself, who is acting as his own attorney.

The Brooklyn woman, now 21, was allegedly raped twice on the rooftop of a building in Canarsie nine years ago.

To underline how clear she felt the DNA evidence was, Umback said the police would have to look in 150 planets comparable to Earth to find another person that shared the exact same DNA.

Wright sought to disprove the results from the lab tests.

“Are there possible sources of error [when analyzing samples]?” he asked.

Umback conceded that mistakes could be made, but explained that the analyzing procedures where thoroughly checked upon completion so chances were slim.

The defendant — dressed in a lilac shirt and tie — was repeatedly asked by Judge Dineen Riviezzo to reformulate his questions to the witnesses.

Among the many inquiries, he asked whether semen samples could be collected if the perpetrator wore a condom. There was no record of a condom being found at the scene of the crime.

“Yes,” Umback replied. “Condoms break or fall off … A lot of babies are born that way,” she said with an almost imperceptible smile.

Could samples be tampered with or washed off? he asked.

“Yes,” Umback replied again. She said both circumstances were highly unlikely.

Umback’s testimony was corroborated by Marie Sample, assistant director of the Department of Forensic Biology, who took the stand late in the afternoon. She said that testing equipment goes through routine quality controls to prevent potential corruption of DNA samples.

The case will resume on Monday.

More Stories on The Brooklyn Ink:

Brooklyn Political Dynasty on Trial

Valenko Trial Delayed But Verdict Nears

Court Considers Evidence in 16-Year-Old Double Murder Case

The bus crashed after hitting an SUV. A small fire is burning in the bus engine, The Wall Street Journal reports.

NY1 has on-the-scene footage and reports that the bus crashed into Little Andy’s Day Care. ABC7 has a small gallery of pictures.

Ravi Kumar of The Brooklyn Ink is heading to the scene. Tweet him @Ravinepal if you have any tips.

**

Are you on the scene? Did you see the crash? Let us know in the comments or Tweet @TheBrooklynInk.

Photo courtesy of the Canarsie Courier

“Teenager Shot on Avenue J” blares the front-page headline. “Burglars Rob and Ransack Avenue L Deli” reports the following page. “Three Injured in Remsen/Avenue K Crash” rounds out the week’s lead stories. At the end of each article, Charles Rogers, author of them all, invites anyone with information about these incidents to call the 69th Precinct Detective Squad.

Full-page, black-and-white photo spreads commemorate the week’s special events: a performance by the Caribbean Big Drum Ensemble, P.S. 268’s Fifth Annual Art Extravaganza, and a local adult daycare center’s Health and Fitness Day. Foreclosure auction sales and advertisements for new beauty salons abound, while the “Contest Corner” on page 28 offers readers the chance to win tickets to concerts, comedy clubs, and Brooklyn Cyclones games.

As evidenced by the issue of June 2, 2011, one chosen at random, such is the local flavor of reporting in the Canarsie Courier, Brooklyn’s oldest continuously published weekly newspaper. Every Thursday since 1921, its staff has delivered a selection of neighborhood news that both serves and reflects a handful of communities on the borough’s southern edge.

“I read it all the time,” said Diana Castellano, 56, a social worker who has lived in Canarsie for 43 years. “They’re at every street fair, every church event, every crime scene.”

Already small in size and scope, the Courier is getting smaller. Circulation recently dropped to about 5,000, though the paper’s website cites an out-of-date number of 10,000. The Courier still costs 50 cents, but prints fewer pages per issue, down to 48 to 52 pages from about 60 a decade ago. Its main competitor, the Canarsie Digest, not only offers a thicker issue at equal cost and distributes free copies at several locations in town, but also aggregates its content for free on BrooklynDaily.com, an online presence of News Corporation’s Community Newspaper Group, the city’s largest group of neighborhood newspapers. In its 90th anniversary year, the Courier finds itself struggling for survival amid a changing community and a changing industry.

“We’re battling like mad,” said Rogers, who declined to say whether the paper’s balance sheet runs in black or red. “We’re counting pennies. I want to punch our business manager sometimes, but she’s just doing her job.”

With only three full-time staff members, himself included, Managing Editor Charles Rogers has kept the Courier afloat for more than two decades using a time-tested formula of bloodthirsty headlines, syndicated columns, classified ads, street surveys and marketing gimmicks.

“I’m always very pleased when I come in on Monday and find out that there’s been two murders over the weekend,” said Rogers. “Crime sells!”

Originally from Ohio, Rogers is “old enough to have been doing this for a long time.” He moved to New York in the 1960s, when he landed a job as a field producer for NBC News. Eighteen years later, tired of the constant travel, Rogers settled in Canarsie and took over editorship of the Courier. Housed in a square, black building in the middle of a quiet, residential block, the paper shares office space (and a receptionist) with the law offices of its publisher’s husband, Alessandro Marra. Most of Rogers’s work happens here, in a small, wood-paneled newsroom with desks for each of the Courier’s nine employees. A smaller, windowless alcove in the back offers a conference table for the occasional interview.

Managing Editor Charles Rogers and Features Editor Neil Friedman run the newsroom (Photo: Peter Madden/The Brooklyn Ink).

Features Editor Neil Friedman, a longtime Sheepshead Bay resident and former public relations specialist, functions as Rogers’ No. 2 and trumpets an abrasive take on local politics in a column entitled “This Week’s Attitude.” A police scanner chatters incessantly from above his desk. Business Manager Catherine Rosa squeezes profits from paychecks and ad pages. Contributing writers from Marine Park, Mill Basin, and Georgetown call with tips and story pitches, and the Courier relies on its patrons for pictures.

“Attention residents: If you see it,” reads an ad on page 24, “snap it.”

And so the next issue takes shape. The office is closed on the weekends, so staffers scramble on Monday and Tuesday to fill the paper with news from Saturday and Sunday. Each page is laid on wooden shelves at the front of the newsroom to be collectively tweaked by staffers with red markers before the two-person “Production Department” transfers the layout to the computer. The issue goes to print on Wednesday and hits newsstands on Thursday, leaving Friday to clean up and start over.

Shifting demographics and the rapid proliferation of digital media outlets have prompted Rogers and Friedman to make changes to remain competitive. Originally populated by middle-class whites of Italian and Jewish descent, Canarsie has experienced an influx of Afro-Caribbean immigrants, especially from Haiti and Jamaica, since the 1980s. Rogers and Friedman watched readership drop as their core constituents moved to Staten Island, Long Island, and New Jersey, leaving the Courier to struggle to appeal to a new audience.

“We made some concessions,” said Friedman, “but we don’t want to make it a Caribbean newspaper. We’re trying to serve the community as a whole.”

Limited attempts to reach out the community’s new population with reprinted AP reports from the Caribbean and coverage of international cricket matches failed to increase readership, but the duo hasn’t stopped trying. When the earthquake struck Haiti earlier this year, the Courier provided extensive coverage of the disaster and followed up with features on refugees who had received extended visas so they could stay with their families in Canarsie.

“We might not have done those stories a few years ago,” said Friedman.

“That wasn’t dictated by sales,” added Rogers. “We said, ‘This neighborhood needs this story.’”

As more and more people advertised on Craigslist and found free news online, the paper also expanded its web presence. The Courier offers a yearly subscription to its online version for $25. A digital archive is also available free of charge; only the most recent two issues exist behind a pay wall. Fearing a complete abandonment of the print issue, however, the Courier resists uploading its classified ads.

Times are indeed tight, and Rogers must mitigate the tension between offering a quality product and keeping his business solvent. Limiting himself and Friedman to four-day workweeks, signing advertisers to long-term deals at slashed rates to guarantee income, and arranging sales-boosting contests with prizes in exchange for free advertising, called barters, have stemmed the leaks for now. But even as the celebration of its 90th anniversary prompts a look back over the past—the Canarsie Historical Society is offering a $1,000 reward for a copy of the first issue—questions about the future loom. Will the Canarsie Courier adapt quickly enough to see its 100th?

While reading the Courier may be a fixture of the weekly routine for some older residents, in its own profile of its readership, the paper estimates that only 21 percent of its readers are under age 30.

“It’s mostly advertisements,” said Eric Ali, the young Manager of the Sammy & E Minimart on the corner of Rockaway Parkway and Avenue L. “Only the first few pages are about things that happened in Canarsie.”

Rogers believes the paper’s tradition of commitment to Canarsie will help him weather the storm.

“We’re sophisticated,” said Rogers. “Neil and I like to think we’re as sophisticated as The New York Times.”

“People trust us,” he added. “We’ve been around a long time.”

According to CBS, three of the injuries are considered serious.

Longtime community activist Charles Barron, who has represented the 42nd district of Brownsville and Canarsie as well as parts of East New York and Flatbush for nine years, said the new health care bill creates more questions than it answers due to the size and scale of the legislation.

“Before the bill people were always complaining about health care,” Barron said. “We don’t really know what it all covers. I am concerned that people will be fooled into thinking this is comprehensive change.”

Barron said it was in fact only a baby step toward health care reform because people are going to still be paying out of pocket instead of the government footing the entire bill. He also questioned some of the last minute changes to the bill and slammed fiscally conservative Democrats, whom he refers to as “blue dogs,” for demanding compromises to the bill in exchange for their votes.

“We want to stop these corporate run parties, Democrats and Republicans, from prioritizing profits for insurance companies over health care for the people,” said Barron, who feels the benefits of the revised bill favor insurers. “That’s the problem when you have a two party system and both are dependent on the money from corporate business.”

As of Monday, Barron’s office had not been directed any calls concerning the health care legislation.