A Congressional Inquiry was held March 13, 2004 in San Bernardino, California to hear testimony and receive evidence of what many parents, grandparents, and advocacy organizations describe as “a festering cauldron of fraud, corruption,abuse of power and exploitation of children.”During 8 hours of testimony, impassioned tales of rampant abuses of power, denial of due process protections,violations of civil rights, and accusations of blatant defrauding of the American taxpayer were evidenced bydocumentation, video, and prepared statements heard by the committee.
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1 EXPOSED June 2004 Expose III–on the Child Abuse Industry Recognizing the Problems, Seeking the Solutions A Congressional Inquiry was held March 13, 2004 in San Bernardino, California to hear testimony and receive evidence of what many parents, grandparents, and advocacy organizations describe as “a festering cauldron of fraud, corruption, abuse of power and exploitation of children.” During 8 hours of testimony, impassioned tales of rampant abuses of power, denial of due process protections, violations of civil rights, and accusations of blatant defrauding of the American taxpayer were evidenced by documentation, video, and prepared statements heard by the committee. Testimony included documentation of schemes designed to provide financial gain for states, counties and service providers in the form of agency mandates to “maximize the federal funding stream” by placing children needlessly in foster care. This is in reference to financial incentives provided to child welfare agencies drawn from an already abused social security fund. The testimony continued unabated as parents and extended family members presented the committee with documentation of violations of state and federal statutes, denial of civil rights, and predation upon vulnerable children and families by child welfare workers who regularly exceed their authority with impunity. Evidence presented during testimony before the Congressional Inquiry held in San Bernardino, lead to promise of official investigations into systematic fraud, “color of law” civil rights violations, and abuse of power by child welfare agencies. Congr ngr ngr ngr ngressi si si si sion on on on onal In In In In Inqui ui ui ui uiry
Transcript
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EXPOSED
June 2004
Expose III–on the Child Abuse IndustryRecognizing the Problems, Seeking the Solutions
A Congressional Inquiry was held March 13, 2004 in San Bernardino, California to hear testimony and receive evidence ofwhat many parents, grandparents, and advocacy organizations describe as “a festering cauldron of fraud, corruption,abuse of power and exploitation of children.”
During 8 hours of testimony, impassioned tales of rampant abuses of power, denial of due process protections,violations of civil rights, and accusations of blatant defrauding of the American taxpayer were evidenced bydocumentation, video, and prepared statements heard by the committee. Testimony included documentation ofschemes designed to provide financial gain for states, counties and service providers in the form of agency mandates to“maximize the federal funding stream” by placing children needlessly in foster care. This is in reference to financialincentives provided to child welfare agencies drawn from an already abused social security fund.
The testimony continued unabated as parents and extended family members presented the committee withdocumentation of violations of state and federal statutes, denial of civil rights, and predation upon vulnerable childrenand families by child welfare workers who regularly exceed their authority with impunity.
Evidence presented during testimony before the Congressional Inquiry held in San Bernardino,lead to promise of official investigations into systematic fraud, “color of law” civil rights
violations, and abuse of power by child welfare agencies.
The American Family Rights Association is a professional association of parents,grandparents, family rights advocates, former foster and adopted children,attorneys, licensed social workers, medical professionals, human rights andfreedom advocates.
The insertion of the coercive force of government into the private lives of families,without accountability, due process, or recourse to redress the government forgrievances is epidemic nationally and invariably harms families, communities,threatens our country’s future and should be vigorously opposed.
As an association we are dedicated to assisting families and their children byproviding access to educational materials, news, support and information whichwill allow families and individuals to educate themselves on subjects of vitalimportance in restoring, exercising, and defending their sovereign rights andliberties.
Visit us at: www.familyrightsassociation.com
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AFRA Mission Statement ........................................................................................................................... 2Press Release – AFRA Visits Washington DC ........................................................................................ 4Speakers line up to report abuses by kids’ agencies–Baca-led panel records claims at SB hearing ... 6Kid snatching not MO of children’s agency, letter from Cathy Cimbalo .......................................... 8Letter in response from Laura Koepke, President–Government Watch ............................................... 10Christine Korn’s reply to Cathy Cimbalo’s Letter ...................................................................................... 11Linda Jennings reply to the recent Cimbalo editorial ............................................................................... 12Report: Foster care system needs massive overhaul ............................................................................... 14Comptroller: “Texas is Abusing the Children it is Supposed to Protect” ............................................... 15Photographs from the Report “Forgotten Children” by Carole Strayhorn ......................................... 16Child Protection Programs Stir Controversy ............................................................................................ 17Foster Care is Un-American ........................................................................................................................ 18Suicide Warning Sought for Antidepressants ........................................................................................... 20Foster Care Cash Cow, by Troy Anderson .................................................................................................. 22Ways to Care for an Ailing Foster System, Federal funds could help more kids at home ................... 24Private Agencies Diverting Millions, audits find parties, vacations, & more ....................................... 26Child Abuse: A Quiet Shame, by Kathy Gambrell, UPI White House Reporter ...................................... 28Public Hearings Sought on Foster Care System ......................................................................................... 31Child services scandal heats up–Molina: Fire or discipline ineffective social workers ....................... 32Committee Chair, Marie Parente, is Trouble by DSS, ............................................................................... 34Successful alternatives to taking children from their parents–Nine Ways to do Child Welfare Right .. 38Foster Ruling to Cost the State Millions, relatives get back pay for foster care benefits ................. 40Judge Michael Nash Calls for Case Reviews of 30,000 Foster Children ................................................. 41Foster-kid cash lure may fade–Governor wants to alter system ........................................................... 42Proposal limits CPS powers ........................................................................................................................ 43Schwarzenegger attempting to stop exploitation of children for money in California..................... 44DSS “Follows the money”–Makes an Extra $90 Million Per Year ............................................................ 46Abused, drugged and unprotected–mentally ill children suffer in state paid centers ....................... 50Ruling on Hearsay Evidence Guts Cases ..................................................................................................... 53Danny’s Story, another child sold to foster care ...................................................................................... 54“Relaxing” Liberty Protection for Child Abuse and Terror Attack Prevention for “Our” Children and Nation ............................................................................................................. 55Group fights for changes to Child Protective Services........................................................................... 58The FIA Game–Child Abuse and Child Welfare Protection Laws............................................................. 60You Know You Are a Corrupt Juvenile Court Judge If, one man’s experience of the Juvenile Courts ........ 63National Advisory on Organized Crime Operating in the Child Protection System ............................ 64State’s Child Protection Agencies Collude with Judges to Defraud Federal Government ................... 66Study–kids rushed into foster system ....................................................................................................... 69Letter from former foster child Raymond Anthony Marrujo–from San Quentin Prison ................... 70When the state becomes parent................................................................................................................ 76Psychiatric Fraud–Mental Health Care Today ........................................................................................... 78Restraint Deaths and Abuse, Involuntary Commitment Abuse Victims ................................................. 79Oregon Black Market Child Selling, USA-Mexico Baby Market ............................................................... 85Woman pleads no contest, gets 8 year term in baby buying case ......................................................... 85Agency Blasted in Abuse Probe.................................................................................................................. 86CYF program allows mother to take fate into her own hands ............................................................... 87A few victims of the Child Abuse Industry ................................................................................................ 88David’s children: little children placed in foster care wtih a convicted child molester ...................... 89Panel on foster schools–rate of student graduation from nonpublic facilities low ........................... 90Board focus on schooling–Supervisors vote to form council to improve education of foster kids ........ 91Making Drugs, Shaping the Rules ............................................................................................................... 92Multiple Transistions – A young child’s point of view on foster care and adoption ........................... 96Stratton Children Bring Home the Bacon ................................................................................................. 98How Dependency Court Really Works ..................................................................................................... 100Thirty Years of CAPTA ............................................................................................................................... 104Government Bonuses Accelerate Adoptions .......................................................................................... 109In this land? ................................................................................................................................................. 110Why Join the American Family Rights Association ................................................................................... 111
Table of Contents
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Date: Tuesday, 8 June, 2004 10:00:45 EST
Press Release2004 American Family Rights Association
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASERepresentatives of American Family Rights Association (AFRA) and its member organizations will bemeeting June 14, 2004 with the U.S. House Ways and Means Sub-Committee on Human Resources inWashington DC, by invitation from Representative Wally Herger (R) of California’s 2nd CongressionalDistrict. This invitation was extended to AFRA as a result of the Congressional Inquiry held March 13,2004 in San Bernardino, California, which investigated the abuse of families by Child ProtectiveServices agencies, nationwide.
During the Congressional Inquiry held in San Bernardino, and the more recent hearings before the TexasHouse Interim Sub-Committee on Child Welfare and Foster Care, irrefutable evidence was presented ofabuses of authority and violations of civil rights by state agencies nationwide, in the pursuit of“maximizing the federal funding stream by placing children needlessly in foster care”. These agencyactions have destroyed families, and irreparably harmed, injured, and killed children.
The representatives from AFRA will be speaking with the U.S. House Sub-Committee to presentevidence of the unwarranted, systematic destruction of families and the exploitation of their childrenby a system of bureaucratic terrorism under the guise of “protecting children” that is taking placenationwide.
AFRA and its participating member organizations will be presenting evidence to the sub-committeeclearly demonstrating the need for immediate action on the part of Congress in the form of:
● Immediate revocation of all “waivers” to states applying for federal incentives under the ChildAbuse Prevention and Treatment Act, the Adoption and Safe Families Act, and all funding underprovisions of the Social Security Act in light of the dismal failure of literally ALL 50 STATES tocomply with requirements of those and related acts or regulations as evidenced by the recentfederal review completed in 2003.
● Immediate US CONGRESSIONAL state-by-state public inquiries into all local child protectiveagencies, juvenile courts, family courts, contracted mental health agencies and service providersincluding private placement agencies.
● Review of All CPS prosecutions, Termination of Parental Rights decisions, and Foster Care andAdoption Cases in all jurisdictions for the past ten years.
● Immediate repeal of current immunity laws to insure agency accountability for maliciousinterventions and prosecutions.
Proposals will also be presented to the Sub-Committee addressing specific solutions to the ongoingissues of the literal disregard of established law in the everyday execution of the mandates assigned tothe child protection industry and in excess of the authority delegated to these agencies by the will ofthe people.
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It is the position of American Family Rights Association and it’s member organizations as wellas the individual membership that under the guise of protecting children, “protective” serviceagencies across the nation are acting in bad faith, with malicious intent, and exceeding theauthority delegated to them by the will of the people of this nation with complete impunityand the full approval and involvement of the courts.
The continued “color of law” civil rights violations, virtual kidnaping of children, and maliciousmanipulation of the system has resulted in the total devastation of entire families by the veryagency mandated to protect children. The conduct of the entire child abuse industry is havingfar-reaching ramifications for every person in the nation in terms of their right to even exist as amember of a traditional family, such as those that brought this nation to the forefront ofgreatness in personal freedoms and liberties.
American Family Rights Association and the participating member organizations invite andstrongly encourage members of the media to make inquiries of American Family RightsAssociation in order to dispel the misinformation that has been, and is currently spewed forthby the child protection industry in the United States. This propaganda is used to perpetuateand validate it’s over-reaching interference in the private lives of the free citizens of the UnitedStates. We also hope you will read and pass on this Expose on the Child Abuse Industry. Getinformed before they come for your children!
American Family Rights Association can be found on the internet at:www.familyrightsassociation.com
Dennis Hinger,Dennis Hinger,Dennis Hinger,Dennis Hinger,Dennis Hinger,Executive Vice President
AFRA Board of Directors
Leonard HendersonDennis HingerGregory A. HessionSusan JacksonHarry L. SimpkinsDennis JacquesKay HensonDr. Shirley MooreRobert T McQuaidTHE COMMITTEE - CANADAAl White
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Sunday, March 14, 2004 - SAN BERNARDINO - Theyare stories people sometimes read about in newspapers orsee on television: children savagely beaten, burned withcigarettes, or sexually molested by their foster parents.Sometimes it’s all of the above.
Congressman Joe Baca, D-Rialto, and state legislatorsSaturday heard such stories during an all-day forum at CityHall.
But the focus of the forum was to address another kind ofabuse, that allegedly inflicted upon parents, relatives andothers by child protective agencies nationwide.
Numerous complaints from people across the countryabout extensive abuses they say they have suffered bychild protective agencies, primarily parents and relativesalleging they were stripped of their custodial rights, weresnagged in a mess of bureaucratic red tape, and evenfalsely accused of crimes by inept social workers,prompted Baca to call the forum.
Representatives of Government Watch, the AmericanFamily Rights Association and groups claiming torepresent victims of child protective agencies alsoattended and served on a panel with Baca to hear andrecord the complaints.
The presentations were audio and video recorded andtranscribed. Baca promised they would be sent to theappropriate state, county, federal agencies andlegislatures for further action.
A resounding allegation Saturday was how child protectiveagencies push to adopt children out for profit instead oftrying to place them in the custody of relatives. Childprotective agencies receive state funds for every child theyadopt out.
Critics told of children burned hundreds of times withcigarettes, being forced to swallow baking soda forpunishment and being sexually molested by their fosterparents.
When they complained to social workers, the complaintsfell on deaf ears, they said.
Some alleged they were even accused of lying and hadfrivolous complaints filed against them by social workersto cover up their own blunders and avert an investigation.“It’s really been an eye-opener right out,” Baca saidSaturday during the forum in a maxed capacity CityCouncil Chambers. “It tells us we need some form of auniform standard nationwide. Apparently there’s been a lotof abuse.”
Baca said a critical element to fixing the system would beto ensure that social workers receive proper training, thatstricter requirements be implemented for the certificationof social workers, and that social workers and the wholechild protective services system be held accountable forwrongdoing and subject to criminal penalties and fines.While many of the grim stories heard Saturday told ofordinary people faced with extraordinary circumstances,some allegations were even more colorful, as if they wereright out of an “X-Files” script.
Ted Gunderson, who said he is a former senior FBI agent,told of an international child kidnapping ring involving aconspiracy among the wealthiest, most powerful people inthe nation.
Every day, Gunderson said, children are being kidnappedoff the streets and sold into child prostitution and forcedto participate in blood rituals and sex orgies. He spoke ofsecret societies and dropped names like “The Finders” and“The Illuminati,” alleged social orders of affluent peopleholding most of the power and influence in government orsociety, including judges, politicians, and attorneys.
“The system, basically - is corrupt to the core,”Gunderson said.
Whatever the stories were, they were all taken seriously.Baca said he would first find out if Gunderson is legitimatebefore he inquires as to if his story is true.
“But it’s something you can’t take lightly,” Baca said.Arizona state Rep. Ray Barnes, R-Phoenix, said: “If there’san international conspiracy, if there is an internationalselling of kids, we’ve got a problem.”
Critics residing in San Bernardino County who attendedthe forum hoping to speak got left out in the cold whentime ran out at 5 p.m. and everyone was forced from thebuilding.
Out-of-state speakers and those from outside SouthernCalifornia were allowed to speak first.But some didn’t seem to mind.
“There are so many stories that need to be heard,” saidRaymond Matney, 53, of Redlands, who alleges he hasnever seen his son, now 7, who was adopted by a familyout of state at birth. He continues his efforts to connectwith his son and said he was never given parental rightsbecause he wasn’t married to the boy’s mother.“The baby was bought and sold before he was even born,”Matney said.
Letter from Cathy Cimbalo, Director of the SanBernardino County Department of Children’sServices.
The San Bernardino County Department of Children’sServices recently has come under a series of unfair andmisinformed attacks.
The first has come from a small group of citizensfrustrated at the outcome of their personal cases. Theywere followed by Congressman Joe Baca, D-Rialto, whomade no effort to find out the facts. Now, The Sun hasseen fit to print half-truths and downright inaccuracies inan apparent effort to spin sensational but harmful tales.
It’s time to set the record straight, not just for thedepartment’s public servants, who work tirelessly toprotect children from abuse and neglect, but also for thechildren themselves, who have been caught in the middleof a fight started by adults who seem interested only inpushing their own personal agendas.
The attacks (“Too many families left in the dark onChildren’s Services,” March 21 editorial) are based on twofallacies … that the department takes children away fromparents and grandparents for no good reason, and thatthere is no public accountability for the department’sactions.
Federal and state laws prohibit the department frompublicly disclosing the facts surrounding Children’sServices’ cases. These laws exist to protect children whohave been abused or neglected from publicembarrassment, but they also serve as cover for adultswho falsely claim to be the victims of an uncaring orsinister bureaucracy. However, it is an absolute fact thatchildren are not removed from their homes, unless there isstrong evidence of abuse, neglect or the very real threat ofdanger.
By law, children cannot be removed from a home withoutthe consent of law enforcement, and they can be removedonly for reasons clearly outlined in the state Welfare andInstitutions Code. Social workers cannot take actionunless a police officer or sheriff’s deputy is convinced thata child is in danger.
Then, the department has 48 hours to file a petition withthe Juvenile Court, outlining the reason for the removal.The court then must conduct a hearing within 72 hours todetermine if, in fact, the children should have beenremoved.
Parents and grandparents who challenge a decision toremove children from their homes are provided free legalcounsel … they do not have to spend money on “high-priced attorneys.” They also are entitled to have theirappeals heard by an appellate court.
Therefore, in each of the caseswhere parents or grandparents havecomplained publicly that theDepartment of Children’s Servicesremoved their children unjustly, the decision wasupheld not only by law enforcement, butalso by the courts. If that isn’t oversight,I’d like our critics to outline what is.
The state Department of Social Services oversees thechild welfare operations in all 58 counties. The departmentconducts audits and reviews to assure that laws andregulations are followed.
AB 636 was enacted last year, establishing a process for allcounties to set goals to accomplish a specific plan toimprove outcomes for children and families. Although theBoard of Supervisors will have to approve the plan, thelegislation does not give the board control over thedepartment’s operations. The department still will begoverned by federal and state laws.
When Baca conducted his legislative hearing or “fact-finding session” recently at San Bernardino City Hall, heclaimed he had invited the Department of Children’sServices to participate. He did not. Additionally, we neverhave been contacted by anyone from Baca’s office seekinginformation.
The result was one-sided, undocumented, anecdotalinformation that was distorted, inflammatory and oftenpatently untrue. It was an irresponsible way to do researchon a system that is in place to protect the most vulnerablepopulation we have … our children.
The department relies on the public to report suspectedabuse and neglect. If they lose faith in the system’scredibility, they may be reluctant to report abuse, andchildren may be harmed, because the department did notintervene.
The Department of Children’s Services has invited thenews media to accompany social workers on field calls, sothat they could fully understand how child abuse referralsare assessed and the complex and difficult job socialworkers have. As much as the department is able under thelaw, we have been willing to educate the public, the newsmedia, elected officials and others regarding child welfareprocedures. We are more than willing to let “sunshine” inwithin the parameters of our legal and regulatoryconstraints. Cathy Cimbalo is director of the countyDepartment of Children’s Services.
LETTERS TO THE EDITOR CAN BE DIRECTED VIAEMAIL TO: [email protected]
Attorney Robert PowellAttorney Robert PowellJoseph BrowneJoseph Browne
Tom HansonTom Hanson
Am
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Ch
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Ted GundersonTed Gunderson
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TO: San Bernardino Sun
Submitted by Laura Koepke, President,Government Watch
Dear Editor:
April 3, 2004 – Kathy Cimbalo’s blatant attempt to hide a giant ugly and dangerousmonster fails by any standard (“Kid snatching not agency’s MO,” April 2, 2004).
Kid snatching is exactly what Ms. Cimbalo’s unlicensed gang of errant social workersdoes. She, herself, has no active license, according to state records.
Government Watch officers, along with victims of San Bernardino County Children’sServices, have been addressing the board of supervisors for several weeks. We presentevidence of the fraudulent taking of children by Ms. Cimbalo’s department and county counsel. Wedo this to call attention to endangerment of innocent children with the expectation that electedand appointed officials who run county government will take appropriate corrective action toprevent more deaths, rapes and exploitation of children in government custody.
Ms. Cimbalo states that Congressman Joe Baca “made no effort to find out the facts.” In truth,Congressman Baca sat for more than eight hours on March 13 listening to testimony. His staff spentuntold additional hours listening to more testimony.
After unfairly attempting to discredit a federal official, Ms. Cimbalo proceeds to blame everyoneexcept herself as she implicates, but does not name, parents, grandparents, Governor ArnoldSchwarzenegger, judges, District Attorney Mike Ramos, Sheriff Gary Penrod and GovernmentWatch.
Government Watch began an investigation into our nation’s child welfare system in October of2002. We soon discovered such a high level of corruption involving federal funding that weconcluded no solution was feasible at the county or state level. It is well documented throughoutthe nation that we urgently need federal intervention to protect America’s children from furtherharm including physical violence, psychological abuse, medical exploitation, sexual molestation andmurder while in government custody.
Fortunately, Congressman Baca recognized the need for federal action and hosted the nationalevent on March 13. Americans can be proud of March 13. It was American democracy as our foundersenvisioned, a public event of the people, for the people and by the people.
Over fifty expert witnesses and victims came to San Bernardino by plane, train and car from tenstates to speak about tragedies perpetrated by child welfare agencies and the courts. They spokeof children who died in government custody, children who were placed by courts with abusers andpedophiles, children who were unnecessarily and dangerously drugged, children who were tradedand sold as a common commodity, for perverse profit and pleasure, into international sexual slaveryand pornography.
Over 100 evidence books were submitted to Congressman Baca for distribution to the UnitedStates Senate and House of Representatives. We invite the United Nations, the White House,federal and state departments of justice, federal and state legislators, governors, districtattorneys, law enforcement, the Sun and interested journalists around the world to review theseevidence books, interview the witnesses and promulgate the findings.
The American Family Rights Association, representing over three million families, professionallytaped the full eight hours of testimony and is making the film available to individuals,organizations, elected officials and the media.
Laura Koepke, President, Government Watch
[email protected], 909-585-4633, 909-217-1787, P.O. Box 1031, Big Bear Lake, CA 92315
Laura Koepke
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Consider this an outraged rebuttal, done in total disbelief that ANY oneas culpable as this person would have the nerve to publicly deny theTRUTH. I guess that this person must adhere to the belief that the bestdefense is an offense. I testified at that hearing that Congressman Bacahosted in San Bernardino a few weeks ago. I spoke to those people, Ihave copies of the transcripts of HOURS of court hearings in whichjudges totally failed to even make an appearance of affording theparents due process. I have DAYS worth of taped proof of CPS workersLIES on witness stands, in court records, in MEDICAL reports. And thisperson, in the interest of saving the CPS MONEY train, has theAUDACITY to attck the validity of those desperate parents whoBEGGED that forum for help to gain redress of the very REAL abusesthey and their children continue to face at the hands of this woman andher minions.
All I can tell you about this is that this person is NOT a public servant.Her consideration is NOT for the safety and well being of ANY child.Her allegiance is to a corrupt and ever more destructive system that haslong since FAILED to help the kids most desperately in need, and hasdestroyed thousands who were in no danger to begin with. All in thename of MONEY and in concert collaborations with other criminals ofsimilar ilk. Sue me. I can PROVE my “hysterical raving”. And the veryBEST defense to the charge of defamation is TRUTH. Some one said, “Ifyou do not know what your rights ARE, you HAVE none. “ Sadly, most ofSouthern California seems not to realize that this is THEIR State andTHEIR country, and that they can and MUST demand that theconstitution and the Bill of Rights be honored even in the KommunistState of Kalifornia.
Ms.Cathy Cimbalo We will see you in a Federal Courtroom before thisissue is laid to rest, and you WILL be held accountable for covering upthe egregious crimes committed against the people of your county.Either you are incredibly obtuse, or incredibly dishonest. Either isunacceptable and to have to tolerate your scathing attack, on top ofthe destruction of our families and children is just beyond the scope ofhuman ability. The people of your county should not have to endureone more day of your malfeasance.
Here is Christine Korn’s reply to therecent Cimbalo editorial
Kid snatching not MO of children’s agency ?
Christine Korn, Colorado Family Rights Association, 226 G Street, Penrose, CO 81240
Christine Korn
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The Editor of the San Bernardino Sun;Mr. Steve Lambert,
The following is in reference to thecomments that Ms. Kathy Cimbalo,Director of the County Department ofChildren’s Services, had in regards to theCongressional hearing of March 13, 2004in San Bernardino, CA. I feel so frustratedthat Ms. Cimbalo has taken such adefensive and bitter approach to thatwhich is such a huge problem not only inCalifornia, but also nationwide.
Please read:
Sincerely,Linda M. JenningsProud Member ofAmerican Family Rights Association
Dear Ms Cimbalo:After reading your response regarding the congressionalhearing of March 13, 2004, in San Bernardino, whichCongressman Baca had called, I felt it mandatory to directmy comments and statements not only to you, but also tothe Editor of the Sun and Governor Schwarzenegger. Yousee, Ms. Cimbalo, I was one of the speakers at thathearing, and I would like to believe that you are beingsincere when you say that this is all about the best interestof the children.
I spoke little of my own case at the hearing, as it was arepeat of thousands of cases that are heard in Californiacourts on a regular basis, where parents have gone to CPSfor help and have ended up losing their children under nogrounds, which inevitably result in lengthy and expensivecourt cases. By law, I am required to go to CPS should Isuspect my child is being abused. This I did and the resultwas CPS’ failure to investigate, and my son ended up in thecustody of the very person who I firmly believed molested,and and continues to molest my son.
What I did speak of was that I had witnessed an illegalremoval of a woman’s children by the police, without acourt order, warrant or reason to believe that her childrenwere in imminent danger. When asked if they had a warrantor other paperwork, the police said that they did not haveany paper work and that they were the police (exactwords, “we are the police”) and that Child Protective
Services told them to takethe children and so that waswhat they were doing.
This Mother was investigatedby CPS two weeks prior, andthe case was closed,“unfounded”. Later when shefound out why they had removed thechildren, she was told it was about thecase that had already been closed.There is a law on the books that statesthat a person must be given the reasonfor the invasion at the time of the incident. Generallyparents do not learn about why their children wereremoved until they can afford an attorney or the statedecides to offer one who obviously is working for thestate and has little to no interest in actually helping aparent regain custody of her children. These publicdefenders are simply following illicit systematicalpractices, and know that the system is too big for them tobeat, so they do that which is easiest, generally costingthe parent/s their children.
I would ask you to rethink the below statement that youmade as it is inaccurate with what the reality of this wholething really is.. What happened in the above case is by nomeans an isolated situation, and for you to publicly falsifywhat actually occurs in the system is an embarrassment tothe American People, who would hope that the courts willimmediately recognize that the policies and practices, inwhich you defend, are unjust and nothing short of perjury.
You stated:
“By law, children cannot be removed from a home withoutthe consent of law enforcement, and they can be removedonly for reasons clearly outlined in the state Welfare andInstitutions Code. Social workers cannot take actionunless a police officer or sheriff’s deputy is convinced thata child is in danger.”
So that there is no misconception as to whether or not thechildren were in danger, CPS clearly stated to this Mother’sattorney that the case was closed and they did not feelthat the children were in any kind of danger, includingimminent danger. The problem which follows is that CPShas a notorious reputation for falsifying records, in whichthey will not release to the parent, which leaves the Parentblindsided when they are in court and finally realizing thatthe reports do not say what they were told by CPS, orwhat factually happened.
I was undecided as to whether I wanted to offer you acopy of the tape, but I would like to so that you may have
Here is Linda Jennings reply to therecent Cimbalo editorial
Linda Jennings
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some of the “evidence” and “facts” that CongressmanBaca indeed did collect. Perhaps you may view things a bitdifferently after hearing the tape. I request a mailingaddress in which I may send this to you.
The tape will be sent on to the editor of the Sun as well asGovernor Schwarzegger.
You say that you feel thatthis sort of bad coveragemay hurt your reputationand make people loseconfidence in what youstand for. Have you noknowledge that you and thesystem you represent arealready under close scrutinyfrom coast to coast? Thereis little confidence left whenrepeatedly we see thatpeople’s rights are beingviolated. We have noconfidence in this systemwhen we see that a parenthas completely beenstripped of all parentalrights without even beinggiven a fair chance to ahearing or trial. When wesee that parents are guiltywithout even being charged and must prove theirinnocence at a huge cost to not only their finances, but totheir families and anyone who happens to be part of theirlives, the system’s credibility is greatly damaged. When wesee that children are stolen, literally, by social workers whoare not qualified to make these kinds of life alteringdecisions, and when we see that children are placed insituations that are conducive of abuse, rape, unnecessarydruggring and sometimes even murder, we not only have nofaith or confidence, but also would like to see that thissort of malice be stopped immediately.
And you say you have the child’s best interest at heart?This truly is disheartening. You should be more concernedwith cleaning up or clearing out, because We The Peopleare outraged, and will no longer idly sit back as the currentsystem rips apart the very thing that America is made of;family.
I have seen the greatest disservice performed at the handsof CPS and I have a couple questions. First, how do youfigure that you, and other’s who stand so firm in that youare doing the right thing, are above the law and mayviolate a person’s Constitutional Rights? Second, is thereany conscience attached to those of you who commitsuch nefarious acts or are you so sold out in what the so-called Child Protective Services has become that you aremore interested in raking in the bucks rather than actuallydoing what is in the best interest of the child? I wouldinvite you to ponder these questions. Perhaps there is
something that you are overlooking. Have you bothered tocontact any of the 150 people present, to ask themquestions about their personal dilemmas, or have you justdecided to discard them as, “citizens frustrated at theoutcome of their personal cases”?
You said, “It was an irresponsibleway to do research on a systemthat is in place to protect themost vulnerable population wehave, our children.´ You have noright to call them your children,they are not your children. Thesechildren are mine, my neighbors,and the desperate Mom whocalled me crying that “they arestealing my children”. If the systemhas no conscience about what it isdoing to families, I would dare tocategorize the system with thosewho we jail and slap a label on suchas “monstrous”.
You made several statements that Ididn’t find at all surprising, butrather consistent with the overallway that CPS is run. One was thatthe testimonies were “one-sided,undocumented, anecdotalinformation that was distorted,
inflammatory and often patently untrue”. Again, howmany of these testimonies did you take on yourself toinvestigate? Or is this like how it is when you steal aparent’s child and just decide that your word is fair enough,without proper investigation? Your statements arereflections of people (who work the system) so caught upin the wrong doings of a system gone awry. What you andyour cohorts are left with is covering your backsides sothat you don’t suffer the consequences of partaking inillegal acts, which may result in the loss of jobs, or shouldjustice prevail, nice long jail sentences.
In closing,, I will say that when the system that you defendrefused to investigate my concerns that my son was beingmolested, you did me a favor, for where CPS intervenes,nightmares follow. I am highly grateful that you left me todeal with this problem at a different level. I have oftenasked myself, what I will do the day that my son finally hasthe courage again to show me and tell me what his fatherdoes to him sexually. He saw what happened last time thathe dare tell, he was ripped out of the only home that heknew since birth, because nobody bothered to call the 4adult witnesses that could confirm my story. My answeralways comes up the same; I don’t know, because there isno safety in going to CPS for help.
Sincerely,
Linda M. JenningsLinda M. JenningsProud Member of American Family Rights Association
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Report: Foster care system needs massive overhaul
AUSTIN, Texas (AP) — The state’s foster care system needs a massive overhaul,particularly the special camps where a small number of children are housed, thestate comptroller’s office said.
Announcing the results of a seven month investigation, Comptroller Carole KeetonStrayhorn on Tuesday showed large color photographs taken at group foster carefacilities, including a sewage-spewing outdoor toilet and a secret attic “seclusion”room where children could be locked inside.
“I challenge any defender of the current status quo to put their child or theirgrandchild in some of the situations, some of the places that I’ve seen, for one day,much less for a lifetime,” she said.
The investigation by Strayhorn’s office followed reports from news organizationsand other complaints that children have died, run away and suffered sexual, physical
and emotional abuse after being placed in the state’s custody.
Much of Strayhorn’s criticism was directed at “therapeutic camps,” whichoffer an experience in outdoor living deemed helpful to some troubledchildren, and residential treatment centers, where foster children live as agroup instead of with families.About 20 percent of foster children live in such group facilities, the vastmajority of them in the residential centers. In all, there are 16,000 children infoster care at any time in Texas.
The report does not name homes where problems were discovered, but shows photosof homes with squalid toilets and other problems.
At one therapeutic camp, Strayhorn said, children used makeshift outhouses and sleptoutdoors in sleeping bags, sometimes for years. “That’s not care. That’s cruelty,”Strayhorn said.
The Texas Department of Family and Protective Services, which oversees foster care,responded by saying it has begun making changes.
“Obviously there are situations in the foster care system that we would like to improve,and we have taken steps to make improvements in the areas addressed by thecomptroller’s report,” said spokesman Geoffrey Wool.
The report makes 87 recommendations, including saving and redirecting $193.9 millionso that state enforcement staff can be beefed up.
“This is a huge step,” said Jerry Boswell, president of the advocacy group Citizens Commission on HumanRights. “Finally someone is actually recognizing what’s going on in these facilities.”
First elected comptroller in 1998, Strayhorn says it’s her duty to monitor the way Texas spends its money.
Some critics have questioned her use of audit powers, and last year the Legislature removed her authorityover performance reviews of school districts and recommendations for state government spending.
Strayhorn, a Republican, hasn’t ruled out running for a higher elected position in 2006 — for governoragainst incumbent Republican Gov. Rick Perry.
On the Net: Comptroller’s Office: http://www.window.state.tx.us/ Department of Family and Protective Services:http://www.tdprs.state.tx.us/ American Family Rights Association: www.familyrightsassociation.com
Report: Foster care system needs massive overhaulWednesday, April 7, 2004 Posted: 2:19 PM EDT (1819 GMT)
Comptroller Carole Strayhornholds her agency’s report on thestate’s foster care system.
That’s not care. That’s cruelty.— Carole Strayhorn on living
conditions at some Texas fostercare facilities
Access this report by going to:www.cpa.state.tx.us/forgottenchildren/
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COMPTROLLER: “TEXAS IS ABUSING THECHILDREN IT IS SUPPOSED TO PROTECT”
“From an outdoor ‘pee wall,’ to unrefrigerated meat patties, plasticsheets for walls and an attic lock-down room, Texas is abusing thechildren it is supposed to protect.” So reported today’s Houston
Chronicle in reference to “Forgotten Children” a seven monthinvestigation into foster care released yesterday by Texas Comptroller,
Carole Keeton Strayhorn.
The Chronicle continued that the report “said the Department of Family and Protective Servicesoperates a system in which children have died, been reported missing and suffered sexual, physical andemotional abuse.”
Moreover, Strayhorn says in the report, “The truth is some of the children are no better off in the careof the state than they were in the hands of abusive and negligent parents.”
These facts come as no shock to us at Texas Center for Family Rights. Is it any wonder that children aretreated as chattel when handed over to strangers? Certainly there are well-intentioned foster familiesand managers of group homes. But there are also foster parents and group home facilities in thebusiness for one reason: money.
Wouldn’t it make more sense to give parents the option to direct the placement of their children withother family members, relatives, church members, neighbors and friends than to turn them over intothe hands of strangers? Wouldn’t that make more sense for the best interests of the children?
Or wouldn’t it make more sense to remove the alleged perpetrator from the home during theinvestigation rather than the children? Why subject the children to certain emotional trauma during aninvestigation when there is no certainty that abuse even occurred? Wouldn’t that make more sense forthe best interests of the children?
And wouldn’t it make financial sense to save the state money by not incurring the excessive costs offoster care?
Of course, these common sense principles make too much sense unless there is a motive thatsupersedes common sense. Unless perhaps money motivates the decisions.
Could there be dark secrets behind the veil of CPS? The Comptroller’s report calls it a “Crisis in TexasFoster Care”. It reveals: “Federal and state oversight agencies have reported on DPRS’ troublesrepeatedly, yet the problems remain…The system reflects a legacy of weak leadership; anatmosphere of helpless acquiescence to the status quo; a reluctance to look tooclosely into dark corners; a culture of self-protection and buck-passing.”
Among the “many and varied” problems are “perverse financial incentives to keepchildren in restrictive environments by paying them more money to provide childrenwith expensive and restrictive placements, and offering them little incentive to helpchildren return to their homes or become adopted.”
Yes, it is time for a change. TDFPS must be held accountable beginning with the Executive Director,Thomas Chapmond and every level down to the newest social worker. They must be held accountablebecause they are dealing with children – children made in the image of God, not chattel.
The Houston Chronicle article can be viewed at:http://www.chron.com/cs/CDA/ssistory.mpl/metropolitan/2489841
Comptroller Strayhorn’s report in its entirety can be viewed at:www.window.state.tx.us/forgottenchildren/
COMPTROLLER: “TEXAS IS ABUSING THECHILDREN IT IS SUPPOSED TO PROTECT”
Open showers at a therapeutic campsite.These unheated open showers are the only type available to fosterchildren who live at the facility year round.
Sleeping platform at a therapeutic campsite.Foster children have limited space for their possessions. A toothbrush and tube oftoothpaste lay on the floor near the door. During the winter, plastic sheeting is used toprovide limited protection from the cold. Children live here 365 days a year. This facilityreceives a daily rate from DPRS for each foster child ranging from $80 to $115.
Sleeping platform at a therapeutic campsite.
Freezer at a therapeutic campsite.According to the National Dairy Council, freezing milk is notrecommended. “It causes undesirable changes in milk’s textureand appearance.”
“Pee Wall” at a therapeutic camp.“Pee Wall” at a therapeutic camp.According to DPRS rules for wilderness camps, toilet areas must be located at least75 feet from sleeping areas. The adjacent sleeping area is only a few feet away.This facility receives a daily rate from DPRS for each foster child ranging from $80to $115. DPRS standards for permanent camps require flush toilets if the water supplyis available. There is water available through pipes at the campsites. DPRS has beenlicensing camps like this one for more than twenty years.
Food preparation area at a therapeutic campsite.This photo shows the cook site at this wilderness camp wherechildren prepare 11 of their own meals every week. There was nodishwashing detergent. A local health inspector reported thatindividual campsite food preparation areas were unsanitary.
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Emotion wells up in Calvin Gleason’s eyes as he remembersthe day he last saw his 12-year-old daughter.
“January 21. I can never forget,” the 47-year-old man said,his voice wavering slightly.
It was then that state child-abuse workers took her fromDessau Middle School, alleging Gleason and his wife hadnot provided his daughter proper treatment fordepression, even though, he said, a previous exam showedthe girl was not depressed.
Since then, he and child- protection advocates who haveinvestigated his case say, the girl has spent weeks atAustin State Hospital, where she was put on psychiatricdrugs, restrained and injured, and then transferred to aprivately run San Antonio center for troubled youths — allwithout her parents’ knowledge or permission.She even turned 13 in custody and has spoken with herparents once in almost five months after lawmakersintervened in March.
“Child Protective Services is like the Gestapo,”Gleason said. “With them, you have no rights.They lie and seem to make their own rules. Thestate child-protection system in Texas is out ofcontrol.”
On Wednesday, Gleason and others with similar storiespacked a Capitol meeting of the House Select Committeeon Child Welfare and Foster Care to call for an overhaul ofthe Texas Department of Family and Protective Services,whose Child Protective Services programs were criticizedby Comptroller Carole Keeton Strayhorn in April for poorleadership, lax enforcement and regulatory miscues.
Wrong, said agency officials and their advocates. “We’vebeen getting a harsh spotlight based on a very smallnumber of cases, but it should not be an indictment of theentire agency, because we have a lot of success stories,and we’re making a positive difference in a lot of Texanslives,” said Geoff Wool, a spokesman for the agency.In their questions during the hearing and comments toreporters during breaks, though, some lawmakersappeared unconvinced.
“There’s absolutely no question that changes need to bemade,” said Rep. Leo Berman, R-Tyler, echoing sentimentsof several colleagues.
Gleason told the committee he has gone to court to gethis daughter back. “She never had a problem withdepression before . . . and although she had some behaviorproblems, things children this age go through, I can’timagine what kind of problems she’s going to have when Iget her back.
“If I get her back.”
‘System can’t be trusted’
Gary Gates, a Rosenberg businessman, said he had muchthe same fear when CPS workers showed up at his upscalehome in February 2000 and took custody of his 13 children— 11 of them adopted. His crime: “I sent one of my sons toschool with a plastic bag pinned on his shirt, with (empty)candy wrappers inside, to remind him that he was not tosteal candy.”
School officials were not amused with the unusualpenance, Gates told the committee, and called CPS. “Isent a letter with the boy telling them why he was wearingit, and that he could take it off if they felt it wasinappropriate in the classroom. But that didn’t seem tomake any difference. They never even called me.”
The Rev. Gary Bower, the Gateses’ pastor who was at theirhome when CPS workers took the children, described howsheriff’s deputies roused them from their beds in pajamas,loaded them in the “jail wagon” and hauled them off.Several are special education students, he and Gates said.His pleas to allow them to remain with relatives — or evenhis family — were refused.
Three days later, after Gates hired lawyers and challengedthe CPS seizure, the children were returned. Ironically,Bower noted, he was named as a responsible party by thecourt to monitor their well-being until the case wasclosed. Since then, Gates has sued the agency in state andfederal court seeking redress for the raid.
So far, Gates estimates he has spent hundreds ofthousands of dollars on legal bills, money that mostpeople who are wronged do not have, he admits.“I adopted four kids from this system I trusted,” Gatessaid. “But the system can’t be trusted any more.”
Child-protection programs stir controversyParents complain state agency oversteps law, acts like Gestapo
By Mike WardAMERICAN-STATESMAN STAFF
Thursday, June 3, 2004
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Looking for solutions
One proposal being studied by the committee, a so-called“kinship rule,” would give blood relatives more say in wherechildren are placed. Some 250 petitions supporting moreparental rights were presented to the committee, whichquizzed state officials, judges and others involved in thechild-protection system about why so many thousands ofemergency seizures of children are necessary each year andwhy more children are not placed with relatives, instead ofin foster homes.
Even so, Scott McCown, director of the Center for PublicPolicy Priorities, an Austin-based think tank, offeredanother perspective from his years as an Austin statedistrict judge who handled child-protection cases.“The problem is not that we don’t do enoughinvestigations. The problem is not that we don’t placeenough children with relatives, or that we place too manyin foster care, or that we do too many emergencyremovals,” he said. “The problem is that these programsare drastically underfunded, and we’re expecting too muchfrom this system we’ve created.
The Rev. Jerome Milton, pastor of Pleasant Hill BaptistChurch in Tyler, offered an unusual plea as someone whogrew up in 14 foster homes, two reform schools and twoorphanages, “who was mentally, physically and sexuallyabused,” and who now has six adopted children:
“There’s no question the system has problemsand that those problems will continue, untilthe hour comes, that you say enough isenough,” Milton told the committee. “Thathour is now . . . for the hopeless, voiceless,helpless children of Texas.”
Sunday, May 2, 2004 – In our “child protectionsystem,” children are five times more likely todie from physical abuse and 11 times more likelyto be sexually abused than in their own homes,Child Protective Services Watch tells us. The organizationalso reports that, on average, a foster child will spend atleast three years in the system and live in three differenthomes during their stay in foster care.
It would be a comfort if we could at least say that thereare not too many children in the system, but we would bewrong. There are presently over a half a million Americanchildren in foster care — nearly enough children to replacethe entire population of our nation’s capitol. On any givenday, more than 91,000 of those children are Californians(for purposes of comparison, that’s roughly thepopulation of Santa Barbara).
Californians should be especially embarrassed andoutraged. This state has one of the worst systems forproviding child welfare services in the entire country. TheSacramento Bee reported in January that just last summerpolice burst into a house to arrest suspected drug dealersand found seven children inside who depended on theState of California for their care. Last year when thefederal government reviewed states’ services for childrenand families, California failed. In fact, the legislativeanalyst’s office reported that California is the only statethat failed more than four of the seven standards forchildren’s safety, well-being and placement in a permanenthome.
These children often travel from house to house with theirfew personal belongings in a used paper grocery bag orthrown over their shoulder in a plastic garbage sack. Morethan 1 in 10 California foster children will pack their thingsand move to a home filled with strangers, go to sleepamidst unknown surroundings and often go to a newschool five or more times for every 12 months that theyhave been entrusted to foster care.
The Little Hoover Commission, a California Stategovernment oversight organization reports that, despiteperhaps good intentions, some experts estimate thatnearly half of the children in California’s foster systemshould never have been removed from their families andhave been even more traumatized as a result. The childrenwould have benefited most if their families had been givensome basic support, treatment and parenting training.To make matters worse, once children enter the system,
Foster care is
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the system can’t even keep track of them. In any givenmonth the state departments entrusted with trackingthese children have no idea where hundreds of them are —some may be runaways, some may have been kidnappedby relatives, and some are simply unaccounted for.
Our government is funding this system in ournames and with our tax dollars. We say this systemis un-American. Our system for handling abandoned,neglected and abused children is broken. Consider that anationwide Casey Foundation Studyfound that we are spendingnearly $100 billion dollarsannually on direct and indirectcosts associated with childmaltreatment and we end upwith a system that oftenappears worse than leavingchildren in the homes weconsidered unfit.
Part of the reason so manychildren end up in this brokensystem is due to the way thatthe federal government paysfor child-welfare services atthe state and county levels;these local governments earnmore federal money by havingmore children in the system.Technically this is called a“perverse incentive.” State andcounty governments receive open-ended fundingfrom the federal government for children whoare in the Child Welfare System, while they onlyget limited funds to provide services that mighteliminate the need for some children to be inthis system in the first place. Linda WallacePate, a veteran attorney in foster cases, justlystates that “it’s scandalous that the Californiafoster care system has been reduced to a ‘kidsfor cash’ system. “
It’s easy to start pointing fingers, and social workers —who are the direct links to these children — often get theworst rap. In most cases, however, these arecompassionate, well-meaning and horrifyingly overworkedindividuals trying to operate within a broken system.
The real responsibility lies with legislators andvoters. With a 2003- 2004 State budget of $1.7 billion
($447 million less than last year’s), it is unclear howCalifornia will be able to improve its services for our needychildren. Nonetheless, even in this period of severe budgetcuts and competing priorities, legislators and votersshould make these children a top priority.
Over the years there have been multiple attempts to fixthe system, and currently the Department of SocialServices is implementing a Child Welfare Redesignprogram. All of these efforts, however, do not go farenough because they do not offer a true redesign of the
system - instead they offer onlysymptom management.Organizations, like the Little HooverCommission, have provided multiplereports offering thoroughdescriptions of what needs tochange, but unfortunately these arenot the changes that areimplemented. We must demandcentralized oversight,communication, and organization ofthe state agencies that serve ourmost disadvantaged children.Moreover, we must take action onbehalf of these children who do nothave a voice in our political system.After all, these children can’t vote.
Learn moreThere are a number of organizations that work on behalfof children in foster care. One such group is the CaliforniaYouth Connection, a statewide, youth-led advocacyorganization with members (current and former fosteryouth age 14-24 years) throughout 23 county chapters.CYC, the only such organization in the nation, strives toimprove the foster care system by helping youths learntheir rights and have a say in the treatment and theservices that they receive. Government officials and youthadvocates alike have recognized CYC for its contributions.For more information, contact 800- 397-8236 [email protected].
Christine Borders is a former CEO and past president of a child-welfare foundation who is completing a Columbia/UC-Berkeleyexecutive MBA program. Ariel Coyote is a licensed psychologistwho has worked for nearly a decade with foster children inprivate and public programs.http://sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/chronicle/archive/2004/05/02/EDGC76DA4O1.DTL
un-American
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WASHINGTON March 22 - Doctors who prescribe somepopular antidepressants should monitor their patientsclosely for warning signs of suicide, especially when theyfirst start the pills or change a dose, the governmentwarned Monday.
The Food and Drug Administration asked makers of 10drugs to add or strengthen suicide-related warnings ontheir labels.
The agency insists it’s not yet clearwhether the drugs actually spur suicideon occasion or whether the underlyingmental illness is to blame.
But FDA bowed to pressure fromanguished families who, at anemotional meeting last month, blamedthe pills for their loved ones’ suicidesand pleaded for better warnings.
It’s a difficult issue to sort out because depression itselfcan lead to suicide, and studies clearly show thatantidepressants have helped many people recover fromdepression.
Still, until the question is settled, FDA’s own scientificadvisers had urged stronger warnings that certainantidepressants may cause agitation, anxiety and hostilityin a subset of patients who may be unusually prone to rareside effects.
Monday, FDA followed that recommendation, stressingthat the most vulnerable time is when a patient startstherapy or changes the dose.
”We think this is good advice whether the drugs increasethe risk or not,” said FDA medical policy chief Dr. RobertTemple. “There’s a reason people are put on therapy theirdepression is worse or somebody’s worried about it.
Maybe that’s what drives it (reports of suicides) or maybeit’s the drugs. In either case, you really need to payattention in the early days.”
While FDA’s investigation into the possible suicide linkinitially focused on children and teenagers, Monday’swarning includes adults, too. The FDA had investigatedreports of suicide among adult antidepressant users in theearly 1990s and concluded there was no link but onMonday revealed that it is reanalyzing that question.
The drugs of concern are newer generationantidepressants: Prozac, Paxil, Zoloft, Effexor, Celexa,Lexapro, Luvox, which are called SSRIs or SSRI-like drugs,and Remeron, Serzone and Wellbutrin, which operatedifferently.
Manufacturers didn’t immediately say if they’d comply.
British health authorities sounded the alarm last year,saying long-suppressed research suggests serotonin-
affecting antidepressants mightsometimes increase the risk ofsuicidal behavior in children andteenagers.
Excepting only one drug, Prozac,that has been proven to alleviatepediatric depression, Britaindeclared the other six SSRIs or SSRI-like drugs unsuitable for depressedyouth. Britain didn’t mention the
other three drugs listed in the U.S. notice.
FDA issued a caution on pediatric use last year but says itdoesn’t yet have proof the drugs are to blame. Among 25studies of the suspect medications involving 4,000children and teens, there were no completed suicides.Some 109 patients experienced one or more possiblysuicide-related behaviors or attempts but the studiesvaried dramatically in what was considered suicidalbehavior. For example, among 19 patients classified ascutting themselves, almost all were superficial, with littlebleeding.
But critics flooded an FDA meeting last month demandingstronger action and days later, the issue again madeheadlines when a 19-year-old woman taking part in a studyof Eli Lilly & Co.’s experimental new antidepressantduloxetine hanged herself in a company-run facility.
Most antidepressant labels already contain some fine-print statement about suicide, usually that the possibilityis inherent with depression.
FDA asked Monday for explicit explanations of worrisomebehavior changes to be placed in bold print under theprominent “warnings” section of those labels: agitation,anxiety, irritability and recklessness. Doctors spottingthose traits should consider prescribing a lower dose orstopping the drug, FDA said.
Suicide Warning Sought for AntidepressantsPatients Who Use Some Antidepressants Should Be Monitored
for Suicide Warning Signs, FDA Says
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The drugs are used for many conditions other thandepression; the warning applies regardless of the reasonfor use.
Critics welcomed the change but said suicide complaintsfirst were raised many years ago.
”I’m just very sorry that it so long for them to act on thisissue, because there’s been so much tragedy thatoccurred,” added Jennifer Tierney of Kernersville, N.C.,who describes her daughter Jame as turning from a sweet,popular honor student into a raging loner after takingEffexor for migraines at age 14.
But psychiatrists caution that suicides havedropped as SSRI use has increased roundthe world.
”We do a disservice to a population ofpeople who could benefit from thesemedications” by overreacting, said Dr. BelaSood, chair of pediatric psychiatry atVirginia Commonwealth University.
Still, FDA’s warning does alert doctors“who in a very lackadaisical way decide toput these kids on medications” to do amore thorough exam and to tell parentswhat risks to watch for, Sood said.
Children in particular aren’t goodcandidates for SSRIs if they’re highlyimpulsive, angry or aggressive, she said.There also is a window period of risk just after pill usebegins, before depression is really alleviated butwhen some patients experience more energy.
ALLIANCE FOR HUMAN RESEARCH PROTECTION(AHRP) – Promoting openness and full disclosurehttp://www.ahrp.org
A new survey by Express Scripts found the rate at whichAmerican children are prescribed antidepressants almostdoubled (49%) in 5 years. The steepest unfathomable,medically unsupportable, increase—64%—was amongpreschool children. This is evidence of a violation of thephysician’s oath: First, Do No Harm.
Antidepressant drugs have not shown evidence of abenefit when tested in children 6 to 18, but the drugs havebeen shown to pose severe risks of harm for some childrenand adults. For example, a twofold increased suicide riskfor children taking an antidepressant compared to thosegiven a placebo.
Since June, 2003, GlaxoSmithKline discloses to on the UKSeroxat/Paxil label: “In common with other selectiveserotonin reuptake inhibitors, withdrawal symptoms havebeen reported on stopping treatment. .Dizziness,sensory disturbance (e.g. paraesthesia), anxiety, sleepdisturbances (including intense dreams), agitation, tremor,
nausea, sweating and confusion have been reportedfollowing abrupt withdrawal of Seroxat.” “The risk of drugwithdrawal syndrome is 25%. See:http://emc.medicines.org.uk/emc/industry/default.asp?page=displaydoc.asp&documentid=2057
Given the unfavorable risk / benefit ratio, doctors whoprescribe antidepressants for children should be subject tomalpractice. Medically unsupportable use ofantidepressants in children is nothing short of childabuse.
The serious health hazards for children is aconsequence of the undue influence of thedrug industry on medical practice. Thisindustry’s inordinate influence extends tothe media which is disseminating industry’smisleading advertisements. The nationalmedia has lent the appearance oflegitimacy to industry’s unsubstantiatedfalse claims about the safety and efficacyof drugs by repeating such claims in newsreports.
The influence of the drug industry at theFDA is demonstrated by FDA’s failure to (atleast) issue warning labels that informphysicians and parents that these drugs arenot safe nor demonstrably more effectivethan a placebo. Instead, the FDA hasembargoed a report by its own medicalofficer that corroborates the fact that the
clinical trial evidence showed a twofold suicidal risk forchildren who had been prescribed an antidepressant incompany controlled clinical trials.
CBS evening News and the San Francisco Chroniclereported that two Congressional committees-the HouseEnergy & Commerce subcommittee on Investigations, andthe Senate Finance Committee—are investigating the FDAcover-up.
See: FDA Mum On Suicidal Side Effects? Sharyl Attkissonhttp://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2004/03/30/
eveningnews/main609491.shtml
See: Lawmakers open probe of FDA: Agency accused ofbarring safety data on antidepressants, by Rob Waters,
Cassandra from the CitizensCommission on HumanRights, gathering signaturesduring a protest inHollywood. California.
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Up to half of Los Angeles County’s fosterchildren were needlessly placed in a system thatis often more dangerous than their own homesbecause of financial incentives in state andfederal laws, a two-year Daily Newsinvestigation has found.
The county receives nearly $30,000 a year fromfederal and state governments for each childplaced in the system — money that goes to paythe stipends of foster parents, but also wages,benefits and overhead costs for child-welfareworkers and executives. For some special-needschildren, the county receives up to $150,000annually. “Called the ‘perverse incentive factor,’ statesand counties earn more revenues by having morechildren in the system — whether it is opening a caseto investigate a report of child abuse and neglect orplacing a child in foster care,” wrote the authors of arecent report by the state Department of Social ServicesChild Welfare Stakeholders Group.
Since the early 1980s, the number of fosterchildren in California has gone up fivefold, anddoubled in the county and nation. About one infour children will come into contact with the child welfaresystem before turning 18, officials say.
This has overwhelmed social workers, who often don’thave time to help troubled families or monitor the carechildren receive in foster homes.
The hundreds of thousands of children who have cycledthrough the county’s system over the years are six to seventimes more likely to be mistreated and three times morelikely to be killed than children in the general population,government statistics reveal.
Officials acknowledge that more than 660 childrenembroiled in the county’s foster care system have diedsince 1991, including more than 160 who were homicidevictims.
‘Could have stayed home’ “The county’s foster caresystem makes Charles Dickens’ descriptions lookflattering,” said Mark Rosenbaum, legal director at theAmerican Civil Liberties Union of Southern California.David Sanders, who took over as director of theDepartment of Children and Family Services in March, saidexperts estimate up to 50 percent of the
75,000 children in the system and adoptivehomes could have been left in their parents’ careif appropriate services had been provided. He said DCFScomes into contact with nearly 180,000 children each year.
“There were probably issues the kids and their familieswere facing, but if they had some kind of support services,the kids could have stayed home,” Sanders said. “At theextreme, there are clearly parents who never should havehad their children. They torture their children and everyonein the community would agree that they should not havetheir children.
“On the other end, you clearly have situations wherefamilies have done things, but may be under stress one day,have every intention of taking care of their children and arenot dangerous, but involvement by child protectiveservices ends up being much too intrusive.”
The Daily News’ investigation of the child-welfare system,which is shrouded in secrecy by confidentialitylaws, involved the review of tens of thousands of pagesof government and confidential juvenile court documents,studies, computer databases and several hundredinterviews.
As the investigation progressed, state andcounty officials acknowledged that thefinancial incentives built into the lawsencourage the needless placements of childrenin foster care, and officials have started taking steps toreform the system.
Social worker Anthony Cavuoti, who has worked 14 yearsfor the county, said DCFS employees use the most liberalof guidelines in deciding whether to remove a child fromtheir home. Some parents have had their childrenremoved for yelling at them, allowing them tomiss or be late to school or having a dirtyhome.
“The service that DCFS now provides is worsethan the abuse that most abused children everexperienced. The trauma they inflict onordinary children is unspeakable.” Overeagercaseworkers Sanders said he thinks caseworkers havesometimes been too eager to remove children from theirhomes — a practice he is trying to change.
Foster care cash cow’Perverse incentive factor’ rewards county for
“I think children should only be removed when there is animminent risk. I’ve said consistently that we do have toomany children who have been removed,” he said.“We need to provide the kind of supports to keep thesekids at home.”
As early as 1992, the state’s Little HooverCommission cited experts who estimated that35 percent to 70 percent of foster children inCalifornia should never have been removed fromtheir families and have suffered deeppsychological trauma as a result. On any givenday, a total of 175,000 children are now in thestate child protective system.
In recent months, parents in several states have filed class-action lawsuits and testified before Congress, allegingthat thousands of their children have been wrongfullytaken from their homes.
State and county officials admitted recentlythat they have placed too many children infoster care, especially poor and minoritychildren. California has 13 percent of the nation’s totalchild population, but 20 percent of its foster children,statistics show.
Minorities make up 85 percent of fosterchildren in the county and 70 percentstatewide. Experts say so many minorities areplaced in foster care because the federalgovernment pays for most of the costs of caringfor foster children from poor families whilestates and counties are expected to pick upmost of the tab for foster children fromwealthier homes.
“That’s exactly right,” Sanders said. “Theeligibility for foster care reimbursements ispoverty driven.” State and county officials say notenough has been done to help troubled families and thesystem has deteriorated into an “adversarial and coercive”one that places too much emphasis on investigatingfamilies for alleged mistreatment and removing theirchildren.
About 80 percent of foster children in the state andcounty are removed for “neglect,” which experts say isoften a euphemism for poverty-related conditions, such asdirty or cramped homes, a lack of money to provideenough food, clothing and medical care to children or asingle mother who works more than one job, can’t affordchild care and leaves her children unattended.
The Reason Public Policy Institute, a Los Angeles thinktank, released a report in 1999 that found the current childprotective system undermines parental authority,wrongfully accuses hundreds of thousands of innocentfamilies and leaves many children at risk of mistreatment.The study’s author, Susan Orr, a former U.S. Department ofHealth and Human Services child-abuse researcher, saidtoo many unfounded allegations drain the system’sresources.
She noted that nearly 50 percent of child-abuse deathsoccur in families that have had some contact withchildren’s services agencies. That statistic, say experts,shows the system is failing in its basic mission ofprotecting children from truly abusive parents.
‘Legal kidnapping’ A review of more than $25million in foster care lawsuit settlements andjudgments in Los Angeles County since the early1990s found about half involved theunnecessary removal of children and theirsubsequent mistreatment or wrongful deaths,according to the county’s own admissions ofwrongful seizures in county Claims Board documents orassertions by the families’ attorneys.
In a Daily News review of 139 claims against the county —an action that usually precedes the filing of a lawsuitagainst the county — 26 of the claims involved allegationsof wrongful seizures of children. In two cases, parentsalleged their children were seized by the county forfinancial gain because local governments receive revenuefor every child taken into the system.
Parents also have alleged in dozens of recent appeals tostate appellate courts that their children were needlesslytaken from them.
“It’s legal kidnapping to make a profit,” saidLancaster resident John Elliott, a 54-year-old formerWarner Bros. special-effects technician, who filed a claimalleging social workers made false allegations against himand placed his daughter in foster care.
After he spent $150,000 fighting to get hisdaughter back, the county ultimately admittedit was mistaken in taking his daughter andreturned her to him. “They tell lies to keep yourkids in the system,” Elliott said. “My daughterwas abused the whole time she was there. It’s amultibillion-dollar business. It’s all aboutprofit.”
Santa Ana attorney Jack H. Anthony, who won a $1.5 millionverdict in 2001 in a case involving the death of a fosterchild burned in scalding bathtub water, said parents oftencall asking him to file lawsuits over the unnecessaryplacement of their children in foster care. But socialworkers are generally immune from liability for thewrongful placement of a child in foster care, Anthony said.“It’s very difficult to hold anybody responsible for making anegligent decision to take the children,” Anthony said. “Inmost of the cases I see, the children would have beenbetter off had they not been taken from theirparents.”
No clear standards
For years, DCFS had no clear standards defining what childabuse or neglect was. The decision whether toremove a child was often left up to overworkedsocial workers’ hunches about how safe children werein their parents’ homes, Sanders said.
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Bruce Rubenstein, DCFS deputy director from 1991-97, saidthe department intimidated social workers into removingchildren for little or no reason after a couple of high-profilecases where children returned from foster care to theirparents were murdered.
“The word was, ‘Remove everybody. Remove allthe kids.’ It’s pretty fundamental that the county wasbreaking up families that didn’t need to be broken up,”Rubenstein said. “Only new leadership giving clear messagescan free that department from this sickness.”
DCFS recently began training social workers in a research-based tool called “structured decision-making,” whichSanders hopes will help them make better decisions aboutwhen to remove a child. The method has been successful inreducing unnecessary foster care placements in other statesand counties.
The stakeholders report found the vague definition ofneglect, unbridled discretion and a lack of training form adangerous combination in the hands of social workerscharged with deciding the fate of families.
Despite a quadrupling in reporting of child mistreatmentcases since 1976 due to greater awareness of the childabuse problem in the nation, the number of actual cases ofabuse and neglect annually has remained flat.
Unfortunately, experts say in explaining the large number offalse accusations, the DCFS Child Abuse Hotline hasbecome a weapon of choice for malicious neighbors andangry spouses and lovers in child custody disputes.“A lot of people use child protective services for revenge,”Cavuoti said. “About half of the cases we get arecompletely bogus. They are just people calling to get backat a neighbor.”
While about 7,500 children enter the county’s foster caresystem each year, only a small percentage are reunified withtheir families. A recent study found that nationwide 76percent of children are returned home from foster carewithin a year. But in Los Angeles County, only 19 percent arereturned home within a year of entering foster care.
Since the 1980s, the number of children in the child-protective system has sharply increased, governmentfigures show:
Nationwide, the number of children in foster care doubledfrom 273,500 in 1986 to 540,000 in 2003.
In California, the number of children increased more than400%, from 32,288 in 1983 to 175,000 in 2003.
In Los Angeles County, the number increased from 42,894 in1986 to approximately 75,000 in 2003.http://www.dailynews.com/cda/article/print/0,1674,200%257E20954%257E1814532,00.html
Following years of scandals and heartbreak in the nation’slargest child-protective system, Los Angeles Countyofficials and child advocates hope a new director andinnovative ideas will dramatically improve the lives of localfoster children.
“We spend $1.4 billion annually on foster care in LosAngeles County,” said Andrew Bridge, managing directorof child welfare reform programs at the private BroadFoundation in Los Angeles.
“We are not getting what we should for that $1.4 billion.And for the first time, Los Angeles County is beginning aconstructive conversation to change that.”
The proposed reforms by the county and state are set tobegin next year. Congress plans to take up legislation inthe summer that could radically change the way the childwelfare system is funded.
President George W. Bush has proposed a $5billion-a-year flexible block grant that could beused to help keep families together — ratherthan placing their children in foster care. Mostof the funds are now used to pay for the care of children infoster care.
“It’s not going to cure everything,” said Wade F. Horn,assistant secretary of the U.S. Administration for Childrenand Families. “States could still choose to spend themoney on things that don’t matter.
“But for a state with innovative leadership that wants toinvest in services that have proven effective in preventingchild abuse and neglect, this would give them the flexibilityto do that and reduce the need for costly (foster care)intervention later on.”
Critics are skeptical about whether officials will followthrough with their plans, citing innumerable failedattempts to reform the system in the past.
Ways to care for anailing foster system
Federal funds could helpkeep more kids at home
By Troy AndersonStaff Writer
Sunday, December 07, 2003 -
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Critics also expect heavy opposition from whatthey call the private “child-abuse industry,”which has grown wealthy and powerful over theyears off the $20 billion-a-year child welfaresystem, a two-year investigation by the DailyNews found.
A recent state Department of Social Servicesreport found the indirect costs of childmistreatment and foster care, such as juveniledelinquency, adult criminality and lostproductivity to society, total $95 billionannually.
At the heart of the system’s failures, state officials admitin documents, are “perverse financial incentives” infederal and state laws that encourage localgovernments to earn money by placing andkeeping too many children unnecessarily infoster care.
“Financial incentives, inherent in the state andfederal government structure, are encouragingthe retention of children in foster care untilthey reach adulthood,” researcher Julia K. Sells wrotein a report on child welfare privatization for the SanFrancisco-based Pacific Research Institute think tank.“States are actually profiting from keepingchildren in the system because they continue toreceive federal funds.”
David Sanders, director of the county Department ofChildren and Family Services, said experts estimatethat as many as half of the county’s fosterchildren could have been left in their parents’care if the appropriate services had been provided to thefamilies.
This year, the county settled a class-action lawsuit withthe American Civil Liberties Union of Southern Californiathat called for improvements in the mental-healthtreatment foster children receive. It also led to the closureof the long-distressed MacLaren’s Children Center in ElMonte — the site of numerous horror stories of abuse,neglect and even death over the years.
“Throughout this case, there is a stream of tales ofsadness, desperation and despair,” U.S. District Judge A.Howard Matz said when he approved the settlement.“There is no doubt, there are almost no instances wheresomeone said the system has worked well.
“But this settlement is a start. It’s a very admirable changeand innovative. The foster care system has proven to betotally inadequate and disgraceful so far.”
The investigation also found widespread misuse oftaxpayer funds and some of the highest salaries in thenation among the nonprofit foster familyagencies and group homes responsible for mostof the 30,000 children in foster homes.
The $1.4 billion DCFS budget, which has swelled from $103million in 1985 when the department was created, pays tosupport a total of 75,000 children in the system andadoptive homes.
In the private foster care agencies that overseemost of the children, some executives receive upto $310,000 a year in salaries and benefits andspend millions of taxpayer dollars for poshoffices, expensive furniture and luxury cars,according to tax returns and county audits.County officials and child advocates acknowledge thatreforms are needed to overhaul the way the countycontracts with group homes and the foster familyagencies that recruit foster parents and oversee children’scare.
Another key reform, according to child advocates andcounty officials, began in November when the Board ofSupervisors voted to negotiate with the federalgovernment for a waiver that would allow DCFS touse $250 million of its $1.4 billion budget onservices to help keep children with theirfamilies, instead of placing them in foster care.
Using a similar federal waiver and a program known as“performance-based contracting,” Illinois was able in thelate 1990s to reduce its foster care population by half andprevent many needless foster care placements.
DCFS recently renegotiated contracts with foster-familyagencies and is in the process of negotiating a newcontract with its group homes. The new contracts areexpected to hold the agencies accountable for providingsafe homes and good education for foster children.Under the current “buck-a-head” paymentstructure, the private agencies lose revenuewhen children are reunified with their familiesor put up for adoption, child advocates say.
“There are a lot of twisted incentives,” said Benjamin Wolf,associate legal director at the American Civil LibertiesUnion in Chicago, which sued Illinois in the late 1990s andforced the state to use performance-based contracting.The innovative form of contracting improved children’slives and forced about half of the agencies to closebecause they couldn’t meet the new standards.
Los Angeles County Chief Administrative Officer DavidJanssen said the county should have only 12,000 to 15,000children in foster homes.
“We have way too many kids in our system,” said Janssen,who was one of the first county officials to supportreforms now under way.
DCFS officials expect a tough lobbying campaign to getthe federal waiver and don’t expect a decision until March.“We really think this offers an opportunity to start to fix
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the system,” said Sanders, who took over as head ofDCFS last March after the Board of Supervisors calledfor the resignation of the previous director. “It’s not thesilver bullet, but at least it’s an opportunity to start thekind of major reforms we need to have in place.”
Like many of the reforms the state and county haveagreed to, critics are skeptical about whether theproposed reforms will help much, noting that the childwelfare system has long abused its power to break upfamilies for its own financial gain.
“It’s a money-changing game,” said Beverly Hillsattorney Debra Opri, who won a $75,000 settlementearlier this year from the county on behalf of aPasadena man whose distraught wife pushed their twochildren off a courthouse roof, killing them, and thenjumped to her death. She had just learned her childrenwould be returned to foster care. DCFS had made aseries of errors in the case that the father claimed ledto his children’s deaths. “Instead of selling sprocketsand gidgets, the children are getting sold,” the lawyersaid.
Manhattan Beach attorney Sanford Jossen, who filed aclass-action lawsuit in 2000 alleging staff at MacLarenChildren’s Center manhandled children and broke theirbones, wrote in a court objection to the ACLUsettlement that it seduces the public into believingreforms are on the way, but in reality does little morethan create a six-member advisory panel to makerecommendations with no timeline for implementation.
“In this respect, history continues to repeatitself,” Jossen wrote. “Studies are done.Recommendations are made. Implementationdoes not occur. More delays result. Theproposed settlement agreement creates the illusion ofpromise, but on closer inspections provides fornothing.” State Department of Social Servicesspokeswoman Blanca Castro said the state isredesigning the foster care system and focusing onwhat can be done to keep families together.
The result is several recent reports by the Child WelfareServices Stakeholders Group, a group of 60 childwelfare experts, that call for an “ambitious and far-reaching overhaul” of the state’s foster care system.
The reforms, starting in January, call for Los Angeles and10 other counties to use a series of innovative programsthat have been successful elsewhere in the nation.“We don’t expect to turn this around overnight,”Castro said. “It’s taken us 20 years to get to this point.It’s going to take five to 10 years to turn this boataround.”
Since 1998, county auditors have found more than $9million in unallowable or questionable expenses by theprivate foster-care agencies that have contracts with LosAngeles County.
The audits revealed taxpayer funds were used topay off Las Vegas gambling debts, call psychichotlines and pay for jewelry, parties, lotterytickets, alcohol, vacations, antiques, artworkand even a cremation.
“They have abused both children andtaxpayers,” said Jon Coupal, president of the HowardJarvis Taxpayers Association. “Particularly in these tougheconomic times, the fact that money is beingmisspent this way is absolutely appalling. Localgovernments are screaming for more revenues,yet they are grossly misspending these funds,frittering away this money without anyaccountability at all.”
Supervisor Michael D. Antonovich said the county shouldbe reimbursed for those misappropriated funds.
“There is no excuse for using money intendedfor foster children to cremate one’s father-in-law or to use those funds at Victoria’s Secret,”he said.
Some of the executives of the private fostercare agencies that oversee the children receiveup to $310,000 a year in salaries and benefits,enjoy extravagant lifestyles and drive luxurycars provided to them at public expense, thecounty audits reveal.
Some directors of foster-family agencies and group homesdrive around in head-turning vehicles Jaguars, a Land Rover,a Cadillac Escalade SUV, Mercedes and Lexus provided tothem at public expense, according to the audits.
Private agenciesdiverting millions
Audits find parties,vacations, more
By Troy AndersonStaff Writer
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One official billed the taxpayers more than $12,000 formembership dues and a banquet party at the Beverly HillsCountry Club.
“I think it suggests Los Angeles County is anational scandal,” said Richard Wexler, an author,former university professor and executive director of theNational Coalition For Child Protection Reform inAlexandria, Va. “There are lots of troubled foster caresystems in the United States. But Los Angeles County isalways on people’s lists.”
Department of Children and Family Services DirectorDavid Sanders, who earns $175,000 a year and is amongthe nation’s highest-paid public child welfare agencydirectors, said taxpayer dollars should be spent ensuringthe safety of children.
“When we have that kind of credibility issue, it’s littlewonder people can raise questions about our ability to getthe work done,” said Sanders, who took over thedepartment in March. Since 1985, the four previous DCFSdirectors have resigned under pressure from top countyofficials.
As private foster care agencies made millions ofdollars off the children under their care, criticssay the Board of Supervisors looked the otherway. From 1995 to 2002, foster family agencies, grouphomes and others spent more than $262,000lobbying and making campaign contributionsto the supervisors, including more than $67,000in campaign contributions.
“I think it’s clear that foster care has becomean industry in some parts of Los AngelesCounty,” said child advocate Nancy Daly Riordan,founder of United Friends of Children and wife of formerLos Angeles Mayor Richard Riordan. “There isdefinitely a financial incentive to keep kids infoster homes way beyond what is necessary.”
The group homes and foster family agencies that care formost of Los Angeles County’s foster children have misusedmore than $9 million in taxpayer funds since 1998, payingoff debts at Las Vegas casinos, buying lingerie and evenpaying for the cremation of an executive’s father-in-law,county audits reveal.
Based on the audits, the Department of Children andFamily Services reviewed $6 million of the unallowable andquestionable costs from March 1998 to May 2001 andrequired the agencies to pay back $1.5 million. So far, thedepartment has received about $600,000.
Here are examples of thedisallowed spending:
Group home directors paid $4,500 in debts at twoLas Vegas casinos and spent $54,472 on leasepayments for a luxury home.
Foster family agency directors bought $1,814worth of lingerie and racked up $6,113 on 116restaurant meals, even sticking taxpayers with thetab for their alcoholic beverages.
An agency director spent $774 to cremate hisfather-in-law.
Officials spent $12,247 for a membership at theBeverly Hills Country Club and a $6,013 banquetparty for 150 employees.
Agency officials spent $57,379 on legal fees and tosettle sexual harassment lawsuits by three formeremployees.
Directors purchased or leased two Jaguars, aRange Rover, Mercedes, Lexus, Ford Expedition,GMC Suburban SUV and a Cadillac Escalade SUV,which cost $1,083 a month to lease.
An official made $4,715 in credit card charges forvarious unidentified items during trips to theCzech Republic, Great Britain and Panama, and$989 in purchases made in Las Vegas at the MGMGrand Hotel, Luxor and Rio hotels.Auditors found agency executives purchased$3,800 worth of pantyhose, razors, suits, shoes,pet supplies and jewelry and beauty supplies in LasVegas.
Officials billed the county $2,950 a month for achild who had left the facility four years before,collecting a total of $35,400.
Payments for a president’s 1998 Land Rover andcredit card charges for trips to London and NewOrleans.
The audits showed the agencies seemingly missedno opportunity to bill the taxpayers for personalitems, no matter how trifling. One audit noted$152 was spent on cigarettes, liquor, pet food anda church donation.
WASHINGTON, Dec. 4 (UPI) — This is the second part of athree-part series examining the abuse of children in theUnited States and is being repeated as a tie-in with thestory of child abuse in Newark, N.J.
United Press International found that despite the periodiceruption into public consciousness of high-profile cases ofchildren being abused, the issue has failed to resonate withthe general public or government officials in any consistentway.
Child protection caseworkers are often the front line ofdefense for at-risk children, but those working in the systemsay they face work that is tough and public scrutiny that istougher. They say the answer lies in more funding for staffand education, something many jurisdictions, such as LosAngeles County, are either unwilling or unable to provide.
Many child protection caseworkers are in violation of the laweven before they walk into their offices in the morning, saysAnita Bock, former head of the Los Angeles CountyDepartment of Children and Family Services.
“Social workers violate policy and procedures everyday,” shesays. “It’s the quiet shame. It’s the dirty little secret.”Rarely are they able to complete the paperwork or make thevisits mandated under state law, she says, but it’s a fundingand staffing issue, not negligence.
Bock should know. She has headed two major children’sservices agencies, in Miami and in Los Angeles. The work istough. The scrutiny, she says, is tougher.
Child-protection workers have come under fire over the pastsix months as high-profile cases in Miami revealed somehad falsified court reports, and in one case the agency losttrack of a child’s whereabouts.
Laws, many of which vary from state to state, mandate thatat-risk children be seen by a worker within a specifiedperiod, sometimes as soon as within 24 hours of acomplaint. Follow-up visits are also often mandated eitherby state law or by the policies of individual agencies.
No matter who is making the rules, the cases pile up.“This job is risk-driven and liability driven. If you don’t send achild home, then the parents call the media who ask why,”Bock says. “If you send a child home and they die, thenyou’re asked why.
“When something goes wrong, they always fire a socialworker or a supervisor.”
This time it was Bock who lost her job. It was in July whenthe Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors ordered herdismissal, saying she had not implemented reforms to thesystem quickly enough. She had been in the job about twoyears.
Bock spent three years in Miami leading the child-protectionagency there before coming to California.
Bock, who left the Florida Department of Children andFamily Services after Gov. Jeb Bush was elected, maintainsthat the backlog of 8,000 cases in Miami when she left hasgrown to some 50,000 cases under the new administration.Florida released its report on its backlogged cases lastsummer. As of July 2002, it had 54,330 open cases, with33,779 of them open longer than 60 days.
Owen Roach, spokesman for the Florida Department ofChildren and Family Services, says some of the districtsformed special backlog units to address the issue.
“The representatives of the department, at the direction ofthe Secretary Jerry Regier, is taking a good, hard look at thebacklog issue and (is) studying several proposals andinitiatives that will fully address the scope of the backlogissue with the ultimate goal of eliminating as much of thebacklog cases as possible, in as short a time as possible,”Roach says.
The agency captured America’s attention as it came underfire last spring for having lost track of 5-year-old RilyaWilson — a child supposedly under its care — more than ayear ago.
Child-protection workers — or caseworkers as they areoften called — are the frontline defense for children beingabused in their homes. An increasing number are leaving thejob for positions that are less stressful and where there isn’tso much at stake.
In 2000, 9.3 percent of positions for state child-protectiveservice workers nationwide were vacant. The rate amongprivate agencies was about 11 percent. The turnover rateamong caseworkers around the nation ranges from 20percent among state agencies to 40 percent in privateagencies.
Child Abuse: A quiet shameBy Kathy A. Gambrell
UPI White House Reporter
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Shay Bilchik, executive director of the Child Welfare Leagueof America, says though the nature of the job contributes tothe high vacancy rates, it is possible to keep caseworkerson the job.
“There is so much value in what they do. I mean, why (do)people leave their jobs? They leave their jobs becauseworking conditions are miserable, they don’t feel they getthe right kind of supervision and support,” Bilchik says.“Salary usually goes down four or five notches (when theychange jobs).”
For example in Los Angeles County where they have 2,200caseworkers, the turnover rate is anywhere from 12 percentto 15 percent, but can skyrocket to as high as 30 percent insome areas, Bock said.
Bock says the problem is not just poor management. Sheattributes the high national turnover rate to a shortage ofcaseworkers, a chaotic and volatile work environment andthe fact they are typically judged by their failures rather theirsuccesses. A trend has emerged that finds 50 percent ofcaseworkers abandoning their jobs in less than five yearswhen once they stayed with an agency an average of 10 to15 years.
“It’s a trend that has to be watched,” Bock says.
She says the nature of the cases had changed, too.“Increasingly, cases are more complicated. Families areheavily impacted by substance abuse, mental health issuesand teen pregnancy,” she said. “Poverty is a big factor incities like Los Angeles.”
Bock says caseworkers are increasingly being asked todeal with increased court demands, spend more timelearning automated systems that are in need of redesignand to master an increasing number of regulations that arealmost impossible to follow completely.
A bill introduced in the California state legislature, called the20-30 bill, would have incrementally reduced caseloads overthe next five years, Bock says. But when the U.S. economytanked, the measure fell by the wayside.
“It never materialized,” she says.
The burden of answering the question of why the systemdoes not work should fall not on the caseworkers, but onadministrators and politicians responsible for policy andfunding, she says.
Consider Janet.
Janet is on her cell phone receiving information about ahouse she will have to visit later in the day. But right nowshe is parking her car in front of a home in Los AngelesCounty. She isn’t sure what she will find inside, but she isalmost certain that whatever it is, it won’t be good.It is one of more than 80 cases that she has sitting on her
desk and she has no idea how she will plow through themall. It’s an improvement. A little over a month ago, her in-boxwas crammed with the files of more than 100 at-risk familiesbegging for her attention.
Janet is one of more than 2,000 child-protection workers inher county’s Department of Children and Family Services.Janet is not her real name. Like many caseworkers acrossthe country, she is afraid that if her identity is revealed, shemay lose her job.
United Press International asked her to describe her job —and that of many others doing what she does everyday —and what toll it takes on her emotionally and physically.“It’s almost impossible,” she says.
Workers like Janet generally hold either a psychology orsocial science degree and receive on-the-job training inassessment and investigation of abuse and neglect cases.Training and experience can vary depending on thegeographical location and size of the state or county.In the case of Janet’s agency, she is required to have abachelor’s or master’s degree in social work and to havereceived 12 weeks of training in the department’s policiesand procedures.
Janet’s day begins often about 9 a.m. and runs nonstopuntil well after 8 p.m. — sometimes she doesn’t get homeuntil midnight. Her task is to assess complaints of abuseand neglect levied against parents and caretakers. Whenshe enters a home under investigation, she is looking forwhat the county calls the “minimum standard of living.” Aslong as the home does not have unsanitary conditions andthe parents are meeting the child’s basic needs, she leavesthem where they are.
She says the downside of the job is that her agency iswoefully understaffed. The No. 1 reason child protectionworkers leave the job, Janet said, is stress. There is neverenough time to do the paperwork that comes with each newcase.
“They blame everything on the social workers,” she says.Then with a sigh, Janet says, “Sometimes I don’t know whatto do first.”
Janet is an example of a government employee who feelscaught between politicians unwilling to commit sufficientresources to the service and a general public quick to blamethem should a child fall though the cracks and end upinjured or worse — dead.
Admittedly, Janet says she often does not have the time toplace follow-up calls to doctors or schools. She says herpriority is to make sure the children in her charge are aliveand well.
What child protection workers do and how they make theirdecisions regarding the fate of a child is often not clear tothe general public. State agencies are reluctant to speak
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publicly about how decisions are made on whether ornot to remove a child from a home.
Janet said that choice to detain a child rests solelywith her, but she then notifies her supervisor aboutwhat should be done next.
That scenario plays out differently in different states.Some agencies require caseworkers to contact anon-staff attorney to help decide whether a child can beremoved from his or her parent’s care and placedoutside the home.Little help exists for caseworkers like Janet. Thefederal government has adopted a “hands-off”approach to overseeing child protection within theUnited States.
Officials from the Administration for Children andFamilies, the federal agency that overseeschild protection in the UnitedStates, say: they don’t want tomicro-manage the system withadditional mandates andregulation; and they don’tbelieve a system such as anintegrated computer database,aimed at better tracking achild’s progress through thechild welfare system and thecourts, would be useful.
Not surprisingly, childadvocates stronglydisagree.Bilchik, of the Child WelfareLeague of America, saysnot enough has beeninvested in the system toensure it has good, trainedinvestigators, well-supervised caseworkers
Child Abuse: A quiet shameand low caseloads.
Child advocates and groups representingcaseworkers such as the Service EmployeesInternational Union say state agencies that governchild-protective services are buckling under the weightof an overwhelming number of abuse and neglectcases and children. Those agencies are caught in aweb of overburdened, under-supervised caseworkers,under-funded local agencies and poor managementthat remain, for the most part, below the radar of theU.S. Department of Health and Human Services, thenation’s top health agency charged with protectingAmerica’s most vulnerable population.
In Los Angeles County, 146,495 emergency calls wereplaced to the city’s hotline reporting child abuse andneglect last year. Some 52,650 children received
services from DCFS, the agencysays.
“The situation here isdire by any method
of comparisonand rapidly
becomingbiblical in bothscale andscope,” SEIUspokesmanTom O’Connorsays. “... We arejust anearthquakeaway (from atotal systemcollapse).”
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Dennis Hinger Executive Vice Presidentof AFRA (L), with Assemblyman DennisMountjoy.
Cassandra Auerbach from the Citizens Commis-sion on Human Rights, and Dennis HingerExecutive Vice President of AFRA prepare tovisit the State Capitol in Sacramento.
January 13, 2004 -- State Assemblyman Mervyn M.Dymally, D-Compton, on Tuesday called for threepublic hearings in March to address findings thatcounty governments and their private contractorsprofit off the plight of foster children.
In a series of recent Daily News reports, officialsacknowledged the existence of financial incentivesfor children to be placed in, and remain in, thefoster care system.
“(Dymally) wants to make sure the children firstand foremost are getting the attention they areentitled to in a healthy and humane environment,”said Kenneth Orduna, the lawmaker’s chief ofstaff. “He also wants to ensure that tax dollarsthe state puts into the program are spentappropriately.
“We’ve read these stories where children are beingabused and people are getting the state andfederal dollars. The children are not getting thecare that is intended for them.”
Also on Tuesday, representatives of the nationalAmerican Family Rights Association spoke beforethe Assembly Health Committee and gavelawmakers a report, calling on Gov. Arnold
Schwarzenegger to order a statewideinvestigation and audit of the child protective andjuvenile court systems.
Public hearings sought on foster care systemBy Troy Anderson
Staff WriterLA Daily News
“We’re getting a very favorable response,” saidDennis Hinger, executive vice president of theassociation. “A legislative aide to Schwarzeneggersaid he was extremely concerned (and) had beentotally unaware of the problems going on withchild protectiveservices andpromised to lookinto it and getresults.”
The reports in theDaily Newsdisclosedestimates that upto half of the75,000 childrenin the LosAngeles Countychild protectivesystem andadoptive homeswere needlesslyplaced in a system that is often more dangerousthan their ownhomes.
State and federallaws have createdincentives for placingchildren in the fostercare system since thecounty receives$30,000 to$150,000 annually instate and federalfunds for each childplaced in the system,according toofficials.
“We want nationwide case reviews and 50-80percent of the children returned to their homeswho were taken by child protective serviceagencies for the federal funds,” Hinger said.
“These agencies have received federalreimbursement due to putting these children intofoster care and adoptive homes. We want theredirection of federal funding to provide servicesto maintain the children inside the home wheneverpossible.”Troy Anderson, (213) 974-8985 [email protected]
Assemblyman Dennis Mountjoy, standing, and Dennis Hinger,(R) testify before the California State Assembly.
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Tuesday, February 10, 2004 - Los Angeles Countysupervisors on Tuesday demanded the firing or discipliningof social workers and their bosses after the death of a 2-year-old Canoga Park boy, in what is expected to be thefirst in a wave of firings in the nation’s largest child-protective system.
The supervisors called for theaction after learning thatsocial workers visited youngIvan Merlos’ home on RoscoeBoulevard six times, includingonce when he had a brokenleg, but did not take himaway from his mother. Hedied Oct. 1.
“People around this childcalled to say he was in harm’sway,” Supervisor GloriaMolina said. “But every timethe social workers looked,they said there was nothingto it until the day they wentand found the boy in ahospital bed, totallydeformed from the brutalbeating.
“Those social workers andsupervisors need to bebrought in, and just like acop, asked to turn in theirbadges. I’m angry becauseI’m supposed to be able totrust the system. This tellsme that these people don’tknow what they are doing.”
The supervisors’ demand foraction came as the Board ofSupervisors debated a set of reforms aimed at improvinglong-standing problems in the county Department ofChildren and Family Services.
The supervisors reached agreement on the major points ofthe reform plan but postponed the vote for a week to getmore information on a proposal by philanthropist Eli Broadto build a residential academy to prepare foster childrenfor college.
Claudia Merlos, 19, was arrested Sept. 30 on suspicion ofattempted murder for allegedly punching her son in thestomach, police said. She didn’t call paramedics to treathis critical injuries because she feared that authoritieswould take him away from her, police said. After her
roommate calledauthorities, the boy wasrushed to West HillsHospital in full cardiacarrest. After her son’s deaththe next day, Merlos — adwarf who stands 3 feet tall— was charged with murder,assault on a child causingdeath and torture. She haspleaded not guilty and isawaiting trial.
The boy’s injuries includedmassive internal bleeding.Detectives later determinedthat the child had both oldand new unexplainedexternal injuries. “The casehas many complex legal andmedical issues,” said DeputyPublic Defender JonathanPetrak, who is defendingMerlos.
“Claudia and I are stilldiscussing the evidence, butit appears to me that shewas a responsible singleparent who did her best tocare for her young son.”
DCFS Director DavidSanders, who took over thetroubled department lastMarch after the forced
resignations of its previous four directors, said internalinvestigators are in the process of identifying a group ofsocial workers and supervisors who historically have madepoor decisions on when to remove children from theirfamilies. “The issue is that there is a core of employees whohave been in the department for many, many years thathave not been doing a good job,” Sanders said.
Child services scandal heats upMolina: Fire or discipline ineffective social workers
By Troy Anderson,Staff Writer
Pat O’Conner at a protest in Hollywood.
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When he started last year, Sanders discovered thatperformance evaluations had not been conducted on morethan half of his employees.
In recent months, Sanders has embarked on a massiveshake-up inside the department, transferring hundreds ofworkers promoted to office jobs by previous directors tothe streets as social workers. So far, he has reduced thenumber of cases social workers carry from 31 to 25 andexpects to further reduce their caseloads, giving workersmore time to ensure the safety of children.
“There is, unfortunately, morethan this one situation wherewe have had poorperformance on the part ofour workers,” Sanders said.“The good workers knowabout these people. Theyhave asked why the peoplewho haven’t done their jobsfor years are kept on. Just lastweek, two or three peoplewere fired for poorperformance. It was extreme.”
Supervisor Michael D.Antonovich said Children’sServices Inspector GeneralMichael Watrobski’sinvestigation into IvanMerlos’ death found that theboy had been reported to theDCFS on six occasions as avictim of possible abuse andneglect. “The investigationinto the death of Ivanincluded a complete review ofthe case file and severalfactors indicating that thequality of supervision byDCFS may have contributedto Ivan’s death,” Antonovichsaid.
Molina said she was outragedthat the social workers andsupervisors involved inoverseeing the case had not been fired yet and could stillbe handling cases. “These workers still work for us,probably doing the same dumb stuff they were doing thatled to a child’s death,” Molina said.
Sanders said the investigation into the workers has beencompleted and that disciplinary recommendations havebeen made to him. He said the department will now gothrough the disciplinary process, which involves civilservice hearings.
The supervisors directed Sanders to report back in twoweeks on what discipline was carried out and what
corrective-action plans were taken to prevent similartragedies in the future. In addition to social workers wholeave children in dangerous homes, Sanders said he isconcerned about the high rate of children abused andneglected in foster homes, which averages 6 percent to 7percent of the children in the county’s foster care system.
In the past 10 months, 271 perpetrators ofabuse and neglect were foster parents, Sanderssaid.
The supervisors’ comments Tuesday followrecent Daily Newsreports that foundthat as many as halfof the 75,000 childrenin the Los AngelesCounty foster systemand adoptive homeswere needlessly placedin a system that isoften more dangerousthan their own homes.About 28,000 childrenactually live in foster homesin the county.
Child-welfare experts saysome social workers leavechildren in dangeroushomes while taking childrenfrom homes that could bemade safe with theappropriate services.
The reforms the supervisorsdebated Tuesday include aproposal to help reversethese financial incentivesthat encourage the countyand its contractors toprofit off the plight offoster children.
It includes a request for afederal waiver to use $250million of the $1.4 billion
DCFS budget on services to help prevent the placement ofchildren in foster care.
The package also includes goals to reduce the high rate ofchildren mistreated in foster care to national standards, toreduce the percentage of children entering the system by15 percent and to return 25 percent to 30 percent of thechildren in the system home quickly.
Staff Writer Michael Gougis contributed to this report.Troy Anderson, (213) 974-8985
Dear victims of the government child processingindustry, advocates, media and elected officials:
Although Massachusetts State Representative MarieParente (Worcester since 1980) is speaking only inher capacity as a Massachusetts elected official,what she reveals in the news article below is what Ihave heard from families across America.
Rep. Parente speaks with authority and outstandingcredentials. She is Chair of the LegislativeCommittee on Foster Care, is an expert on familyand foster care issues, chaired a subcommittee onthe 1993 Governor’s “Blue Ribbon Commission onFoster Care” and holds a Bachelor’s Degree and aMaster of Science Degree in Human Services. Shespeaks candidly in the article below published inDecember of 2003.
In a stunning and candid interview with Massachusetts News,the Chair of the Legislative Committee on Foster Care, StateRep. Marie Parente, leveled serious charges at the Departmentof Social Services saying, DSS is “perverting the system” byconducting their business without regard to due process forfamilies. In doing so, she unknowingly confirmed theheartbreaking stories coming to this newspaper fromanguished parents who have been trying to breach the mediasilence about their plight. The outspoken Democrat, who hasserved the 10th Worcester District since 1980, is an expert onfamily and foster care issues. She graciously opened thetestimony in her possession compiled from years of experienceon investigating committees and laid out for MassachusettsNews some of the ugly truth about a half-billion-dollarbureaucracy run amok in our state, called DSS.
Massachusetts News
By Edward G. OliverDecember 1— 2003
The biggest issue is due process,there really isn’t any for families,”says State Representative MarieParente. She explained that DSShas failed to abide by itsoriginal mandate, which is toseek “first” to preserve andstrengthen families. Instead, the agency has beenvirtually trafficking in children by acting as anunaccountable police force, judge, jury andexecutioner - where the DSS equivalent of executionis termination of parental rights.
Representative Parente insists DSS must be made toadhere to established legal standards in orderto have a fundamentally fair system that willkeep abuses and mistakes to a minimum.
The Representative, who chaired a subcommittee on the1993 Governor’s “Blue Ribbon Commission on Foster Care”and holds a Bachelor’s Degree and a Master of ScienceDegree in Human Services, told Massachusetts News thatDSS:
o Can almost be viewed as autonomous because itacts as its own court system and law enforcementagency.
o Has perverted the system by affording familiesaccused by DSS fewer rights than rapists andmurderers.
o Relies on the word of incompetent, sometimesmentally unstable social workers to make themomentous decision to remove children from ahome.
o Places foster children with vendors where they aresometimes molested and physically hurt and fosterchildren are not provided a lifeline to contact theoutside if they are in danger.
o Has social workers who are not doctors or nursesstrip children naked for inspection on a home visit.
Committee Chair Is Troubled By DSS
Marie Parente
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o Practices job security by “fudging” cases to keepthe caseload up.
o Puts the impetus on getting money and not ondoing what’s right for the kids.
o Has transformed its original mandate from keepingfamilies together to becoming an investigative“child protection agency.”
o Summarily removes caseworkers who try to tell theCommittee the truth about what goes on.
o Denies families due process when it:
Removes and holds children without evidence ofa crime,
Denies the accused the right to know theiraccusers by using anonymous reporting,
Does not read parents their rights althoughtheir words are used against them in court,
Denies or delays giving a family its records tohelp defend themselves,
Either does not give notice of or delays a 72-hour “fair hearing” for the better part of a yearalthough a child has been taken,
Does not give access to a court appointedlawyer until the day a family or child enters aDSS courtroom,
Routinely terminates parental rights withnothing more than a legal notice in theclassifieds.
These points, which Parente shared with MassachusettsNews, were gleaned from testimony heard fromprofessionals in the field, families, judges, educators,children and teens, foster families and families experiencingproblems, health and medical professionals, advocates forchildren, service providers and direct care workers, legalprofessionals and members of the criminal justice systems.
Too Many Reports of Abuse
Commenting on the astronomical number of 51As (theinitial report of suspected abuse), Parente says, “DSSboasts that there are over 90,000 Chapter 119, 51Areports per year. And we all know the first 30,000 arethrown out. They’re frivolous and some of them aremischievous. With the second 30,000, there isn’t enoughevidence. The last 30,000 are looked into a little deeper,and about 400 to 500 cases end up in court every year.“When a child is abused there are other statutes thatcome into play besides 51A. Those other laws are designedto keep the child safe. Those really are the child protection
laws and that kind of abuse is a crime against the child.Therefore, if the abuse is serious enough to remove a child,then the case should be turned over to a law enforcementagency, where people who do have a degree and trainingand experience in criminal actions can process them. Outof the 400 cases that go to court, there are not 400people a year going to jail because they abused childrenseriously enough to take the child out of the home. Sosomething is wrong when you look at how many cases areprocessed and how many people are not punished. If a DAhas rejected a case for lack of evidence, a child should bereturned.”
Asked why children are often taken from goodparents, she replied:
“It’s because of the incompetent social worker. Thesocial workers don’t know how to quantify whatthey see when they’re inexperienced, brand-new,just out of college and are assigned twenty cases. IfI went into a home and I were a brand new socialworker, I’d look around and say, ‘Hmmm is this abuseor not? I’m not really sure. I’ll take the kid. That wayI’ll be safe.’ So I yank the kid, and then after thateverybody believes me anyway. So the kid stays outof the home. The safest thing for a social worker todo who doesn’t know what he or she is doingbecause of a lack of experience is to yank the kid.You’re safe. That’s the one good decision you canmake without knowing anything, because you cantake the kid out and say, ‘Well, maybe the kid willget back in the home.’ But by then, some of thevendors making money in the case don’t want thekid to go back home. “I remember asking onecommissioner, ‘Do you ever administer psychologicaltesting to your social workers?’ ‘No, why would I dothat?’ ‘Has it ever occurred to you that they may beas sick as the people they are interviewing? Youdon’t think that people bring their problems to thejob?’ I knew one woman, and so I called the DSSoffice where she worked and asked, ‘Does thiswoman talk about child molesting all the time?’They said ‘yes.’ ‘And does she bring in leaflets andbooks?’ She was doing it to an excess. She’d beenmolested as a child, and in every case she handledshe saw child molestation whether it was there ornot. So first of all, the social workers in DSS shouldundergo a battery of tests. And we should look attheir qualifications. Some have a degree insomething else and say they are working towardsocial work. If you had a degree in architecture andwere out of work, you could get a job with DSS andbecome a social worker.”
How Lawyers Can Protect Parents
Parente lists some issues lawyers should look at to helptheir clients, such as “anonymous reporting, the fact thatthey don’t get the 72-hour notice, the fact that it’s notalways an experienced social worker that is making the
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decision, and the fact that the fair hearing is not alwaysfair, even when it’s conducted. I think DSS has to come togrips with the constitutional rights that people have.You’re supposed to be innocent until proven guilty; but inDSS, you’re guilty until proven innocent.
”I’ve always thought that anonymous reporting, whichDSS accepts, is contra the oldest constitution in theworld. That’s the Massachusetts Constitution whichpredates the federal constitution. They tell the parentsthat they can’t tell them who the accuser is, but theyshouldn’t be allowed to get away with that. Everybody hasthe right to know who his accuser is. What if it’s your ex-lover? What if it’s your brother’s wife who doesn’t like youand reports you? You have a right to know who it isbecause only then will you be able to point out that it’sfrivolous or that it’s just harassment.
”When DSS plays court and plays detective andpoliceman, they never ever read rights. They contaminatethe case. I’ve asked DSS a thousand times, ‘When yoursocial workers knock on the door because they’ve receiveda complaint, do they say, “I’m here from DSS and what yousay can be used against you?”’ Are the Miranda rightsread? No, they’re not, but yet down the road everythingthey write ends up in court against the parents. “So, thewhole thing is, maybe the child should be removed, maybeDSS is right in doing it. But damn it all, there’s a system,and, they can’t pervert that system.”
Asked if anything is happening to correct such blatantconstitutional abuses, Parente replied, “No, they havepowerful friends and I keep trying. I’ve been able with thehelp of a very wonderful committee of Reps and awonderful researcher, Marian McCarthy, to make changes -over ten of them over the past ten years. We’ve madesome major changes. But, this year with those thingshaving been done, my big impetus, my big focus is goingto be on due process, all those things that I mentioned toyou.”
New Adoption Law Will Hurt
Acknowledging that federal dollars play a bigrole in determining the fate of children, Parentepoints out that a federal adoption law passedin 1997 offering monetary incentives forspeeding up adoptions has the statesscrambling to comply. Massachusetts passedtheir hurry-up law this March, and she fears itwill only exacerbate the problem for peoplewith children caught in the system.
”The federal government decided that theywould reimburse states handsomely forprocessing adoptions within twelve months. If achild is removed from a home, it can take fouror five months before a hearing is held. The lawsays it must be held in 72 hours, but it almostnever happens in 72 hours. We’ve had
complaints from the CapeCod area… you’ll find four,five, six, seven monthsbefore they get a hearing.Meanwhile, the clock isticking towardsadoption. So with notmuch time left, thefamily has to try toscramble to savetheir child fromadoption. If thesocial worker haserred in removing thechild, the family is inserious trouble.”
In order for DSS to rush achild through to theadoption stage, DSS must be able to terminate parentalrights. To illustrate her point, Parente had an aide bring theday’s newspapers into her office during our interview andopened a Boston Herald to the classified section. Shefound a tiny legal notice on page 74 titled, “Care AndProtection Termination Of Parental Rights, Summons ByPublication” and had this reporter read the words back toher. After the reporter read right past the key wordsburied in the legal terminology, she had to point them out:“The court may dispense the rights of the person namedherein…” Parente says of the legal notice, “That may bethe only notice and if that person isn’t around and lives inConnecticut or lives in Florida and doesn’t see that notice,he or she has lost their parental rights. You read it. Theydon’t need to give you any other notice to terminate yourparental rights. It’s the most dangerous thing that I’ve everseen. And you can find that in any newspaper any day.There are five, six, ten, or even twenty of them on somedays. Parental rights are terminated this casually.” Shecontinues, “I blew this up once and sent it to all themembers of the House. Look what they are doing! A courtnow doesn’t have to give you notice beyond this. That’s ablood relationship and the person may be absent for a lotof reasons. Maybe the person is in rehab; not every drugaddict hates his kids, or her kids. Some of them are betterthan other parents. They abuse drugs and their ownbodies but they love their kids. Who’s to say just becauseyou put the kid in a foster home that the kid is safer?
We’ve had a lot of abuses by foster parents. So, this is oneof the most dangerous things they’ve changed. I’ve triedto fight it. And concomitant with that is another law thatsays that when a judge conducts a hearing, he doesn’thave to put his reasons in writing for terminating parentalrights. He does not have to have proof that services wereoffered. What are we doing here? Are we stealing kids? Ithought this was terrible. I don’t care how bad a mom ordad is. The system has to work, the system was createdfor people to have their rights.
”That is the big issue for families. Now that the rush is on
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for adoption both by parents seeking adoptive childrenand by DSS because they get rewarded by the federalgovernment, families are under pressure. I remember thelast time when federal money speeded up the adoptionmachine and my colleagues said, ‘We’re gonna make a lotof money on this one.’ And so the impetus became gettingmoney and not what’s doing right for the kids. How canyou get a kid adopted in one year with that threat hangingover a family that can’t get a 72-hour hearing, sometimesfor seven months?
”They have perverted this system, and DSS has made itselfa court. They are a court system, and nobody’s saying aword about this. Their fair hearings, their judgments, theiraccusations are all true, no matter who disagrees. Theybelieve an incompetent social worker that they just hired.You go into court, the court always says to the DSSworker, ‘And what do you say about this?’ “So DSS holdsall the cards. You stand accused by DSS who has 75lawyers and you don’t have the resources to have goodlegal representation. You get a court-appointed lawyerthat perhaps hasn’t been receiving money from the court.
What kind of representation is that? What about thechild getting a court-appointed lawyer that never sees thechild? What about all those bench warm-ups where thejudge calls them all up close and the DSS lawyer ispractically directing the judge? Where is the justice for thefamily that has not abused the child and someinexperienced social worker has classified the case asneglect and abuse? So that’s why I think that somethingneeds to be done. Due process, due process and dueprocess.”http://www.massnews.com/past_issues/2000/12_Dec/parente.htm
Committed to Family Preservation and theConstitutional Right to be a Parent
PO Box 5491, Stockton, CA 95205209 937-9507
www.the-facts.com
Advocates for Children
and FamiliesA self-help organization comprised of members concernedwith the practices of the California Dependency andFamily Court systems and the actions of the CaliforniaDepartment of Social Services in protecting Children andFamilies.
PO Box 10, Los Gatos, CA
Charlie Wittman, Director408 395-6999
www.theacf.org
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At the National Coalition for Child ProtectionReform, we often are asked what can be done to preventthe trauma of foster care by safely keeping children withtheir own families. There are many options, and we’velisted some of them below.
None of the alternatives described below will work in everycase or should be tried in every case. Contrary to the wayadvocates of placement prevention often are stereotyped,we do not believe in “family preservation at all costs” orthat “every family can be saved.” But these alternatives cankeep many children, now needlessly taken from theirparents, safely in their own homes.
1. Doing nothing. There are, in fact, cases in which theinvestigated family is entirely innocent and perfectlycapable of taking good care of their children without any“help” from a child welfare agency. In such cases, the bestthing the child protective services worker can do isapologize, shut the door, and go away.
2. Basic, concrete help. Sometimes it may takesomething as simple as emergency cash for a securitydeposit, a rent subsidy, or a place in a day care center (toavoid a “lack of supervision” charge) to keep a familytogether. Indeed, the federal Department of Housing andUrban Development has a special program, called theFamily Unification Program, in which Section 8 vouchersare reserved for families where housing is the issue keepinga family apart or threatening its breakup. Localities mustapply for these subsidies. By doing so, they effectivelyacknowledge what they typically deny: that they do, infact, tear apart families due to lack of housing.
3. Intensive Family Preservation Servicesprograms. The first such program, Homebuilders, inWashington State, was established in the mid-1970s. Thelargest replication of the program is in Michigan, where itis called Families First. The very term “family preservation”was invented specifically to apply to this type of program,and only this type of program, which has a better trackrecord for safety than foster care. The basics concerninghow these programs work - and what must be included fora program to be a real “family preservation” program —are in NCCPR Issue Papers 10 and 11. Issue Paper10 listsstudies proving the programs’ effectiveness.
CONTACTS:
Charlotte Booth, executive director,Homebuilders (253) 874-3630,[email protected].
Successful Alternatives to Taking Children from their Parents
Nine Ways to Do Child Welfare Right
Susan Kelly, former director, Families First(734) 483-6671, [email protected].
4. The Alabama “System of Care.” This is the singlemost successful child welfare reform in the country. TheAlabama reforms actually have reduced the foster carepopulation while making children safer. The reforms are theresult of a consent decree growing out of a lawsuitbrought by the Bazelon Center for Mental Health Law. Theconsent decree requires the state to rebuild its entiresystem from the bottom up, with an emphasis on keepingfamilies together. The number of children taken from theirhomes has dropped dramatically, re-abuse of children leftin their own homes has been cut in half since 1996, and anindependent monitor appointed by the court has foundthat children are safer now than before the changes.
CONTACTS:
Ira Burnim, Legal Director, Bazelon Center forMental Health Law (202) 467-5730, ext. 29.Mr. Burnim also is a member of the NCCPR Board ofDirectors. The Bazelon Center also has published a bookabout the Alabama reforms.
Paul Vincent, Child Welfare Policy and PracticeGroup, Montgomery, Ala. (334) 264-8300.Mr. Vincent ran the child protection system in Alabamawhen the lawsuit was filed. He worked closely with theplaintiffs to develop and implement the reform plan.
5. Family to Family. This is a multi-faceted programdeveloped by the Annie E. Casey Foundation (which alsohelps to fund NCCPR). One small element of the program,Team Decisionmaking (which is similar to an approachcalled family group conferencing) often is confused withthe entire program, which has many more elements. Theprogram is described at the Casey website http://www.aecf.org/familytofamily. Also on the website is acomprehensive outside evaluation of the program,showing that it led to fewer placements, shorterplacements, and less bouncing of children from fosterhome to foster home – with no compromise of safety.
CONTACT:
Gretchen Test, Annie E. Casey Foundation(410) 547-6600.
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Barbara Drake, El Paso County Department ofHuman Services, 719 444-5532.
9. Changing financial incentives. While not aprogram per se, making this change spurs private childwelfare agencies to come up with all sorts of innovationsthey previously had claimed were impossible.
This is clear from the experience in Illinois. Until recently,Illinois reimbursed private child welfare agencies the wayall other states typically do: Though the agencies weretold to seek permanence for children, they were paid foreach day they kept a child in foster care. Thus, agencieswere rewarded for letting children languish in foster careand punished for achieving permanence.
Now those incentives have been reversed, in part becauseof pressure from the Illinois Branch of the ACLU, whichwon a lawsuit against the state child welfare system.Today, private agencies in Illinois are paid for permanence.They are rewarded both for adoptions (which, in fact areoften conversions of kinship placements to subsidizedguardianships) and for returning children safely to theirown homes. They are penalized for prolonged stays infoster care. As soon as the incentives changed, the“intractable” became tractable, the “dysfunctional”became functional, and the foster care populationplummeted. The University of Illinois is monitoring thechanges and has found no compromise of safety.
CONTACT:
Ben Wolf, Illinois Branch, ACLU, (312) 201-9760, ext. 420.
Financial incentives forremoving children from homes
The Adoption and Safe Families Act passed by Congressin 1997 gave financial incentives to states for removingchildren from their homes and putting them up foradoption. The federal government gives the states anaverage of $13,000 per child in foster care each year outof the Social Security Trust Fund, with up to $50,000 ayear to provide “services” to that child. In addition, thegovernment gives a “bonus” of $4,000 - $10,000 tostates who can terminate a parent’s rights andsuccessfully adopt the child to another family.
The federal government also pays a per-child bonus toeach state that increases its annual number of adoptionsfrom the foster care system. In contrast, the federalgovernment pays the states nothing to leave a child inhis or her home, and nothing if that child is placed withrelatives during the red-tape laden investigation. Thefederal government only pays the states an average of$1,100 per year for each child receiving welfare.
That’s it. With the lure of all that federal and SocialSecurity money, some states are making the removal ofchildren from their homes take precedence overprotecting children who are actually in danger.
6. Community Partnerships for ChildProtection. These partnerships, overseen by the Centerfor the Study of Social Policy in Washington, are similar tothe Family to Family projects. They mobilize formal andinformal networks of helpers to prevent maltreatment andavoid needless foster care placement. These projectsoften encourage an approach called “differentialresponse,” sometimes also known as “two-tieredresponse.” This is an approach that both widens andnarrows the net of intervention. Families consideredrelatively low risk are offered voluntary help. Previously,some of these cases would have been ignored entirely,while others would have subjected families to traumatic,coercive investigations and the threat of having theirchildren taken away. A literature review commissioned bythe federal government found that all studies done ondifferential response revealed the approach led to bettersafety outcomes.
7. The turnaround in Pittsburgh. In the mid-1990s,the child welfare system in Pittsburgh and surroundingAllegheny County, Pa. was typically mediocre, or worse.Foster care placements were soaring and those in chargeinsisted every one of those placements was necessary.New leadership changed all that. Since 1997, the fostercare population has been cut by 30 percent. When childrenmust be placed, half stay with relatives and siblings arekept together 82 percent of the time.
They’ve done it by tripling the budget for primaryprevention, more than doubling the budget for familypreservation, embracing innovations like Family to Familyand adding elements of their own, such as housingcounselors in every child welfare office so families aren’tdestroyed because of housing problems. And as inAlabama, children are safer. Reabuse of children left in theirown homes has declined.
CONTACT:
Karen Blumen, Alleghency County Departmentof Human Services, Office of CommunityRelations (412) 350-5707.
8. Reform in El Paso County, Colorado.By recognizing the crucial role of poverty in childmaltreatment, El Paso County reversed steady increases inits foster care population. The number of children in fostercare is down by about 22 percent – and the rate ofreabuse of children left in their own homes is below thestate and national averages, according to an independentevaluation by the Center for Law and Social Policy,available on the Center’s website, here.
CONTACTS:
Rutledge Hutson, Center for Law and SocialPolicy 202-906-8009, [email protected]
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In a ruling that will cost California and its 58 counties morethan $80 million, a Sacramento federal judge has orderedthe payment of unlawfully withheld foster care benefitsfor children living with relatives.
The ruling applies to anestimated 18,000 fosterchildren statewide removedby court order from parentalhomes and living primarily inthe homes of grandparents.
“This is a huge victory for theneediest among us,” saidBarbara Jones, a Legal AidFoundation lawyer whopursued the matter on behalfof a Los Angeles womanacting as her grandson’sfoster parent. “No segment ofsociety needs our help morethan these children, most ofwhom have been abused,neglected or abandoned bytheir parents.”
On Tuesday, U.S. DistrictJudge Frank C. Damrell Jr.ordered payments inappropriate foster care casesthat were active on or afterMarch 3, 2003 - the date ofan appellate ruling ruling -going back to Dec. 23, 1997, when the state submitted aplan rejected by the U.S. Department of Health and HumanServices that made relatives eligible for foster carebenefits.
According to Damrell’s 25-page order, the CaliforniaDepartment of Social Services estimates that $30 millionwill have to be taken from the state general fund andanother $42 million from county treasuries to cover theback payments. The federal government will be obligatedto match those amounts.
According to a court declaration from a departmentofficial, the counties also will have to underwrite morethan $10 million in administrative costs to determine whois eligible.
The judge gave the state agency 60 days to direct countywelfare departments to find the beneficiaries. The file
review must be completed within eight months, Damrellordered.
Enedina Rosales, the Los Angeles grandmother whoseLegal Aid attorneys pursued the case after the state
dropped it, was denied fostercare benefits because theparental home from which hergrandson was removed wasnot eligible for welfarebenefits.
The state challenged thatfederal requirement five yearsago in a suit filed againstHealth and Human Services.Rosales later entered the suiton the side of the state. Her5-month-old grandson wasplaced in her care after beingremoved from his parents’abusive home. Rosales had toquit her job to care for thebaby, who suffered fromrespiratory ailments requiringfrequent emergencytreatment. She was deniedfoster care benefits becauseof the federal agency’sinterpretation of the law, andwas forced to apply forregular welfare, which is lessthan foster care benefits.
According to AARP, there are approximately 1.5 millionfoster homes like Rosales’ throughout the nation. Insupport of her, the organization filed friend-of-the-courtbriefs in the district court in Sacramento and with the 9thU.S. Circuit Court of Appeals.
In the brief, the former American Association of RetiredPersons said that even though “grandparents - primarilysingle, poor, African American grandmothers - havestepped in to rescue these children,” many of them “arenot in good health and, even if they are employed, havelow-skilled, low-paying jobs.”
Foster care benefits “are essential for grandparents to beable to provide food, shelter and other necessities” suchas health care, AARP said. The federal agency’sinterpretation “discourages kinship care providers whoprovide better care for these children.”
Foster ruling to cost state millionsA federal judge orders back payments for homes
where kids live with relatives.By Denny Walsh — Bee Staff Writer - (Published February 12, 2004)
Jeanne Sinclair-Krause, author of “RememberCynthia Rose” that chronicles six Californiagrandparents as they fight the child saveragencies and family courts, with Al White, afamily advocate from www.the-facts.com.
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Damrell deferred to Health and Human Services’interpretation and threw the case out in 2000.The state did not appeal, but Rosales did, and the 9thCircuit reversed Damrell and sent the case back to him todecide the scope of relief for foster parents.
Rosales and her attorneys then found themselves pittedagainst not only the federal agency but also the state,their former ally. Both governments argued stronglyagainst retroactive relief, throwing up a multitude of legalreasons and insisting that it was unjust to burden themwith the costs and logistics of going back more than sixyears.
Larry Bolton, acting chief deputy director of the stateDepartment of Social Services, said Wednesday there hadbeen no decision on whether to appeal the retroactiveelement of the ruling.
State Deputy Attorney General Frank Furtek had warnedDamrell in an October brief that retroactive application ofthe appellate opinion would add to the state’s budgetwoes and “the costs would be profound. The state has nocurrent appropriation or authorization to make thisadditional payment, and the funds would need to betapped from other state welfare funds.”
“Further,” he said, “the administrative obstaclesassociated with identifying eligible recipients prior to April2003 are monumental.”
But Damrell said he had to weigh all these problemsagainst the “public interest in compensating foster carefamilies who have been denied ... benefits to which theywere entitled for six years.”
Jones sees trouble ahead. “The (Bush) administrationchose not to appeal the 9th Circuit’s opinion to theSupreme Court,” Jones said. “Instead it is trying to use thebudget to legislate these benefits out of existence.” TheBush budget for fiscal 2005 proposes to amend the law sothe benefits can be denied legally.
The proposal would “leave foster children who live withrelatives behind,” Jones said in a reference to Bush’s much-touted goal to “leave no child behind.”
Yolanda Arias, another Legal Aid Foundation lawyerrepresenting Rosales, said the administration “has notgiven a good reason that justifies continuing a policy thathurts abused and neglected children and the relatives whocare for them.”
The Bee’s Denny Walsh can be reached at (916) 321-1189 [email protected].
Judge Calls For CaseReviews Of 30,000
Foster ChildrenMost Urgent Need For 8,000 Teens
Close To Being Released From SystemPOSTED: 1:05 PM PST December 10, 2003UPDATED: 1:16 PM PST December 10, 2003
LOS ANGELES — A judge wants an unprecedentedreview of the cases of half of the 30,000 childrenin Los Angeles County foster homes to determineif they could be safely returned to their ownfamilies or relatives, it was reported Wednesday.
Juvenile Court presiding Judge Michael Nash, responding to aweekend article in the Los Angeles Daily News, said Tuesday themost urgent need is for judges, attorneys andsocial workers to review the cases of about 8,000foster children — mostly teenagers — who have been infoster care for years and are about to turn 18, after which theywill be released from the system.
“We need to closely review each of these cases as they comeup and determine what is the most appropriate long-rangeplan for these kids,” Nash said in remarks reported by the DailyNews.
“For many of those kids, it will require us to go back and look attheir family situations. Are there responsible adultsthey can rely upon once they leave the system?”Nash said. The Daily News reported Sunday that up to halfof the 75,000 children in the system and adoptivehomes were needlessly placed in a system that isoften more dangerous than their own homesbecause the county receives $30,000 to $150,000in state and federal revenues for each placement.
The $1.4 billion Department of Children and Family Servicesbudget currently pays to support a total of 75,000 children,but Nash pointed out that the number of children in fosterhomes has dropped from 52,000 in 1998 to 30,000 now,according to the Daily News. He said about half of thosechildren are placed with relatives.
Andrew Bridges, managing director of child welfare reformprograms at the private Broad Foundation, told the Daily Newsthat since the mid-1990s, the county’s child welfare system hasbeen based on an aggressive policy of detaining childrenbecause of the financial incentives.Copyright 2003 by NBC4.tv. All rights reserved.
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Monday, February 16, 2004 - Gov. Arnold Schwarzeneggerhas called for an overhaul of California’s foster-care systemto end financial incentives that critics say encouragecounty officials and their contractors to make money offchildren in their care.
Schwarzenegger’s call for reforms comes as the LosAngeles County Board of Supervisors is set to vote todayon a similar proposal toradically change the fiscalstructure of the county child-protective system, placing anunprecedented focus onproviding services to help keeptroubled families together.
The governor’s proposal comesafter recent Daily News storiesreporting that some officials’estimate that as many ashalf the 75,000 childrenin the county’s foster-care and adoptive homeswere needlessly placed ina system that is oftenmore dangerous than thehomes from which thechildren were taken.
Some officials and critics say state and federal lawscreate financial incentives for taking childrenfrom their parents because county governmentreceives $30,000 to $150,000 annually in stateand federal funds for each child placed infoster care.
”We’re calling for significant reforms in the programbecause we believe it’s pretty clear that when the statefailed 12 out of 14 outcome measures when the fedsreviewed the foster-care system, you’ve got issues withthe way the program is managed,” said state Departmentof Finance spokesman H.D. Palmer.
In a joint written statement, the state’s Little HooverCommission has described the foster-caresystem as a “public calamity.”
Century City attorney Linda Wallace Pate, who has won anumber of lawsuits aimed at reforming the system, saidthe governor’s plan is a “courageous effort.”
”It’s scandalous that the California foster-care system hasbeen reduced to a ‘kids for cash’ system driven byperverse financial incentives,” Pate said. “It’s contrary tocommon sense that children are removed from theirparents for little or no reason 80 percent of the time andplaced in a system where they are more likely to beabused, all to service this sacred-cash-cow foster-caresystem.”
Last month the 150,000-member American FamilyRights Association calledon Schwarzenegger toorder a statewideinvestigation and audit ofthe child-protection andjuvenile court systems. Thegroup says the system hasneedlessly placedthousands of children infoster care to draw downstate and federal revenues.
Fred Baker, a former Glendaleresident and group-homeowner, said he would like to seean audit determine whetherany funds are missing from theDepartment of Children and
Family Services budget and whether county employeesneedlessly placed children in foster care to boost theirbudget.
Baker won a $459,940 judgment against countygovernment in 2002 after a jury found that county officialsclosed five of his group homes in Lancaster and South LosAngeles in 1996 without offering him a chance to appeal.
Baker said county officials closed his facilities in retaliationafter he went to authorities in 1995 and told them childrenwere placed needlessly in foster care to obtain state andfederal funds.
Schwarzenegger’s proposals, which his administrationestimates would save $20 million in fiscal year 2004-05and more in subsequent years, calls for performance-basedcontracts that would require private agencies, as acondition of payment, to measure up on desired outcomesunder federal and state guidelines to improve the care ofchildren.
Foster-kid cash lure may fadeGovernor wants to alter system
By Troy AndersonStaff Writer
Executive Vice President of AFRA, Dennis Hingerin Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger’s office inJanuary as he prepares to present the first AFRAChild Abuse Industry Expose.
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Since Illinois switched to such contracts in the late 1990s,the number of children in foster care in that state hasdropped by 50 percent. Half of the private agencies wereunable to meet the goals and were forced to close.
Schwarzenegger also proposes to pursue a waiver fromthe federal government so that much of the money nowused to pay for foster care could be spent on programs tokeep children with their birth parents.
The county supervisors’ vote today would authorize child-welfare officials to negotiate with the federal governmentfor the first waiver in the state to allow the countyDepartment of Children and Family Services to use $250million of its $1.4 billion budget on services to help preventthe placement of children in foster care.
The national nonprofit Pew Commission on Children inFoster Care expects to release a report in late spring onhow Congress could reform federal child-welfare financingand strengthen court oversight of child-welfare cases.
”Every problem in child welfare cannot be attributed tofederal financing or to the courts, but many have rootsthere,” Pew Commission Chairman Bill Frenzel said.“Federal dollars flow relatively easily to pay for foster carefor poor children, but they are much less available for otherservices that may avoid the need for foster care or shortenthe time a child must stay in care.”
Jim Mayer, executive director of the state’s Little HooverCommission, which has released three largely unheededreports in the past decade calling for major reforms in thesystem, said Schwarzenegger’s plan could save the statesubstantial amounts of money.
But Mayer stressed that the governor needs to heed thecommission’s recommendation to place one person incharge of fixing the system and establish civilian oversightpanels in the counties.
”Nobody is in charge here,” Mayer said. “That’s been theconsistent theme of our analysis.
”These two pieces — some very clear lines of authorityand accountability at the state and local levels, andeffective public oversight — will be the key ingredients tosustaining reform.”
HONOLULU — The state representative who overseesChild Protective Services said social workers have toomuch power to remove children. He also wants the state toinvestigate any citizen who tries to report abuse toauthorities.
Police and social workers took children from a home afteranonymous witnesses saw a boy hog-tied with duct tape.Witnesses like those would automatically be checked forcriminal records under a bill introduced by Rep. MikeKahikina.
“Is that a real person or is there a vendetta going on withinthe community that they are using these laws to actuallyhurt families?” Kahikina asked.Kahikina held statewide hearings on CPS and said peoplewho witness abuse should deal with the abuserthemselves.
“If we see an abuse out there as neighbors before we callthe police, as neighbors the village should step forward.That is the true America,” Kahikina said.
However, attorneys who represent families in family courtsay investigating anonymous callers would discouragelegitimate complaints.
“How many lives have we saved by intervention? How manyinjuries have we saved by intervention?” attorney MarkWorsham said.
Kahikina’s proposal actually does quite a bit more to rein inCPS, including requiring department representatives to goto family court to hold a hearing before they can take achild.
Kahikina said the police could give children to other familymembers while they investigate. He also wants childrentaken only when abuse is proven, and he says drug usealone shouldn’t automatically trigger a child’s removal.
“Just because someone is smoking a joint next to them, isthat reason why we should take away the child? I don’tknow,” he said. “So, we jump and take a child away forevery case that a CPS worker gets and say, ‘Hey, the guy issmoking.’ Or, do we go out and take the real abuse cases?”Kahikina’s committee will hold a hearing on his billsSaturday.http://www.thehawaiichannel.com/family/2807975/detail.html
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California Governor, Arnold Schwarzenegger, is attempting tochange the purpose of Department of Social Services (DSS)and that of the Attorney General. DSS will be rewarded forallowing the children to stay with their family, rather thattaking them away. The Attorney General will be allowed tokeep his job by enforcing the laws of his state, rather thanallowing illegal marriage between gays.
The impoverishment of the family caring for their ownchildren is becoming apparent and disturbing: As reported inthe Sacramento Bee, “ In a ruling that will cost Californiaand its 58 counties more than $80 million, a Sacramentofederal judge has ordered the payment of unlawfully withheldfoster care benefits for children living with relatives.”, “theCalifornia Department of Social Services estimates that $30million will have to be taken from the state general fund andanother $42 million from county treasuries to cover the backpayments. The federal government will be obligated tomatch those amounts”
The supply side of the Foster care industry is finally beingrecognized and scorned. As reported in Star News, “ Gov.Arnold Schwarzenegger has called for an overhaul ofCalifornia’s foster care system to end financialincentives that critics say encourage counties and theircontractors to make money off children in their care.”,“State and federal laws create financial incentives forplacing children in foster care because counties receive$30,000 to $150,000 annually in state and federal fundsfor each child, say officials and critics.”
The demand side of the Foster care industry is becomingobvious and creepy: As reported in the Press Telegram:”The California Supreme Court declined a request Friday byAttorney General Bill Lockyer to immediately shut down SanFrancisco’s gay weddings. “, “ Pressure on Lockyer, aDemocrat and the state’s top law enforcer, intensified whenRepublican Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger directed him to“take immediate steps’ to halt San Francisco’s marriagemarch. “, “ Regardless of Friday’s order, the San Francisco-based Supreme Court did not indicate whether it woulddecide the issue. The seven justices usually are loath todecide cases until they work their way up through the lowercourts, which this case has not.”
DSS, operating in each state, is paid by the taxpayersto actively pursue removing children from theirfamilies and permanently giving them to strangers. Asreported by the California Children’s Services, most of
these children were not victims of abuse:
• 45% of the 498,720 children that were referred to CADSS in 2003 alleged general/severe neglect orcaretaker absence/incapacity.
• 23% of the 498,720 children that were referred to CADSS in 2003 were substantiated.
• 53% of the 113,702 children that were substantiated byCA DSS in 2003 confirmed general/severe neglect orcaretaker absence/incapacity
The California child pay-off can be presented using thenet per capita income (PCI) of California in 2000 as$26,422/yr ($2,202/mo). [Net PCI across all states arefound in Table SA51-52 provided by the Bureau ofEconomic Analysis (BEA) for 2000]
• $550/mo (25% net PCI) in child support for one child,and $881/mo (40% net PCI) for 2, is payable to afinancially dependent parent who is ordered to care forthe children. [Child support awards across all statesare found using the calculators provided by AllLaw.com
using the state PCI.]
• $627/mo (28% net PCI) in TANF and food stamps forone child, and $813/mo (37% net PCI) for two, isavailable to a financially impoverished parent who is notreceiving child support. [TANF and food stampsprovided by all states are found in • Table 7-9 of the
Committee on Ways and Means Greenbook 2000.]
• $446/mo (20% net PCI) in Foster care benefits for onechild, and $892/mo (41% net PCI) for two, is payableto a financially stable stranger with a spare room.[Foster care benefits provided by all states are found in
Schwarzenegger attempting to stopexploitation of children for money in CACalifornia may be setting the example for the rest of the nation
Jim Untershine, GZS of LB, 03-02-04
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• Table 11-8 of the Committee on Ways and MeansGreenbook 2000.]
Foster care and Welfare are paid for by the taxpayers,and are subject to repayment by the parents who areseparated from their children. The state share (USC 421396d b) of these collections depends on the state’s PCIrelative to that of the nation. The state share of Foster careand Welfare collections = 45%*(PCIstate / PCInation)^2 andcannot exceed 50%. California is allowed to keep 50% ofthe Foster care and Welfare collections with a gross PCI of$32,363/yr ($29,760/yr nationally). [Gross PCI across allstates are found in Table SA1-3 provided by the Bureau ofEconomic Analysis (BEA) for 2000.]
Child Support Enforcement (CSE), operating in each state,is paid to actively prevent the payment of child support anddrive both parents to poverty. The new and improved stateincentive calculation (USC 42 658a b) doubles the Fostercare (IV-E) and Welfare (IV-A) collections compared to childsupport (IV-D) collections.
It is not hard to understand why states, like Utah, haveopened the floodgates regarding unwed mothers givingbabies up for adoption. The exploitation of children formoney is more palatable if the children are suppliedwillingly. The new demand for children by same-sexcustomers may allow some states to distribute acatalogue, complete with a schedule of tax-freeincome that will be provided by the taxpayers or theparents roped into repaying it.
Same-sex marriage would be a public policy wasted on agroup of people who are proud of a lifestyle that precludeschildren. The institution of marriage does not confercommitment (in this no-fault divorce era we are forced to livein) it is simply a means to get free health care from thebreadwinning partner’s employer. State Attorney Generals ofthe Executive branch, who wish to ignore the law in an effortto force a new group of people into the divorce courts, onlyserves to feed the officers and agencies of the Judicialbranch.
Schwarzenegger may see through his Attorney General’smurky motive, in hesitating to enforce the laws uniformlyand adequately throughout the state of California. AttorneyGeneral Bill Lockyer must choose to put the ‘smack down’on Mayors and Judges who choose to ignore the Legislative
branch, or he must choose to resign his office.Is the California Attorney General a puppet of the CaliforniaBar Association or does he report to the CaliforniaGovernor?
Jim Untershine, 3321 E 7th St. #1, Long Beach, CA90804, [email protected], www.geocities.com/gndzerosrv
Jim Untershine holds a BSEE from Mississippi StateUniversity and has 13 years experience in feedback controlsystem design. Mr. Untershine is currently using theteachings of Warner Heisenberg and Henry David Thoreauto expose Family Law in California as the exploitation ofchildren for money and the indentured servitude ofheterosexual taxpayers who dare to raise children in thiscountry.
A study by a child welfare think tankreleased earlier this year found thatthe government spends an average of$65,000 to $85,000 a year to house andeducate a foster child in a group home.The total costs are staggering, authorsof the report wrote, noting that thedirect costs of child abuse and neglectnationwide are estimated at $25 billiona year while indirect costs such asjuvenile delinquency, adult criminalityand lost productivity to society total$95 billion.
We estimate that foster children placedin foster famly homes, actually cost thetaxpayers between $50,000 to $150,000per child, per year. This is when youconsider the real costs of mandatedtherapy for all family members,parenting classes, anger managmentclasses, co-parenting classes, drug andalcohol rehabilitation, attorneysappointed for the whole family, judges,foster parents, foster family agencies,visitation centers, social workers,police officers, and many more.
Did you know ?
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December 1—The Department of Social Services is usingfinancial consultants who specialize in advising the statehow to aggressively “maximize federal revenue.” Thismeans that the decision as to whether to remove a childfrom his parents is often a factor of whether the DSS canget more federal money, according to many experts. It isreported that the Department is making an extra $90million a year by this method.
The practice of hiring private consulting firms to adviseand manage child welfare (and other agencies) is one thatis used nationwide by state governments, sometimes on ano-risk, contingency basis. This means that the federalmoney that is supposed to be helping children is beingsiphoned off by consulting firms and the children arepaying the price.
And Massachusetts is a leader in the practice. The taskforce of accountants that arrive from the consultants re-engineer how the agencies are run, right down to training,policy, forms, and other areas to serve the overridingpurpose of obtaining more money from the federalgovernment.
When asked by Massachusetts News if she knew that DSSwas using one of the revenue maximization firms, StateRep. Marie Parente, Chair of the Legislative Committee onFoster Care replied: “Yes, Andersen Consulting. In fact thatwas one of my big complaints. I thought it should havebeen looked into. “When I was on the Governor’s ‘BlueRibbon Commission’ in 1993, Andersen Consultingvolunteered their services and they kept saying it wasmanagement and maximizing revenue and they could do it;they’re in the business.
In the end they got a three million dollar contract and Ithink they still hold it today. I objected. I thought it wasunethical and I thought there were state workers at thetime doing that work and we never needed Andersen. Wehave a fine revenue collection department in DSS. Andersencarved out a niche for themselves and I think they still havethe contract.”
A spokesman from Andersen Consulting, Meg Travis, tellsMassachusetts News that at one point they had threecontracts with DSS and the last one ended in December of1997. DSS spokesman David Van Dam confirms they usedAndersen until late 1997; and when asked, he said DSS nowuses another consulting firm called PCG (Public ConsultingGroup) but when asked what services they perform, he didnot specify what they do. He says the work Andersen did
that was related to the Commission was completed byAndersen. Attempts to get further information from PCGin time for this article were unsuccessful.
DSS Follows Recommendations For Money
When asked if the recommendations for reform from theBlue Ribbon Commission were acted on, Rep. Parenteanswered that DSS implemented those parts of theCommission “Report” that Andersen liked which increasedthe federal revenue. She said, “What they did was the partsthat Andersen liked, you know, the money part, the federalreimbursement. But my special committee filed a minorityreport because I thought they focused on the wrongthing.”
A look into the Committee’s “Final Report” reveals the“money part” Parente speaks about where it states: “DSSshould undertake an immediate revenue maximizationeffort.” And it continued that DSS should be sure that themoney stays in its hands and does not go to the state. “Aretained revenue account should be established to ensurethat funds brought in through the revenue maximizationeffort are retained and used by DSS.” Andersen reportedto the Commission that enhanced revenues held thepotential of claiming up to $40 to $70 million extra dollarsper year.
The “Final Report” also reveals that DSS was sticking itstoe into the “revenue maximization waters” nineteenmonths prior, when DSS conducted an analysis on the“potential for enhancing federal reimbursements fromMedicaid and other entitlement programs” even as it had“enhanced its federal reimbursements significantly overthe last few years through the use of a consultant on acontingent contract.”
This concept of maximizing federal revenue is beginning tocause trouble in many other states as well. In California,plaintiffs sued Health and Human Services andContra Costa County for allowing childrenclassified as disabled to languish for years infoster care while the county seized andmisappropriated their personal SSI and otherfederal benefits.
Texas Is Imitating Massachusetts
An illuminating report by the Texas Comptroller of PublicAccounts, titled “Maximize Federal Revenues for Healthand Human Services,” is a case study in the thought
DSS ‘Follows The Money;’ Makes An Extra$90 Million Per Year
What’s ‘Best For The Child’ Is Secondary To ‘More Federal Money’Massachusetts NewsBy Edward G. Oliver
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processes and cost shifting schemes associated withmaximizing federal revenue. While some of it is soundmanagement techniques, it is a short leap from creativelysqueezing federal dollars from active cases to directlytargeting children for removal from the home based oncertain demographics and categories - especially ifconsultants are paid on a contingency basis. Someexamples of children who would bring federal money withthem would be those who are eligible to receive Medicaid(which would be given to the state if they become fosterchildren) and special needs children who receive SocialSecurity money.
Incredibly, the Texas report frankly admits, “Statestypically obtain more revenue from the federal foster careprogram by increasing the number of cases that areeligible for federal reimbursement.” Another admissionfrom the same office is a report titled, “Maximize FederalFunding for Child Welfare Programs,” which reveals thatfinancial consultants indeed train agency staff directly tomaximize federal funding. “Some states,” says the report,“that have hired Title IV-E expert consultants haveincreased their federal reimbursements by as much as $20million or more per year. These consultants work with childwelfare program staff to improve policies, forms, trainingand other program elements to generate additionalfederal reimbursements.”
The Texas Comptroller’s Report uses - who else but -Massachusetts as a shining example of how revenuemaximization should be done by confirming thatAndersen’s recommendations were put into effect. “Forexample” says the Texas Report, “Massachusetts raised itspercentage of children’s eligible cases for reimbursementfrom 23 percent of all children receiving services in 1993 tonearly 65 percent in 1996. Massachusetts also changedhow it accounts for its essential program costs so that thestate could claim full instead of partial reimbursement.Massachusetts received $58 million more in federal funds inthe first year, $64 million in the second, and expects netadditional revenues in the third year to reach from $88million to $90 million.
Massachusetts also considers clients who are eligible forMedicaid and are either abused and neglected, or at riskof being abused and neglected, to be eligible for Medicaidservices through the child protective serices agency.”
Money Influences Workers
The big question that arises out of the quest to maximizefederal dollars is, are financial consultants hired to adviseand train DSS workers in determining who gets taken outof the home? Do they design risk assessment models forcaseworkers to use on home visits which serve to provideinteresting details that perhaps raise a flag to supervisorsabout a child’s potential federal funding eligibility status?For example, a minority child is automatically considered“special needs” and therefore eligible for Medicaid. Broadlydefined “disabled” children are also very profitable. The
foster child population is in fact heavily weighted in thosecategories now and those parents are least able to fighttheir removal.
An innocent notation of these “trip wires” by a caseworkermay have serious implications for the child. If, as DSSclaims, a caseworker’s notes are reviewed by supervisors,do revenue maximization considerations enter theequation when deciding who gets pulled from the home?Perhaps seemingly irrational decisions by caseworkers topull a child can be explained better in this light rather thana case of widespread incompetence. Perhapsincompetence comes into play only in the fact that a moreeducated worker may question the guidelines, while lesstrained field personnel dutifully act without questioning.
Virginia based researcher Emerich Thoma, who uses fostercare and child welfare data from many states, mentionsthat, “Two Massachusetts studies serve to demonstratethe inextricable link between poverty and child removal.”He says that in a study of abused and neglected childrenentering a hospital emergency room it was found that if aphysical injury was severe, it was less likely that the childwould be removed. “Specifically, the researchersfound that the highest predictor of removal wasnot the extent of a given physical injury, butrather whether or not the family was Medicaid-eligible.
In a follow-up study of 805 children, researchers found thatthe degree of physical injury to a child only becamestatistically significant in the reporting of child abusewhen the family’s income was excluded from the analysis.”Both studies involved Boston-based Dr. Eli H. Newbergerwho also served on the Governor’s Blue RibbonCommission on Foster Care.
Attempts to reach Dr. Newberger in time for commentwere unsuccessful. Speaking to Massachusetts News, Thomaquotes the Texas Comptroller of Public Accounts, JohnSharp, as saying that before a social service agency isconsidered to be well managed, there must be at least50% of its children who are eligible for Social Security. TheTexas Comptroller said, “There is a little knownformula employed by child welfare agencies,this formula is called the “penetration rate.”What that means is before a system isconsidered fiscally well managed, it has to havea minimum ratio of 50% of its children aseligible for SSI.”
Thoma says the Comptroller “received that informationfrom a communication with one of the big consultingfirms, I believe it was Maximus…Federal Grand Juries havelooked at this problem in California and what they havefound is that these agencies are dipping into Medicaid, SSI,Title IV-E, and virtually everything else they can get theirhands on. You end up with six or eight times theamount of money that is needed for that fosterplacement, and many states bill the parents on
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top of it. As the Santa Clara County Grand Jury put it:‘Agencies benefit financially from foster careplacements.’”
”Cooking the Books”
Thoma provides numerous examples of creative, some callfraudulent techniques, which consulting firms perform forstate agencies. He cites a recent study issued by theOffice of the Inspector General of Health and HumanServices. That study, “Review of Rising Costs in theEmergency Assistance Program,” laments that we arecooking the books to claim federal funds by “lengtheningeligibility periods, defining emergencies broadly, andsetting high income limits for determiningeligibility…thereby maximizing federal revenue. The[Emergency Assistance] expenditures are escalating at arapid pace due mainly to three types of costs, juvenilejustice, foster care, and child welfare services.”
The prospectus from the consulting firm Maximus Inc.warns investors, “To avoid experiencing higher thananticipated demands for federal funds, federal governmentofficials on occasion advise state and local authorities notto engage private consultants to advise on maximizingrevenues.”
Thoma uses Massachusetts as an example. “Conna Craig[a Boston-based children’s advocate] points out that in herown home state of Massachusetts, child welfareagencies are known to defer requests fortermination of parental rights until childrenreach the age of seven, as at that age childrenare deemed to have ‘special needs’ for whichchild welfare agencies may claim additionalfederal reimbursements.”
Massachusetts News has been unable to reach Craig forcomment.
Ten Thousand Children Every Year
Approximately 10,000 children per year are taken fromfamilies in Massachusetts and placed into foster care,according to DSS spokesman David Van Dam.
Rep. Parente describes for Massachusetts News theimportant role federal dollars play in decision-makingabout those children at DSS. “I remember CongresswomanSchroeder,” recalls Parente. “She said her greatest fearabout federal funding for DSS is that every time theydecided to put more money into a different facet of DSS,then DSS focused the attention on that.
It is that way across the country. If they thought thatchildren should stay with families and that was their bigthing that year, all kids stayed with their families becausethen the state would get a lot of money. If the focus of thefederal government and funds change to adoption, theneverybody would get adopted.”
Is it really possible that decisions affecting the well-beingof children who cross paths with the Department of SocialServices are being made with emphasis on what will bringin the greatest amount of federal revenue, rather thanwhat’s best for the child? There are indeed monetaryinducements for DSS to take children from their parents.Federal funding, such as Title IV-E of the Social SecurityAct, reward the placement of children into the foster caresystem. Services that focus on family preservation - caseswhere no child is placed into the system - are not aslucrative.
As Conna Craig of the Boston-based “Institute forChildren” wrote in 1995, “The problem with foster care isnot the level of government spending, it is the structure ofthat spending. As more children enter the system, so doesthe tax money to support them in substitute care. As onefoster child put it: ‘Everywhere I go, somebodygets money to keep me from having a mom anddad.’”
”Foster Children” Changes With NewLaws
The number of foster children in the mid to late seventiesnumbered a half million in the United States. In 1982, a lowof 262,000 was recorded, a reduction by almost half.Thoma credits a short-lived requirement passed byCongress with helping to reduce those numbers sodramatically. “In 1980,” Thoma writes, “Congress passedthe Adoption Assistance and Child Welfare Act, or PublicLaw 96-272. The Act included a provision that “reasonableefforts” be made to prevent placement in foster care. Thereasonable effort requirement wasimplemented, in part, because the Congressdetermined that a large number of childrenwere being unnecessarily removed from theirhomes.”
The “reasonable efforts” requirement however, lackedenforcement from the Dept. of Health and HumanServices. State agencies soon saw it as a paper tiger andreturned to routine foster placements which shot past thehalf million mark, where it hovers today.
Still, in order for DSS to get paid for the foster child, ajudge is supposed to be convinced that reasonable effortswere made to keep the child at home. Critics, such as theCape Cod-based, parent support group “Justice forFamilies,” charge that this legal proceeding takes place ina secret, rubber stamp session with nobody else present“to rebut, object, or verify the truth” except a DSSattorney and a judge. The group claims the judge routinelysigns off on a little known federal form called a 29-c whichis the ticket for federal funds. They charge DSS is guilty ofdefrauding the federal government - not to mentiontraumatizing children and their families. Signed 29-cforms obtained by the parents’ rights advocatesappear to provide evidence that children areplaced into foster care no matter what the
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form says when the judge signs off on it. Attimes it is blank.
In a report issued by the parents’ group titled “Findingsand Suggestions on DSS Reform,” they charge, “By seizingchildren illegally, in violation of Title IV-E requirements viathe filing of false and fraudulent documents in secrecythrough the courts to obtain federal funding, DSS isdefrauding the federal government with deliberate intent.”
This was foreseen by the Finance Committee of Congressin 1980 when it stated: “The Committee is aware ofallegations that the judicial determination requirement canbecome a mere pro forma exercise in paper shuffling toobtain federal funding. While this could occur in someinstances, the Committee is unwilling to accept as ageneral proposition that judiciaries of the States would solightly treat a responsibility placed upon them by federalstatute for the protection of children.”
Now, a new bonus is promised to states who can put kidsinto the adoption phase in a year or so. Like circus lionsleaping to the crack of a whip, states are reordering theirpriorities by passing adoption laws that will bring theminto compliance with federal requirements.
Massachusetts passed their adoption law in March of thisyear.
As Thoma observes, “The Congress failed to askone crucial question when it passed thelegislation; Why are so many children in thefoster care system to begin with?”
EXPOSED
Hearings were held March 13, 2004 in San Bernardino, California
to hear testimony and receive evidence of what many parents,
grandparents, and advocacy organizations describe as “A festering
cauldron of fraud, corruption, abuse of power and exploitation of
children.”
During 8 hours of testimony, impassioned tales of rampant abuses
of power, denial of due process protections violations of civil
rights, and accusations of blatant defrauding of the American
taxpayer were evidenced by documentation, video and prepared
statements heard by the committee. Testimony included
documentation of schemes designed to provide financial gain for
states, counties and service providers in the form of agency
mandates to “maximize the federal funding stream”. This is in
reference to financial incentives provided to child welfare
agencies drawn from an already abused social security fund.The testimony continued unabated as parents and extended
family members presented the committee with documentation
of violations of state and federal statutes, denial of civil rights
and predation upon vulnerable children and families by child
welfare workers who regularly exceed their authority with
impunity.TO OBTAIN A TAPE WITH THE ENTIRE PROCEEDINGS, CONTACT [email protected].
CCCCCooooongrngrngrngrngreeeeessssssisisisisionononononal al al al al InquiInquiInquiInquiInquirrrrryyyyyInvestigating Abuse and Fraud byChild Protective Services, Foster Careand the Juvenile Court SystemEvidence presented during testimony before the
Congressional Hearing held in San Bernardino, lead topromise of official inquiries Into systematic fraud,“color of law” civil rights violations, and abuse of
power by child welfare agencies.
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VHSVHSVHSVHSVHS8 HOURS
CCCCCooooongrngrngrngrngreeeeessssssisisisisionononononal al al al al InquiInquiInquiInquiInquirrrrry video tapey video tapey video tapey video tapey video tapeInvestigating Abuse and Fraud by Child Protective Services, Foster Care and the Juvenile
Court System. Evidence presented during testimony before the Congressional Hearing held inSan Bernardino, lead to promise of official inquiries Into systematic fraud, “color of law”
civil rights violations, and abuse of power by child welfare agencies.
The video of the Congressional Inquiry is now available; theentire proceedings, uncut and unedited, for $25 includingshipping and handling. The tape you get will be over 7hours long and they are being recorded in EP mode. Thequality is fine for viewing, but are not intended forbroadcast purposes. By recording in EP mode, I couldmake the tapes affordable for everyone who wanted acopy of the presentation.
.Sorry, no longer available.
At the protest in Hollywood.
50
Monday, March 22, 2004At Ohio psychiatric centers,workers molested children,denied them food or gavethem alcohol and drugs.Some kids suffered brokenbones. Others lived in homesso dirty they urinated on thefloor by their beds.
Taxpayers shell out $160 to$1,000 a day for eachmentally ill child who lives inthese private treatmentcenters.
But a Cincinnati Enquirer investigation reveals that kidsdon’t always get the help they’re promised. Some strugglejust to survive.
“You have kids secluded, restrained and injured over andover again,” says Carolyn Knight, director of the OhioLegal Rights Service, a state-funded agency thatinvestigates how children are treated inside facilities.“It’s like Dante’s Inferno: ‘Abandon all hope, ye who enterhere.’”
Whether a child ends up in a troubled treatment center orone that helps is largely a gamble, state records andinterviews show. A review of the 10 largest facilitiesstatewide shows that conditions were so bad in the pastthree years that the government ordered three not toadmit new children and a fourth to stop putting kids inseclusion.
Yet with demand high and space short, county officialswho send more than 7,000 children into treatment eachyear say they place kids wherever they find an opening.These children include abuse victims, anorexic girls, teensex offenders and youths who repeatedly cut themselvesor are suicidal. Most are mentally ill. Some are as young as 3or 4.
Michael Hogan, director of the Ohio Department ofMental Health, acknowledges that some centers aretroubled, but says that most improved in the past fewyears after state inspectors cited them for failing toprotect kids.
“We’ve never found gross andwillful neglect. We havefound disturbing patterns ofproblems,” he says. “We’veworked to correct those.”Hogan says the state tries tohelp facilities change ratherthan shut them downbecause Ohio desperatelyneeds homes willing to takein the most difficult kids.“Any child being hurt isunacceptable, but when youask, what are the norms,there are no norms for what
is acceptable. Are we satisfied?” he says. “We’re neversatisfied, but I’d say we’re realistic about howcomplicated this is.”
Knight says the system is so complex that many familiescan’t figure out who’s in charge of watching over theirchildren, and many kids are sent to centers that can’t helpthem.
“We saw overworked, undertrained staff in very volatile,high-burnout situations,” Knight says. “Parents send theirchildren there thinking, ‘Johnny is going to get better, andsome day he’s coming home.’ But all too often they justend up back in another facility.”
Kids ‘deserve better’
Advocates say it’s difficult to find good care for mentally illchildren in Ohio because the state closed most of itsmental institutions in the late 1980s and early 1990s - andcreated few programs to replace them.
Ohio once operated 17 mental hospitals caring for morethan 20,000 children and adults. Today, the state runs ninehospitals caring for 1,100 adults - and no children.As a result, thousands of mentally ill kids seek help outsidestate institutions. But severe shortages persist, andchildren routinely wait three months or more just for anoffice visit with a psychiatrist.
Those who don’t get therapy, or turn violent, depressedor suicidal, often end up in Ohio’s privately run treatmentcenters. Twenty-two companies operate licensed centersin Ohio, providing 937 beds.
Abused, drugged and unprotectedMentally ill children suffer in state-paid centers
By Spencer Hunt and Debra JasperEnquirer Columbus Bureau
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“Residential treatment centers have kids that 10 years agowould have been in psychiatric hospitals,” explains PennyWyman, director of the Ohio Association of Child CaringAgencies. “We serve children who, if they don’t get help,end up homeless, in juvenile detention or prison.”
To be sure, not all treatment provided by centers issuspect. Many children live in well-maintained facilitieswith supportive, trained staff. They have access topsychiatrists, medication, group counseling and othercritical help.
But thousands of kids are caught in a system so confusingthat even officials in the state Department of MentalHealth and Department of Job and Family Servicesstruggle to explain how it works.
State officials don’t even track how many investigations ofabuse and neglect are done or their outcomes. At timesthe two departments argue over which agency shouldinspect which center.
With state oversight spotty and confounding, much of theburden for funding and operating the mental health caresystem falls to 88 different counties. As many as fiveagencies in one county might share responsibility for achild - who may be in treatment several counties away oreven out of state.
“For some kids, the practical effects of the licensingsystem can be devastating,” says a 2002 report by theOhio Legal Rights Service. “Families don’t know who isresponsible for their child or their child’s rights, andparents frequently aren’t told when their child has beenabused, injured or is ill.”
‘Blatant abuse’
Much of what happens inside facilities that house childrenis secret because of federal and state privacy laws. Butextensive interviews and an examination of stateinspection records, court documents and governmentstudies provide a glimpse into how the system works.For example, an inspector in the Mental HealthDepartment cited the Cleveland Children’s Aid Society in2002 for failing to report injuries to children, calling it“blatant abuse.”
The report also found that a worker grabbed and broke aboy’s right arm, the home was dirty, staff was poorlytrained and there was only one bathroom for 15 children sosome kids urinated in their bedrooms. The center alsofailed to show that it followed 14 state rules to care forchildren and keep them safe, the inspector said.“It was apparent from the documentation that staffaggravate daily situations which in turn escalateschildren,” the inspector wrote. “This has and will continueto result in injury to staff, ineffective mental healthtreatment, child injury and child abuse.”
Roberta King, chief executive officer of Children’s Aid, saysthe worker who broke a boy’s arm was suspended andretrained. She says the company corrected problems, butrestraints are sometimes necessary to keep children safe.“The Ohio Department of Mental Health, they don’t thinka child should be restrained at any time,” King says. “I quitefrankly think some folks at the mental health board needto spend a couple hours or a day at some of these facilitiesfor kids.”
‘A pincushion’
Mental health regulators also found serious problems atBelmont Pines Hospital in Youngstown, which they put onprobation for five months and banned from admitting anymore children.
The action came after Ohio Legal Rights Service wrote tothe state complaining that workers gave children toomany shots of powerful drugs to control their behaviors.“We are concerned about how frequently the facility usesemergency medication shots,” an April 2002 letter byagency worker Beth A. Oberdier said. “Our further concernis the use of Haldol and Thorazine on children.”A month later, Judy Jackson-Winston, a Cuyahoga CountyMental Health Board official, also complained thatBelmont Pines improperly drugged kids. She said onefather told her that his son and other children weresedated whenever they got upset.
“The treatment the father had in mind did not include hisson being used as a pincushion,” Jackson-Winston wrotethe Department of Mental Health. “He is concerned thatnearly every encounter ends with (his) son receiving ashot.”
Drugs commonly are used to treat mental illness. Andsometimes, even children need several strong drugsadministered at the same time, authorities say.But Patricia Goetz, a child psychiatrist with the state,wrote the Mental Health Department that themedications used on Belmont Pines children “have effectsthat last far longer than required for a patient to regainself control.”
Mental health department records show that BelmontPines, a 65-bed facility, changed its policies, and the statetook it off probation.
Officials at the home wouldn’t comment. But the facility’sparent company, Nashville-based Ardent Health Services,said in a statement that it’s committed to operating thehome according to state and federal regulations.Other centers also use powerful drugs to control children’sbehavior, according to a 2002 Legal Rights Service reviewof medical charts at four, unnamed centers.
The report found children as young as 10 on six differentkinds of psychotropic drugs at once, including an 8-year-
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old on eight medications that caused serious adverse sideeffects. It said most weren’t approved for use in children.In another case, a 13-year-old boy was given three shots ofHaldol and three shots of Ativan in one five-hour-period. A12-year-old girl, born addicted to crack cocaine andalcohol and sexually abused until she turned 3, was givensix shots of Thorazine, restrained by two or three men 31different times and put in seclusion 23 times during a nine-month period.
“These children aren’t combative anymore, they’re justdrugged out. They do well to just get out of bed,” saysKnight, the agency’s executive director.“Who can really fathom yet what the side effects are? Thecumulative effects of multi-meds and heavy doses can justgnaw away at a child’s life.”
No state action
Psychotropic medications aren’t the only drugs improperlygiven to children. At a treatment center in Parma, Ohio, apolice investigation two years ago found that a workergave kids laughing gas, Ecstasy and marijuana beforehaving sex with a 13-year-old girl and watching two otherkids have sex together.
Another former youth counselor, Michael Brown, 49, ofCleveland, got sexual favors from six boys at the center byletting them drink liquor, taking them on field trips, givingthem expensive gifts, or promising to adopt them.Brown and five other workers at Parmadale, a 48-bedtreatment center near Cleveland, were indicted on 110charges ranging from corruption of a minor to rape.
Four workers await trial, one was sentenced to six months’probation for importuning, and, in August, Brown pleadedguilty to kidnapping, gross sexual imposition andtampering with records. He was sentenced to eight yearsin prison.
One 17-year-old victim told Brown in court: “I thought youloved me, but you hurt me and some of my friends. You willno longer have control of me after today.”
Cuyahoga County, which pays Parmadale $2 million a yearto house its troubled children, stopped sending kids thereduring the investigation but started again last March afterthe company moved administrators and therapists intobuildings to better supervise children.
Child-welfare director Jim McCafferty says the countysteps in because it’s not always clear if or when the statewill take action. “It’s a disjointed system,” he says.
Kids at risk
Inspectors also put the Oak Ridge Treatment Center nearIronton on probation after determining the center housedyoung sex offenders with boys under 12.
When children complained they were being sexuallyabused, Oak Ridge couldn’t show it offered them medicalcare or treatment. State officials in 2001 also faulted OakRidge staff for taking away children’s belongings, includingtheir clothes, and for denying kids food, drinks and accessto the kitchen - except to clean it.
Oak Ridge’s director, Dr. W. Michael Dowdy, disputesclaims that his facility admitted child sex offenders. “Theseare issues that are behind us and that we’ve more thanadequately addressed,” Dowdy says. “We’ve never hadissues like that again.”
The state lifted the probation three months later after the75-bed facility said it created a new policy to handle andreport accusations of sex abuse, hired more workers andbetter trained them.
State officials also took action against a Springfieldtreatment center after getting complaints that it put kidsin a time-out room 134 times in a two-month period in2002 - and left them there for as long as nine hours.The state ordered the facility, Oesterlen Services forYouth, to stop the practice after Ohio Legal Rightsbrought it to officials’ attention.
Donald Warner, director of the 52-bed facility, says thehome opted to stop using time outs because it would costtoo much to remodel the rooms. He disputed the claim byOhio Legal Rights that some children spent hours in them.“Some of that had to do with our staff not filling out thepaperwork correctly,” Warner says.He says the issue looked more serious on paper than itactually was. “No one, to my knowledge, alleged thatOesterlen was ever mistreating kids.”
‘Short-changed’
Advocates for the mentally ill say kids and their families willcontinue to suffer until the state sets clear standards fortreatment and establishes a single state licensing body incharge of oversight.
Ohio Legal Rights has urged the state to better trackabuse and neglect, evaluate treatment centers and publishthe results. Under the current system, “Families are leftout, and kids are short-changed.”
Advocates like Gayle Channing Tenenbaum of the OhioPublic Children Services Association agree that childrenneed help now. “The system is unfair and wrong. Whatcould be worse for a family than to have a child who isabused, or who can’t get access to good treatment?” shesays.
“If I felt like some official at the state was agonizing orlosing sleep over this, I’d feel a lot better,” she adds. “Butright now, I just don’t think anybody is.”
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Prosecuting abuse and domestic violence will beharder after the Supreme Court’s affirmation ofthe right to face an accuser
03/11/04
ROBIN FRANZEN
One of the most defense-friendly U.S. Supreme Courtdecisions in years, underscoring the right to cross-examinewitnesses, could severely thwart the ability of prosecutorsto try certain sensitive cases of domestic abuse and childabuse.
Legal authorities were scrambling to decide the extent ofMonday’s ruling but said Wednesday that it could gutprosecution of cases in which victims often refuse totestify at trial — domestic violence being a prime example— and limit the use of co-defendants’ statements in theprosecution of other cases.
The 9-0 opinion potentially disallows hearsay evidencethat courts had increasingly allowed as exceptions duringthe past 25 years and boldly reinforces a defendant’s rightto confront witnesses under the Sixth Amendment of theU.S. Constitution.
“This decision will have a significant impact on criminalprosecution, no doubt,” said Kevin Neely, spokesman forthe Oregon attorney general’s office, which convened ameeting Wednesday to discuss the ruling’s effect.
Dana Forman, a criminal defense lawyer, considers thedecision in Crawford v. Washington to be the mostimportant ruling from the Supreme Court since the 1966Miranda decision in terms of preserving constitutionalrights for criminal defendants.
“I was blown away by the scope of the thing,” she said.The decision overturned an assault conviction againstMichael Crawford of Olympia, who stabbed a man hethought had tried to rape his wife. Crawford claimed self-defense, arguing the victim was going for a weapon whenhe was stabbed.
His wife, Sylvia, who was present at the time of theincident, did not testify at her husband’s trial, invokingmarital privilege. However, a judge said the prosecutioncould use her taped statement to police indicating thatthere was no weapon.
The Supreme Court ruled that the wife’s statement topolice was not admissible because the defense did not
have an opportunity to cross-examine her.In overturning the Washington Supreme Court on theCrawford case, the U.S. Supreme Court also abandoned itsown 1980 ruling, Ohio v. Roberts, that allowed a hearsaywitness statement if a judge found it trustworthy.
Inadequate under Sixth Amendment
Justice Antonin Scalia, who wrote Monday’s opinion, saidthat wouldn’t have been enough for the framers of theConstitution.
“Dispensing with confrontation because testimony isobviously reliable is akin to dispensing with jury trialbecause a defendant is obviously guilty,” Scalia wrote.“This is not what the Sixth Amendment prescribes.”
Previously, Oregon prosecutors handling domestic violenceand child abuse cases did not have an absolute obligationto produce a witness at trial, Neely said. Instead, theycould rely on statements those witnesses made to policeofficers if they were found to be reliable. Typically, indomestic violence cases, those statements had to bemade within 24 hours of the incident.
“Now, in those instances, (prosecutors) will not be able torely on the officer,” he said. “They’ll be required to producea witness.”
It was unclear Wednesday whether the Supreme Court’sruling would be retroactive. Prosecutors certainly hopenot. But they are concerned.
“We had a situation where the law was pretty settled thatthis was admissible,” said Norm Frink, chief deputy districtattorney for Multnomah County. “Now, I’m sure every sexabuser in the penitentiary is probably thinking they aregoing to get out.”
Oregon case already affected
Already, the Supreme Court ruling has caused an Oregoncriminal case to be dismissed.
When a domestic assault trial began Monday morningwithout the victim’s cooperation, a Multnomah Countyjudge ruled that hearsay statements against thedefendant were admissible. But that afternoon, after thehigh court’s ruling, Forman, who works for MultnomahDefenders Inc., successfully asked the judge to exclude thestatement. The case was dismissed.
Ruling on hearsay evidence guts cases
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The only way it can be reinstated, Forman said, is if thedistrict attorney compels the victim to testify by issuingan arrest warrant.
Although John Bradley, special counsel for the MultnomahCounty district attorney’s office, agreed the decision willmake prosecutors’ jobs harder, he cautioned that it mightnot be as broad as it appears on first reading.
Bradley said the opinion doesn’t affect many types ofevidence typically admitted at trial, including medicalreports or business records. He also said he expected itwould take years of litigation to sort out exactly whattype of evidence falls under Monday’s ruling.
Defense lawyer Larry Matasar said he thought the rulingwould, perhaps most importantly, prevent innocentpeople from being convicted.
“If you believe in the judicial system and the right ofconfrontation, it’s one of the bedrock principles,” he said.Although the ruling was unanimous, Chief Justice WilliamRehnquist dissented from overturning the court’s 1980decision that allowed some hearsay evidence. He said itwas crucial to deal with the unresolved questions raisedby the new ruling quickly.
“Thousands of federal prosecutors and the tens ofthousands of state prosecutors need answers,” he wrote.“They need them now, not months or years from now. . . .The parties should not be left in the dark in this manner.”
News researcher Kathleen Blythe contributed to thisreport. Reporter Robin Franzen: 503-221-8133;[email protected]
THE MISSING CHILD IS DANIEL SAWYER. HIS PHOTOAPPEARS ON THESE POSTERS. THE FOSTER MOM TOOKDANNY TO A PROFESSIONAL PHOTOGRAPHER. THETOTAL SADNESS ON DANNY’S IS SO REVEALING. HE HASLOST HIS SOUL, HIS HOPE. HIS EYES ARE BLANK.
DANNY’S GRANDFATHER HERB HAS EVIDENCE THAT CPSLIED. HE HAS A DOCUMENT FROM CPS SIGNED BY A SOCIALWORKER AND HER SUPERVISOR THAT STATES DANIEL ANDJACOB WERE BORN EXPOSED TO DRUGS FROM THE MOM.HERB HAS HOSPITAL AND LAB RECORDS SHOWING MOMAND BOTH CHILDREN WERE DRUG FREE. MOM WASBONDING WELL WITH THE CHILD.
YET, CPS TOOK DANIEL ON DAY SEVEN FROM THEHOSPITAL. MOM WAS NURSING; NURSE SAID SHE WASGOING TO TAKE DANNY TO WEIGH HIM; THEN, CPS TOOKDANNY FROM THE HOSPITAL. WHY IS IT LEGAL FOR CPS TOKIDNAP CHILDREN FROM PERFECTLY GOOD PARENTS? AREFEDERAL INCENTIVES MORE IMPORTANT TO CPS THANPRESERVING THE FAMILY UNIT? DANNY IS STILLSOMEWHERE IN FOSTER CARE AND IS NOW PROHIBITEDFROM SEEING HIS REAL PARENTS AND GRANDPARENTS.
LEGAL KIDNAPPING DESTROYS FAMILIES
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Where was the press when U.S. Sen. Orrin Hatch notedsimilarities between elements of the Patriot Act and childprotection laws and regulations that sidestepConstitutional safeguards for accused caretakers?
Where were the ACLU, First Amendment groups andhuman rights enthusiasts, some members of which withother groups and individuals raise alarms about secrecyprovisions of the Patriot Act? They were begged for yearsto step in, as they do for nearly anyone else, fortraumatized children and guiltless parents whose civilliberties were ignored.
Where are taxpayers, who pay all expenses ofgovernment, and health insurance policyholders, who paymore because accusers need money and medical covereven before a judge’s immunizing signature allows legal,open and financially beneficial trafficking in human flesh?
Where are the historians who, if they bother to lookat all, cannot miss the seeds of injury to bedrock individualliberty safeguards on which the nation was founded in“relaxing” child protective services (CPS) laws,regulations, policies and practices even during April’s ChildAbuse Prevention Month festivities?
Protection from Official Injury
What could be more traumatic to a child than to be ill,perhaps in the hospital seeking care or the essentialproper diagnosis, and to have police haul away loving anddutiful parents and impound the child with strangers?Those actions are dubbed respectively child “protection”and “foster care.”
These are the stories of most nations’ highest profilecases. Where there is a story behind the story of “mothermakes child ill for her satisfaction in getting attention,” itis rarely to never written. (See: http://www.freemarybethdavis.homestead.com )
There is a simple and traceable history—and historyrepeats itself with regard to a supply of children and ademand for them—that helps explain how easily how TheMondale Act or CAPTA (Child Abuse Prevention andTreatment Act) of the mid 1970s led to the June 17, 1980passage of Public Law 96-272 that gave a nod to“reasonable efforts” toward family preservation.
That the late Dave Thomas and other adoptionenthusiasts were able to succeed in the November 1997enactment of ASFA (the Adoption and Safe FamiliesAct) that legalized faster taking and reallocating of child
claimed to be abused or neglected—and siblingsthereafter immediately from the delivery room—is nosurprise to one who follows the logical progression.
With ASFA in place and CAPTA’s successor appropriationbills passed, usually enlarged annually, it was no problemto have each state put a CIP (court improvement project)in place so that legally it is possible to do what isConstitutionally and morally impermissible.
”Legal” and Extraconstitutional
While the general public assumes any caretaker accused“must have done something” or the purse and sword ofgovernment through local agents would not come downon the family, day care provider or baby-sitter, it is realitythat third party financially interested hearsay—with noobjective or producible backup—may be accepted as“evidence” in “relaxed” lower or family courts.
Some states, claiming better efficiency, economy andeffectiveness, have done away with the lowest courts,instead combining their work so that a person wronglyaccused is unlikely ever to have a day in a court open toactual evidence of innocence. The appeal, if there is heartand money to persist, will be “on the record” that theaccusing agency has created.
That record often is withheld from an accused while anyother proceeding occurs, leaving the person to face theworst presumptions of each venue against an accusedwithout access to documents that could clear thematter. The lose-lose situation only benefits accusers, notthe child, family, Justice or taxpayers.
Orrin Hatch noted some time ago that accused parentshave long been familiar with major features of what civillibertarians note about similar aspects of Patriot I and IIand such proposals for protection.
They include hearsay evidence, documents withheld, usualdiscouragement to seek legal representation, as well asdocument suppression. They also usually involve actingfirst and obtaining support, if ever, later or decliningto investigate exculpatory claims or evidence.
Paper Orphans Available
For whatever reason—and for some in influential positionsit has been obtaining infants and children for adoption,preferring to believe they truly must have been abused orneglected or they would not have been make PaperOrphans by a judge’s pen—the reason is highly personal.
”R e l a x i n g”Liberty Protection for Child Abuse and Terror Attack
Prevention for ”Our” Children and Nation
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The U.S. Supreme Court stays as far away from theseconstitutional issues as possible. Its shameful DeShaneydecision was more than enough.
For many, from publishers and producers as wellas accountants and attorneys representingmedia interests, reasons have also beenpecuniary: “Why risk annoying or angering theadvertising or reading or viewing public bysuggesting we have doubts about any of thechild abuse or neglect accusations?”.
In the meantime the public, some easily whipped intoemotion by a belief—no matter how easily disproved whenmedia will not examine or explain what science andcommon sense offer obviously—hate and want to stringup anyone suspected or accused of any hint of hurt to achild, especially an ill one.
That brings us to current awareness in England and NewZealand (while Australian and American professionalscontinue to benefit from belief over reality and hope theMSP myth will persist) that UK’s Roy Meadow’s motivationtheory of Munchausen Syndrome by Proxy really is thescientifically baseless notion this writer has advised all ofthe above (as an investigative reporter, accused andcleared mother, family justice advocate) for more than twodecades.
Funding Known Mistakes
Still funded by Justice Department educationappropriations and hiring presenters from a groupcomposed of self-styled experts whose methods andprior testimony destroyed lives of innocents in fields of sexabuse, MSP and ”shaken baby syndrome” (SBS), perhaps itis small wonder little has changed, except for the worse,while outmoded baseless theories and practices areofficially sanctioned and taught to CPS workers, policeand others.
”Confidentiality” that covers the false accusers andgovernment agents effecting the errors under color of lawis usually the first hurdle. First Amendment groups, whileoverlooking responsibility to vigorously cover CPS’sextraconstitutional procedures and practices, fight formedia’s right to information it wants but give mute mediaa pass. In not exposing the Constitutional, both state andfederal, disconnect media fails to protect never abusedchildren and wrongly accused caretakers from havingreputations destroyed and family ties legally dis-membered.
In UK members of Parliament are openly delving in todecades of injury to constituents whose children havebeen removed and adopted out primarily fromflawed expert testimony totally accepted by the courts.Oooops, now members of Parliament are told they may bebreaching the 1989 Children Act by discussing
anything at all related to confidential matters involvingchildren. Frustrated representatives are seeing the lightAmerican legislators have avoided. Like mute media, thosewho stand for election don’t want seem “soft on childabuse” or offend those many child (as contrasted withfamily) advocacy groups.
No one wants to be “soft on crime,” but so often inhealth-based confusion (or doctors silencing a parent’snotice of mistaken and iatrogenic treatment or a divorce-custody ploy) there is public perception of a “crime” ifa child is suspected to have been hurt minus the accused’sBill of Rights protection that serial killers will have.
Children Pay As Adults
Whether through extraconstitutional CPS procedures orPatriot Act ”relaxing” of liberty safeguards, children somedescribe as “ours” (as they justify taking and reallocatingthem) inhabit the same legal and moral climate as thosewho change its law landscape and nature.
If every child, turned adult at 18 with decades of life ahead,is equally subject to a false allegation, minus Bill of Rightsprotections, if hearsay is evidence and actual innocence,common sense, Constitutional safeguards, objectivemedical documentation cannot clear an officially tarnishedname—and taxpayers continue paying all while mediadeclines to tell the whole truth—how valuable is America’s“relaxed” way of purported child protection?
When we trade liberty for safety—either for emotivesuspicions of groundless abuse claims or go overboard inpresumed patriotism—it may be (and worse) thanBenjamin Franklin opined in 1759: “They that can give upessential liberty to obtain a little temporary safetydeserve neither liberty nor safety.”
The “we” willing to give it up for apparent safety andprotection is nearly never the same “we” who suffers theinjuries that risky move. “Erring on the side of the child”has failed too many children with clear evidence ofrepeated injury. It is past time to “air” on the side of thechild, air the whole and basic problem with letting localagents create their own law and juvenile courts tocontinue operating as, in 1899, admittedlyunconstitutional.
MSP & SBS in UK
During Child Abuse Prevention Month it will put history inperspective and make the nation safer for children ifAmerican media look across the pond to see how MSP isgoing down because of belated press coverage andattention in Parliament. At the same time SBS is exposedcurrently in the British Medical Journal (bmj.com) as it waspreviously at the March 2003 International Conference ofNCADRC (falseallegation.org) by four independentresearchers.
57
Connecting the dots of history, Constitutional safeguards,child abuse protection and “relaxing” liberty prescriptionsagainst international terror attacks are basic for allactions taken under color of law and financiallysupported by taxpayers and in the names and by thefinances of citizens.
Hundreds and thousands have realized belated that theyfunded their own family’s destruction and had nowhere toturn. The Attorney General is each State’s top protectorbut also the lawyer for the offending agencies. That dualjob—interest conflict as CPSprotects children and preservesfamilies with competinginterests—creates a kind ofschizoid duty few handle well.
Sure all those upset and nowchildless and/or jobless peoplesay they are innocent; “they allsay that.” Those in the militarywho swore also to defend theirhomeland against domesticenemies have nowhere to turnwhen gunsare turned against them inmistaken suspicion of childabuse or neglect in their ownhomes.
Media has remained largelymute on the big picture, pastinjustice and futureimplications of America’s toooften misguided and alsocleverly and selfishly guidedcostly child protectionprograms creating giganticfuturefinancial liability for now silent taxpayers.
Pay Now or More Later
A recent example of what silence will cost taxpayers is inCalifornia’s Alameda County’s removal and return of twinsons (April 2000 and June 2001) on alleged emotionalabuse without the warrant Americans assume is drawnwith reasons clearly stated. Not only does a consentdecree have taxpayers, usually local property owners,paying $400,000 for offending government agents’constitutional errors but the twins, now 11, are suing thepublic defender for malpractice.
Across the nation, children who have come of age and will,even if their parents are prevented by the passage of timefrom seeking redress of serious grievances against unjustgovernment actions, seek some kind of repayment for lossof time with their natural families. Cases in which evidenceof innocence always was available but ignored, offending
agents have no case so taxpayers get hosed.
Perhaps if the reporter-mother-writer of this release hadnot lived out 1983 suspicions that culminated in MSPallegations against her, she would have remained part ofthe wrongly angry or indifferent public.
Perhaps if she had not experienced the March 30, 1984hospital ambush and 76-day loss of children affected incommon by a vaccination reaction she pointed out todoctors she would not see the April 1 kickoff date for Child
Abuse Prevention Month withconcern for innocents withconfusingly ill children.
For sure she would not bewriting “The Myth ofMunchausen Syndrome byProxy and Other F.I.B.S.(factitious illness bysuspicion)” or work in TheSpirit of ’76, never forgettingthe surreal year of 1984, asOrwellian as the book of itsname.
British research Dr. CliveBaldwin’s research on thenarrative, as applied to thecounterbalancing storyaccused MSP (MSbP) motherstry to tell, shows thatmothers’ stories have nostanding and are usuallyautomatically discounted ifsought, heard or consideredat all.
By silencing mothers, whether with the original vindictive,retaliatory or mistaken MSP label, or parents or caretakerswith the SBS claim frequently associated withimmunization schedules, by silencing members ofParliament in UK, by having a mostly mute media inAmerica (for many reasons), by local CPS agenciesclaiming “confidentiality” even after families signreleases to shine light on their stories, by anti-FirstAmendment court orders for accuseds to stay quiet at thecost of their kids, a lot of people have loosely cooperatedto prevent documenting the abuses of Child AbusePrevention.
Anyone relaxed about what happens when the Bill ofRights remains in the hall—when suspicion rules andscience and common sense are strangers to CPSpractices and court findings—may want to check withSen. Hatch and someone who’s watched with the eyes ofan investigative reporter...from the inside andout.
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Lola Osborne sits at a desk surrounded by mountains ofpaperwork. Voluminous copies of federal laws and reportson how “the system,” as she refers to it, has failed childrenand the people who take care of them are piled in stacks.Books and newspaper clippings add to the clutter.
She adjusts her black-rimmed glasses on her nose as sherifles through the papers, pointing out items of particularinterest. A book with a photo on the cover of her posingwith her granddaughter, Cynthia Rose, catches her eye.
Osborne, an affluent women with no criminal history orrecord of drug abuse, is not allowed to see Cynthia, now 5,because Child Protective Services, a division of theRiverside County Department of Public Social Services,has refused her visitation rights.
Osborne says she cannot sit back and watch what hashappened to her family happen to others, and has spentthe last couple years educating herself on every facet ofthe system she says so miserably failed her.
She has filed a lawsuit against Riverside County in federalcourt, alleging that social workers and other officials inthe department lied, presented false evidence andmanipulated the situation to keep Cynthia out of herhome, according to the lawsuit.
The lawsuit alleges that county Social Service employeeswillfully and maliciously disregarded Osborne’s rights as agrandmother.
”(Child Protective Services) offered me money to takeCynthia, and I refused, so they said I would never see thatchild,” Osborne said. “They gave my granddaughter to afoster mom.”
The foster mother has since adopted Cynthia.
Hard situation
Cynthia Rose, whose last name is being withheld toprotect her identity, came to stay with Osborne becauseher son, Cynthia’s dad, had been in jail and had a history ofdrug abuse. Cynthia’s mom was homeless, and also useddrugs, she said. Osborne took care of her granddaughterfor about four months before Child Protective Servicestook the child and put her in foster care.
Osborne, along with members of a support group for localgrandparents raising grandchildren, and a governmentwatchdog organization have petitioned the governor’soffice to investigate the state Department of Public SocialServices and its county subsidiaries, including Riverside’s.
They say the system is filled with corruption, that itprotects case workers who have abused their power, takesadvantage of federal incentives for placing children withfoster families, and often works in secrecy, refusing to letpeople closest to child custody cases know what’s goingon.
Further, they say children who have entered the systemhave gone missing or are now dead, and that the agencyshould account for these children so those involved in theirabductions or responsible for their murders can beprosecuted.
The people behind the complaints all come from variedbackgrounds. Doris Adams is a retired sheriff’s deputy forthe Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department. CindyGrimes has held various positions, including owning herown business. Laura Koepke is president of GovernmentWatch, a national organization that keeps tabs on federal,state and county agencies and advocates for people whohave been victims of government abuse.
Taking action
They all have various personal reasons for embarking onthis cause, but one thing binds them: they say ChildProtective Services has failed children, the very people itwas created to protect. It is not relatives who are mostharmed by this agency, or need the most protection, theysay. This cause is about children.
Over the last several weeks, the group has gone to thegovernor’s Riverside office and several state legislators’offices with pages of recommendations on how to fixwhat they call a nationwide problem.
Koepke has studied hundreds of cases involving CPSagencies nationwide, and says she’d like to see theseagencies shut down because they do far more harm thangood.
She recently sent a two-page letter to Gov. ArnoldSchwarzenegger, calling for him to investigate theCalifornia Department of Social Services.
She also asked that all county CPS departments in thestate, judges, attorneys and private contractors whoclaim to provide protective services to children be lookedinto, and audits be performed on agencies that receivefederal and state funding.
County response
Riverside County’s social services department handles6,600 cases in the Child Protective Services program and
Last modified Saturday, May 8, 2004 9:50 PM PDT
Group fights for change in Child Protective ServicesBy: KELLY BRUSCH - Staff Writer
North County Times, serving San Diego and Riverside Counties, California
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receives, on average, 3,043 referrals per month, accordingto the department’s Web site. The department placeschildren in foster care, with relatives or other caregivers,depending on parents’ circumstances and a variety ofother factors.
Dennis Boyle, director of Riverside County social services,declined to be interviewed, but said in a writtenstatement that the department makes every effort to getrelatives involved in caring for children in the foster caresystem. About 50 percent of the children placed are givento relatives when they cannot stay in their own home, hesaid.
”We believe in accountability,” Boyle wrote. “RiversideCounty has opened itself to audit by the Child WelfareLeague of America three times in the past nine years. Werecognize no system is perfect and we work continually todiscover what is not working with our systems andimprove it.”
Doris Adams, who leads a grandparents-raising-grandchildren support group out of Sun City, along withseveral others, met with Larry Grable, a representative ofSchwarzenegger’s office earlier this month. She also hasmet with representatives of Assemblymen John Benoit andRuss Bogh to plead the cases of children she says are beingabused by the system.
”The government needs to get out of the child-raising business —— they are not good at it,” shesaid. “When the government decided they knew moreabout child-rearing than the parents did, this is why wehave the mess we have today.”
Adams is hopeful that her pleas for change will not fall ondeaf ears and says she will continue to talk with legislatorsand others in positions of power until she is heard.
Grable said he did not have any specific recommendationsbecause he only recently met with the women. However, hesaid some of their personal stories have piqued hisinterest, and the issue deserves to be looked into.
He said California Performance Review, an initiativepreviewed in the governor’s budget summary that willinvestigate waste and injustice throughout the state,could look into CPS and the complaints the women havelevied. The review seeks to reorganize and reform stategovernment to be more responsive to the public.
”I’m getting inundated on these calls in Riverside and SanBernardino counties,” Grable said. “I’d like to try and findsomeone who will investigate these issues.”
’You can’t get them back’
Grimes, 54, who is currently raising her five grandchildren,says she has dealt with CPS more than she cares toremember. When she took on the first two of herdaughter’s children, Mattie, 1, and Jeri, 2, a social workertold her if she didn’t adopt the children, the agency would
take them immediately. Grimes would have lost money shedesperately needed to take care of the babies if she hadadopted them, she said.
”CPS comes in, and the grandparent or relative goesthrough all kinds of background checks and they place thekids with you, and six months down the line, they decidethey want to adopt this child out,” Grimes said. “OnceCPS takes them away, you can’t get them back.”
Grimes immediately got on the phone and called statesenators, assemblymen and her local county supervisor’soffice. A regional manager from CPS eventually called herand said the agency wouldn’t be taking the children.
”I just keep hearing more about relatives who keep losingtheir babies,” she said. “It really has nothing to do with therelative, it has to do with the child. ... What is this doing tothe children?”
Failed laws
The women say laws that originally were created toprotect children and create incentives for people to takethem into their homes are not being followed, or are beingmisinterpreted.
According to a provision of the Adoption andSafe Families Act of 1997, states are to receivebonuses for increasing the number of childrenadopted in the foster care system over theprevious year. The act gives states between $4,000 and$6,000 per foster child who is adopted. Critics say the lawwas created to aid the adoptions of children difficult toplace, but in reality, they say, it encourages countiesto remove children from relatives in order to getthe incentives.
Osborne’s federal lawsuit against Riverside County alsoalleges that county officials removed her granddaughterwithout a warrant, without a hearing and withoutjustification, according to the lawsuit.
She also claims social services employees fabricatedevidence against her and her son, and falsely claimed incourt that Cynthia had been sexually abused, even thoughno evidence of such abuse existed, according to thelawsuit.
Osborne said she doesn’t know what precedent might beset if she prevails; however, she is seeking a case plan, orcomprehensive report on Cynthia’s situation, andmonetary damages.
”You get numb,” Osborne says with a sigh. “You can onlyfight so long.”
But Osborne is not ready to give up. Too many children’slives are at stake, she says.
Contact staff writer Kelly Brusch at (909) 676-4315, Ext. 2626, [email protected]://www.nctimes.com/articles/2004/05/09/news/californian/21_39_045_8_04.txt
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Many citizens in our great State of Michigan are unawareof Michigan’s dirty little secret that falls under the guise ofthe Child Abuse and Child Welfare Protection Laws. Theadvertisements and literature surrounding this areaseem to be doing a magnificent thing for the childrenof our state. We have been led to believe that theState of Michigan is saving thousands of childrenfrom severe physical abuse and neglect. This isfar from the truth.
The truth is that this campaign is a giantmoney machine fueled by abuse of power ofsupervisors and case service workersemployed by the Michigan Department ofFamily Independence Agency (FIA) andprivate agencies that have contractedwith FIA that we the tax payers are payingdearly for through our hard earned taxdollars. “Basically it is make work bycreating a case and keep your job orcontract with the state government.” Thecurrent campaign to save the children isdoing just the opposite. Parents andchildren are result of abuse of power in thename of more state and federal funding.
I have been working extensively in thisarea of law for approximately twoyears. All of the cases that I am working on do not involvechildren suffering from broken bones, bruises or starvation.In fact, most of the cases that I am involved in regardparents that merely spanked their children by giving thechildren one or two swats on the clothed behind, parentswho have physically defended themselves from a physicallyviolent teenager, parents who argued in front of theirchildren, recently divorced single parents, parents with lowincomes, parents who have failed to take their child to adoctor for mere cold symptoms such as sniffles and mildcongestion, or parents who owned pornographicmaterials stored in a safe place where the children brokeinto and viewed the materials.According to FIA, the present state of law is that:
1) Parents cannot spank their child. Spanking, even withclothes covering the bottom, is severe physical abuse.Parents are only to use time out, reasoning and loss ofprivileges.
2) Parents cannot engage in physical self defense toprotect themselves from a physically hostile teenager. Anact of self defense by a parent is severe physical and
emotional abuse. Parents are to use reasoning, timeout and loss of privileges only and must sacrifice
their physical safety for their violentteenager’s safety.
3) Parents cannot argue or talk about adultsubjects, such as family finances, in front oftheir children. These are subjects that thechild has no control over and creates extremeemotional distress in the child. FIA hasclassified this area as emotional orenvironmental abuse and/or neglect of thechild.
4) Parents with low income are neglecting theirchildren’s basic needs.Low income parents cannot provide for theproper medical, physical or emotional needs of
their children due to their limited income. Theparents’ failure to obtain middle income jobs
means environmental, medical and emotionalneglect.
5) Parents that fail to take their child to thefamily physician for colds, flu, sniffles and
mild congestion, or parents who fail to obtain a familypediatrician are neglecting the medical needs of theirchildren. FIA has classified this as medical neglect.
6) Parents who own pornographic materials, such asmagazines, books, video tapes, and conceal suchmaterials from their children have created environmentaland emotional neglect of their children. Parents who ownand hide such material run the risk that children will findthese material and view them causing emotional harm totheir children. FIA has classified this as environmentalneglect.
7) Divorced, single parent families seem to be targeted byFIA as high risk environments for emotional andenvironmental neglect. Most single parent families are lowincome and of course, according to FIA, cannot provide forthe basic needs of the children as measured against middleincome standards.
Child Abuse and Child Welfare Protection Laws
THE FIA GAMEBy Janet M. Frederick
Attorney and Counselor at LawFebruary 3, 2004
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Single parents work outside of the home, leaving theirchildren unattended or with “inappropriate care takers”(neighbors, older siblings, grandparents, relatives) causingenvironmental and emotional neglect of the child. Singleworking parents are unable to clean their homes“appropriately” and leave their homes cluttered,disorganized, and untidy (i.e. beds unmade, dirty clotheson floors or hampers, dirty dishes in the sink frombreakfast, unswept or unvacuumed floors and carpets,etc.) which the family must return to in the afternoon orevening that is classified as environmental neglect.Basically, single parents tend more to their needs (i.e.working outside of the home) that to the needs of theirchildren which is classified as emotional and environmentalneglect.
Ironically, FIA complies a list of single parent householdsfrom the Friend of the Court, sends prevention workers tothe homes of such families and initially offers the familiesfree, voluntary services through their prevention program.Such services include free parenting classes, free nutritionprograms, free household budgeting programs, freeemployment training programs, and WIC.
The social workers in these programs compile informationon the family and home for FIA. Basically, when you allowthese workers to enter your lives and your home, you areallowing FIA to build a PS (Protective Services) recordagainst you for child neglect which leads to further childprotective proceedings in the Probate/Family Court whichwill ultimately result in the removal of your children and thechildren being placed in foster care. These workers are nothired to help you, they are hired to make a case of childneglect against you.
Why are families being targeted by FIA. Most people havethe misconception that concerned citizens report childneglect and abuse. This is untrue! A small percentage ofmy cases involve reports of neglect and abuse fromneighbors, family members, friends and school officials. Infact, the majority of my cases involved the family receivingsome form of voluntary services from FIA, such as the freeprograms listed above. In the majority of cases, schoolofficials, such as teachers and counselors, never suspectedchild abuse or neglect in the families that were prosecuted.Moreover, in most cases the family physicians neversuspected child abuse or neglect in the familiesprosecuted. Families are targeted because FIA must justifyits need for State and Federal grants to keep its workersemployed.
Currently, FIA receives, in Federal grants, $2,000 to $4,000per month per child in foster care and $10,000 per childadopted out into permanent homes after the parent’srights have been terminated due to neglect and abuse.The State of Michigan provides matching funds to FIA. BillClinton recently signed new legislation providing for anadditional $2,000 to $4,000 per month per child in fostercare and $10,000 for adoption. FIA is making money hand
over fist through our tax dollars. FIA social workers receivebonuses for removing children from their homes and foradoption. The incentive for abuse of power is extremelyhigh and has occurred at alarming rates.
During 1996, Clare County removed 50% of the children inthe county for neglect and abuse in the home. It is veryhard to comprehend that 50% of the parents in ClareCounty are neglecting and abusing their children. ClareCounty is a “demonstration county” that is a pilot countyfor The Binsfield Laws supported by Federal Grants. Theseprograms involve privatizing the foster care system. Thefoster care program hires private industry to service thefoster care needs of the county children removed from thehome.
Currently, Eagle Village in Hersey, Michigan holds thefoster care contract for Clare County FIA.How does the system work? FIA initially offers familiesfree, voluntary services through prevention services to thefamilies on the FOC (Friend of the Court files, AFDC files,Employment Security Commission files, Social Securityfiles, etc.) such as free parenting classes, free nutritionprograms, free homemaker services, free budgetingclasses, free employment training programs, etc. Theprevention worker works closely with the family tocoordinate these free services by meeting with the familyin their home on a regular basis, once or twice per week.
While working with the family, the worker identifiesproblems areas that put the children at risk for abuse andneglect so as to qualify the family for these free services,such as poor parenting skills, homemaker skills, budgetingskills, and employment seeking skills.
The flip side of this arrangement is that the worker isbuilding a case of neglect and abuse against the parents.Most problems identified are lack of bonding with thechildren and nurturing due to the parents’ participation inthese free programs. Basically, the parents are puttingtheir needs before the children’s needs by focusing on theirproblems as identified in their participation in theseprograms. Furthermore, workers in these programs work intandem with FIA to identify other risk factors such as poorparenting skills, why else would a parent take a freeparenting class if they themselves have admitted to havingpoor parenting skills. Voluntarily entering into theseprograms is an actual admission to poor parenting,nutrition, homemaker, budgeting, or employment seekingskills that put the child at risk for neglect and abuse thatlay the foundation for child protective proceedings in theProbate/Family Court.
The Courts believe that the FIA workers are theprofessionals and take their word as gold. The parentscannot defend against FIA. The testimony and statementsmean nothing in the Probate/Family Court. In fact theCourt can issue an emergency pick up order for thechildren based on only FIA’s statements in an ex-partehearing conduct by the judge and the FIA worker.
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The parents are not present during these hearings. TheCourt will issue an ex-parte emergency order allowing theFIA work to enter the home or child’s school to remove thechild from the parents custody. The parents do get ahearing approximately two weeks later after the removalof the child but FIA is only required to prove that probablecause exists that the children are at risk of neglect andabuse if they remain in the home.
Approximately 90 days later the parents may have a trialto determine whether by a preponderance of the evidencethat the children are at risk to abuse or neglect if they arereturned to the home. Most parents plea to abuse orneglect upon FIA’s promise that if the parents plea andengage in services they will get their children back sooner.
Most parents plea to charges that they have a temper,they have beaten their children by merely spanking them,they have failed to provide the child with medicalattention when they had cold symptoms, or they areunable to provide for the basic needs of the child becausethey are temporarily unemployed. The Court then takesjurisdiction over the children, places them in foster careand orders the parents to follow the Parent/AgencyAgreement to be drafted by FIA. FIA then engages in alengthy and vague process of ordering the parents toengage in specific services, such as individual counseling,parenting classes again, anger management classes andcounseling, psychological evaluations, drug and alcoholtesting, classes and counseling, etc. Once parentscomplete these services, FIA informs the parents, usuallyduring a court proceeding that they have not dealt withthe proper issues in these programs that initially led to theremoval of the children or the parents have notsatisfactorily completed the programs because they willnot or are not mentally able to comprehend their actionsand the affect of their actions that have harmed theirchildren. It is a no-win situation. FIA is in complete controlof the interpretation of whether the parents havesuccessfully completed the Parent/Agency Agreement.
Furthermore, if the parents elect to participate in FIA’sservices with their hired agencies, then the parents neversuccessfully complete the Parent/Agency Agreement.
These agencies are FIA’s hired hands that build a caseagainst the parents. If the parents elect to engage inservices provided by professionals of their choice orreferred by their HMO or other health care providers, thenthe parents must pay enormous amount of money forthese services and for these professionals to come tocourt on their behalf to testify. More importantly, theCourt views parents hired witnesses as hired hands anddiscounts any testimony given by these professionals asbeing adversarial, unbelievable and hired hands of theparents. FIA and some of the Court have gone as far asaccusing the parents of failing to comply with the Parent/Agency Agreement by engaging their own professionalsfor service which has been deemed grounds for
termination of parental rights. It is a no win situation thatfails to focus on the best interest of the child.
During this whole process, Department of FIA is raking inthe Federal and State grants to support its preventive,protective, and foster care programs.
These are our tax dollars at work and are beingmisappropriated and wasted to create a foster care andadoption industry in our state. I am not arguing that thereare never cases of child abuse or neglect in this state.There are real case of such that must be meet with theproper social nets. But our current system is froth withabuse of power and waste of precious tax dollars that hascreated false child abuse and neglect cases for thepurpose of creating employment for social workers andprivate industries providing foster care services,counseling agencies that provide individual therapy andpsychological evaluations, and community educationprograms that provide anger management and parentingclasses. All of these agencies are funded by our tax dollarswhich are being wasted on parents who are only less thanperfect and children who are not abused or neglected inthe legal sense.
Furthermore, all parents are court ordered to pay childsupport to the foster parents through the Friend of Courtfor the care of their children while in foster care. Parentspay on an average of $25.00 to $30.00 per week per childif FIA is providing the foster care family through it countyagency. Parents pay approximately $150.00 to $2,000 permonth if a private agency is hired by FIA to provide fostercare services. Nobody is sure where this money goes onceit is paid to the Friend of the Court.
The system of FIA needs to be restructured to make itworkers accountable for their actions. Presently, FIAworkers have complete immunity from civil actions in theState of Michigan unless a parent can prove that a workerwas grossly negligent in the performance of his or herduties. Unfortunately this is impossible to prove. If a parentpleas or the Probate Court finds that its has jurisdictionover the child for neglect and abuse, FIA continues to havejurisdiction over the child and ultimately terminates theparents rights, this will bar any suit against the FIA workerunder the immunity doctrine.
Once your child is in the system, FIA and its social workersare not accountable for the worker’s actions. Their word isgold and the courts accept the workers word as gold. Theonly recourse a parent has is to appeal the Probate/FamilyCourt’s decision, which is very expensive. Most of myparents spend approximately $10,000 to $20,000 indefending against FIA in child protection cases, even whenthey plea. Most of my parents end up losing their homes,vehicles, jobs because of court appearances andengagement of professional services, and savings. Most ofmy parents are forced into bankruptcy.
● YOU PUT 97,000 CHILDREN IN FOSTER CARE INCALIFORNIA, AND MORE THAN HALF SHOULDHAVE NEVER BEEN TAKEN IN THE FIRST PLACE.
● YOU KEEP KIDS IN FOSTER CARE TO ENDURESTARVATION, SEX, ABUSE, DEATH, RAPE, ANDVIOLENCE.
● YOU STRIP NON-ABUSIVE PARENTS OF THEIRPARENTAL RIGHTS IN ORDER TO FILL QUOTASAND REAP FEDERAL INCENTIVES!
● YOU RUBBER-STAMP EVERY CPS REQUEST TOKEEP A CHILD IN FOSTER CARE, GROUP HOMESAND EVENTUALLY PUT UP FOR ADOPTION.
● YOU MADE A RULING THAT A PARENT ISINNOCENT AND NON-ABUSIVE AND KEEP THEIRCHILD IN FOSTER CARE ANYWAY.
● YOU HOLD ILLEGAL HEARINGS, NOT GIVINGPARENTS THEIR DUE PROCESS RIGHTS,CAUSING THEM TO LOSE THEIR CHILDREN.
● YOU IGNORE ALL CONSTITUTIONAL RIGHTS OFPARENTS AND THEIR CHILDREN.
● YOU, COUNTY COUNSEL, FOSTER AND GROUPHOMES, COURT APPOINTED ATTORNEYS, ANDTHERAPISTS ARE ALL IN BED TOGETHER.
YOU KNOW YOU’RE A CORRUPTJUVENILE COURT JUDGE IF:
● YOU SENTENCE EVERYONE TO THERAPY ANDANGER MANAGEMENT, WHEN YOU AND CPSSOCIAL WORKERS COULD USE IT THE MOST!
● YOU CONSPIRE TO KEEP CHILDREN AWAY FROMTHEIR NON-ABUSIVE INNOCENT PARENTS FORTHE MAXIMUM TIME, NEVER EVEN CONSIDERINGREUNIFICATION.
● YOU HIDE BEHIND CPS CORRUPTION, FRAUD,MALICE, AND LIES, PRETENDING IT’S IN A CHILDSBEST INTEREST!
● YOU LET EVERY CASE YOU HAVE GO BEYONDTHE FEDERAL MANDATED TIMELINES FORCOMPLETION.
● YOU LET CPS DELIVER CASE PLANS WELLAFTER THE 30 DAY DEADLINE, AND PRETEND ITIS LEGAL & ETHICAL.
● YOU CONTINUALLY LET CPS PLACE PARENTS ONTHE CHILD ABUSE CENTRAL INDEX (33,000 AYEAR IN CALIFORNIA) WITHOUT BEINGCHARGED, STANDING TRIAL, OR BEINGCONVICTED OF ABUSE.
● YOU LAUNDER MONEY THROUGH A SLUSH FUNDFOR YOUR OWN SPECIAL INTERESTS.
● YOU LET CPS ABDUCT CHILDREN WITHOUT AWARRANT, WITH NO THREAT OF ABUSE ORIMMINENT DANGER!
● YOU PURPOSELY WILL NOT LET A PARENT TALKIN COURT FOR OVER A YEAR, WHILE THEIRCHILDREN LINGER IN FOSTER CARE, BEINGABUSED WITH DRUGS, SEX, RAPE, STARVATIONVIOLENCE AND EVEN DEATH.
● YOU LET HEARSAY ALLEGATIONS, FALSIFIEDRECORDS AND TAINTED TESTIMONY STAND ASFACT!
● YOU ENCOURAGE CPS TO ALLOW CHILDREN TOBE DRUGGED, BRIBED, COERCED, FORCED ANDBRAINWASHED TO MAKE FALSE STATEMENTS OFABUSE ABOUT THEIR PARENTS, USING CPS RUNCAC CENTERS AND STATE FUNDED THERAPISTS.
● YOU ALLOW CPS TO RECOMMEND THERAPISTS,ATTORNEYS, AND DOCTORS THAT WORK FORTHEIR OWN INTERESTS, AND PRETEND IT’S INTHE BEST INTEREST OF THE CHILD.
● YOU WILL NOT ALLOW A PARENT TO PRESENTEVIDENCE AND TESTIMONY THAT WOULD PROVETHEY ARE INNOCENT OF ALL CHARGES AGAINSTTHEM!
● YOU ALLOW A FOSTER CHILD TO REMAIN IN AFOSTER HOME WITH PROVEN, DOCUMENTEDCASES OF NUMEROUS LICENSE VIOLATIONS,AND SUBSTANTIATED ABUSE CHARGES.
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NATIONAL ADVISORY ON ORGANIZED CRIME OPERATINGIN THE CHILD PROTECTION SYSTEM
The recent horror story of afifteen-month delay in Floridaofficials discovering that foster childRilya Wilson had apparently beenkidnapped by persons knowledgeableof the inner workings of the childprotection system was due to thesystematic falsification of child protectionsystem records. This falsification of childprotection system records is part of a nationalpattern of organized crime. It is not anisolated incident.
The Rilya Wilson case is the tip of a criminaliceberg. Beginning about 1973, criminalelements in the mental health and socialwork professions began cooperating toconstruct an organized criminalenterprise that exploits children behindthe legislated secrecy of the childprotection, juvenile justice, and mentalhealth systems. The contemporary endresult is a nationwide organized criminal operationthat uses everything from sophisticated science-fraud-based “evaluation” instruments structured toproduce false positives to third party state servicecontracts written to sustain a system of structuralcorruption in which state employees and contractservice providers must falsify records and testimonyor they will not continue to be employed or paid.
To maintain their existence, organized criminal operationsmust construct management bureaucracies with policiesand procedures necessary to sustain daily operations, justlike any other bureaucracy. The only adaptation requiredto run criminal operations in the government and quasi-government agencies which constitute the childprotection system is that they must be integrated intothe policies and procedures of the umbrella agency andnot be detected as components of a criminal bureaucracy.
The existence of organized crime in the childprotection system of any given state is not thatdifficult to detect. Prominent among theindicators are:
(1) the annual number of founded child abuse allegationscan be predicted from the number of conditional federalgrant and reimbursement salary fund dollars needed tobalance the state child protection agency payroll (the
number of children taken intostate custody each year will be
the number sufficient to generate thefederal fund claims necessary to balance theagency payroll); and (2) third partycontracts to file state child protection
agency federal fund claims will containprovisions that only compensatethe contractor for increases in
federal funds paid to the state overand above the amount paid in the
previous contract for such claim filingservices. The latter creates a systemthat will only result in compensationto the contractor if the number of
children taken into state custodyconstantly increases and/or the total
claims generated from each child instate custody increases each contract
cycle. The net result is a system in whicheveryone stays employed only if the number
of founded child abuse cases and childrentaken into state custody always increasesand never decreases. An importantbyproduct of this criminal process ofexploiting children independent of the truechild abuse rate is the blind political supportfor the criminal operations generated by theconstant flow of conditional federal funds
into the respective State’s economy. In the Rilya Wilsoncase, even the Foster Mother continued to receive andaccept payments for the care of Rilya over a year after thechild disappeared. Caseworkers reportedly told her to takethe money.
There are similar lessons to be drawn from theembarrassment of the Bush Administration over numerousignored warnings that Osama bin Laden planned to hijackplanes and fly them into buildings and the embarrassmentof Florida Officials having to explain fifteen months offalsified child protection records, sworn court testimonythat Rilya Wilson was in Florida State custody and doingfine, and falsified federal fund claims for services deliveredto a child that may have been dead the entire time. Afterthe collapse of the World Trade Center, both theAmerican Public and terrorists worldwide now know theUnited States is vulnerable to attack, due in large part tocorruption, incompetence and mismanagement inintelligence and law enforcement agencies. After the RilyaWilson case in Florida, the Public and every child molester,
NATIONAL ADVISORY ON ORGANIZED CRIME OPERATINGIN THE CHILD PROTECTION SYSTEM
By James Roger Brown, Director,THE SOCIOLOGY CENTER
The Advisory was sent by e-mail to every Prosecutor and State Attorney General in the United States. Ithas also been posted on several websites.It is published here with the kind consent of the author.
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facts, even if subpoenaed. The bill was withdrawn once theLegislator duped into being the primary sponsor wasmade aware of its contents. In a June 6, 2002, opinion, theArkansas Supreme Court ruled that an infant Arkansascitizen had been illegally transferred to Florida Statecustody in what was essentially an interstate criminalconspiracy to seize and transport children in completedisregard of State and Federal law. (See ArkansasDepartment of Human Services v Cox, Supreme Court ofArkansas No. 01-1021, 349ark, issue 3, sc 9, 6 June 2002http://courts.state.ar.us/opinions/2002a/20020606/01-1021.wpd)
The important point being that these child protectionsystem criminals will be pushing the envelop on what theycan get away with, as in these examples, and sometimesthat envelop will rupture, as in the Rilya Wilson case,exposing not only the criminals but government officialsand private citizens who were indirectly benefiting fromthe criminal activity. The important question being howsophisticated, brutal and embarrassing will organizedcrime in the child protection system be allowed to becomebefore it is addressed.
In the hope that my documentation of how the organizedcrime bureaucracy functions in the child protectionsystem will help prevent any repeats of the Rilya Wilsonhorror story, I draw the material to your attention. Belowis the master link page address for six articles I havewritten on how crime in the child protection is created,organized and managed. The six articles will provide anoverview of the context in which a child’s kidnapping canbe concealed for over a year. Although written for thepopular media, each article contains detailed instructionson how to detect various mechanisms used by organizedcriminals operating in the child protection system tosustain their operations. Part II contains a formula fordetermining if the annual number of founded child abuseallegations can accurately be predicted from the numberof conditional federal salary fund dollars needed tobalance the child protection agency payroll.
See links to Parts I-VI of “Crime Managementin Government” at:
I sincerely hope you will use this information todetermine if the child protection system in yourstate has an organized crime problem. I do notwant to see any more stories like that of RilyaWilson, when I know they can be prevented byending the influence of organized crime in the childprotection system.
If I may be of further assistance, please contact me at:James Roger Brown, Director, THE SOCIOLOGY CENTER,P.O. Box 2075, Little Rock, AR 72115, (501) 374-1788,[email protected]
pornographer and other criminal who need children fortheir misdeeds know that the corruption, incompetenceand mismanagement in the child protection system can beexploited as cover to acquire children for their own illicitpurposes. What happened to Rilya Wilson in Florida canhappen in any state where the current organized criminalexploitation of children is allowed to continue. Sooner orlater other criminals, including child molesters and childpornographers, are going to become sufficiently aware ofthe mechanisms the current organized criminals are usingto manage their criminal bureaucracy that they will also beable to exploit the system, as were the people whoreportedly kidnapped Rilya Wilson and returned a weeklater to collect her clothes. Among the obviouspossibilities is obtaining information about the criminalactivity (falsifying federal claims, official reports,insurance claims, etc.) of individual state employees orlicensed professionals, like psychiatrists and psychologist,and blackmailing them to allow access to children forcriminal exploitation or perversion.
Of major importance to prosecutors is that thesystematic falsification of records by child protectionsystem crime participants in psychiatry, psychology, socialwork and child abuse investigation units, results in thesystematic falsification of evidence used in child relatedcriminal and civil judicial proceedings. While it may betempting not to look to closely at experts and evidencewhich make convictions easier, relying on criminals whohelp conceal their nefarious enterprises by providingconvenient services to the people who should beprosecuting them is a house of cards that will collapselocally or nationally at some point. We have thecontemporary examples of the falsification of evidence inthe Los Angeles Police Department and the newlydocumented error rate in death row convictions.
Unless something is done to shut down the organizedcriminal activity in every state in which it exists, RilyaWilson is not going to be the last horror story to capturenational attention. Careers will be ruined, as they havebeen in Florida, and people will end up going to prison forcrimes far beyond what they thought they were gettingthemselves into by falsifying a few reports to get federalfunds into the state or for insurance claims. Prosecutors,Legislators, and other state officials who thought theywere benefiting their state by looking the other waybecause federal funds were coming into the state’seconomy, may end up having to face situations far uglierthan they ever thought. Former Arkansas State SenatorNick Wilson is now in federal prison for his sponsorship andparticipation in one such legislated criminal enterprise toexploit children. Other Arkansas attorneys involved losttheir licenses to practice law. An Austin, Texas DHSSupervisor committed suicide after allegedly being caughtrunning a foster child prostitution ring from his officecomputer. In a recent Arkansas Legislative Session, a billdrafted by Arkansas Department of Human Servicesemployees was discovered to contain provisions thatwould have required employees to lie about records and
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State’s Child Protection Agencies Collude withJudges to Defraud Federal Government
In 1974 Walter Mondale initiated CAPTA (the Child AbusePrevention and Treatment Act), the legislation that beganfeeding federal funding into the state’s child welfareagencies. With remarkable foresight Mondale expressedconcerns that the legislation could lead to systemic abusein that the state agencies might over-process children intothe system unnecessarily to keep, and increase, the flow offederal dollars. Shortly after CAPTA was enacted therewas a dramatic increase in the number ofchildren in foster care, peaking at around500,000 during the mid-70’s.
George Miller, the Chairman of the federalSelect Committee on Children, Youth, andFamilies, initiated an intensive investigationof the nation’s foster care system after theeffects of CAPTA started to becomeapparent by the soaring numbers ofchildren who were being placed in fostercare. An official at the U.S. Departmentof Health, Education, and Welfareadmitted to Miller that the governmenthad no idea where many of the nation’s500,000 foster children where living,what services they were receiving, ifany, or if any efforts were being madeto reunite them with their families.
To address the obvious free-for-all snatching of childrenthat CAPTA had stimulated, the Committee crafted newfederal legislation with the intent of creatingaccountability and clearer guidelines for the states childwelfare agencies. During the crafting of P.L. 96-272Chairman Miller’s concern was that the federal governmentwas footing the bill for warehousing children in institutionsand inappropriate settings without accountability.
In 1980 the Adoption Assistance and Child Welfare Act, P.L.96-272, was enacted. The act included provisions that“reasonable efforts” be made to prevent children frombeing unnecessarily removed from their homes and placedin foster care. Although CPS has always tried to buffalo themedia and the public that they are involved with familiesdue to some sort of horrific child abuse or neglect, therehas never been any debate among national policy makers,researchers, and federal agencies that the vast majority ofCPS cases are due to poverty or frivolous/social reasonsand do not contain elements of real child abuse. If thecases did actually involve acts of abuse they would becriminal, identified and investigated by law enforcement,rather than social workers, and would be prosecuted assuch.
P.L. 96-272 came into effect partly because Congressdetermined that a large number of children were being
unnecessarily removed from their homes, and, onceremoved, they were lost in the limbo of foster care foryears, many until they just grew too old, when they werethen put on the streets at the age of 18.
The Child Welfare League of America testified before asenate subcommittee: “In fact, there were many instancesthen, as now, of children being removed unnecessarily fromtheir families. It is important to recognize that children
are almost always traumatized by removal fromtheir own families.”
So, accountability from each stateschild protection agency was alsowritten in. To receive the federal moneythe states would have to submit anannual report to the federalgovernment, known as an AFCARSreport, that specifically accounts foreach child in state care. ACLU Children’sRights Project attorney, MarciaRobinson Lowry, explained in hertestimony to Congress: “As a conditionof federal funding, states must have areasonable information system toidentify children in federally-funded
state custody.” These requirements were implemented in1980.
Up until 1999 some states were still not filing theirfederally required AFCARS report to the federalgovernment. According to Jeffrey Locke, formerCommissioner of the Massachusetts Department of SocialServices, the excuse to the legislature was that they“couldn’t figure out how to work their computer system.”
When I called Senator Therese Murray in 1998 to ask howmany children had died in foster care in Massachusetts, heraide replied: “We don’t have those statistics.” At that timeSenator Murray was the Senate Chair of the Committeeon Health & Elderly Affairs, and therefore responsible tooversee the collection and filing of AFCARS data.
The “reasonable efforts” requirements were designed toaddress these issues by requiring the states child welfareagencies to have specific investigation and assessmentpolicies to minimize frivolous removals, to provide“services” to address and ameliorate conditions that weredetrimental to the child’s well-being; to place children withrelatives when removal from the home was absolutelynecessary; and make efforts to reunite families in a timelyfashion. Methods to audit and track compliance withfederal requirements were also built in.
State’s Child Protection Agencies Collude withJudges to Defraud Federal Government
The states were to establish “citizen review panels”comprised of a specifically designated representation ofthe population which would include not only members ofcollateral professional communities involved in childprotection, but “parents, foster parents, and formerfoster children.” Each state was to have at least threecitizen review panels. The panels would essentially act as astanding jury of peers and would review CPS cases. Twentyyears after P.L. 96- 272 went into effect the citizen reviewpanels have never been established in most states.
Another means of creating accountability was to have thefederal authority, U.S. Department of Health & HumanServices, conduct compliance audits, which are known asSection 427 reviews. The method of enforcement thatCongress devised to ensure that the states followed thefederal law was to provide incentive funds to the statesthat documented their compliance with the federalregulations. The states would self-certify compliance, butcould be subjected to “periodic” 427 reviews by the Dept.of Health & Human Services. Were the states to findthemselves in non-compliance they would simply returnthe incentive funds. It would seem that providing cash toagencies that are allowed to self-document compliance isa somewhat less than intelligent system. It would beinteresting to track down exactly how much money thestates child “protective” agencies have returned to thegovernment because they found themselves in non-compliance. Gee, maybe this is rocket science.
Like CAPTA, P.L. 96-272 could only have worked if thefederal government demanded compliance and meticulousaccountability, and them imposed sanctions for non-compliance. Even better – criminal charges forracketeering for intentional fraud. Mark Soler, director ofthe National Youth Law Center in California explained:
“The Department of Health & Human Services hasfailed to promulgate meaningful regulations toimplement the Adoption Assistance and ChildWelfare Act. It has applied even the minimal federalregulations that were developed in an inconsistentand arbitrary manner, and only tokenimplementation of the laws protecting children.’
Even when HHS finds overwhelming evidence of lack ofcompliance during 427 reviews, no sanctions are imposedand they continue to keep the fed $$$ pouring in – inviolation of their own regulations. Not so much as a slap onthe hand or even token admonishment. Certainly explainshow CPS developed their arrogance and contempt for anyauthority – because there is none. Their confidence thatthey are free from the feds insisting on compliance withthe law is well illustrated by the foster care numbers whichincreased dramatically after CAPTA began feeding federaldollars into the states child protection agencies, thendropped equally dramatically after the enactment ofP.L.96-272, which was supposed to create more specificfederal regulation and accountability. However, once thestate agencies saw that the federal government was notenforcing compliance, the foster care numbers soaredonce again.
Michael Petit, Deputy Director of the Child WelfareLeague of America, stated in his testimony beforeCongress: “A 427 is a meaningless process for most of thestates. It represents no kind of sanctions to the stateswhatsoever for non-compliance.” Marcia Robinson Lowrytold Congress: “States are passing HHS audits withsystems in which no reasonable person could consider thatchildren are being well treated. It is virtually impossible tofail a 427 audit.”
The initial concept of “reasonable efforts” was the onlyconclusion that any rational person could come to: ratherthan disrupt children’s lives, and traumatize them byseizing them from non- abusive situations and placingthem with strangers (who are often no better, andsometimes far worse), assist families in overcoming theirobstacles and problems by providing support andservices. The idea never worked, though, because it hasalways been more profitable to too many to removechildren rather than keep them at home. Rather than offersupport and simple, practical services to families CPSforged contracts with vendors. Now private businesses,under the guise of “service providers”, could mushroominto existence knowing that their sugar daddy, CPS, wouldprovide a never-ending flow of coerced clients. The marketpotential is unlimited – potentially every mother, father,grandparent, and child in the country. Rather than offeringpractical, meaningful services that are germane to thefamilies circumstances, CPS clients are ordered to engagein “services” with CPS-contracted vendors; specialinterest groups who are dependent on CPS for theirincome and profit by maintaining the levels of children infoster care, and whose interests are protected by abureaucracy intent on securing it’s own survival andprotecting unlimited growth.
The extent of which CPS is allowed to continue to operatewhile being so far out of compliance with the existingstate and federal laws is mind boggling. It would be achallenge to find any other agency in our countries historythat operated in such gross and blatant violation of thelaw with absolutely no intervention from theadministration. Tens of millions of tax dollars are beingsquandered on a system that is destroying families andcausing lifelong emotional ruin to children – and those arethe lucky ones who live through it.
The most egregious area of outright criminal fraud is CPS’spractice of filing their federally required documentation ofcompliance in secrecy through the courts. The federalfoster care reimbursements are channeled through theTitle IV-E section of the Social Security Act. Each stateschild welfare agency enters into a contract with thefederal government, which is referred to as their Title IV-Estate plan. It is this contract that spells out theresponsibilities that CPS must, by law, comply with inorder to receive their federal funding. To documentcompliance with the fed regs CPS must file a form throughthe courts in each individual case. In Massachusetts theseforms are referred to as a “29-C.” 42 U.S. Code, ss 672reads:
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“These requirements are not mere formalities. TheFinance Committee of Congress, in preparing itssummary for final passage of the AdoptionAssistance and Child Welfare Act of 1980, P.L. 96-272, stated; ̀ The Committee is aware ofallegations that the judicial determinationrequirement (sic: that a judge makes adetermination that a child needs to be removedfrom the home) can become a mere pro formaexercise in paper shuffling to obtain federalfunding. While this could occur in some instances,the Committee is unwilling to accept as a generalproposition that the judiciaries ofthe States would so lightly treata responsibility placed uponthem by federal statute for theprotection of children.”
1980 U.S. Code Cong. and Admin.News: “A judicial determination ofthose efforts (reasonable efforts,as defined in the Act) serves toclosely examine, in the case ofeach individual child, whetherreasonable efforts were made tokeep the family intact.” Inaccordance with the federalrequirements the Massachusettslegislature enacted G.L. c.119 ss29b, which requires all judges tocertify that the Department ofSocial Services met the obligationgrounded in the federal statute ofmaking reasonable efforts toprotect the child short ofremoving him or her from theparents, and, if the child was removed, making it possiblefor the child to return home in a timely manner. Rather than“closely examining”, in Massachusetts this graveresponsibility is carried out by judges by rubber stampingstacks of 29c forms that simply contain three “yes” or“no” check boxes. In many instances making three checkmarks is even too much work for Massachusetts judgesand they rubber stamp the forms while leaving them blank– never mind actually verifying that the “reasonableefforts” were made. In return for these forms DSS receivesit’s federal money.
The three questions are:
1. Continuation in the home is contrary to the wellbeing of the child?
2. Reasonable efforts have been made prior to theplacement of the child to prevent or eliminate theneed for removal of the child from his/her home?
3. Reasonable efforts have been made to make itpossible for the child to return to his parent/guardian?
I discussed this issue a few years ago with VeronicaMelendez at the Children’s Bureau (the federal authority).She told me that the federal government was under theimpression that all parties were present in the court roomat the time of the filing of the 29c’s, so that the parentsattorneys had the opportunity to object, rebut, or verifythe “reasonable efforts.” In reality, no one sees the federalforms except the judges and a representative of DSS’s mainlegal department. Attorneys ask us how we ever “got ourhands on” the 29c forms, as we have never yet met anattorney who has seen the forms, let alone have been
notified of the filing hearing. We evenhave forms on which the “no” boxes
were checked, yet the children were stillremoved from their homes and federal funds
collected for them.
By seizing children illegally in violation of theTitle IV-E requirements, then filing false
documents in secrecy through thecourts to obtain federal funding,
CPS is defrauding the federalgovernment with intent. CPSshould be subject to investigationand prosecution by the U.S.Attorneys Office. They should beheld liable for the restitution of allillegally obtained funds, andprosecuted for perjury,obstruction of justice, and thefraudulent collection of federalfunds under the False Statementsand Accountability Act of 1996,P.L. 104-292 110 stat 3459, 42U.S.C.S. 670-679a; P.L. 96-272;C.F.R. part 1356; and Title IV-E. I
have discussed this issue with the Inspector GeneralsOffice and they felt it could possible be prosecuted underRICO, yet they have also failed to act, possibly because itisn’t just CPS/DSS who is committing federal fraud, butalso the judges who are signing the documents.
In 1988 George Miller, the original architect of P.L. 96-272,and Chairman of the congressionally appointed SelectCommittee on Children, Youth, and Families, recognizedthe fraud being committed in the name of child“protection”, and stated:
“What has been demonstrated hereis that you have a system that issimply in contempt. This system hasbeen sued and sued and orders havebeen issued and they just continueon their merry way. And HHS justcontinues to look the other way. Youhave a system that is not only out ofcontrol, it’s illegal at this point.What you are really engaged in isstate sponsored child abuse.”
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Monday, September 29, 2003 - Too many childrenhave been unnecessarily placed in foster carebecause of a “perverse financial incentive” thatencourages local governments to earn money bybringing youngsters into the system, a newstate report says.
The study by the California Department ofSocial Services also says too much emphasis hasbeen placed on investigating whether parentsabused or neglected their children while notenough has been done to help families overcometheir problems.
“Over a period of years, the original vision forsupporting and healing families through thechild welfare system has deteriorated into anadversarial and coercive approach,” DSSDirector Rita Saenz said.
David Sanders, who took over in March as head of thetroubled Los Angeles County Department of Children andFamily Services, said experts have estimated that as manyas half of the county’s foster children could have been leftin their parents’ care if the appropriate services had beenprovided.
A study by a child welfare think tank releasedearlier this year found that the governmentspends an average of $65,000 to $85,000 a yearto house and educate a foster child in a grouphome.
The total costs are staggering, authors of thereport wrote, noting that the direct costs ofchild abuse and neglect nationwide areestimated at $25 billion a year while indirectcosts such as juvenile delinquency, adultcriminality and lost productivity to societytotal $95 billion.
In response, the Child Welfare Services StakeholdersGroup, a body of 60 child-welfare experts formed by Gov.Gray Davis in 2000, has proposed an “ambitious and far-reaching overhaul” of the state’s child-welfare system.Andrew Bridge, managing director of child-welfare reformprograms at The Broad Foundation in Los Angeles, saidone of the most basic problems with the system isrestrictions that provide money only when a child entersfoster care.
“The county will only continue to receive fundingfor the period it keeps the child in its care. Youcan’t run a system that is based on a buck-a-head for as long as you can keep the child,”Bridge said.
The state report said California has 13 percent of thenation’s total child population and 20 percent of its fosterchildren.
More than 700,000 children come into contactwith the child-welfare system annuallystatewide. About 77 percent of those in fostercare were removed from their homes for neglect.In Los Angeles County, more than 160,000 children cameinto contact with the system last year. Nearly 80 percentwere involved because of neglect.
More than 91,000 children are in foster homes statewide. Inthe county, the $1.4 billion DCFS budget pays to provideservices to 75,000 children in the system or living inadoptive homes. Of those, nearly 30,000 actually live infoster homes.
The stakeholders’ report recommends the Department ofSocial Services seek approval from the federal governmentfor more flexible use of its $3.7 billion annual child-welfarebudget so more money can be spent on services to helpkeep families together. Congress is expected to take uplegislation next year dealing with reforms in how the systemis funded.
The stakeholders also recommended that the state improveits method of contracting with public and private fostercare agencies.
Of the county’s 30,000 children in foster homes, an averageof 6 percent to 7 percent are abused and neglected, a rateamong the highest in the nation.“The safety issue is such a big one,” Sanders said. “LosAngeles County is way out of line with the rest of thecountry. You just have kids who are being abused after wehave supposedly put them in a safer environment.”Janis Spire, executive director of the Alliance for Children’sRights in Los Angeles, said the report outlines the “onlyrealistic path toward achieving stable, secure homes for ourchildren.”
“The toughest job is still ahead in terms of providing a step-by-step plan for achieving these goals,” Spire said.
Study: Kids rushed into foster systemBy Troy Anderson
Staff Writer
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EDITORIAL from the LA TimesMay 8, 2004
So rickety are foster-care programs across the nation, and so invisible are the 500,000 children in them, that the release lastweek of a federal survey detailing how all 50 states are failing these vulnerable youngsters surprised no one. Californiashares with 50 other states the shameful distinction of falling short on nearly every measure used to assess the quality ofcare. This booby prize might be reason for despair, but Los Angeles leaders instead hope it will push state bureaucrats to helplocalities provide better-tailored, more individual care.
Federal investigators reviewed data and a sample of case files in every state from 2000 to 2003, looking at such keymeasures as the length of time children spent in foster care, the stability of their arrangements and how frequently theysuffered abuse and neglect at the hands of their caregivers. California’s 58 county-run foster-care programs fared poorly onall these key indexes.
Children like Raymond Marrujo, up and down the state, and particularly in Los Angeles, bear the steep costs of these failures.Already traumatized by their parents’ mistakes, violence or indifference, they often drift for years in county care, passedfrom one social worker to another, tossed among foster homes, often finally “graduating” at age 18 to homelessness, teenpregnancy or crime.
The survey’s dismal results could exacerbate those failures because the federal Department of Health and Human Servicescould sock failing states with penalties — up to $18.2 million in California’s case. The federal government already pays abouthalf the national tab for foster children, about $5 billion annually. This money largely goes to cover state and countyadministrative costs and to pay for spaghetti and blue jeans for children in care. Instead of reducing funding, a better way toimprove the odds for foster kids would be to give states and counties flexibility in how they spend federal dollars andencourage these agencies to maintain the children in their own homes whenever possible.
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Five-year-old Deborah Hasson was pulled out of herkindergarten class and taken to the nurse’s office. Her earswere bright red, and the child constantly complained of anintense pain. The school, required by law to reportanything of this nature, called Child Protective Servicesin Fromberg, Montana.
CPS immediatelyconcluded that the child wasbeing abused at home, and sothat same hour picked her upfrom school and arranged toplace her into a foster-caresituation. Deborah’s mother,Grace, was horrifiedupon hearing this andimmediately produced adoctor’s report, which explainedthat Deborah had an earinfection. CPS chose toignore this informationand insisted that Deborah was being abused.That was the fall of 1992. The incident launched a violentcustody battle that lasted for two and a half years.
In 1995, the very night Deborah came home, Grace, asingle mother, was awakened at 2 a.m. by a harsh rappingat the door. Through the window she could see four policeofficers and a social worker. In a state of panic she calledher friend Betty for help.
When Betty arrived she found a hysterical Gracehandcuffed downstairs with a police officer, and the malesocial worker upstairs with the three frantic, young girls.The social worker said nothing more than thathe had received an anonymous report of abuse.Grace was arrested and the children were putinto foster homes. It was to be another four and a halfyears of bitter court battles before Grace would clear hername and regain custody of her daughters.
Too outrageous to be true? According to Dr. Marc Einhorn,a forensic psychologist in Atlanta, Ga., these types ofcases are prevalent throughout child protectionagency suits across the country. Einhorn has beeninvolved in several hundred cases across five states.
Einhorn said that Child Protective Services started in 1974with the best of intentions. Back then the definition ofchild abuse was narrow — consisting of what reasonable
people thought of as abuse. Over time, however, thatdefinition has broadened to include anythingand everything you can imagine — whatever thestate deems appropriate.
Many states now have very broad definitions of abuse. Forexample Utah’s is simply “actualor non-accidental harm.” Thisleaves grounds for the removal ofchildren up to the discretion ofthe social worker.
Einhorn recalls a case he workedon involving a family in Salt LakeCity. The family had fourhandicapped children, one beingseverely autistic. The parentsdecided to apply for SocialSecurity benefits for the autisticchild, and had him examined as apart of the standard application
process. The child protection agency of Utah gotwind of the application and removed all fourchildren from their home. The grounds? The parentswere exploiting the handicapped children for money.
Matthew Hilton, the family’s attorney commented, “It’snot the happiest area to deal with ... these are real fights,some are black and white, but most are in the gray.” Theguidelines are very vague. Juvenile court has its own set ofrules and laws, which are very informal. A lot of“protections” are put up around the children.
”The problem with the system is that ChildProtective Services has quotas to fill,” Einhornsaid. “If a certain number of children are not removed fromtheir homes each year, the agency will lose status andfunding — causing people to lose their jobs.” He said thatthis causes children to be removed on the flimsiest ofterms.
Suzanne Shell, author of “Profane Justice” and president ofthe Family Advocacy Center, affirms the idea of a quota.Shell said for the agency to receive the amount ofmoney it does, each social worker mustcomplete a certain number of cases. Therefore,social workers are pushed to remove childrenfrom their homes on very questionable grounds.For example, Shell cited several instances where childrenare removed for ”safety reasons” — the house was not
When the state becomes parentBy Mollie Martin
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clean, or instances of “neglect” because there was notenough food in the refrigerator. The reports neglected toshow that it was spring cleaning day or it was the end ofthe month when the food supply was low.
In response to the question of a quota, Patricia Montoya,commissioner for Children, Youth and Families inWashington, D.C., said that “child protective services arethe responsibility of the state. Funding is provided by thefederal government ... but the system itself is designedand operated by the states.” She went on to say “thequota is not the goal — the goal of CPS is to protect thechild, make sure they are safe, and help provideintervention. That’s what the laws that are in place are allabout.”
Dianne Warner-Kearney, a Utah child protection specialist,says, “A quota for children to be removed from theirparents into foster care is absurd. In fact, if at amultidisciplinary staffing which occurs within 24 hoursafter the child is removed from the parents, should it bedetermined at that point that there were no legal groundsfor removal, the child would be returned immediately.”
Einhorn recalled many social workers he worked with in thepast who left CPS in sheer disgust of the corruption of thesystem. According to the caseworkers, executives would“sit back and lick their chops” while deciding which familyto harass next. One caseworker quit after working withthe agency for 12 years. He said 95 percent of the childrenshould never have been removed from their homes.
Many of these “atrocities” are done in the name of “thebest interests of the child,” a term abundant throughoutseveral states’ CPS websites. Einhorn said that ironicallythe agencies are seriously disturbing and frightening thevery children whose interests they are trying to protect.
Shell is very skeptical of whether the state should be giventhe benefit of the doubt when the child’s well being is atstake. She says that social workers would not be willing todo their job without pay or give their lives for the children,whereas parents would — “So, who has the child’s bestinterests in mind?”
According to the FAC web site, “Children in foster carenumbered more than 520,000 in March 1998, up from340,000 in 1988.” Montoya accounts for the increase infoster care as “a combination of different things... an increase in child abuse and neglect due to the addedstresses of the changing world we’re in — with betterreporting systems we’ve brought the issue to a higherlimelight: kids are often self-reporting if they are beingabused or neglected at home .. family and neighbors havealso started reporting. ...”
Pamela and Wilbur Gaston, of Mount Angel, Ore., havebeen fighting the courts for nearly four years in an effortto regain custody of their daughter, Melissa. Melissa wastaken at the age of five on the false report that her 72-year-old father had inappropriately “touched” her. TheGastons, who have meticulously documented evidencerefuting the charges, are outraged at the lack of dueprocess in thejustice system. Ata hearing in May1998, the Gastonsclaim that thepresiding judgestatedtwice on therecord that “Iwill not allowyou to make anoffer of proofbecause factsare not anissue.”
Einhorn commented that in CPS cases, the accused aremost often guilty until proven innocent. “There is a seriousaccountability problem in the Child Protective Services ...CPS answers to no one.”
According to a statement by the office of OregonAttorney General Hardy Meyers, “claims againstdefendant judges, district attorneys and assistantattorney generals are barred by judicial and prosecutorialimmunity ... this immunity applies even when a judge isaccused of acting maliciously and corruptly.”
”Parents have no legal right to stand in the court for theprotection of their children when the children are beingknowingly abused in state custody, even though theirparental rights have not been terminated,”Gaston claims.
Betty Asplin of Laurel, Montana, who was the eyewitnessin the Hasson case, counsels people in these types ofsituations. “This is allowed to go on because people don’tknow their rights, if they understood the lab this would beover, it wouldn’t happen ... people see the law at theirdoor and they assume they have to abide by whatever theofficer says — but they don’t.”
*Videotape court record of Judge William O Lewis saying“facts are not an issue” at: www.avoiceforchildren.com .
Will Gaston and daughter Melissa.
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How do you stop violentcrime? What aboutincreasing rates ofilliteracy, drug and sexualabuse, homelessness andsuicide? For governments,the initial societal fix wasto spend millions on“experts” who claimed to have the answers to theseproblems. But when the problems worsened, the expertssaid they needed billions, not millions. And when theproblems continued to worsen, the experts said theyneeded more billions.
Today, according to these experts, we are facing a trulyalarming epidemic that is going to strike one out of everytwo people – half the population. It is, they say, the causeof society’s problems. And it is going to cost even morebillions to resolve.
But wait a minute. This epidemic has apparently beenescalating since day one. After World War II, these sameexperts estimated the epidemic affected only one in 10;less than a decade later, they stated that one out of everythree people were suffering; and today, they state thatevery other person is going to suffer the consequences ofit. Why is it then, that literally billions of dollars ingovernment funding for research have failed to halt theepidemic? It just keeps rolling remorselessly along,spreading further and wider, in spite of the money, in spiteof the research.
Could it be that these estimates aren’t true? Could it bethat they represent nothing less than a camouflagedfunding push to not only scare the government intokeeping its faucet open, but to open it even wider? It is apossibility worth examining. And one we examine in thesepages.
The epidemic so alarmingly reported on is mental illness.
This is fraud.
In legal terms, fraud involves intentional deception ordeliberate misrepresentation to secure money, rights,property or privilege. In general terms, fraud isunderstood to mean dishonest dealings, cheating ortrickery, most often involving money. Logically then, if thestatistics are false, the perpetrators are guilty ofcommitting fraud to the tune of billions.
The obvious question of course, is how could such amassive fraud be conducted without detection? Theanswer is simple. Psychiatry and psychologyactively sought and were given a monopoly overmental health care by governments all aroundthe world. They asserted themselves as the “experts”
and as nobody elsesought responsibility forthe troubled and insane, itwas with some relief thatthe problem was handedover to them.
Unfortunately however,they were given the monopoly without accountability.
If indeed the mental health situation is becoming worse, itmust be due to their failure to effectively resolve theproblem. At the very least, they have proven themselves tobe technically incompetent. Furthermore, if they areknowingly incompetent yet claiming to be efficientlyhandling the problem, then by definition, they are guilty offraudulent conduct.
Charges of fraud are not new to psychiatry.
Unsubstantiated claims of special inner knowledge of themind and behavior, of being able to cure the disturbedindividual, of the denial of the harm inherent in theirvarious treatments – such things in any other field wouldlend themselves to accusations of quackery. Butpsychiatrists have managed to fend off such charges overthe past decades by claiming they are based onuneducated opinion. Some acts of deception, however, arenot so easily defended.
Which brings us to the core function of this article. In thisarticle, we examine psychiatry and psychology from thepoint of view of fraud, covering their scientific standing,claims and tools, their statistics and their results. And weshow another little-recognized aspect of all fraud in whichpsychiatry and psychology have both excelled.
Fraud encompasses the taking of somethingfor the giving of nothing.
Our intention is to provide here the necessary markers toenable those in positions of power and trust, includingpoliticians, legislators, doctors, educators, lawenforcement agents, health insurers and businessmen, tosee for themselves that what is happening amounts tonothing less than extortion, and that it is beingperpetrated the world over in the name of mental healing.With enough independent individuals and groups who havethe power and determination to improve societal well-being seeing this for themselves – and willing to take thenecessary action – lives will be saved, money will be saved,and the world will be saner than it has been for more than50 years.
Jan Eastgate, International President, Citizens Commissionon Human Rights
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Through CCHR’s work:Thousands of victims have been rescued frominvoluntary commitment and other coercivepsychiatric practices. Hundreds of victims havebeen compensated tens of millions of dollarsfor the mental and physical damage they havesuffered in psychiatric hands. Legislation hasbeen enacted to ensure that psychiatric rape ofpatients is dealt with as a criminal offense.
CASE REPORTS
Whatever their claims, psychiatrists create unhappiness.Read personal stories of abuse and degradation sufferedat the hands of psychiatrists and psychologists.
CHILD DEATHS
While psychiatrists proclaim psychoactive drugs safe andeffective for children, many parents know from tragicpersonal experience that this is false.
SHAINA DUNKLE — 1991-2001Vicki Dunkle’s daughter Shaina’s lifehad been filled with dance classes,Girl Scouts, piano lessons andsoftball games. But in 1999, whenShaina was in second grade,teachers said she was “too active”and “talked out of turn.” Withoutdiagnostic tests or physical exams,a psychiatrist concluded shesuffered from ADHD and prescribeda psychiatric drug. On February 26,2001, Shaina suffered a seizure in the doctor’s office. Hermother rushed to hold her in her arms, where, minuteslater, she died. “Shaina looked into my eyes as her lifeended and I could do nothing to save her. It’s been twoyears and I relive those last few minutes every day. Believeme, it is a nightmare no parent should ever have to livewith,” Mrs. Dunkle said. An autopsy revealed that Shainahad died from toxic levels of the prescribed psychiatricdrug.
SAMUEL GROSSMAN — 1973-1986In 1986, Samuel Grossman, 13, diedafter being prescribed a stimulant for“over-activity.” The autopsy revealedan enlarged heart caused by thepsychiatric drug. According to theboy’s mother, “Giving this drug to achild is like playing Russian roulette.No one knows which child will get thebrain damage and/or those who willdie. I played the game and I lost.”
MATTHEW SMITH — 1986-2000At age 7, Matthew Smith was diagnosed with ADHD. Hisparents were told he needed to take astimulant to help him focus and thatnon-compliance could bring criminalcharges for neglecting their son’seducational and emotional needs. “Mywife and I were scared of the possibilityof losing our children if we didn’tcomply,” says Matthew’s father,Lawrence. The parents acceded to thepressure after being told that there wasnothing wrong with the “medication.”But on March 21, 2000, whileskateboarding, Matthew suffered aheart attack and died. The coroner determined thatMatthew’s heart showed clear signs of the small bloodvessel damage that is caused by stimulant drugs likeamphetamines and concluded that Matthew died fromlong-term use of the prescribed ADHD stimulant. “I cannotgo back and change things for us at this point. However, Ihope to God my story and information will reach thehearts and minds of many families, so they can make aneducated decision,” Mr. Smith said.
STEPHANIE HALL — 1984-1996Stephanie Hall was a shy first grader inOhio who loved books and school. Afterher teacher reported that Stephanie hada hard time “staying on task,” a doctordiagnosed Attention Deficit Disorder andprescribed a stimulant. Over the next fiveyears, Stephanie complained ofstomachaches and nausea and displayedmood swings and bizarre behavior. OnJanuary 5, 1996, at age 11, Stephanie diedin her sleep from cardiac arrhythmia. Mrs.Hall remembers the last words exchanged with herdaughter: “I said, ‘It’s 9 o’clock Steph, get to bed,’ and shereplied ‘OK Mom, I love you.’” The next morning when herfather went to wake her for school, she didn’t respond.“We called paramedics and the police...Stephanie was socold. I kept saying to them, ‘She is supposed to bury me,not me bury her’....”
RESTRAINT DEATHS AND ABUSE,INVOLUNTARY COMMITMENT ABUSE VICTIMS
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PSYCHIATRIC GUESSWORK
In his book A Dose of Sanity, the late neurologist andpsychiatrist Sydney Walker III wrote of the dangers of theDiagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, citingcases such as these:
John, a successful and happy family man, beganexperiencing fatigue and sadness. Two psychiatristssaddled him with a variety of DSM labels and treated himwith 26 different drugs without ever conducting a singleneurological examination. When a qualified medical doctorfinally conducted a thorough diagnostic evaluation, hediscovered that John had a brain tumor. Once removed, his“emotional” problems and tiredness rapidly vanished.
Lilian, a 46-year-old normally athletic woman, felt sad andweary. A psychiatrist prescribed an antidepressant. “Afterall, Lilian had enough symptoms to be lumped into theDSM category of ‘depression’—and that was all he neededto know.” However, in the final analysis, “the simplicity wasthat her husband’s chronic snoring had been waking her upevery five to ten minutes during the night—she wassuffering from a severe case of sleep deprivation.”
Another example is Austin, who was hailed as “the posterchild for Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder.” He hadbeen kicked out of 11 preschools in three years for doingeverything from shouting obscenities and hitting otherchildren to poking a teacher in the eye with a pencil. Hewas prescribed stimulants. But after a blockage wasremoved from his colon, he suddenly stopped terrorizinghis teachers and classmates. Austin, who is now nine, wasable to sit quietly and was a joy to be around. He gave upthe medication. His mother said she never would havethought to connect Austin’s behavior with the chronicconstipation he had suffered since infancy. “The badbehaviors disappear as soon as the impaction is removed,”said Dr. Paul Hyman, chief of pediatric gastroenterologyat the University of Kansas Medical Center in Kansas City.
Dr. Walker concluded, “It’s important to remember...that anumber of DSM-oriented psychiatrists have, to a largedegree, abandoned the science of differential diagnosis,and thus consider most psychiatric illnesses ‘incurable.’This leaves them with only two weapons: psychotherapyand drugs. It’s not surprising that they’re among the firstto leap on each new drug bandwagon; like long-agodoctors who recommended bleeding for every ailment,they have little else to offer....”
ABUSES IN INSTITUTIONS
With billions in government appropriations allocated formental health treatment, just how safe and effective arepsychiatric institutions? The following cases illustrate thedangers of a system that lacks scientific understanding ofcauses of mental health problems, with subsequent lack ofworkable remedies and the terrible consequences of this.
On April 12, 1991, 14-year-old Jeramy Harrel was with hisgrandmother when a patrol car pulled up beside them, andtwo hulking uniformed men who appeared to be policeofficers announced that they were taking Jeramy toColonial Hills Psychiatric Hospital. They said thatpsychiatrist Dr. Mark Bowlan and a child welfare agent—who had never spoken with Jeramy or his parents—hadfilled in an application for the boy’s detention, claiming hewas a “substance abuser” and that his grandparents hadphysically abused him. The psychiatrist also stated thatJeramy was “truant from school, failing grades, violent[and] aggressive,” and was “likely to cause serious harm toself.” It took the efforts of Texas State Senator FrankTejeda to finally obtain Jeramy’s release from the hospitalafter he had discovered the boy’s admission was based onthe unsubstantiated and untrue comments made byJeramy’s 12-year-old brother, Jason. The family’s healthinsurance was billed $11,000 for this fraudulent“admission” and “treatment.”
In 2001, a psychiatric nurse found a 53-year-old manunresponsive 12 hours after he had been medicated for“hostile, cursing behavior.” The man died within hours. Anautopsy revealed that he suffered from multiple sclerosis(MS). Hospital staff thought “MS” on his admission formmeant “mental status.”
Carl McCloskey says his son, John, 19, was sodomized witha broom-like handle so savagely in a psychiatric hospitalthat his bowel was torn and his liver was punctured. Theteenager became violently ill, lapsed into a coma, and died14 months later.
Seventeen-year-old Kelly Stafford agreed to enter apsychiatric facility expecting a brief respite from troubledfamily relationships. But once the door was closed, she waskept for 309 days, many of them behind blackenedwindows in cruel darkness. Her arms and legs werestrapped for months at a time. Others in the facility wereforced to sit motionless and silent for 12-hour stretches. “Ihad to eat Thanksgiving and Christmas dinner inrestraints,” Ms. Stafford said. “There’s not a day that goesby that you don’t think about it.”
In 2003, Dr. Masami Houki, head of Houki psychiatric clinicin Japan, was charged with manslaughter after he pluggedthe mouth of a 31-year-old female patient with tissue, putadhesive tape over her mouth, injected her with atranquilizer, tied her hands and feet, and forced her to layon the back seat of a car while being transferred to theclinic. She was dead on arrival.
In Athens, Greece, the Ntaou Pendeli psychiatricinstitution kept children in a ward with mentallyhandicapped adults. Some of the children were naked; allwere housed in cold, barren rooms and often left to lie intheir own feces and urine. A teenager had been locked upfor 10 years after he misbehaved when his father left hismother for another woman. He witnessed horrors such asthe rape of other children by psychiatric nurses.
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RESTRAINT DEATHS AND ABUSE
Psychiatrists persist ininflicting psychosurgery andelectroshock on patientseven though no valid medicalor scientific justificationexists for these practices.After more than 60 years,psychiatrists can neitherexplain how they aresupposed to work nor justifytheir extensive damage.When Jennifer Martin’s 70-year-old mother experiencedheadaches and nausea andstopped eating and talking,a psychiatrist claimed shewas in shock from recentdeaths in her family and gaveher ECT. Less than 24 hours later she was dead. Anautopsy revealed that the problem was not depression,but a brain stem complication. “Shock treatment killedher,” Ms. Martin said.
A grieving husband says a psychiatrist recommendedelectroshock because it would release a chemical in thebrain that would make his wife, Dorothy, feel better. Awareof her earlier heart attacks, he administered 38electroshocks. The last one killed her.
In 2001, the New Zealand government was forced toformally apologize and pay $6.5 million to 95 formerpatients of the Lake Alice Child and Adolescent PsychiatricUnit for torture and abuse they suffered at the directionsof psychiatrist Selwyn Leeks in the 1970s. ECT had beenapplied to victims’ legs, arms and genitals withoutanesthetic.
At 28, Gwen Whitty was a wife and mother of two withanother on the way. When she developed difficultybreathing, psychiatrist Harry Bailey recommended “deepsleep therapy”for a “rest” —which turned outto involve heavydoses ofbarbiturates andsedatives whileshackled nakedto a bed, keptunconscious fortwo to threeweeks, and givenrepeatedelectroshock. Tenyears later, adoctor
discovered two jagged steel plates in her head, attachedto the bone by Bailey to cover holes in her skull.
In 1998, 16-year-old Tristan Sovern was held facedown byat least two mental health assistants with his armscrossed under his body. When he screamed, “You’rechoking me...I can’t breathe,” staff at the U.S. psychiatricfacility shoved a large towel over his mouth and tied a bedsheet around his head. Tristan died of asphyxiation.In 1998, psychiatric staff forced 13-year-old StephanieJobin of Canada to lie face down on the floor and placed abeanbag chair on top of her. A female staff member sat onthe chair to pin her down while another staff member heldher feet, after she had already been dosed with fivedifferent psychiatric drugs. After 20 minutes of struggling,Stephanie stopped breathing and later died. Her deathwas ruled an accident.
The night before 15-year-old Edith Campos was sent toDesert Hills psychiatric hospital in Tucson, Arizona, shemade colorful computer drawings for her family. If hermother missed her, all she needed to do was look at thepicture and think of her daughter and that she would soonbe home. Two weeks later, Edith came home in a coffin.During the time she was hospitalized, her parents were notallowed to speak to her. On February 4, 1998, Edithapparently died of asphyxiation, her chest compressedwhen she was held to the ground for at least 10 minutesafter reportedly raising her fist during a confrontationwith staff members.
On August 18, 1997, 16-year-old Roshelle Clayborne diedduring restraint at a psychiatric facility in San Antonio,Texas. Roshelle was slammed face down on the floor, herarms yanked across her chest, her wrists gripped frombehind by a mental health aide. “I can’t breathe,” shegasped. Her last words were ignored. A syringe delivered50 milligrams of Thorazine into her body and with eightstaffers watching, Roshelle became suddenly still. Bloodtrickled from the corner of her mouth as she lost controlof her bodily functions. Her limp body was rolled into ablanket and dumped in an 8-by 10-foot room. There she layin her own waste and vomit for five minutes before anyonenoticed she hadn’t moved. By the time a registered nursearrived and began CPR, it was too late. Roshelle neverrevived.
In Denmark in 2002, a patient who was punished by beingput into restraints was compensated in a damages suitagainst the treating psychiatrist. This was the first timeever that compensation was awarded to a patient harmedby the restraint procedure.
INVOLUNTARY COMMITMENTHow easy is it to be committed? Very easy. In the UnitedStates alone, a person is involuntarily incarcerated in apsychiatric facility every 1 minutes. How therapeutic isinvoluntary incarceration? Consider the followingexamples of committal abuse.
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A psychiatrist committed Ruchla “Rose” Zinger, a 64-year-old Holocaust survivor with an understandable history ofmental instability, to an institution. He relied solely onreports by family members. To carry out the involuntarycommitment, police broke down the door to her house,handcuffed her and shoved her down the stairs. Shesuffered a heart attack and died.
In 1999, psychiatrists in Germany involuntarily committeda 79-year-old woman because neighbors reported she hadacted “strangely.” Despite her long-term diabetes andliver, kidney and heart conditions, she was prescribedbetween five and 20 times the normal dosage of powerfultranquilizers. Six days later the woman had to be rushed toa hospital emergency room, where she died.Doctors reported she had needed urgent medicalattention at least a day earlier and the autopsy showedthat she died of breathing difficulties—a complication oftranquilizers.
An 8-year-old boy from Massachusetts, who suffered fromepilepsy, was rushed by his parents to a hospital for amedication adjustment after he experiencedhallucinations. Instead of adjusting his medication, staffcommitted him to a psychiatric facility. It took the franticparents an entire day to secure his transfer to a medicalhospital for appropriate care.
Dana Davis was slammed face down on his living roomfloor and handcuffed by police before his horrified wife andsix-year-old son. This occurred after he walked out of theoffice of a psychiatrist he didn’t like. As he was leaving, sheasked, “Can you promise that you will not commit suicidebetween now and your next meeting?” Jokingly hequipped, “I’m no soothsayer!” Thirty minutes later, thethree police officers were taking him to the hospital wherehe was found not suicidal and was released.
Seventy-four-year-old William, suffering congestive heartfailure and reliant on an oxygen tank to breathe, said “Yes”when his homecare nurse asked if he felt depressed. Within30 minutes, an attendant from a local psychiatric hospitalarrived at his home and when William refused to go withhim, called the police. They arrived, unhooked the oxygentank, searched him for weapons, shoved him into a policecar and drove him to the psychiatric facility. With noexamination, William was admitted as “suicidal,” and heldfor 72 hours involuntarily, for “observation.” The next day apsychiatrist said he needed to be detained another 48hours and possibly as long as six months. William was“saved” only by the onset of a heart attack. He wastransferred to a general hospital where a medical doctordetermined that William had no need for psychiatricconfinement. William’s health insurance was billed $4,000for four days in the psychiatric facility (even though he hadonly been there two days and not by choice), and he wasbilled $800 personally.
PARENTS SPEAK OUT
THE MISDIAGNOSING OF MICHAEL
School psychologists and psychiatrists coerced New Yorkmother, Patricia Weathers, into drugging her 10-year-oldson, Michael, after he was diagnosed with “ADHD.” Withinsix months, he was withdrawn, stopped socializing withchildren, started chewing pencils, lost his appetite andcouldn’t sleep properly. He ran away from home.
Recognizing that Michael’s bizarre behavior began withthe prescribed drugs, Mrs. Weathers withdrew him slowlyoff the drugs. Medical tests determined he had untreatedallergies and anemia. Michael is now drug-free, is receivingtutoring and is doing well at his schoolwork.
“I want to thank my son Michael for surviving his ordeal. Iwant to let him know that I love him dearly and believe inhim and in his capabilities. I believe deeply that everythinghappens for a reason and that out of this ordeal, he and Iboth have become a stronger unit,” Mrs. Weathers said. “Iwould like to thank CCHR. Without your continuedsupport I would not have been able to get my story out inthe open.”
THE UNDERLYING PROBLEMA young California mother had to fight to get her pre-school son a referral to an ear, nose and throat specialistwhen she suspected he had a hearing problem. The schoolnurse referred him instead to a psychologist, who labeledhim as having “ADD” and needing a stimulant. The motherfought for four months to get the referral she wanted;eventually the specialist discovered the boy had a chroniccase of fluid buildup and 35-decibel hearing loss as a result.Within a month the boy was in the hospital: a 15 minutesurgery prevented what could have been a childhood spenton psychiatric drugs.
“I’M SMART ON MY OWN, MOM”
Another mother was called into the school principal’soffice where a psychologist explained that her son’s brainhad an inability to send signals correctly, which was why hecouldn’t concentrate for long periods of time.Tim was put on a psychiatric stimulant. He began to losehis appetite, have headaches, tire easily and it seemedimpossible for him to sleep at night. Tim pleaded that hedidn’t want to depend on a pill to make him concentrateand said, “I’m smart on my own, Mom.” On the advice of afriend, the mother took her son to a doctor who usesalternative medicine. He took Tim off the drugs, andbegan giving him nutrients and vitamins. He found himallergic to certain foods. With this corrected, Tim beganto eat again and could fall asleep naturally.
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It was also discovered that since starting school, Tim hadbeen taught using the “Whole Word” method and, assuch, didn’t understand what he had been reading in class.His mother purchased a “phonics game” for him. Shetaught him grammar. Within a few months, his reading levelincreased from second to sixth grade level.
NEW ZEALAND MOM
A New Zealand mother read CCHR’s booklet, Psychiatry:Betraying and Drugging Children. She said, “I read thispublication accidentally over two years ago; it had a majoreffect on our lives. At the time my son had been diagnosedas having ADHD and was on the drug, Ritalin, during theday and a night medication to help him sleep....Afterreading your publication I was horrified; what was I doingto my son? I then rang my son’s specialist to find out whathe thought. He was patronizing, derogatory and arrogant.Our conversation ended unpleasantly. I removed my sonfrom all medications, we flushed everything down thetoilet, and we have been trying alternative methods…myson is [now] receiving principal awards for increased workout-put and attitude…I would be more than happy for youto share this positive result (drug free) with other parentswho may be unsure....Thank you so much for your life-changing publication....”
“THANK YOU!”
An American mother said that she and her 14-year-old sonhad “gone through hell for years” because he had beendiagnosed as having ADD and “bipolar” (ups and downs)disorder. The boy became suddenly violent after severaldays of being on a psychiatric drug and when the mothercomplained that she thought it was drug related, she wastold this couldn’t happen and the boy, himself, had made adecision to go off on a temper tantrum. “I am thoroughlydisgusted with everything we have been through and theChief of Police brought me your literature yesterday and Iwas amazed to find out so much information. THANKYOU!!!! From the bottom of our hearts. We are now goingto try a different approach to see if we don’t have anallergy or vitamin deficiency. Again, thank you.”
ALLERGIES & SCHOOL FAILURE
At 15, Betsy was depressed and suicidal each year in thelate summer when ragweed pollen was in the air innorthern Michigan. During her first visit to Dr. Doris Rapp’sclinic she appeared normal until she was tested for anallergy to ragweed. Then she crawled into the officebathtub and refused to come out. She screamed, wasuntouchable, and complained of so much abdominal painthat she pulled her knees to her chest and held herstomach. After she was given a neutralizing allergytreatment, she felt entirely normal within a few minutes.Betsy was a persistent school failure until her allergies wererecognized and treated, and her academic work anddemeanor in school improved dramatically.
SUGAR JUNKIE
Karl was a darling 3-year-old youngster with a charmingpersonality—until he ate sugar. His mother noticed thatwhen Karl ate party food or candy, his total personalityquickly and dramatically changed. He was videotaped ashe gleefully devoured eight cubes of sugar. Just as themother had predicted, within less than an hour heswitched from Dr. Jekyll to a Mr. Hyde. At first he stoppedplaying quietly and began to whine. Then he became moreirritable, stomped his feet, wiggled in his chair, tossed histoys over his head, and threw pieces of a puzzle at hismother. When he was given the correct allergy treatment,within a few minutes he was transformed back into hisadorable self. His mother was in tears. She realized she wasnot a bad mother and he was not a bad kid.Parents are now refusing to be intimidated by psychiatriccoercion to drug their children
Parents are now refusing to be intimidated by psychiatriccoercion to drug their children
DIABETES & BEHAVIOR
Dana was diagnosed as having hyperactivity andoppositional defiant disorder because of bad moods,tantrums and aggressive behavior. She was always in theprincipal’s office, usually for starting fights. However, shewas also thin, pale, fragile-looking, not sleeping, wettingthe bed and losing her appetite. Something was makingher feel miserable. That something turned out to be thebeginning phases of diabetes. An endocrinologist taughther family how to control Dana’s diet and manage herdisease; she never needed a psychiatrist.
Matthews protested the ADHDdiagnosis of her first-grade son
Fred Erlich, with photo of hisson, told a hearing panelthat his son committedsuicide after psychiatrictreatment
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COLOR-BLIND, NOT “DISORDERED”
Warren was diagnosed as hyperactive. He was impulsive,restless and inattentive. He also had breathing problems,episodes of partial hearing loss during ear infections and aheart murmur. Originally, at school he had good reportcards and was never in trouble with the teachers. Then hestarted getting into squabbles and scrapes with kids whoused to be his good friends. He was prescribed apsychotropic drug for his “hyperactivity.”
A proper medical evaluation discovered Warren was color-blind, his EEG showed abnormal but non specific brainwave patterns and a carbon monoxide assay revealed ablood saturation of this deadly gas at the dangerous 20%level. Carbon monoxide was displacing the oxygen inWarren’s bloodstream, drastically reducing the supply ofoxygen to his brain. His fidgeting, falling academicperformance and purposeless hyper behavior were allsymptoms of low-level carbon monoxide poisoning.Warren’s parents immediately called the gas company andhad their heating system overhauled. Within 3 weeks, hiscarbon monoxide level had dropped to 3%. Within 6months, his EEG was normal and his color-blindness wasresolved. He improved at school.
These are valuable examples for at least two reasons.To begin, they inspire and validate the concept that theparent can know best and can rightfully take control ofthe situation, ideas all too easily lost in what is most oftena David and Goliath struggle for parents and families.Secondly, they help strip away the lies and restore hope,with the simple idea that there are inexpensive, non-invasive and productive alternatives to the expensive,enforced and unworkable labeling, drugging and other“solutions” of psychiatry.
HOW TO REPORT ABUSES
If you have been subjected to or areaware of abuse, sexual assault, crime ormalpractice committed by a psychiatrist,psychologist or other mental healthpractitioner, CCHR is a group willing tolisten to and help you.
Vulnerable people who have sought helpfrom psychiatrists and psychologistshave been falsely diagnosed and forcedto undergo unwanted and often harmfulpsychiatric methods. Hundreds have died.CCHR is investigating these and otherpsychiatric abuses. We can assist youwith your evidence and reports ofcriminal psychiatric practice.http://www.cchr.org/issues/solutions/report/index.htm
American families are being destroyedby the U.S. Government
All fAll fAll fAll fAll for the Almighty Dollaror the Almighty Dollaror the Almighty Dollaror the Almighty Dollaror the Almighty Dollar(Yes, we have proof! – LOTS of it!)
In 1999 the “Adoptions and Safe Families Act of1997” (ASFA) allowed U.S. Health and HumanServices to start paying out annual bonusincentive payments from federal funds to thestates in exchange for adoptions of children fromstate custody foster homes. This bonus incentivepayment has encouraged more outrageousunjustified CPS abductions of young “adoptable”children than ever before. States were given agoal: to double the number of children adoptedout of foster care by 2002.
This and other wretched child “welfare” laws havebeen put together at a federal level since the1970’s – giving states incentive money from theFederal Social Security Fund for taking away thechildren of the poor and forcing unwanted“services” on them. There are thousands of non-abused, non-neglected children caught up in thissystem, traumatized and abused by the U.S.Government – their families being destroyed,their parents devastated. Parents with moremoney that are caught up in this system arequickly bankrupted by legal defense and childsupport costs.
Don’t believe what the government’s propagandaartists are telling you about parents abusing andneglecting their children at record numbers thesedays. It simply isn’t true.
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Woman pleads no contest,gets 8-year term in baby-
buying caseWeb Posted: 04/15/2004 03:15 PM CDT
Jesse BoganExpress-News Border Bureau
LAREDO —— A day after two young mothers gave tearfultestimony, a woman accused in a baby-buying casedecided in court today not to contest the charges againsther.
Maria Dolores Bondoc, 54, who was the representativehere for AAA-Adoption Agency, of San Antonio, was ontrial on one count of sale or purchase of a child and onecount unlawful transfer, both stemming from claims of a22-year-old women from a southern state in Mexico.Bondoc had similar charges pending involving three otheryoung mothers from Mexico who came to the border togive up their babies. She had long maintained herinnocence, but recent testimony caused at least three ofthe jury members to shed tears, an obvious score by WebbCounty prosecutors in a case that initially caughtinternational headlines.
At the beginning of court today, Bondoc immediatelywent into conference with her family, defense attorney
and prosecutors. When she came back in the courtroom,Bondoc’s emotions appeared publicly for the first time. Shewiped tears from her eyes with a red handkerchief and, attimes, glared at three young mothers sitting together inthe front row of the courtroom.
Bondoc agreed to an eight-year sentence for all chargesheld against her, without the chance to appeal. She will beeligible for parole in two years.
Defense attorney David Almaraz asked 341st DistrictCourt Judge Elma T. Salinas Ender if his client could remainfree until formal sentencing later this month to attend tosome family matters. It was not granted.Then, after each charge was addressed, Almaraz askedagain.
“Would the court consider at least two days?” he asked.“No, sir,” Judge Ender said.
Bondoc worked for Alamo for five years and at least 10years at a different agency here, family said.
A Department of Protective and Regulatory Servicessupervisor testified Wednesday that they continue to tryto revoke Alamo’s license. Alamo previously appealed thecase against it, and a decision remains open pending adecision by the State Office of Administrative Hearings.
The woman who seized my husbands then 6 yr old.daughter from their yard, named SHIRLEY BAEZ, wasarrested a few months later in August l996 in Guadalaharafor black market child selling, and was brought back to thestates and protected by the courts. No one would bringcharges against her, and still wont, even with alotmore now known to be part of theirnetwork here.
The courts inOregon are stillprotecting thismarket in childflesh beingoperated out ofthe childservicesagency. Theperpetratorsin our casewere found guilty in l998, yet remain unprosecuted. Thesenames also are on the Operation Ore international list ofpedophiles and black market child sellers, KAY TORAN inOregon being found guilty of this along with a wholenetwork in the Marion County and Woodburn offices ofchild services here.... the FBI, the US Attorneys, allexecutive branch officers and courts are fully knowing ofthis since l998.... still no prosecution, only activeprotection for pornographers and pedophiles in the courtsso far....
Until the outrage becomes such that the people demandredress and prosecution, they will continue in theirlucrative market in child flesh and ultimately body parts,working all sides for the profit. We proved that even with ajury verdict they are guilty, no prosecution happens.
We are doing all we can to be as loud as we can that this ishappening. Every day THOUSANDS of children go“missing” in the United States, the state operating thismarket under the guise of “child protection” seizingchildren who are never again seen by their families.
In Oregon there are NO ANSWERS at any level,total corruption all the way through.... the courtand agency won’t even admit the children are missing,murdered, seized without lawful process. No answers.No acountability anywhere.
In a blistering letter to the head of Florida’s child welfareagency, the state attorney in Fort Pierce hasaccused Department of Children & Familiescaseworkers of ‘’coaching’’ two children tofalsely accuse their father of sexual abuse —allegations that robbed the man of custody forseveral years.
State Attorney Bruce H. Colton blasts the agency forcausing a father who may be innocent to lose his children,while an alcoholic, drug-addicted and neglectful motherwas allowed to raise them.’
Although DCF employees are not technically guilty ofcommitting a crime in this case, it is evident that thesechildren have no chance to be ̀ normal’ due to the recklessmishandling of this family,’’ Colton wrote in the March 29letter to DCF Secretary Jerry Regier.``If the children aretelling the truth in their latest statements, the childrenhave been sent on a six-year roller coaster ride of recklessindifference by DCF from which they will probably neverrecover.’’
Colton’s letter concerns an ongoing dispute between DCFinvestigators, caseworkers and attorneys in severalCentral and North Florida counties and Dennis Gaffney,the father of boys ages 16 and 10. DCF’s actions in the casenow are under investigation by the agency’s InspectorGeneral’s Office in Tallahassee.
’’I feel very strongly about ensuring integrity andaccountability in our district offices,’’ Regier wrote in aMarch 17 letter to Colton, asking the chief prosecutor tooutline his concerns over DCF’s handling of the case.
Gaffney said he was heartened by Colton’s remarks, whichserve as a kind of vindication. Since 1997, Gaffney has livedunder a cloud of suspicion that he molested his own son,as well as the teenage daughter of his ex-wife’s friend.’Itcomes down to this: ̀ Oops, we made a mistake,’ ‘’Gaffney said. ̀ `It is obvious DCF is not capable of policingthemselves.’’
Okeechobee sheriff’s Capt. Dale LaFlam, who investigatedthe case, said he has concluded Gaffney ̀ `has not donewhat he is accused of doing.’’
In surprisingly harsh language, Colton suggested agencyemployees made a series of decisions over several yearsthat left the two boys at great risk.
During most of the past seven years, DCF caseworkerswent to great lengths to leave the two boys with theirmother, Colton wrote, despite:
• An internal agency report that concluded ‘’the mothermay not be a stable parent.’’ One report concluded themother’s alcohol and drug abuse ̀ `may present asubstantial barrier to her achieving effective parentingskills.’’
• Reports from officials at a halfway house in which DCFplaced the mother and two boys said that they‘’suspected that she leaves the premises to drink,’’ doesnot require the boys to attend school, has allowed her carto be repossessed and is not allowed to visit her ownmother due to a domestic violence injunction.
• A sworn statement from a doctor who said the mother``brings [the] children to his office with alcohol on herbreath.’’At a January 2001 court hearing, DCF officialsblocked the introduction into evidence of a videotapedstatement by the mother who said ‘’that DCF employeesasked her to lie in order to obtain an injunction ofprotection against Gaffney,’’ Colton wrote.’’
DCF first took the children away from the father based onan inadequate investigation,’’ Colton wrote. ̀ `Then, DCFgave custody to the mother who had past criminalconvictions, abused alcohol and controlled substances,and committed new crimes while having custody of thechildren.’’ Is it any wonder that the children are rebelliousand uncontrollable at the present time,’’ Colton added.
Agency blasted in abuse probeA state attorney blasts officials at Florida’s child welfare agency for their
‘reckless mishandling’ of a child abuse investigation that tore apart afather and two children.
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By last February, DonnaMcCormick hadn’t smoked crackin 30 days. And she had a roof overher head.
But stability wasn’t a sure thing.McCormick was still grieving forher father who’d died in January.Then, the father of her 9-year-oldtwins dropped them off at hermother’s house where McCormicklived, telling her to keep them,even though the lease prohibitedchildren.
Not knowing what to do with thechildren, McCormick calledAllegheny County’s Office ofChildren Youth and Families. Twocaseworkers showed up two hourslater. Instead of removing thekids, they offeredMcCormick something unexpected, a programunique in Pennsylvania called Family GroupDecision Making.
It flips traditional social work upside down. Instead ofcaseworkers telling parents what to do to resolve theirproblems, this program helps families devise their ownsolutions.
Family Group Decision Making workers organize a meetingof family members — grandparents, aunts, uncles, cousins— anyone whom the parent invites. They meet over a mealto discuss how to solve the parents’ problems, protectthe children and prevent foster care placement. The familywrites a plan, and caseworkers assist in itsimplementation.
For McCormick, the plan was for her to get all of herchildren back, three teens in addition to the twins, to gethousing of her own, to faithfully attend her outpatientdrug treatment program and stay clean. Later, shedecided she needed a job and training to get a better job,too.
She accomplished all of that and more within afew months, and her case was closed.
McCormick told her story during a presentation beforestate Welfare Secretary Estelle Richman, who visited sevensocial welfare programs yesterday at the request of StateRep. Jake Wheatley, D-Hill District.
Marcia Sturdivant, CYF’s deputy director, said Family
Group Decision Making putspower in the hands of thefamilies — a concept not easilygrasped by traditionally educatedsocial workers.
After hearing details of theprogram, which is run by theMacedonia Baptist Church in theHill District, Richman said she wasimpressed.
Richman said she was struck thatMcCormick felt the programtreated her with dignity.Richman said workers in the state’snew welfare program calledTemporary Assistance for NeedyFamilies contend they’rerespectful. “But few people whogo through say that,” she noted.
Sturdivant, who brought the Family Group DecisionMaking to Allegheny County two years ago after readingabout it, told Richman it’s hard for social workers torelinquish the power to tell people what to do. It tooktraining.
“It is not very easy to get people to think this way,” shesaid. “Even judges said, ‘What do you mean, letfamilies make their own plans? Are theycapable?’ “
As it turns out, families seem to be very capable. Anegligible number of children in the program have beeninjured or placed in foster care, she said.The program at Macedonia has served 102 families,including 218 children in the past two years. Another inMcKeesport, called Touching Families Inc., serves families inthe Mon Valley.
Family Group Decision Making is offered in about 20states. It originated in New Zealand and Australia and wasintroduced in the United States in the late 1990s.McCormick, 33, lives in her own apartment on the NorthSide, has all of her children back, and is caring for a niece aswell.
The family meeting over dinner, without caseworkers, wasimportant, McCormick said, because family members willtell it like it is. As she said,
“Your family will call you on your stuff.”
Barbara White Stack can be reached at [email protected] or 412-263-1878.
CYF program allows mother to take fate into own handsSaturday, December 20, 2003
By Barbara White Stack, Pittsburgh Post-Gazette
Donna McCormick gets a hug fromher son, Darron Clinton, 16.McCormick, a former drug user,got her children back with helpfrom the Family Group DecisionMaking program, which shediscovered through AlleghenyCounty’s Office of Children Youthand Families.
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My children were removed five yearsago from my care and placed in mymother’s home where she is paid by thegovernment to keep them. Bothchildren were taken 7 months after myson’s leg was accidently broken and Iwas accused of abuse. Half of mywages are being garnished for past duechild support making it impossible forme to make ends meet. I will never giveup trying to get custody of my childrenwho want desperately to come home.
My dad had healthproblems and putme voluntarily inCPS custody fortwo-weeks. Eventhough herecovered, CPSsent me to agroup home formore than 15months. They putme on several
psychiatric drugs and wondered why Ideveloped behavior & health problems.Now, my dad is an advocate for CPSreform and they have retaliated againstus by refusing to let me go home. Wewill never give up trying to reform thiscorrupt system.
I went to the police and CPS while seekinghelp in a women’s shelter as I firmly believedthat my son was being molested by hisfather, who is an attorney. The outcome ofme trying to protect my son, caused CPS toimmediately place him in his father’scustody. For the last two years, I have hadonly supervised visits which I can’t afford.Due to this unjust ruling, my son hasendured unthinkable acts of sexual abuseand his father’s alcoholism. I will not quitfighting for my son’s return and being anadvocate for CPS and Judicial reform untilthis system is overhauled.
A few victims of the Child Abuse Industry . . .
At 4, I was illegally taken bythe police without a warrantfrom my non-abusive dad andforced into foster care. In myfirst foster home, I enduredsexual and physical abuse. Myfoster mom, therapist andcourt appointed attorneybrainwashed me to make falsestatements about my dad. Mydad spent thousands ofdollars defending himself inDependency court. Now, mydad’s case plan has beencompleted for months and Istill haven’t been able to gohome.
My 7-children were removedfrom my home and thrust intofoster care when the policearrested my husband who wascreating a domestic disturbance.They took all my childrenbecause they said I had a dirtyhome. After fighting in court formore than a year, I lost my home,and all of my possessions to payfor legal expenses. My husbandand I were forced to live at thelocal homeless shelter. After oneof my children was burned in ascalding hot bath in the fosterhome, then my 7 children werefinally returned. I can’t believeour own government would treatfamilies this way and make us payfor their mistakes.
A two-year investigation by a Los Angeles Newspaper Group found that the child welfare system hastaken thousands of children away from their parents in cases where it may not have been necessary oradvisable, sending them to homes that are more dangerous than the ones they left. This is happeningnationwide, not just in Los Angeles.The reason? It appears to be a twisted system of financial incentives that rewards county ChildProtection Service agencies for placing a huge number of children in foster care– allocating from$30,000 to $150,000 for each child per year. This money comes from our Federal Social Security Fund!The reward system, which one expert called the “perverse incentive factor,” led Los Angeles CountyDepartment of Children and Family Services as well as CPS agencies nationwide to whisk children awayfrom their parents when alternatives to out-of-home placement would have worked better . . .
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Every day across America, citizens of the United States logonto the internet and inquire whether there might be childmolesters and other kinds of sex offenders living somewherein their neighborhood. Yet, the State of Michigan has madesure that David and Hege Crowton’s children get to live withone.
After taking away David & Hege’s children with a falsepetition and keeping them away because he admitted toneeding help with drug use and because of the State’sfailure to provide the services required for them to have theirchildren returned, the State of Michigan refused to removetheir children (including their 5 year old girl) from a homewhere the children would cohabit with a child molester. Thebiological son of the foster parents assigned to the Crowtonchildren was convicted of Criminal Sexual Conduct (Seconddegree multiple) for doing something very sick to aninnocent little 5 year old girl. Sources say that the fosterfamily had gone to court to acquire “grandparents rights” andforce the visitation of their grand-daughter. They weregranted under the condition that the child be undersupervision. According to the police reports (which arepublic information available through the Livingston Countycourthouse), at least one visit resulted in the 15 year oldbiological son of the foster parents inviting the visiting 5 yearold girl up to his room. There, he had his way with her whilehis parents and David’s children were in another room. Forone reason or another the State of Michigan doesn’t believehe ever touched David’s children. They apparently also areputting a lot of stock into the idea that he never will.Amazingly, the State of Michigan believes that the samechild molester who sexually abused a 5 year old girl whovisited the home never once touched the 5 year old girl helived with and babysat on numerous occasions—David’sdaughter. They believe this in spite of the fact that a policereport shows a “similar complaint” about sexual molestationcoming from David’s 5 year old daughter. They have chosento rely on “forensic interviews” by total strangers (rather thansomeone the child would trust) to determine he had notabused her.
Note: A Study of 630 cases of alleged sexual abuse ofchildren from 1985 through 1989: Using a subset of 116confirmed cases, findings indicated that 79 percent of thechildren of the study initially denied abuse or were tentativein disclosing. Of those who did disclose, approximatelythree-quarters disclosed accidentally. Source: Sorensen &Snow, 1991.
After the sexual abuse, sources say the foster family’s“grandparents rights” were terminated. It seems quite oddthat the State of Michigan would end the Grandparentsrights of this foster family partly because of their failure toprotect this little girl but then approve the placement ofDavid’s children in this same home. The Ombudsman, astate-appointed office set up to oversee the state’s Child
Protective Services,reviewed this case andsubsequentlyrecommended a policychange forbidding this from occurring in the future. In spite ofall this, steps are now being taken for this foster family toadopt these children. They refused to grant adoption to thechildren’s Norwegian grandparents who are available andwaiting with open arms to adopt them. The adoption to thefoster family is VERY close to being finalized. Their fate isto ultimately be decided by the same judge that allowed theplacement of these children into this foster home, judgeElizabeth Pezzetti. Pezzetti was recently re-elected as aprobate court Judge in Oakland County.State Representative Tim Pope, who was on the Health andHuman Services Committee in the state of Oklahoma andhas vast experience in dealing with Child Protective Servicelaws, has investigated and reviewed the entire file. He foundthat State and Federal laws have been broken by the Stateof Michigan Child Protective Services (FIA). Click here toread one of the letters he wrote asking a Michigan StateRepresentative for help. The following is a statement fromTim Pope about this case:
“I have gotten to know David and Hege Crowtonpretty well and I am convinced that they have beendealt a very bad hand from the Child WelfareAgency (that title is a real joke). David and Hegehave had their rights repeatedly violated and I hopethat somehow justice can prevail and they can getthings put back together. Unfortunately, to makethese kind of people accountable for their actionsyou must get them in court and that takes a lot ofmoney - money that they do not have. I served for anumber of years on the Oklahoma Department ofHuman Services committee in our State House andI can promise you that, if something like this hadhappened here, heads would roll and the peoplewho perpetrated this crime in the name of the statewould probably be put in jail.” Tim Pope, FormerOklahoma State Representative
This is an OUTRAGE and must be stopped!
Read the evidence on this web site and voice yourconcerns with the Michigan Children’s Institute, JudgeElizabeth Pezzetti’s office at (248) 858-0240 andGovernor Granholm at 517-373-3400. Pezzetti wasrecently re-elected as a probate court Judge inOakland County and Granholm is the State’s newGovernor.
Ask them to remove the children from this home andimmediately put a stop to their adoption of them.Demand a full investigation into how the state couldallow such a terrible thing to happen and let themknow that you are watching the developments on thiscase. http://www.davidschildren.com/children.htm
Little children placed in foster carewith a convicted child molester
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Concerned about the education that Los Angeles County’s foster children receive atnonpublic schools, the Board of Supervisors today will consider forming a specialpanel to help improve student achievement.
The state spends $125 million a year to educate foster children in 400 nonpublicschools, most of which cater to youngsters with disabilities or special needs. Manyof the nonpublic schools are operated by nonprofit foster family agencies and grouphomes that contract with the county to care for foster children. Others are operatedby people who obtain licenses from the state.
The schools have captured the attention of Supervisor Michael D. Antonovich, who isconcerned that some of the schools have no qualified teachers, no standardcurriculum, no computers, no benchmarks or performance measures, noextracurricular activities and no record of the number of children who graduate orattend college.
“These schools are defrauding the children, their futures and the taxpayers who haveinvested large sums of money for the children’s welfare,” Antonovich said. “Thesystem has turned a blind eye toward that.”
The county Department of Children and Family Services and the Children’s LawCenter of Los Angeles will recommend today whether to create an EducationCoordinating Council to provide additional oversight of the nonpublic schools.
Bruce Saltzer, executive director of the Association of Community Human ServiceAgencies, which represents 70 nonprofit foster care and community mental healthagencies in the county, said most of the nonpublic schools provide “extremely high-quality” educations. He noted that some of the nonpublic schools the supervisorshave criticized are not operated by agencies his association represents.
“Some of our agencies have been around for well over 100 years providingoutstanding quality services to kids in the foster care system,” Saltzer said.Studies show 75 percent of foster children perform below their grade level, 83percent are held back by the third grade and some can’t read. A total of 35 percentof foster children are in special education programs and 46 percent to 70 percentdon’t complete high school, compared with 16 percent among nonfoster children.
“It’s not surprising that these troubled youth today will become tomorrow’s troubledadults,” said Miriam Aroni Krinsky, executive director of the Children’s Law Center.“As we’ve heard from the youth, stand-up teaching is the exception and the schoolsoften become an exercise in glorified baby-sitting.”
David Sanders, the county’s new director of the Department of Children and FamilyServices, said contracts with the group homes that run many nonpublic schools willexpire in April and the county is negotiating new standards that will require theagencies to improve children’s education.
“Too many children in foster care today have marginal academic achievement,”Sanders said. “We need to set higher standards.”
Panel on foster schools?Rate of student graduation from nonpublic
facilities lowBy Troy Anderson
Staff Writer
At the Hollywood protest.
Dennis Hinger in San Diego.
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Tuesday, January 27, 2004 -Los Angeles County supervisors voted Tuesday to createa council to improve the education of foster children intaxpayer-paid nonpublic schools that serve youngsterswith disabilities or special needs.
It costs $20,000 to $40,000 a year to educate a fosterchild in nonpublic schools, some of which are located informer motels and old storefronts in strip malls, saidSupervisor Michael D. Antonovich, adding that some ofthe children could receive a better education in publicschools.
“There has been a great scandal of some foster agenciestaking money and using the children as pawns to make abuck and allow the children to remain in their carewithout the ability to learn,” Antonovich said.
The creation of an Education Coordination Council,composed of various public agencies and local schooldistricts, will allow the agencies to work together toimprove the education of foster children and those onprobation, he said.
Some nonpublic schools are operated by nonprofit fosterfamily agencies and group homes that contract with thecounty. Others are operated by people who obtainlicenses from the state.
“We certainly support strong actions being taken whenabuses are identified, and the provider community isanxious to work with the new Education CoordinationCouncil,” said Bruce Saltzer, executive director of theAssociation of Community Human Service Agencies,which represents 70 nonprofit foster care and communitymental health agencies in the county.“However, we must not paint all nonpublic schools withthe same broad brush. It does a disservice to nonpublicschools operated by ACHSA agencies, which provide thehighest quality care and which want to work with thecounty to help weed out bad practices and poor-qualitycare.”
Studies have found that only two out of 100 fosterchildren get a community college degree or go on to afour-year college.
Miriam Aroni Krinsky, executive director of the Children’sLaw Center of Los Angeles, said foster children often fallbehind in school when they are moved through multiplefoster care placements.“The tremendous consequences for these youth ... areundisputed,” Krinsky said. “In the first two years afteraging out of foster care, too many will end up unemployed,living on the streets or in prison.”
If a child is identified as needing special education, thestate pays 100 percent of the costs for nonpublic schools,said Tom Parrish, deputy director of education programsat the American Institutes for Research, a Washington,D.C.-based think tank commissioned by the CaliforniaLegislature to study the costs of educating foster children.“So we see a huge fiscal incentive to place foster kidsoutside of public schools in nonpublic schools,” Parrishsaid.
Board focuses on schoolingSupervisors vote to form council to improve
education of foster kids
By Troy AndersonStaff Writer
Mourning the death of their brother in fostercare, at the protest in Hollywood.
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The drug industry has created vast markets for productslike Viagra, Celebrex and Vioxx by spending billions ofdollars on consumer advertising.
But to sell medicines that treatschizophrenia, the companies focuson a much smaller group ofcustomers: state officials whooversee treatment for many peoplewith serious mental illness. Thosepatients - in mental hospitals, atmental health clinics and on Medicaid- make states among the largestbuyers of antipsychotic drugs.
For Big Pharma, success in the halls ofgovernment has required a differentset of marketing tactics. Since themid-1990’s, a group of drugcompanies, led by Johnson & Johnson,has campaigned to convince stateofficials that a new generation ofdrugs - with names like Risperdal,Zyprexa and Seroquel - is superior to older and muchcheaper antipsychotics like Haldol. The campaign has led adozen states to adopt guidelines for treatingschizophrenia that make it hard for doctors to prescribeanything but the new drugs. That, in turn, has helpedtransform the new medicines into blockbusters.
Ten drug companies chipped in to help underwrite theinitial effort by Texas state officials to develop theguidelines. Then, to spread the word, Johnson & Johnson,Pfizer and possibly other companies paid for meetingsaround the country at which officials from various stateswere urged to follow the lead of Texas, according todocuments and interviews that are part of a lawsuit andan investigation in Pennsylvania.
How did this play out? In May 2001, as Pennsylvania wasweighing whether to adopt the Texas guidelines, JanssenPharmaceutica, a Johnson & Johnson subsidiary that sellsRisperdal, paid $4,000 to fly two state mental healthofficials to New Orleans, where they dined at an elegantCreole restaurant in the French Quarter, visited theaquarium and met with company executives and Texasofficials, according to documents. Janssen also paid twoPennsylvania officials $2,000 each for giving speeches atcompany-sponsored educational seminars for doctors andnurses working in the state’s prisons.
The payments were discovered a little more than a year
ago by Allen L. Jones, an investigator in the inspectorgeneral’s office in Pennsylvania, who stumbled upon them
when he was looking into why stateofficials had set up a bank account tocollect grants from pharmaceuticalcompanies.
With the help of his congressman inPennsylvania, Mr. Jones, who is 49 anda former parole officer, brought theinformation to the attention offederal health officials - after, he says,his superiors removed him from theinvestigation, citing the politicalinfluence of the drug industry. TheDepartment of Health and HumanServices has asked the health carefraud unit of the Federal Bureau ofInvestigation to determine whetherany laws were broken, according toletters Mr. Jones has received fromfederal officials.
DETAILS of the drug companies’ efforts, recorded in Mr.Jones’s investigative files and confirmed in part by drugcompanies and state officials, offer a glimpse inside thedrug industry’s behind-the-scenes efforts to promote thenew-generation antipsychotics, called atypicals becausetheir action in the body is unlike that of earlier drugs.
There is no proof that drug-industry money changed anystate official’s opinion about the drugs. And comparedwith the billions of dollars spent marketing to doctorsfrom their first days as medical students - or the billionsspent to underwrite and publish research - the dollaramounts are small.
But questions have multiplied about the many ways thatthe drug industry tries to influence the medicalinformation that determines its products’ success orfailure. Last month, for example, some senators sharplycriticized the National Institutes of Health for allowing itsscientists to accept consulting fees and stock optionsfrom drug and biotechnology companies. Officials of theagency said that its top-level scientists were no longeraccepting such compensation.
Sales of the new antipsychotics totaled $6.5 billion lastyear, according to an estimate by Richard T. Evans, ananalyst at Sanford C. Bernstein & Company. About a thirdof those sales were to state Medicaid programs, whosecosts have ballooned with their adoption of the new
Making Drugs, Shaping the RulesBy MELODY PETERSEN
February 1, 2004
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medications. Texas, for example, says it spends about$3,000 a year, on average, for each patient on the newdrugs, versus the $250 it spent on older medications. Theescalating costs have prompted a few states to try tolimit access to the new antipsychotics - efforts that drugmakers have opposed vigorously.
The Texas guidelines advise doctors to choose Risperdal orone of four other new antipsychotics - Zyprexa from EliLilly, Seroquel from AstraZeneca, Geodon from Pfizer orAbilify from Bristol-Myers Squibb - unless they can explainin writing why an older drug would be better. If a patientdoes poorly on the first medication, doctors at statehospitals and mental health clinics are advised to tryanother of the new drugs next. Texas officials said suchguidelines were simply a road map for doctors, who canexplain to the state on written forms why they are notprescribing a recommended drug.
The drug companies deny doing anything untoward. Theysay it was appropriate for them to help pay for thedevelopment of guidelines aimed at giving patients thebest care. The ones for schizophrenia, they say, werewritten by medical experts and Texas officials withoutindustry interference.
“Janssen did not participate in nor influence the content orthe development of the guidelines,’’ said Doug Arbesfeld,a spokesman for Janssen Pharmaceutica. Officials in somestates asked the company for financial grants so that theycould learn about the guidelines, he said.
Dr. Steven P. Shon, who as medical director of the Texasmental health department led the work on the guidelines,said the effort was not the drug companies’ idea. Rather,he said, state officials decided that guidelines wereneeded because of the wide variations in prescriptionsbeing written for patients.
Dr. Shon said that the condition of many patients hadimproved when their care followed the guidelines. Evenwithout them, he added, doctors in Texas would haveprescribed the new drugs. “Everyone wants to use the newthing,’’ he said.
WHEN work on the Texas guidelines began in 1995, onlytwo of the new-generation drugs were approved for sale:Risperdal and Clozaril, a medicine from Novartis thatdoctors were uncomfortable prescribing because of itsknown potential to cause a life-threatening blood disorder.At the time, Janssen had little research on which to base itsclaims that Risperdal represented a medical advance. Infact, when federal regulators approved the drug, theyforbade the company from claiming in marketing materialsthat it was better than the older drugs.
Now, doctors widely prefer the new medications, sayingthat the older drugs cause a higher incidence of sideeffects like stiffness, trembling and uncontrollable jerks
that can stigmatize patients and prompt them to stoptaking the drugs.
But some recent studies have complicated the picture fordoctors by showing that the new medicines havepotentially serious side effects, too, including thedevelopment of diabetes in some patients. On Tuesday,four medical groups, including the American PsychiatricAssociation, warned that the new drugs could increase apatient’s risk of obesity, diabetes and high cholesterol -which can all lead to heart disease. Some leading expertson schizophrenia, after reviewing the accumulatedscientific evidence, have developed a set of guidelines thatclash with the Texas policy. These recommendations,produced entirely with federal government financing, saythat physicians should not consistently choose the newdrugs over the older medications.
“You choose the one that seems the best for the patient,”said Dr. Anthony F. Lehman, the chairman of the psychiatrydepartment at the University of Maryland School ofMedicine. Dr. Lehman was the leader of the panel, calledthe Patient Outcomes Research Team, that put togetherthe alternate guidelines under a grant from the NationalInstitute of Mental Health. The guidelines are expected tobe published this spring.
As early as 1999, physicians were raising questions aboutthe drug industry’s financing of the Texas guidelines. In anarticle that year in The Journal of Practical Psychiatry andBehavioral Health, Dr. Peter J. Weiden and Dr. Lisa Dixonargued that corporate financing created a potentialconflict of interest that could hurt the project’s credibility.
Dr. Weiden, professor of psychiatry at the State Universityof New York Downstate Medical Center in Brooklyn, said inan interview last month that he believes the new drugshave benefits over the older ones. But he continues toworry, he said, that the industry controls too much ofwhat doctors learn in psychiatry. For example, Dr. Weidensaid, industry-sponsored educational events focus onmedications, while subjects like how to talk to patients tomotivate them to get better fall through the cracks.
“The industry drives education right now,” Dr. Weiden said.“Across the board, there has been a shifting of educationtoward psychopharma,” meaning drug treatment.
Mr. Arbesfeld, the Janssen spokesman, said that thecompany disagreed with the recommendations of Dr.Lehman’s panel. A growing body of evidence, Mr. Arbesfeldsaid, shows the benefits of the new drugs. He pointed to a2002 study that found that patients treated withRisperdal had a lower risk of relapse than those treatedwith Haldol. He also noted that the National Institute forClinical Excellence, part of the National Health Service ofthe British government, recommends the new drugs as afirst-choice treatment for schizophrenia.
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Other companies say it is important that they helpeducate doctors about the intricacies of their drugs.“There is no one who knows more about our products thanwe do,” said Mariann Caprino, a spokeswoman for Pfizer.The company, like many others, gives financial grants foreducational events but says that it is not involved inwriting the instruction materials.
Industry financing of the Texas guidelines began in 1996,when Janssen agreed to help pay for a survey of dozens ofexperts about the best way totreat schizophrenia, according tothe article by Dr. Weiden and Dr.Dixon.Texas officials relied on the experts’conclusions to help them write theguidelines, which were first appliedto patients in 1997. The initial onescalled for doctors to use eitherRisperdal or one of the earliergeneration of antipsychotics. Threeyears later, Janssen and five othercompanies helped underwrite anupdate of the consensus; Texas, inturn, used it in updating theguidelines. The 1999 versionestablished a preference for thenew drugs.
Dr. Shon said 11 drug companies hadgiven Texas a total of $285,000 for the project. The effortproduced guidelines for treating schizophrenia as well asfor treating bipolar disorder and major depressive disorderin adults, and attention deficit hyperactivity disorder andmajor depression in children.
In all, Texas has spent about $6 million on the guidelinesand on educating doctors about how to use them, Dr.Shon said. In addition to the drug industry support, thestate has received help from the federal government,universities and nonprofit foundations. The largest grant,$2.4 million, came from the Robert Wood JohnsonFoundation, a leading backer of health care research, whichwas established by the estate of a longtime chiefexecutive of Johnson & Johnson.
David J. Morse, a vice president of the foundation, saidthat it made the grant because one of its goals is to helpfind the best possible medical treatments. The foundationhas about 50 percent of its financial assets invested inJohnson & Johnson stock, he said, and has former companyexecutives on its board. But it is “completely independent”of Johnson & Johnson, Mr. Morse said.
IN May 2002, a manager in Pennsylvania’s public healthdepartment reported to state investigators that mentalhealth officials had created a bank account to collectgrants from drug companies.
Mr. Jones said the inspector general’s office soondispatched him to look into the report. Pennsylvania’sethics law covering state workers bars them fromaccepting honorariums and gifts if they are made toinfluence officials’ decisions; ethics officials say the bancan also extend to accepting reimbursements for travel insome cases. Violators can be punished by fines andcriminal penalties.
Mr. Jones said he began to believe that drug companieswere trying to buy the loyalty ofstate officials. “The more research Idid, the more alarmed I became,”he said in an interview.
As he reconstructed the flow ofdeposits into the account, heinterviewed drug companyexecutives and state officials.Pennsylvania mental health officials,he determined, were beginning toexpress interest in the Texasguidelines by October 2000.Janssen paid twice for Dr. Shon tofly to Pennsylvania, according tonotes from an interview Mr. Jonesconducted with Janssen executivesin September 2002. Janssen madethe grant covering Dr. Shon’s travelexpenses “to expand atypical
usage,” according to a company document that was givento Mr. Jones.On April 17, 2002, Janssen paid for an educational seminaron the guidelines for doctors and nurses working inPennsylvania’s prisons. Each of the speakers - includingSteven J. Fiorello, the top pharmacist in Pennsylvania’smental health office, and Dr. Frederick R. Maue, clinicalservices director of the state’s Department of Corrections- was paid $2,000, according to Mr. Jones’s interviews anddocuments he obtained. Comprehensive NeuroScience, amarketing company in White Plains working for Janssen,provided Mr. Fiorello with slides to use as a model for histalk, according to an e-mail message that ComprehensiveNeuroScience sent to Mr. Fiorello. In the message,Comprehensive NeuroScience asked him to personalize theslides and then send them back for Janssen’s review.
Sandra Forquer, vice president for educational services atComprehensive NeuroScience, said in an interview that Mr.Fiorello had written his own speech. She also said that Mr.Fiorello had requested that his $2,000 payment be givento charity, but that her company sent it to him directly bymistake. According to Mr. Jones’s interview notes, Mr.Fiorello described several instances in which drugcompanies gave him honorariums but said he was unsureabout which ones he had kept and which ones he had givento charity.
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Stephanie Suran, a spokeswoman for the Department ofPublic Welfare in Pennsylvania, said Mr. Fiorello was notavailable for comment. She said that she could notcomment on Mr. Jones’s findings because of a continuinginvestigation.
Mr. Jones’s interview notes show that Ms. Forquer also toldhim that Janssen, through Comprehensive NeuroScience,paid Dr. Maue $2,000 for each of two other speeches, inOrlando, Fla., and Sacramento. A spokeswoman for Dr.Maue said that he had turned over any honorariums hereceived to the state; state officials confirmed that he hadsent the money to the state’s general fund.
But Mr. Jones learned that Janssen nurtured other ties tostate officials. It named Dr. Steven J. Karp, medical directorof Pennsylvania’s mental health office, to the advisoryboard of a newsletter, Mental Health Issues Today, that amarketing firm created for Janssen. Janssen paid to fly Dr.Karp, as well as top officials from other states, to advisoryboard meetings in Seattle, Washington, D.C., and Tampa,Fla.
ACCORDING to Mr. Jones’s interview notes, Dr. Karp saidhe eventually became uncomfortable about attending themeetings because a Janssen executive was always present.Ms. Suran, the spokeswoman for the Department of PublicWelfare, said that Dr. Karp was not available for comment.The records that Mr. Jones compiled in his investigation arenow part of a lawsuit he filed against his supervisors in thePennsylvania inspector general’s office after they removedhim from the inquiry. Mr. Jones said he did not know if theinspector general’s office had investigated the matterfurther.
Mr. Jones contends in the lawsuit, which has beentransferred to the United States District Court inScranton, Pa., that his bosses violated his rights by tryingto hide the evidence he found.
“I was told that drug companies write checks topoliticians on both sides of the aisle,” said Mr. Jones, whostill works as an investigator in the inspector general’soffice.
W. Scott Foster, a spokesman for the inspector general’soffice, said that the office did not comment on lawsuits orits investigations. In court, lawyers for the state healthofficials have argued that the officials did nothing wrongand did not violate the rights of Mr. Jones.
Pennsylvania officials believe that the schizophreniaguidelines, adopted by the state in 2001, are savingmoney, Ms. Suran said. In the past, many doctorsprescribed more than one drug for schizophrenia patients,the mental health office found. The guidelines, however,rarely allow multiple prescriptions. Preliminary data alsoshow that the mental health of some patients hasimproved, Ms. Suran said.
Before he was pulled off theinvestigation, Mr. Jones said, helearned that Janssen was not theonly drug company that had madepayments to Pennsylvania officialsinvolved in adopting the guidelines.According to Mr. Jones’s interviewnotes, Mr. Fiorello said that Pfizerhad paid twice for him to travel to its Manhattanheadquarters from Harrisburg for meetings of “an elitegroup of pharmacists,” put him up at one of theMillennium hotels in Manhattan and paid him anhonorarium of less than $1,300 for each meeting.
According to the notes, Mr. Fiorello also told Mr. Jones thatPfizer had paid for him to travel with a Pfizer salesrepresentative to Maryland to meet with a mental healthofficial from that state and discuss Pennsylvania’s use ofthe guidelines. Pfizer paid him an honorarium, he said, buthe could not remember how much.
Ms. Caprino, the Pfizer spokeswoman, said the companyfinances development of treatment guidelines to ensurethat patients get the best possible medications. Thecompany, she said, plays no role in writing the guidelines.In addition, Ms. Caprino said, Pfizer often hires medicalprofessionals as consultants and pays them for their time.Pfizer cooperated with Pennsylvania officials as theyinvestigated the payments, she said, and the officials latertold the company that it had not acted inappropriately.SOME payments went to patient groups instead ofdirectly to state officials. In 2002, Janssen gave theOlympia, Wash., chapter of the National Alliance for theMentally Ill a grant of $15,000 to fly Dr. Shon and otherTexans to speak to Washington state legislators about theguidelines, according to Bill Pilkey, the chapter’s formertreasurer. Each speaker, he said, was paid $1,500.Dr. Shon said that he gave the $1,500 to the Texas mentalhealth department. In all, he said, he has traveled to morethan a dozen states to talk about the guidelines, withmost of the trips paid for by grants from either the RobertWood Johnson Foundation or the federal government.When he asked the drug industry to cover variousexpenses, Dr. Shon said, it was because of a lack of statemoney. “It was the only source of funding to complete ordo all the things we wanted to do,” he said.
Dr. Shon said he was working with three more states -Alabama, Hawaii and Wyoming - to help them adopt theguidelines.
Referring to the effort to draw up state guidelines thatbegan in 1995, he said, “None of us ever imagined it wouldgrow into what it has become.’’
I want to talk to you about what it feels like getting readyto be adopted, when you are a little kid who has alreadyhad about a hundred mothers. When you can barelyremember what your first mother smelled like.
When everyone spoke a different language in the placewhere you were born than in the place you are now.When some of the people who took care of you werecalled “foster parents” and you didn’t know what thatmeant except something about they weren’t going tostick around. When, in the process of being moved all overthe place, you lost some of your brothers and your sistersand a particular pair of shoes that felt just rightand your absolutely most favorite cuddly, and a certainplace on the inside of your last crib where you used toscratch with your fingernail to help yourself go to sleep.Kids like me, see, don’t have families of our own.
Because there’s something wrong about us. (I guess) Orbecause there aren’t enough to go around.Or something. And I probably won’t get one, either. Or if Ido, will it be too late for me to believe that they love me,and are going to stay with me? So I want to talk to you,Big People, about these things, even though I am not sureyou are real interested. Are you the same Big People whokeep doing these things to me in the first place? (Pleasedon’t get offended if I talk to all of you at once:caseworkers, foster parents, judges, adoptive parents. Ijust need to say how it all feels to me, and sometimes Ican’t get the cast of characters straight.)
Some people say that my first parents shook me until myeyeballs got loosened up, or they left me alone, or theygave me away, or they just ran away. I guess you think,because of that, I am supposed to not miss them?(Because if I did it would sure make me lots morecooperative with all the plans you keep making for me.)Should I just say, “They did the best they could” so I amnot so ticked off and lonely and worried all the timeabout what the Big People are going to do next? The truthis, I can’t do any of these things: I can’t forget.(Even when my brain does, my body won’t.) I can’t stopmyself from yearning (even though later I will get quitegood at playing games about this).
I’m not saying I was some cherished treasure or anything inmy family.
But what were you thinking when you sent big men inuniforms to grab me out of my screaming father’s armsat eleven o’clock at night, scaring me to death? Or whenyou sent me to a foster homewithout telling them about the special ways I needed tobe handled because I had never stayed anywherelong enough to get attached to anybody? Or when you
then took me from those people who were sodisappointed in me after a few weeks that they said Iwould have to be “disrupted” (whatever that means).
So you sent me to a family with an older foster child whowas mean to little kids because they were weak and small.And so he punched me a lot in secret. And pulled real hardon my penis in the middle of the night.
And when that family got rid of me, and the next, and thenext, did you think I was going to take it all lying down?
Did you think I was supposed to just be sweet andadorable and ready to connect to yet another familywho were going to throw me away? (Could you have donethat?) After a while, I had just lost too many peoplethat I might have cared about. I had been with too many“parents” who really weren’t, because they couldn’t holdme tightly in their hearts at all. None of you got how I wasbeing changed by all these losses, (in my heart and in mybehavior).
After a while, I began to get some pretty bad ideas abouthow things work. And mostly those ideas said that I was,by that time, in deep doo-doo. I wasn’t going to letanybody like me.
Not even me. And so, now, I won’t let you imagine even for aminute that I like you. That I need you, desperately. That Imight ever grow to trust you. I am not, after all, acomplete moron.
Are you ready to have me not believe you? Are you readyfor me to fight you for control? Are you ready to hold me,and then hold me some more (when all the time I act like Idon’t want you to at all?) Are you ready to really stay withme, through a battle that might last almost my wholegrowing up? Are you willing to feel as powerless as I do?What will you think when I say I don’t care a bit whetheryou go on vacation and leave me with Aunt Harriet, who Ihardly know at all? Then, when you come back,are you ready to deal with me taking a dump in front ofyour bedroom door every single day for three wholeweeks?
You see, it is like this, Big People: I’m not stupid. I was notblind. I do pay attention, because it matters lots to me.And so when my first parents knocked me around or actedlike I was invisible, or gave me to someone else to raise, orstood there screaming while you took me away from them,I noticed.
And when no one came to take their place, I noticed thattoo. And when the orphanage didn’t last, and the firsthalf-dozen foster families didn’t last, something startedhappening to me.
MULTIPLE TRANSITIONSA YOUNG CHILD’S POINT OF VIEW ON FOSTER CARE
AND ADOPTION
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A little bit of my spirit started to die. For some reason,then, I started pulling out my eyebrows.
(I’m not sure what that has to do with my spirit dying.) Iagree that it doesn’t make much sense for me to join inwith all the other people that have hurt me, by hurtingmyself. But I do it anyway. So I bite on my hand, or dig atmy face, or make a real bad sore on the top of my headfrom scratching myself. I pull out clumps of my hair,and so the kids at preschool laugh, and Big People have anodd look on their faces when they see me.
I masturbate a lot to comfort myself. (I even let a dog lickme down there.)
They say that sometimes I try to touch other kids downthere. Sometimes I run into the arms of strangers,like I have know them forever, and like I don’t actually careanymore who I am safe with or not.
(Am I safe with anybody? Does it matter any more?) Did Imention how much I am growing to hate smallness,and weakness and defenselessness? It’s getting so theonly thing I know how to do is to just be as tough as I can,and to try to rub out smallness and weakness wherever Isee them:
In the kittens that get hung by the clothesline in thebackyard and squished with a tennis racquet.
In the babies in my recent foster homes who turned upscratched. In my own Self, which I attack, particularlywhen I am feeling small or scared, and I need to beatmyself into more toughness.
And as little parts of my spirit keep dying, will it surpriseyou that I’m not exactly going to be overjoyed when youfinally say you have permanent parents for me? Do youhonestly think I am going to say, “Oh, I get it. You werejust kidding all those other times, but this time you reallymean it”?
And, so, do you want to hear something funny? Just aboutthe time I am ready to get what everybody thought Ineeded (parents who are actually never going to leave me)I’m going to get just a tad weird.
I’m going to start banging my head more than I did before.I might start acting like a baby again and , even if I hadgotten a little bit comfortable with my latest “parents”
I’m going to go back to stiffening my body, and screamingat night, and doing everything I can to tell you that I don’twant you to love me.
I can’t stand all this talk about “permanence” and“adoption”. I will make you sorry you ever thought abouttrying to get close to me. I will make you feel almost ashelpless and small as I have usually felt.
So are you wondering what I need? Are you wonderingwhat I would do about all of this if I had the power?
First of all, it would help a lot if you would start with onesimple, clear commandment to yourself: Never forget thatI am watching. Never forget that every single thing you domatters immensely to me, (even when I work like crazy tomake you think that it does not). And I will remember.You may be able to get away with treating me as if I aminvisible for a while (perhaps long enough to “disrupt” meor move yourself to a different casework job). I was there,watching, I was having deep feelings about what washappening to me and I needed someone to act as if itmattered, hugely. Second, don’t imagine that I will everstop yearning for my birth family (even though, as in otherthings, I will pretend otherwise). Help me find some way tokeep a connection with them, even if I never see themagain. Bring out pictures, or a Life Book and hold me while Irage or sob or stare, or all of these at once. Andunderstand that none of this is a reflection on you.Don’t be surprised when I come back from a visit withthem peeing my pants or throwing tantrums in the baththat night.
I told you: things matter to me. So I am going to havefeelings about things that matter to me. Third, it wouldhelp a lot if you would make the decisions that you need tomake and stick with them. Some days I think my mind isgoing to explode because I know something is going on inmy life but I can’t tell what it is; later I’ll learn that therewas a court hearing that day and everybody in my life waswrought up and then it was “continued” (whatever thatmeans - except mostly that nothing is getting decided,and I still don’t have a family).
I don’t get to make the decisions. You do. So have thecourage to make them. So that I can get a life. Fourth,it would mean a lot to me if you would take good care ofmy foster family. They have their hands full.
Sometimes they don’t know what to do with me. So makesure someone is there to answer their questions,toencourage them, to help them understand me better. Youwon’t like what will happen if I keep getting disrupted,and the only way I can think of to prevent that is to takeextra good care of the people that are taking care of me.
So have I told you anything that you wanted to know?Have I helped you to understand how we feel - all of us kidswho fell into the world of foster care and adoption? I knowit is a burden for you to think so carefully about me,and I know you might get a little nervous to realize that Iam watching, and affected by all that you do.
But you won’t be sorry if you take me seriously. Someday,see, I will be Big People.
GIVE THAT A THOUGHT.
By Michael Trout, Director of The Infant-Parent InstituteChampaign, Illinois 217-352-4060, EMAIL: [email protected]
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Jack and Kathy Stratton’s nine children have proved to be averitable cash cow for the Mecklenburg CountyDepartment of Social Services. The Stratton children havebeen in foster care for nearly two years, ever since the DSSremoved them from their home on charges of neglect. TheStrattons have steadfastly denied the charges, and havebeen fighting to regain custody.
During that time, the DSS, through federal funding, hasbeen receiving $9,971.73 per month for the Strattonchildren, while paying out only $3,600. Net profit: $6,372per month.
The numbers may seem numbing, but they’re notsurprising. In fact, in reading the 100 or so pages of the2000 US House of Representatives Ways and MeansCommittee’s report on foster care programs and adoptionincentives, two common threads sew these federal lawstogether: Parents accused of abuse or neglect have verylittle protection under the Constitution; and there is amoney trail following every foster child who moves throughthe system.
Under federal guidelines established in 1980, children infoster care are eligible to receive funds from a block grantto states called Temporary Assistance for Needy Families(TANF). As a condition of receiving TANF funds, statesmust operate foster care and adoptive assistanceprograms under title IV-E of the Social Security Act.
In 1997, Congress enacted significant changes to title IV-E,namely adding a push to terminate parental rights (TPR) incases where children have been in foster care for 15 out of22 months. The new legislation, a Clinton initiative calledthe Adoption and Safe Families Act, called for these TPRproceedings to begin 12 months after a child’s placementin foster care, rather than the 18 months required by theold legislation. Both the Illinois Supreme Court and theNebraska Supreme Court ruled that portion of theAdoption and Safe Families Act unconstitutional because itpresumes parents are unfit simply because their childrenhave been in foster care for 15 months.
The law also authorized incentive payments to states toincrease the number of foster and special-needs childrenwho are placed for adoption. Lawmakers said the purposeof the legislation was to keep children from languishing infoster care for years of their childhood. But some criticssay the adverse result is that families are being torn apartat a much higher rate since the new laws were enacted.
In fiscal year 1999, the latest information available for the2000 report, the federal government set adoption goalsfor each state that were equal to the highest number of
adoptions in any preceding yearbeginning with 1997.
States are paid $4,000 for eachfoster child adopted out over theirgoal in a given year. For example,North Carolina had an adoptiongoal of 467 in 1998. The state didnot meet its goal that year,therefore it did not earn adoption incentive money.
Conversely, in 2001, North Carolina exceeded its goal of1,244 by 37 percent, bringing in more than $623,000 inTitle IV-E money and placing the state third in the nationfor the amount of adoption incentive money received thatyear. California placed first and Missouri placed second.
Children with special needs bring in even more money. AsMecklenburg County DSS personnel have pointed out,North Carolina classifies a child as having special needswhen he has an existing medical condition, is physically,mentally or emotionally handicapped. But a child who is aminority, who is of a certain age or who has brothers andsisters also available for adoption can also be classified ashaving special needs. Those children carry an extra $2,000above the $4,000 if they are counted in the group thatwas adopted over the state’s goal.
According to Cheryl Barnes, national director of the DSSwatchdog organization Child Protective Services Watch,the children social workers removed from Jack and KathyStratton could bring in a large amount of money if theywere adopted. The children are in a large sibling group,some of them are teenagers and two of them have beendiagnosed as having special mental, physical or emotionalneeds. But the smoking gun in the Stratton case, Barnessaid, is that they are racially mixed. Their mother is blackand their father is white.
Barnes has conducted research nationwide about howfamilies are affected by child protective services andjuvenile courts. Her figures show that 60 percent of abuseand neglect claims against children in Mecklenburg Countywho are racially mixed were substantiated in 2001,compared with 43 percent substantiated cases againstblack children and 35 percent substantiated against whitechildren. It could just be coincidence, but Barnes calls itdiscrimination.
Barnes also claims child protective services can get moremoney for holding children in foster care. Under title IV-Elegislation, the Foster Care Program provides open-endedmatching payments to states for the costs of maintainingcertain children in foster care. The match also helps pay foradministrative, child placement and training costs.
Stratton Children Bring Home The BaconThe Jack and Kathy Stratton Story will be aired February 28th 2004 on Scams-n-Scandals• Don’t miss it!
By Allison Hart
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According to the House committee’s report, the averageestimated monthly number of children in title IV-E fostercare more than tripled in the U.S. between 1983 and 1999.During those same years, federal spending on title IV-Efoster care increased from $395 million in 1983 to $4billion in 1999. That same year, North Carolina spent $64million of those funds on maintenance payments, childplacement services and administration, informationsystems and staff training.
Based on those 1999 figures, North Carolina received$1,107.97 per month per child in foster care from title IV-Efunds. The state paid out on average about $400, or 36percent, per month to care for foster children. Theremaining $707 – allocated per child in foster care – isused for administration. Thus, Barnes said, the DSS isgetting $9,971.73 per month for the Stratton children,while paying out $3,600 for its net profit of $6,372 permonth.
Still, DSS personnel and some Mecklenburg Countyofficials – most notably Board of County CommissionersChairman Parks Helms and DSS Director Richard “Jake”Jacobsen – have denied that the DSS has any financialincentive to remove children from their homes and keepthem in foster care.
Mecklenburg County DSS officials have said that all themoney it has received through state and federal fostercare and adoption programs goes toward helping thechildren they service.
What Barnes said she finds most interesting is that thefederal government pays out thousands of dollars forfoster care and adoption programs, yet earmarks little ofthat money for programs to help keep families together –the alleged number one goal of Child Protective Services.
Just this week, a Charlotte-based adoption agency won a$1 million grant to recruit black men to adopt. That kindof money is not available to keep biological familiestogether, Barnes said.
“If you want to go and open up an agency to promote theadoption of foster kids, you can get a federal grant easy,”she said. “But, if you want to open an agency thatprovides family preservation services, there is no moneyfor that.”
Federal grants, though, are available to states for familypreservation under the program Promoting Safe andStable Families. Before the 1997 legislation, at least 90percent of the funds had to be used for familypreservation services and community-based familysupport services.
In 1997, Congress added two additional categories to thegrant program: time-limited family reunification servicesand adoption promotion and support services. Thestatute does not specify a minimum amount that must be
spent on any particular service, nor does it excludeservices for adoptive families in the family preservationcategory.
“I’ll never forget that horrible day. From ourkitchen window my wife, Kathy, and I saw all kindsof government vehicles pulling up around ourhouse. Before we knew it, agents from theDepartment of Social Services were there knockingat our door. They said they had a court order totake our kids and place them into permanentadoption. I couldn’t believe what was happeningto us! Kathy broke down sobbing. Our childrenpanicked. What did we do? I protested but nobodylistened. The social workers were more like thegestapo. They wanted our kids and that was that!They knew we were innocent but, as I found out, bi-racial children bring a handsome bonus in theNorth Carolina adoption system. What I’ve learnedabout the Mecklenburg County Department ofSocial Services has made me a target. Today, mylife is in danger. It’s been nearly two years sincewe’ve seen or heard from our girls and boys. I can’ttake it anymore! I’ve been sent to jail, threatenedand ordered by the court to shut my mouthbecause I know too much. I’m a man with no otherchoice now. All I want is my family back. My onlyhope now is defy the court and speak out!”
Jack and Kathy Stratton could never imaginethat their 10 beautiful children would besuddenly snatched away by government agentsand that their life would change forever. Theyhaven’t been allowed to see any of their kidsfor close to two years. How come? Why is theMecklenburg County North CarolinaDepartment of Social Services and Judge LibbyMiller so anxious about keeping Jack Strattonquiet and behind bars? Why is North Carolina’sState Attorney General James Coman refusingto hear Jack’s evidence of corruption andcollusion in the very system that took his kidsaway? A sworn affidavit by witness GastonCounty Patrol Officer Jeannette Seagle statesthat there was no need for the removal of thechildren.
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If you added up the budgets of all the Children’sServices in America, it would come to larger thanthe United States defense budget. The child abusewar is headed by the biggest, most out of controlbureaucracy in the United States, each dayconducting thousands of kangaroo courts in whichall parents are equally guilty until proven innocent.It is so out of control that everyone is nowdemanding that the system be changed.
The Lance Helms case, in which a Los Angeles child wasreturned to the biological father in whose home the childwas beaten to death, and the O.J. Simpson case, in whichchildren were returned to a father who apparently killedtheir mother, are simply the most notorious examples of achildren’s legal system way out of wack. They illuminatethe current hypocrisy demanding fathers takeresponsibility for their children while simultaneouslymaking it as difficult as possible for them to do so.
It’s a system the public knows little about. Thepress is not allowed in juvenile court, ostensiblyto protect the anonymity of the innocentchildren, but equally protecting the systemitself from exposure.
Things were different in my case. In my case, the pressattended each and every hearing. I am a professionaljournalist. In my case, I was the press and they not only letme in, they demanded my presence. I got a first hand lookat how it really works. No wonder they don’t want anyoneto know. The juvenile court system works theexact opposite of the criminal justice system.The word justice is left out entirely. Everyone isguilty until proven innocent.
All child abuse cases begin with a complaint. TheMondale act of 1976 gives total immunity tothose who make reports of child abuse, nomatter how specious. Thanks to overzealous medicalpersonnel who are forced to disclose even the slightest,most benign signs of abuse, coupled with untrained socialworkers who also have legal immunity, the child abuse warroutinely turns molehills into mountains. Like the waragainst drugs, the war against abuse is doing infinitelymore damage than it is preventing. To kids, parents areomnipotent. When they are taken away from their home,they get separation anxiety. But removal from the home isnot the last recourse in a case of potential abuse, it’s thevery first knee-jerk reaction. A study conducted bythe Little Hoover Commission came to theconclusion that 30-70% of the children
currently held in group homes in Californiadon’t belong there, and never should have beentaken from their parents in the first place.
According to 1991 Orange County statistics,80% of all accusations of child abuse turn outto be unfounded. Of 34,259 hotline calls, 7,916 weredismissed immediately as inappropriate (23%), 26,343were actually investigated (77%), and 4,700 weredetermined to need further investigation (13% of total).Of that 13%, 141 (3%) involved medical problems, 376(8%) involved potential sexual abuse, and the remaining80% involved general neglect based on ignorance andpoverty.
When the problem is ignorance and poverty, the answer iseducation and money, not legalized kidnapping.Unfortunately, most social workers are entry levelinvestigators with little expertise. Their mission is toprotect children, and they often do, but in the process,they destroy whatever stability a household may have. Dueto burnout, L.A. has a 150% turnover rate of socialworkers. Most of the new ones simply go by the book.
They are neither prepared nor educated for the job. Mostaren’t parents so they have no idea what the job ofparenting actually entails. Less than 20% of social workershave a college degree, and no criminal history check isdone on applicants. Our children’s safety has beenentrusted to thousands of incompetent bureaucrats withfar-reaching authority.
Let’s say the DCS (Department of Children’s Services)makes a mistake, goes to the wrong address, or that noneof the allegations they make are true. So what. They’vegot the kid. They never have to prove their case, and theynever back down. The bureaucracy is so thick that,innocent or guilty, it takes a minimum of six to nine monthsfor parents to get their children back.
Though the legal immunity of social workers has beenwhittled away by some states, it hasn’t stopped themfrom becoming the most powerful bureaucrats in thecountry. When the police bust down the wrong door, theycan be sued for false arrest, but if a social worker takes thewrong baby, there’s not much anyone can do. To sue inCalifornia, you have to prove malice, and social workers aresimply following the mandate of their job. Just as metermaids are judged by how many parking tickets they giveout, social workers are judged by how many babies theytake away. Since social workers don’t have to pay for theirmistakes, and since they err on the side of caution, they
HOW DEPENDENCY COURTREALLY WORKS
by Michael Dare
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inevitably end up abusing more children than they help.When the only tool you have is a hammer, all problems looklike nails. The only tool social workers currently have attheir disposal is removal of the child, so all situations looklike abuse. If a circumstance looks potentially dangerous,as though there might be a problem, it means nothing forthem to simply take the kid away just to be on the safeside. They don’t want to be caught with their pants downif something goes wrong after the investigation. So theytake the kid away. They have no alternative courses ofaction.
Once a child has been taken away, the parent isallowed no contact with them whatsoever untilthe hearing. They aren’t even told where thechild is. The hearing is three days away, andthere is absolutely nothing they can do untilthen.
If the parent is poor and receiving AFDC for their child,they stop getting their $500 a month, which may havebeen their only means of support. The group home thatnow houses their child starts receiving up to $5,000 amonth to care for the child. Since the vast majority (80%)of children are taken away due to poverty, if parents wereto receive only 25% of what group homes are given for theexact same service, the child would never have to be takenaway in the first place.
When the parent makes their first appearance independency court, they discover that they have not beencharged with a crime. People charged with crimes are incriminal court where they have civil rights. Parentsentering dependency court check their civilrights at the door. From the moment the parententers the system, they never meet one singleperson who presumes they are innocent. Theircourt appointed attorney is there more for comfort thanto fight in their behalf.
Like criminal court, dependency court works on theadvocacy system. The judge hears the case argued byattorneys with opposing viewpoints. Nobody who is ontrial is allowed to personally address the judge unlessrequested to do so, so each case automatically beginswith the defendant’s inability to speak for themselves.Parents are not allowed to say one single word in theirdefense, and are actually encouraged not to defendthemselves.
Everyone who appears in criminal or dependency courtmust bring their own representative, or if they cannotafford it, one will be supplied for them. Since parents independency court are predominantly poor,virtually all the attorneys are court appointed.These attorneys always recommend that theparent simply plead guilty and get it over with.They don’t want to actually defend you.Everybody maintains the position that they have beenhired to maintain, so every case looks exactly the same.The safest thing for anyone working in the system is to
preserve the status quo, so the bureaucracy grinds on,making everything take forever.
O.J. Simpson’s attorneys do a good job defending himbecause they actually work for him. He is the one they gettheir paychecks from. But attorneys in juvenile court don’tdo a good job because they don’t actually work for theparty they are representing. The parent’s courtappointed attorney gets their check from thesame place as the state’s attorney and thechildren’s attorney and the judge. Like every otheremployee on earth, they work for the party that givesthem their paycheck. Their job is to keep their job. Nobodyhas anything to lose as long as the child is kept away fromthe “potentially” abusive parent, except for the child andthe parent, who are both equal victims. Nobody in thebureaucracy does anything to rock the boat. No onewants to be held responsible if something goes wrong.
And things do go wrong. Unfortunately, cases like LanceHelms and O.J. Simpson focus the public on only one side ofthe issue. The knee-jerk reaction is to back the socialworkers and aid them in making it more difficult formurderous parents to get their kids back, forgetting thatsocial workers make just as many mistakes in the otherdirection. Children often end up being abused, neglected,or damaged by the very system that the State has set upto protect them. Children with no seriousproblems are routinely placed in psychiatricinstitutions or group homes for seriouslytroubled children, and children with seriousemotional problems are routinely placed infoster or group homes for children withoutproblems. For every Lance Helms who is incorrectlyreturned to a bad situation, there are hundreds ofother children who are incorrectly not beingreturned to perfectly normal situations. Anysolution has got to deal with both aspects of the problem.
One easy solution is to make juvenile courtwork the same way as criminal court. Simplyfollowing the same rules of evidence andallowing jury trials would clear up a lot of theinjustice. Or simply abolish juvenile courtaltogether. If social workers have got a case, letthem present it in criminal court.
In criminal court, defendants are generally released on bail,and they are presumed innocent until the state proves guiltbeyond a reasonable doubt. Either the judge, or everymember of a jury, must be absolutely convinced of guilt. Ifone single jury member is not convinced, there is noconviction. The idea seems to be that it is better to leteleven potentially guilty people go rather than send onesingle innocent person to jail. If and only if the defendant isproven guilty is sentence pronounced.
But in dependency court, the first thing that happens isthe sentence. The social worker has removed someone’schild from their home. It is a accomplishment before asingle hearing has taken place. Based solely upon the
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recommendation of a social worker, the child has alreadybeen separated from the parent. This action is traumaticunder any circumstances, but particularly when theparent/child relationship was strong and healthy to beginwith. Dependency court is full of parents whomay or may not have done anything wrong, buthave already been found guilty by an all-mightysocial worker. It’s a building full of nothing but parentswho are trying to get their kids back.
Once in court, all the social worker has to do is stand bytheir original charges, but the parent must now provethemselves innocent before the judge will release theirchild to them. The idea seems to be that it isbetter to take eleven children from healthyhomes than let one single child actually getabused. If and only if the defendant is proven innocent istheir child returned to them. This system might besomewhat fair if innocence were not infinitely moredifficult to prove than guilt.
In criminal court, if it turns out the police made a mistake -that their actions were indefensible - the case is dismissed,and the defendant may subsequently sue the policedepartment for false arrest. This keeps the police on theirtoes. They try to make sure they have evidence orwitnesses to back their version of what happened.But in dependency court, if it turns out that the socialworker made a mistake - that their actions wereindefensible, the case is not dismissed, and the parent maynot subsequently sue them. Social workers are not kept ontheir toes since they are immune from retribution. Theyproceed with their case, full speed ahead, whether or notthey have evidence or witnesses to back their version ofwhat happened.
Unlike criminal court, hearsay is actuallyadmissible in juvenile court. Social workersroutinely take the stand and present a case thatconsists solely of allegations made by someonewho isn’t there. Parents don’t get to confronttheir accusers. No other testimony is presented,and no evidence is introduced. The parent’s courtappointed attorney routinely says “We deny theseallegations,” and the judge routinely allows the parentmonitored visits with their child, ordering them intocounseling and parenting classes and drug testing. Thejudge then orders the parent back in three months,promising that if the parent is good, obeying all thecourt’s orders, they will be allowed unmonitored visits. Thedevastated parent is led from the room. The whole thingtakes less than five minutes.
Like a parole board, they do not want to hear that you’reinnocent. They want to hear that you will never do it again- a particularly difficult thing to do when you have beencharged with nothing more than normal behavior.Children’s Services will never, ever, under anycircumstances, admit that they made a mistake, so there’sno making a deal for your kid. The Los AngelesDepartment of Children’s Services had children “suitably
placed” in Guyana with Jim Jones, and they still haven’tapologized to anyone.
Imagine for the moment that you are the judge in one ofthese cases. The father’s court appointed attorney, whomay or may not have consulted with the father, says “Werequest the child be returned to the father,” and nothingmore. The mother’s court appointed attorney, who may ormay not have consulted with the mother says “We requestthe child be returned to the mother,” and nothing more.The state’s attorney says “Both parents areunsuitable, the child should stay where it is,”and the child’s court appointed attorney, whocertainly has never met the child, reads from areport that “The child seems to be developingnormally where he is.” And that is all theinformation you have to go on in virtually everycase, 30-40 cases a day, five days a week.
In the case of the death of 2-year-old Lance Helms, thesocial worker recommended against the release of thechild to the father. Why didn’t the judge heed the socialworker’s warnings? Because the judge hears the exactsame warnings in absolutely every case. If judges heededthe warnings of every social worker in each case, nochildren would ever be returned to their parents, no matterhow unfounded the charges. Thank god there are judgeswho take social worker’s recommendations with a grain ofsalt. They realize that social workers are not infallible. Inmany cases, the only effect that the social workerhas on the family is the emotional damage theyinflict by the needless separation. In thesecases, the social worker is the abuser, not theparent. Immunity gives them a free license toabuse.
Social workers routinely make boilerplate accusations,using the same phrases against everybody. “Children aresuitably placed” in a group or foster home. “Parents homeis inappropriate.” The child is at “substantial risk” with theparents.
Like the boy who cried wolf, social workers cannot betaken seriously because they always make the sametrumped up charges. By using identical wording in eachreport, they make each case look equally dangerous. Bypursuing each action with equal vigor, they neveracknowledge that there are such things as levels ofincompetence or abuse. There’s a big difference between aparent who smokes crack every day and a parent who hasan occasional puff of pot, but social workers call themboth drug addicts and take their children away. There’s abig difference between a professionalpornographer and a parent who takes nakedbaby pictures, or between a parent who routinely beatstheir child and a parent who gives them an occasionalsmack on the butt, but social workers call them allchild abusers and take their children away. Andthey do it with little research, with lesstraining, and with total impunity.
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Which is why the Lance Helms and O.J. Simpson cases areso troublesome. The system is already incrediblyprejudiced against fathers, and both of these cases arebeing used as an excuse to make it even harder for fathersto get their children back.
Just look at a letter The L.A. Times printed from JanleeWong, the Executive Director of the California Chapter ofthe National Association of Social Workers. In it, sheinadvertently admits why social workers are as much theproblem as they are the solution. She states “Thechallenges to the social worker’s recommendations areoften procedural and deny the most important aspect ofthe case, the social worker’s assessment of risk to thechild.”
It’s impossible to imagine a more outrageouslymegalomaniacal statement. In any case of potentialchild abuse, the social worker is not adisinterested party, they are the prosecution.Can you imagine Marcia Clark stating that the mostimportant aspect of the O.J. Simpson murder trial was theprosecution’s assessment of the case? What about thetwo dead bodies? Obviously the most important aspectof a murder trial is the defendant’s relationship with thedeceased. Similarly, the most important aspect of anabuse case is the parent’s relationship with the child.
That’s what it is all about. Social workers should focus allefforts upon repairing that relationship, if indeed there isanything wrong with it in the first place. But as Ms. Wongadmits, social workers think that the case is about them.
Further in her letter, concerning the death of Lance Helms,she states that “A professional social worker’srecommendations did not prevail in a situation in whichthere appeared to be great risk to a small child.” But all thewarnings were about the father, who is innocent. It is hisgirl friend who currently sits in jail for killing the child. Whywasn’t anyone warned about her? She’s obviously the onewho was dangerous, not the father, but she was notinvestigated. The social worker’s recommendation mayhave turned out to be valid, the child was at risk, but forentirely the wrong reason. As usual, the socialworker’s report was trumped up, misguided, andinaccurate.
Social workers are already allowed to take awaychildren on a whim, using nothing but hearsayand circumstantial evidence. The last thing on earththey need is encouragement to err further on the side ofcaution. Social workers need to be encouraged not to errat all. This will never happen as long as they don’t have toprove their case or pay for their errors in any way.
Thomas Jefferson said that “No nation is permitted to livein ignorance with impunity.” He never met a social worker.
In recent years, the psychiatric industryhas been the focus of increasing civiland criminal litigation. Cases haveranged from the physical andmental maltreatment of patients, tofraud and malpractice.
According to psychiatrist SanderBreiner in the Psychiatric Times,nearly 40% of psychiatrists are suedfor malpractice in the United Statesalone. In 2002, 70 civil lawsuits werefiled against individual psychiatrists and mental healthfacilities in the United States, a 28% increase over civil suitsfiled the previous year.
Litigation has included charges of false imprisonment inpsychiatric wards, psychiatric sexual assault, insurancefraud, misdiagnoses, and wrongful death suits brought byparents or relatives whose children have died as a result ofbeing prescribed psychiatric drugs.
A study of Medicaid and Medicare insurance fraud in theU.S., especially in New York, between 1977 and 1995,showed psychiatry to have the worst track record of allmedical disciplines. According to a veteran California healthcare fraud investigator, one of the simplest ways touncover fraud is to review the drug prescription records ofpsychiatrists.
And the problem is not confined to the United States.Sweden’s Social Board, that country’s senior medicaloversight body, investigated patient complaints over afour-year period and found psychiatrists were responsiblefor nearly half of all incidents of reported patientmistreatment. Offenses involving personal violence andsexual abuse were referred to prosecutors for furtheraction.
A 1998 review of United States medical board actionsagainst 761 physicians disciplined for sex-related offensesfrom 1981 to 1996 found a significant number ofpsychiatrists and child psychiatrists to have been involved.
Though psychiatrists accountedfor only 6.3% of physicians in theU.S., they comprised 27.9% ofphysicians disciplined for sex-related offenses.
As more and more victims havedemanded justice through civillitigation or criminal prosecution,psychiatry has become a growingtarget for attorneys and prosecutors.
CCHR is a respected consultant and can provide factual,up to date information and statistics on psychiatric abuseto local, state and federal authorities.http://www.cchr.org/government/eng/index.htm
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On January 31st, 1974, President Nixon signed PublicLaw 93-247, The Child Abuse Prevention andTreatment Act (CAPTA). This act ostensiblyaddressed a growing awareness of the problem ofchild abuse (ranked by some polls as one of thethree most pressing national problems in the early’70s). It resulted in effects more far-reaching andconsequences more devastating than the designerscould have imagined.
Federal Congress
Congress unsuccessfully proposed multiple childprotection bills during the period from 1964 to 1973, but itwas Walter Mondale’s adoption of this potent issue in hismovement toward presidential candidacy that resulted inCAPTA’s ultimate success. He championed this relativelynon controversial issue, using the well remembered phrase“Not even Richard Nixon is in favor of child abuse!”
Social legislation was not widely popular at that time, butchild abuse was a potent archetypal issue that everyoneunderstood emotionally, and therefore acted as a powerfulbond tying national “pulse points” to candidaterecognition. The success of this unidimensional argumentremains remarkably effective - Janet Reno’s popularitysoared when she claimed child abuse intervention as thepurpose for the Waco Texas raid that incinerated 87children and adults.
It is of interest to consider some of the key testimonybefore CAPTA during the sub-committee hearings of 1973.Under Walter Mondale’s probing, Brandeis professor DavidGil linked an increase in factors adverse to family life amongthe poor to a concomitant increase in abuse found amongthat social class. Class character distinction then, as now,was politically incorrect, and discussion which should havemoved investigation in that direction was activelythwarted. More than once, skillful questioning by Mondaledeflected problems of neglect and focused on abuse. Thisdeflection stood in stark contrast to the vastly greaterscope of the problem of neglect, which has its roots firmlylinked to poverty.
The Director of the Washington DC office of the ChildWelfare League of America, William Lunsford, articulatedthe resultant dichotomy in terms of the medical viewversus the state’s view. Medical professionals define abuseas an individual problem to which individual treatmentmust be applied. Child welfare services, however, view thegovernment as a provider with equal or greaterresponsibility in bringing up a child. As in mostbureaucracies, global programs and universal maxims areeasier to apply than individual treatment. The committee’sneglect of fundamental problems in favor of a simple “stopbeating the child” approach, ultimately supported
punitive social agency response instead of facilitatingfamily health and stabiliy.
An even more important minimization occurred in debatearound the proper role of the state in the upbringing ofchildren. To retain the powerful single issue quality(necessary for voter support) of the proposed legislation,child abuse had to be separated from the parent’s right todiscipline the child. This was accomplished with the help ofthe gripping testimony of Jolly K., former child abuser andfounder of Parents Anonymous. She spoke of how herchildren were almost killed in incoherent rages, and howpowerless she felt to stop the frenzy once it began. Herfigurative example of sin (compounded by the complicitlack of public response) and redemption (to be supplied byprograms to be funded under the law) skewed thediscussion in the direction of physical abuse alone. Thesubcommittee saw only one ‘sin’ (physical abuse) and one‘redemption’ (governmental intervention).
In its nascent form CAPTA primarily provided minimumfunds to study and collect information on the extent andnature of child abuse and neglect. Its final form, however,replaced simple investigative funding with acomprehensive series of restrictions and rewards. Mostimportant of these were the criminal penalties to be leviedagainst professionals who did not report suspected childabuse, and the availability of federal funds to those stateswhich passed laws which conformed to the federal act. AsBarbara Nelson states in her seminal book Making anIssue of Child Abuse, “National child abuse legislationwas good for its sponsors, good for the professionals whosupported it and constructed on the faith of goodintentions and the hope that the whole of all categoricalsocial programs will be greater than the sum of their parts.This is rarely so.”
Nelsons statement is born out in numerous incidents, ofwhich the Swan Case (Washington) is a fairly typicalexample. Bill and Cathy Swan each spent over 3 years inprison on child abuse charges which were supported byevidence so contradictory and misleading that HarvardSenior Law Professor Charles Nessen refers to the Swancase in his classes as the worst miscarriage of justice in theAmerican Legal Profession. Nessen also wrote an amicuscuriae brief to the court of appeal urging the case beoverturned. In an ultimate parody of justice, the Swan caseis now precedent for the use of hearsay evidence tocorroborate hearsay evidence.
State Legislative Response
By 1976 many states were well into a funding crisisfollowing the recent recession. Significant potential federalfunding provided motivation for rapid passage of lawswhich conformed to CAPTA’s requirements. If one
THIRTY YEARS OF CAPTAAnalysis of the 1974 Federal Child Abuse Prevention and Treatment Act (Public Law 93-247)
The background, limitations and results of federal and state child abuse legislationBy Damon Coffman
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compares the rapidity with which states changedlaws related to child abuse with their speed inadopting other federally supported socialprograms, the results are astonishing. Instead ofthe 15 to 25 years it usually takes for federal moresto percolate down to the state level, all 50 statespassed within 5 years laws that entitled them totake advantage of these federal social welfarefunds.
The speed of adoption and the related lack of legislativeinvestigation brought with it a host of problems, many ofwhich will take the next decade to rectify. Not the least ofthese was the problem of “outplacement.” Title IV-EFederal funds require outplacement or removalof children from their immediate and/orextended family to a foster or group home.
One can charitably surmise that the framers of CAPTAconsidered only the most critical cases deserving ofradical intervention. The resultant creation of a vastbureaucracy of children’s aid agencies, supported bycontradictory and poorly written laws, has insteadmotivated case workers to strive for outplacement at theexpense of reconciliation. The amounts of direct andindirect moneys that states receive from the federalgovernment as a result of CAPTA are substantial.
In addition to Title IV-E funds, Social Services Medicare/Medicaid funds (Title XX) are available for flexibledisbursement. These two pots constitute the bulk offederal money flowing into the state child welfare coffers.The state of Oregon in 1992, by way of example, with lessthan 700,000 total families, receives about $80 million(direct) per biennium in federal matching funds - orapproximately 40% of the total child welfare budget.Most states are much more aggressive in qualifying theirprograms, receiving 80% or more budget reimbursmentfrom the federal government.
Social Service Agencies
As the burden of mandated child protection has shiftedfrom the parent(s) to the government, a continuousredefinition of what constitutes abuse has occurred. Thelines between physical abuse, neglect, and sexual abusehave been blurred, even though the causes and cures forthese problems are vastly different. Child welfare agenciesover the last 20 years have re-shaped their original charterof child protection to one of punitive response. Quotingfrom The Oregon Child Protective Services PerformanceStudy of 1992, “Part of the reason for this change is theincreasing disparity between what counts as abuse orneglect from a legal and [mental health] professional pointof view and what is imagined by the public when the words“abuse and neglect” are used. The former is a far broaderconcept than the latter, and in fact the majority of abuseand neglect complaints do not involve any assault, eitherphysical or sexual, upon the child, which is the public’simage of abuse. Indeed, most reports do not involve evenan incident which the agency can verify occurred at all.”
From the agency’s point of view, however, these changesare sensible, since they contribute to sustaineddepartment funding and continuance of existingprograms, and provide for increased power, responsibility,and job security. The ultimate well being of the family unitin general or child in particular is usually not of concern.
There remains a significant problem with the redistributionof responsibility from the parent to the government. Itrequires only an anonymous phone call to start aninvestigation, in which the first response is to remove thechild. Poverty places single mothers in a predicamentwhere they cannot refrain from acts that fall under thenew definition of neglect. Case histories abound of goodmothers who ran to the corner store for milk, only to havethe child removed for years, often life, because of a fewminutes of “abandonment.” Government funding toprovide services which help the indigent mother arerejected in favor of services which provide federalreimbursement.
Discipline in some states has been defined to be abusive ifit includes any form of coercion, such as requiring a child totake a time-out when they don’t want to. Raising one’svoice over a screaming teenager to request quiet can beand has been defined as emotional abuse. Adolescents aretaught that they are “violated” if a parent enters theirroom, even after knocking, without express permission.
Corporal punishment has been banned in most states forthe last decade, and affection in the form of a hug orsqueeze from an opposite sex parent is readily defined assexual abuse by super vigilant social workers. Children arewarned to watch for affection as evidence of potentialpedophilia in classrooms all around the nation. This is inspite of the famous studies completed in the 1960’s thatspecifically linked childhood development and intelligenceto physical touch and holding.
Day care workers must now tell children to hug each othersince they as adults are prevented by law from providingwhat all previous human history had defined as propernuture of children. Not suprisingly, social workers andpsychologists have defined a new form of sexual abuseamong children, and are seeking to label even pre-schoolchildren as sexual predators.
Different cultures are also suspect as exampled inWashington, where two pre-school children were removedfrom their Swedish parents when the weekly family saunaswere uncovered in a “good touch - bad touch” trainingsession at the children’s pre-school. The children wereunaware of their peril in responding affirmatively to thequestion “Has anybody seen their parents withoutclothing?” In this case the children were severelytraumatized by the mandated immediate removal andmulti-week separation from their parents. Ultimately thefamily fled back to their native Sweden to prevent furtherrepercussions.
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Children are becoming increasingly aware of their powerover parents; they learn from peers and schools justexactly what they do and don’t have to do. In many states,Florida, Washington, Colorado, and Oregon being keyexamples, children cannot be required by their parents todo anything, from washing dishes to going to school.Testimony offered before the 1993 session of the Oregonlegislature documented a sharply increasing number ofcases where teenagers made false reports on theirparents, simply because they were angry about a parentalrestriction. In every case known to the author, theteenagers were removed from their families, sometimespermanently, and to their great sorrow. It is not possibleto reference by name or case the families affected, due tothe potential for repercussions against them by theChildren Services Division.
Noted child psychiatrist Dr. Richard Gardener ofColumbia University addressed this problem ofpunitive agency response in several nationalarticles. He notes that proper training of caseworkers to administer their increased responsibility(and vastly superior enforcement advantage) ingovernmental family control is almost criminallylacking.
Many states require case workers only to have a highschool education which is supplemented with a two weekcourse in completing forms. This may explain why two ofthe compelling indicators of pedophilia the state ofWashington Child Protective Services applied to thefather of four year old Alica Wade was that he was in theNavy and he was overweight. This in spite of the fact thatthe police actually apprehended and prosecuted theprowler who did molest Alicia in her bedroom. It took 4and 1/2 years and a federal court order before the Wadeswere allowed to see their daughter again.
Families in Retreat
How then does the government perceive the effectivenessof the children and family services programs, and howdoes the public respond? The Oregon Child ProtectiveServices Performance Study of 1992 provides someuniversally applicable insights. Contracted to theUniversity of Maine by the Oregon legislature, participantsin the study team included primarily persons with longbackgrounds in child welfare social services - hardly anunbiased team. Even so the results were profoundlydisturbing to those who read the report carefully.
The study praised Oregon’s child protection services asone of the best in the nation, and yet the members were“immediately struck by the level of public hostility towardsChildrens Services Division as an agency. In experiencesranging from newspaper accounts dealing with CSD toattending public meetings to listening to clients, to casualconversations ... the lack of support for CSD has beenrevealed again and again.”
This experience is in keeping with various family groupsacross the country who are now recommending that a
child be kept home until accidental bruises (due to normalchildhood activities like climbing trees or biking)completely fade. School teachers are required by CAPTAto report any bruise or statement that might beconstrued as potential child abuse (with criminal penaltiesif personal judgment is used).
In attempting to understand the ubiquitous animositytoward children’s services agencies, one should consider anumber of related laws, methods, and networks whichcombine to create a situation never properly investigatedin the simple minded preparation of CAPTA. Again fromthe Oregon study: “One might have guessed that, ifanything, the law would define a wider range of childmaltreatment to be reported and investigated than therange of child maltreatment that can lead to juvenile courtproceedings. After all, a far smaller proportion of casesrequire the drastic remedy of juvenile court proceedings[with the almost rubber stamp long term removal ortermination of parental rights] than those which requireinvestigation and services. Yet, the definition for reportingand investigation is in fact narrower [emphasis added] thanthe definition applicable to juvenile court proceedings.”The study goes on to state that this is due first in order tocomply with the reporting requirements of CAPTA, andsecond because the “definitions in the reporting act havefundamentally different effects on the operations ofagencies [read: financial impact and reimbursement] andcourts than language delineating child maltreatment in thejuvenile court act.”
Completely ignored in the study, but documented byexperts like psychologists Dr. Gardener (Columbia), Dr. LeeColeman MD., Dr. Stephen Ceci (Cornell), Dr. RichardOfshe (Berkley), is the effect and industry created byprevailing laws and social agency tactics. Just as in the1950’s fear of communist domination created the defenseindustry iron triangle and McCarthyism, in the 1980’s and1990’s fears have created an industry which could be calledthe victim abuse triangle.
The players in this triangle are the social protectionagencies, the lawyers and juvenile court system, and themental health profession. The part played by socialagencies can be understood in the framework presentedabove; specifically the power to enforce their decisionscoupled with the concept of government right abovepersonal rights, and exacerbated by the abysmal lack oftraining. Lawyers and juvenile courts are not disposed tochange a system they are familiar with and which providescontinuous employment for their profession.
In the state of Oregon in 1993 over 22,000 cases of childabuse were entered, of which a large proportion requiredone or more juvenile court hearings. Testimony before the1993 legislature indicated that parents who were notcompletely indigent were routinely stripped of thousandsof dollars in legal fees through attempting to regain therights to their children. Most of these families were low-income and impoverished by the court proceedings. Thosethat were able to retain their children were placed in theposition of extreme financial hardship for years to come,
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and usually required to pay for long term weeklycounseling by a state approved therapist. The dictatedcounseling is little more than a hostage releaserequirement enforced by agencies with little or noaccountability.
An argument in favor the current system would beacceptable if child protection were truly engendered.Douglas Besherov, the first director of the National Centerfor the Study of Child Abuse and Neglect (established as aresult of CAPTA), has reported otherwise. In the late1970’s the center stated that the ratio of false reports (ofchild abuse or neglect) to true was about 50%. By the mid1980’s the probability of correct reporting had declined to1 out of 3, and by the 1990’s Mr. Besherov has stated thatthere are approximately 9 false reports for every true one.Statistics from the American Humane Association’s 1986study “Highlights of Official Child Neglect and HouseReporting”, agree with Mr. Besherov. They reported that195,000 of the 328,000 child sexual abuse reports wereunfounded. Other comprehensive studies of the remaining133,000 found that 70,000 to 90,000 were probablyfalsely accused also.
These statistics do not sit well with the mental healthprofession which has seen an unprecedented growth in thearea of state-mandated family and child counseling.However, their complicity is suspect just from the mannerin which references are supplied from juvenile courthearings. Almost every children’s services agency in thecountry has a core of mental health workers they use toevaluate each child brought in.
Mental health professionals who are willing to validate thepre-disposed conclusions of case workers will continue toreceive referrals as a result; those that don’t won’t. Sinceremoval of the children from their family is almost alwaysthe first response of children’s agencies to any reporting,psychological evaluation is a required if the agency wishsto continue to deny family reunification where no evidenceof abuse exists.
Mental Health Therapy
Many whose families have been irretrievably damaged havealleged a conspiracy among mental health professionals.Citing debacles like the McMartin case, the Kelly Michaelscase, the Daniel Akiki case, the Sousa case, the Swan case,or the Little Rascals Day Care case, a clear argument forcomplicity can certainly be made (and may in fact be truefor those cases). In general, however, the mechanism bywhich psychiatry became enmeshed in law is a labyrinth ofpaths and agendas, most of which were initiallyindependent of child welfare.
It began with the use and abuse of the insanity plea in thelate ‘50’s and grew to such proportions that by 1981 thegeneral public was outraged to see John Hinkely declarednot guilty of the assassination attempt on PresidentReagan, in what was just a classic and well acceptedinsanity defense.
Not all of the psychiatric profession is happy with thecarte blanche power they have been given. The AmericanPsychiatric Association (APA) filed an amicus curiae briefwith the Supreme Court in 1983 proclaiming the inabilityof psychiatrists to predict violent behavior. However, thelegal systems in this country have accepted almostuniversally that a psychiatric evaluation provides anaccurate understanding of the current and futurepotential state of the examined in matters from violenceto depression to sex to pedophilia.
This belief has been widely promoted by the media andwell accepted in the general population. The SupremeCourt responded to the APA argument saying “Thesuggestion that no psychiatrist’s testimony may bepresented with respect to a defendant’s futuredangerousness is somewhat like asking us to disinvent thewheel,” and “To accept such argument would call intoquestion other contexts in which predictions of futurebehavior are constantly made.”
As Dr. Coleman states in his book Reign of Error, the courtneeded to continue to use the worthless predictions,“otherwise the bankruptcy of our society’s widespreaduse of these judgments would become so obvious thatdozens of social policies would be suspect.”
Unfortunately it stands in stark contrast to what researchpsychiatrists have been saying all along. Dr. Coleman goeson to document studies in the 1960’s and 1970’s whichdemonstrated conclusively that psychiatric predictions ofdangerousness were no better that flipping a coin - andwere in fact worse due to hidden personal factors thatoften led to injustice. Almost every scientific outcomebased study (i.e. utilizing accepted statistical methodsand principles) which examines psychiatry, psychology ormental health has shown that the probability of correctdiagnosis is random at best.
In juvenile and criminal court hearings, however, theevaluation of the mental health specialist contributes from25 to 50% of the weight of the final decision. Socialworkers tend to base their entire argument on the mentalhealth input. This may be in part due to the large case loadand inadequate time to investigate as should be done inany proper evaluation of child abuse allegations.
As the public has blindly accepted the inerrant mentalhealth premise, poorly trained or unscrupulous therapistshave discovered a gold mine. Insurance companies and thepublic have become the bank for costly therapies andsettlements. Testimony given on various talk shows byrecanters (persons who were convinced by therapists thatthey were victims of abuse and later denied it ever havinghappened), revealed that therapist’s fees in excess of$300,000 over several years are not uncommon.
Other therapists working closely with juvenile courtsprovide penile plethysmograph diagnosis on demand for afee. Lawyers unaware of the utter lack of scientific basis(and rejection as invalid by the AMA) often recommend
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that an accused parent comply with the social servicesagencies’ demand for this test. This bizarre investigationhooks the genitals of the accused to sensitive electronicswhich record responses to previously acquired (usuallyconfiscated) videos of child pornography.
Prisoners serving time for sex crimes provide the controlgroup for this “scientific” measurement. Only onediagnosis is possible, regardless of response: subject is apotential pedophile. No social workers have been willing tosubmit themselves to the same inspection.
Justice for All
A complete understanding of the problem is not possibleuntil the role of the justice system is covered. A quickhistory of judicial response to criminal law is required. Priorto 1970, criminal law was based on the concept ofinnocence and guilt, as determined in trail by jury. Then in1971 a case occurred which had far reaching implications. InSantobello vs New York a plea bargain deal with thedistrict attorney was not honored by the judge duringsentencing, and was subsequently appealed to theSupreme Court.
In their review of the case the court made a landmarkruling that established plea bargaining as constitutionallyacceptable, and the resulting agreement between the D.A.and accused as binding. At the same time, America wasriding a get-tough-on-crime agenda, and prosecutorswere being pressured to bring more and more convictionsto prove their effectiveness to the public. Plea bargainingprovided a bonanza for the D.A.’s. Defendants whoaccepted a plea bargain reduced time and money spent oneach case, allowing the D.A. extra resources to obtainmore convictions, thus validating their effectiveness to thecommunity they pledged to serve.
Criminals and lawyers picked up on the system very quicklyand learned to use it to their advantage, bargaining withthe D.A. over the plea agreement to maximum advantage.In most areas of activity, criminal indictments were over98% accurate, and the guilty party could almost alwaysbe counted on to acquiesce to plea bargaining. Thealternative of jury trial boasted a conviction ratio ofbetter than 3-to-1, and a much harsher sentence .One significant problem, however, was that in order tomotivate plea bargaining, those who refused to bargainhad to be made an example of in order to keep theconviction train rolling. This problem has been eminentlyrecognized - even entry level college political sciencecourses teach that no matter how many prisons are built,they will be filled to capacity under the current system.There is direct empirical evidence for that statement.America incarcerates up to 80 times more per capita thanany other civilized nation. Numerous cases have beendocumented by columnists like Phil Stanford of theOregonian where an innocent party was encouraged toplea bargain by their lawyer, completely unaware of thefuture impact a criminal conviction would have on their life.
Prosecutors will generally bring an indictment if (1) there iscredible evidence, (2) the defendant doesn’t appearunimpeachable, (3) the prosecution witnesses do appearunimpeachable, and (4) it is politically expedient (read:popular vote getter).
Into this environment comes alleged child abuse, which ispolitically a sure vote getter, where hearsay evidence isadmissible, where the defendant can be refused the rightto confront his accusers, and where the defendant isemotionally devastated and somewhat incoherent due tothe absurd nature of the accusations. Parties guilty of childabuse or molestation, aware of their risk in a court case,almost always plea bargain.
Innocent persons, however, tend to be ignorant of thelegal system, and believe they will be acquitted. If they areindigent counsel is appointed. The average case receivesabout $600 legal and investigative services, against whichis arrayed the unlimited pockets of the D.A.
Sir William Blackstone stated famously that it was betterfor ten guilty men to go free than for one innocent man tobe convicted. Place this statement against thebackground of child abuse allegations, in which 9 out of 10reports are false, and where therapists are creating arevenue generating class of victims. One must ask who isthe victim and who is the perpetrator.
One such case was that of 22 year old Kelly Michaels, inwhich a counsel who had not even completed law schoolwas appointed to defend her against multiple counts ofsexual abuse. Her lawyer’s anemic defense allowed theprosecution present evidence to support charges sopatently ridiculous that her conviction was a crime.
Fortunately, after spending only five and one half years inprison, an appeals court threw out her conviction, statingthat the case presented against her was fraudulent. Mostinnocent defendants are not so fortunate.
This country has not been immune to gross injustice, as aresult of hysteria, throughout our 200 plus year history.From the Salem witch trials to McCarthy, special groupshave been singled out for disclosure and destruction. Whatmakes the current injustices so devastating in theirapplication is that they strike directly at the fundamentalunit of any structured society - the family.Although Europe is no stranger to these tactics, havingwithin the last generation thrown off both a Holocaustand the Gulags, this is America’s first real foray into anational hysteria of similar epic porportions.
That may also be the reason Europe has not seen fit tofollow America into our current divergence. Frominauspicious beginnings come great results, both good andevil.
The time has come to rethink CAPTA and consider childrenfor what they are, individuals that breathe and love, notstatistics to be used.
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Bonuses that Los Angeles County and othergovernment agencies get from the federalgovernment for each foster child placed in anadoptive home act like bounties on the heads ofchildren, critics say.
The 1997 Adoptions and Safe Families Act gave counties a$4,000 bonus for each child placed in an adoptive homeand an additional $2,000 for a “special needs” child. OnDec. 2, President George W. Bushsigned legislation increasing thebonus by $4,000 for childrenadopted at age 9 or older.
Since the program wasimplemented in 1997, the federalgovernment has paid $445 millionin adoption bonuses.Critics say the law places apremium on putting children infoster care and accelerates thetime frame for severing parentalrights.
“I think it’s black-market babymarketing,” said Encino residentDiane Lynne Ellison, 59, who hasserved as a foster parent for morethan a decade. “If they see a baby,they swoop in on it.”
For foster children who cannotsafely be returned to their families,county Supervisor Michael D. Antonovich said, adoption isthe best way to provide them with a loving, stable family.
“If they don’t have this love and support, theconsequences of them being left in the world arestaggering,” he said. “More than two-thirds of them willend up in cemeteries or penal institutions. That isunacceptable.”
David Sanders, the new head of the Department ofChildren and Family Services, agreed that children whocan’t safely be returned home need to be placed inadoptive homes, but he has his concerns.
“What you have now is an incentive to initially remove thechild and an incentive to adopt them out,” Sanders said. “Ithink when you put these two together, there is aproblem.”
A former DCFS child abuse investigator, who requestedanonymity, said adoptions of children are “pushedthrough at all costs” even before adequatebackground checks are made of prospectiveadoptive parents, because DCFS officials wantto get the federal adoption incentive.
Since 1997, when 530,000 children were in foster homesnationwide, more than 230,000 have been adopted. But
more children have taken their place,and 540,000 are in foster homes now.
California has seen adoptions ofnearly 20,000 children since 1999 — a140 percent increase over the levels inthe preceding several years — andreceived $18 million in federalAdoptions Incentive funds, the mostof any state in the nation. It received$4.4 million this year.
Los Angeles County has placed morethan 11,000 children in adoptivehomes since 1998, and collected $3million in adoption bonuses in 2001-02, the most of any county in thestate.
Some critics say the adoptionincentives have only served to fuelthe needless removal of children fromtheir parents, pointing to a nearlythreefold increase in adoptions in the
county in the first few years after ASFA passed, althoughthe number of adoptions has dropped from 2,900 in 2001to 2,121 last year.
Adoptive parents receive $424-$1,337 per child a month,depending on whether the child has special needs. About75 percent of children in foster care are now labeled as“special needs,” qualifying their caretakers for the higherpayments, experts say.
Adoptive parents can receive even higher payments —$1,800-$5,000 a month — for disabled children.The average amount of time it takes to adopt a child inLos Angeles County is one of the longest in the nation at5.2 years compared to 3.9 years in New York City. Thestate of Illinois averages 11 months from the time parentalrights are terminated.
Government bonuses accelerate adoptionsBy Troy Anderson
Staff Writer
Sunday, December 07, 2003 -
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Imagine living in a land where a bureaucratic agency, deeply entrenched, and answerable to no one reigns as thesupreme authority in the land.
A land where children are considered property of the state, and are brutally ripped from their parents only to beconsigned to often decrepit, abusive “foster homes” or “therapeutic” facilities.
Imagine living in a land where parents are considered by this agency as enemies of their own children, the parents whoare vilified and maligned relentlessly, have false allegations and outright lies used to present a facade of legality forkidnapping their children.
Imagine living in a land where the falsely accused parents are considered “guilty until proven innocent”, and even afterproving themselves innocent, are still considered guilty. In this land, parents are denied their children for the flimsiestof reasons; getting the electricity shut off, a child having diaper rash, the parents having an argument, any reason willsuffice.
All the while, the kidnapped children languish for years, locked away in strange homes or “facilities”, growingdespondent, and heartbroken while yearning for family and freedom. Children are brutally ripped from the parentswho love them to become state property are then subject to be truly abused, starved, beaten, raped, drugged tocontrol them, and all too often killed in these government sanctioned “homes” and facilities.
In this land, the parents are coerced to participate in government sanctioned, court ordered “programs” often at theexpense of their jobs, their homes, their marriage, and sometimes even their very lives under the threat of neverseeing their children again. These hapless parents are then placed on government “abuse registries” virtuallyguaranteeing that many of them will never be able to find suitable employment again.
After being compelled to participate in and enduring all the government mandated classes, evaluations, treatments,therapies, and submitting to having every detail of their lives, including their very thoughts, monitored by thegovernment; most still do not regain their children.
In this land, entire families are shattered and destroyed to advance the agendas of agencies and individuals bent oneliminating the traditional family to bring about the government ownership of all children.
This isn’t a description of life under a now defunct communist regime, this land exists in our world today, it isn’t insome far off country, it isn’t in some steaming third world jungle or in a country ruled by a despotic dictator bent oncontrolling every aspect of the people’s lives…
This land is right here in America.
Yes, you read that correctly. Right here in the United States of America, families are under siege by governmentagencies which regularly and systematically rip children from their families unecessasarily. These agencies are knownby various names throughout the nation, but whatever name is used, they are present in virtually every county in everystate. These agencies are commonly known as “Child Protective Services” or “CPS”.
The Civil and human rights of the parents and the children victimized by these agencies are routinely ignored andintentionally violated in order to gain custody of the targeted children. Once children are removed from the home,often in midnight raids without a warrant or valid court order, it is next to impossible for parents to regain theirchildren and extricate their families from the “system”.
All states and the federal government have statutes and regulations in place to protect families and children frombeing unjustly ripped apart; however, these are ignored or misapplied maliciously to gain another child at any cost.The courts, which should ensure that families are not destroyed unjustly and that rights are not violated have for thepast three decades condoned these actions and have even assisted with this holocaust of the American family.
In this land?
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American Family Rights Association is dedicated to the purpose of halting and reversing the erosionof rights and liberties which are today being intentionally ignored or maliciously circumvented by thevery agencies mandated to protect families as well as the courts which condone and encouragethese violations.
The primary message of American Family Rights Association to families and individuals is that theythemselves are the first line of defense in protecting their “inalienable rights” as endowed by theircreator. Every citizen of the United States has sovereign inalienable rights; the constitution howeverdoes not by itself protect those rights.
Neither does the Constitution of the United States bestow these rights and liberties, these rightsand liberties do not originate with government. All people are believed to have been “endowed bytheir creator” with certain inalienable rights. The Constitution of the United States is an instrumentto be used to build a wall between intrusive or oppressive government and your family or yourself.The Constitution and Bill of Rights is written to protect your sovereign, inalienable rights. However,if you do not know and exercise your rights, the Constitution and the Bill of Rights will not protectyou or your children.
Through a cooperative effort by it’s membership, American Family RightsAssociation exists to enable the families of this nation to educate themselvesabout their sovereign rights and liberties as families, individuals, and citizens.Through this cooperative effort, families are provided with the resources andsupport to stand up in defense of their rights and liberties in the face of blatantviolations by government agencies and the courts, whether they are intentional ormerely the result of uninformed arrogance on the part of the offending office.
To assist in the return to Constitutional Courts, wherein the rights and liberties of the family,children and individuals are upheld and staunchly defended; American Family Rights Association isengaged in a nationwide effort to increase public awareness of the need to know and defend theserights and liberties as individuals and citizens. American Family Rights Association is also constantlyinitiating and promoting efforts to enlighten the public, various legislative bodies, and the offendingagencies themselves of the egregious manner in which families and children are treated under “colorof law”. As an association, the membership believes that only by scrutinizing these systematicabuses of authority under the bright light of public exposure can the true form and extent of thecurrent system of bureaucratic terrorism of the American family be accurately revealed andsubsequently righted.
American Family Rights Association vigorously exercises the constitutionally enumerated right toredress the government for grievances in light of the exposure of these abuses on behalf of it’smember families and consequently, all families in concerted efforts to introduce true reforms of thissystem of abuse and exploitation of families.
American Family Rights Association, it’s member groups, and individual membership realizes thatgiven the decades of misinformation and hysteria-mongering by these agencies in order to secure thepublic support for their existence and the continued usurping of the rights and liberties of thepeople in excess of the authority delegated to such agencies that exceptional dedication to rightingthese wrongs is required to return justice and liberty for all to this nation.
Visit www.familyrightsassociation.com
Why join the American Family Rights Association?
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