Staffordshire Social Services
March 6, 2010
Torn from their mothers’ arms What are social workers for?
Filed under: Secret family courts — nojusticeforparents @ 8:50 am
Torn from their mothers’ arms What are social workers for? Charles Pragnell considers some disturbing cases
CHARLES PRAGNALL
Tuesday, 13 December 1994SHAREPRINTEMAILTEXT SIZE NORMALLARGEEXTRA LARGE
Family, Parent and child, Sex, Adoption, Primary care physician
Is social work out of control? This question has again been raised this week with reports of a series of events in Lancashire in which social workers are alleged to have acted intrusively and wrongly towards mothers and children.
Now, more than 60 families have formed an action group,Mothers In Action, each with a story to tell of overt interference by social workers which has often resulted in the parents being separated from their children for long periods. In many cases children have been placed with adoptive parents.
So what is going wrong in Lancashire? The Children Act, which was passed in the wake of the 1987 Cleveland child abuse affair and came into force in October 1991, was supposed to control many of the abuses of power by social workers.
The Act placed duties on social workers to promote the welfare of children and families and to interfere as little as possible in their lives. If social workers have to become involved, then the Act requires that their intervention is minimal to prevent family breakdown and avoid the separation of children from their families.
Even after a child is removed, social workers are required to involve parents, and grandparents where appropriate, in the planning of the child’s care and future placement – primarily they should be seeking to restore the child to the family.
And of course in all these decisions social workers are required to ascertain the wishes and feelings of the child.
Many of the cases examined in Lancashire, however, indicate that legal principles are not being applied. In fact, in some cases, the law is being used to separate families, and children are being placed with adopters before any reasonable attempts have been made at reunification.
The evidence and versions of events which follow were provided by the families and may not coincide with the recorded perceptions and views of events of social workers.
CASE STUDY 1: A single mother, divorced from a violent former husband, arrived at school one afternoon to collect her eight-year-old son; but he did not appear with the other children.Worried that he might have had an accident, she entered the school, tobe informed that he had been taken away.
She was confronted by social workers and police who accused her of sexually abusing her son and questioned her for many hours. She did not deny that her son occasionally slept in her bed but explained repeatedly that since her son had endured the violence present in her marriage he had become anxious and incontinent during the night, and when his bed was saturated he came to join her in her bed. It is something which probably occurs in thousands of other homes each night throughout the UK.
The situation had arisen when the child had told a schoolfriend about sleeping with his mother in a conversation that was eventually relayed back to the school by another child’s parent.
The mother vehemently denied the accusations of sexual impropriety and was extremely upset that such accusations could have been made against her. The social workers refused to believe her and although no charges were ever brought, her son remained in care for five years, during which time she was allowed to see him on only three occasions.
On their first visit he rushed to her and she cuddled him in mutual comfort, only for social workers to separate them and order that they must not touch each other. On other visits social workers constantly supervised and observed them while they were together and intervened immediately if their conversation touched on matters the social workers did not want them to discuss.
For some years social workers repeatedly asked her son leading questions about how often he had sex with his mother, to which he invariably replied, “You’re daft, I’ve never had sex with my mother!”
After three years in care, social workers pressured him to become adopted. He resisted, stating: “I want to go back to my Mum.”
This child was not in imminent danger of serious harm, there was no proven case to warrant keeping him in care, and there was a notable absence of any attempts to work in partnership with the mother or the child, whose wishes and feelings were constantlyignored.
CASE STUDY 2: A young mother of 16 years, living with her mother and stepfather, had a baby and decided to keep it. She grew increasingly concerned, however, that she could not find accommodation for herself and her baby, and that her stepfather’s drunk
e n sessions at home with various friends were having an effect on the baby.
She asked the social services to look after the baby until she could find accommodation and have the baby back. Her search took longer than she thought and when she sought the baby’s return, her request was refused.
Social workers began proceedings for the baby to be adopted. By this time the baby had bonded with the foster family, and this probably influenced legal decisions for her child to be adopted.
Some time later the mother married and was soon expecting another child. This child was removed shortly after birth by social workers, who again placed the child for adoption. She was pregnant again within two years, expecting twins, and this time the social workers arranged an abortion at a hospital. The mother claims this was despite her family doctor disagreeing with such drastic action.
The twins were removed and, after considerable pressure from social workers, the mother was sterilised. The mother is now 28 years old, has lost four children and may never be able to have other children.
Little in this situation seemed to justify the oppressive and almost ruthless actions of the social workers. From the outset they had shown little inclination to support or help the mother, instead actively working to separate her from her children.
CASE STUDY 3: When children are accommodated by local authorities, parents have a right to expect they will be well cared for and protected. This did not happen in this case.
A young mother found she could not cope with the demands of her two young children after she had undergone a serious operation and asked social workers to help while she recuperated.
The children were placed in a foster home; but after three weeks the mother was visited by a social worker and a social work manager who accused her of sexually abusing her small daughter. They questioned her in detail about her sex life, but distorted the information she gave.
It transpired that her four- year-old daughter had developed a vaginal discharge and had begun scratching her genitals because of the irritation. This was construed as “vigorous masturbation” and she was subsequently examined and questioned by a social worker, police officer and the foster parent.
When the mother eventually saw her daughter, she immediately requested a medical examination. This revealed that her daughter was suffering from a vaginal infection, which responded to treatment within a short time.
After finally securing the return of her children, the mother complained to the social services. Her complaint was investigated by the same social work manager who had originally accused her of sexual abuse.
Not unnaturally, she did not feel her complaint was investigated fairly and impartially, so she persevered with her complaints, even unsuccessfully appealing to a Member of Parliament, who clearly did not wish to become involved.
Eventually, she was able to take her case to a Review Panel, where her complaints were upheld, but she received only a partial apology from the social services. No disciplinary action has been taken against the social workers.
The families involved with and seeking help from Mothers in Action are growing daily. From the evidence so far gathered by MIA there is already sufficient to warrant a full public inquiry into these events.
In the longer term, there is certainly an increasingly powerful argument for a Children’s Ombudsman. We must also examine how we assert better and more effective control over the activities of social workers. This could most effectively be done by a system of national registration and discipline where families could take their assertions of misconduct and malpractice, and if these are proven, social workers could be removed from practice.
http://www.independent.co.uk/opinion/torn-from-their-mothers-arms-what-are-social-workers-for-charles-pragnell-considers-some-disturbing-cases-1389422.htm
Isabella Brooke Knightly and Austin Gamez-Knightly
In Memory of my Loving Husband, William F. Knightly Jr. Murdered by ILLEGAL Palliative Care at a Nashua, NH Hospital
Saturday, March 6, 2010
NH Foster Care Rates for 2005
NEW HAMPSHIRE
RATES UPDATED DECEMBER 2005
ALL COUNTIES ARE PAYING SAME STATE RATE
NEW HAMPSHIRE DEPT OF HEALTH AND HUMAN SERVICES
6 HAZEN DRIVE
CONCORD NEW HAMPSHIRE 03301
603-271-4708
FAX: 603-271-4729
ICPC CONTACT: LINDA BOMBACI
REGULAR DAILY RATES
AGE DAILY RATE
0-5YRS 12.87
6-11 14.02
12-17 16.55
Max of 10 days: Max of 5 days:
SPECIALIZED FOSTER CARE EMERGENCY FOSTER CARE CRISIS FOSTER CARE
AGE DAILY RATE DAILY RATE DAILY RATE
0-5YRS 19.32 33.08 38.08
6-11 21.03 33.08 38.08
12-17 24.81 33.08 38.08
SUPPLEMENTAL FOSTER CARE
DAILY RATE
LEVEL 1
7.01
LEVEL 2
14.02
LEVEL 3
21.03
LEVEL 4
35.95
ANNUAL CLOTHING INITIAL CLOTHING
ALL AGES $.85 daily rate ALL AGES $50. First time in placement
SPECIAL OCCASION ALLOWANCES
(1) In addition to the daily board and care rate, a child in foster care receives funds for his or her birthday, back to school in August, and holiday celebrations in December.
(2) The special occasion allowances are paid to the foster parents to purchase gifts, toys, or extra clothing for the child.
(3) The following table reflects the payment amounts:
Birth - 5 years
6 - 10 years
11 - 13 years
14 - 18 years
Birthday
$50.00
$75.00
$75.00
$75.00
Back to School
$50.00
$50.00
$75.00
$ 100.00
Holiday
$50.00
$50.00
$50.00
$50.00
RATES UPDATED DECEMBER 2005
ALL COUNTIES ARE PAYING SAME STATE RATE
NEW HAMPSHIRE DEPT OF HEALTH AND HUMAN SERVICES
6 HAZEN DRIVE
CONCORD NEW HAMPSHIRE 03301
603-271-4708
FAX: 603-271-4729
ICPC CONTACT: LINDA BOMBACI
REGULAR DAILY RATES
AGE DAILY RATE
0-5YRS 12.87
6-11 14.02
12-17 16.55
Max of 10 days: Max of 5 days:
SPECIALIZED FOSTER CARE EMERGENCY FOSTER CARE CRISIS FOSTER CARE
AGE DAILY RATE DAILY RATE DAILY RATE
0-5YRS 19.32 33.08 38.08
6-11 21.03 33.08 38.08
12-17 24.81 33.08 38.08
SUPPLEMENTAL FOSTER CARE
DAILY RATE
LEVEL 1
7.01
LEVEL 2
14.02
LEVEL 3
21.03
LEVEL 4
35.95
ANNUAL CLOTHING INITIAL CLOTHING
ALL AGES $.85 daily rate ALL AGES $50. First time in placement
SPECIAL OCCASION ALLOWANCES
(1) In addition to the daily board and care rate, a child in foster care receives funds for his or her birthday, back to school in August, and holiday celebrations in December.
(2) The special occasion allowances are paid to the foster parents to purchase gifts, toys, or extra clothing for the child.
(3) The following table reflects the payment amounts:
Birth - 5 years
6 - 10 years
11 - 13 years
14 - 18 years
Birthday
$50.00
$75.00
$75.00
$75.00
Back to School
$50.00
$50.00
$75.00
$ 100.00
Holiday
$50.00
$50.00
$50.00
$50.00
Friday, March 5, 2010
2-year-old boy dies in Linden foster care home
2-year-old boy dies in Linden foster care home
Updated at 05:38 PM today
Phil Lipof
More: Bio, News Team
Web produced by Jennifer Matarese
LINDEN, NJ (WABC) -- A New Jersey mother is searching for answers after her 2-year-old son died in his foster home.
Vanessa Gentleman broke down, just minutes after standing over her baby boy's tiny casket.
2-year-old Xavier, died one week ago, from injuries sustained inside his Linden, NJ foster home.
Questions are lingering by investigators wanting to know if it was an accident or something far more sinister.
Related Content
MORE: Contact the WABC-TV New Jersey Bureau
"What I saw yesterday, my baby boy didn't fall down no stairs, somebody did that to him," said Vanessa Gentleman, Xavier's mother.
Vanessa's children Unique and Xavier were both in the custody of a friend of hers.
Back in 2003, Vanessa spent some time in jail for a sexual assault, having nothing to do with her own children.
She wound up trusting a friend with her children, but soon began to notice cuts and bruises on Xavier's face.
She took pictures of a split lip, a black eye, and a gash on his forehead, with older scars visible.
She called the Department of Youth and Family Services.
She says she called in November, December, January, February, and even the week before Xavier died.
Gentleman says a case worker went to the Linden house.
"Her exact word were, 'Oh, I seen your other kids, but I didn't see Xavier.' I said well did you request him, because I know by law you are supposed to, and she said 'no, I told her I would come back next week.' Well a week later, my son was dead," said Gentleman.
No one answered the door when Eyewitness News visited the Linden home where Xavier died.
All the prosecutor's office can say at this point is that there is an investigation, and they are waiting for the medical examiner's final report.
"Starting Monday, I'm sitting my behind in front of the DYFS office in East Orange, New Jersey, until I get justice for my son and until I get my children back safe in my custody with my family," said Gentleman.
http://abclocal.go.com/wabc/story?section=news/local&id=7314507
Updated at 05:38 PM today
Phil Lipof
More: Bio, News Team
Web produced by Jennifer Matarese
LINDEN, NJ (WABC) -- A New Jersey mother is searching for answers after her 2-year-old son died in his foster home.
Vanessa Gentleman broke down, just minutes after standing over her baby boy's tiny casket.
2-year-old Xavier, died one week ago, from injuries sustained inside his Linden, NJ foster home.
Questions are lingering by investigators wanting to know if it was an accident or something far more sinister.
Related Content
MORE: Contact the WABC-TV New Jersey Bureau
"What I saw yesterday, my baby boy didn't fall down no stairs, somebody did that to him," said Vanessa Gentleman, Xavier's mother.
Vanessa's children Unique and Xavier were both in the custody of a friend of hers.
Back in 2003, Vanessa spent some time in jail for a sexual assault, having nothing to do with her own children.
She wound up trusting a friend with her children, but soon began to notice cuts and bruises on Xavier's face.
She took pictures of a split lip, a black eye, and a gash on his forehead, with older scars visible.
She called the Department of Youth and Family Services.
She says she called in November, December, January, February, and even the week before Xavier died.
Gentleman says a case worker went to the Linden house.
"Her exact word were, 'Oh, I seen your other kids, but I didn't see Xavier.' I said well did you request him, because I know by law you are supposed to, and she said 'no, I told her I would come back next week.' Well a week later, my son was dead," said Gentleman.
No one answered the door when Eyewitness News visited the Linden home where Xavier died.
All the prosecutor's office can say at this point is that there is an investigation, and they are waiting for the medical examiner's final report.
"Starting Monday, I'm sitting my behind in front of the DYFS office in East Orange, New Jersey, until I get justice for my son and until I get my children back safe in my custody with my family," said Gentleman.
http://abclocal.go.com/wabc/story?section=news/local&id=7314507
House backs bill pushing grandparent foster care
House backs bill pushing grandparent foster care
Associated Press - March 5, 2010 3:24 PM ET
BOISE, Idaho (AP) - Grandparents and other close relatives would be placed at the top of the Department of Health and Welfare's list of people eligible to become the foster parents of at-risk children.
The House on Friday passed a measure meant to avoid, if possible, separating children from close relatives who are willing to step in and care for them if the parents are unfit to do so.
The senior advocacy group AARP hailed passage of the bill, saying grandparents raising their grandchildren represent the fastest growing type of family in the nation.
About 6.6 million grandchildren across the United States are now in households headed by their grandparents.
If a grandparent isn't available, great grandparents, aunts, great aunts, uncles, great uncles and other close relatives would come into consideration, according to the bill. It now goes to the Senate.
http://www.khq.com/Global/story.asp?S=12091754
Associated Press - March 5, 2010 3:24 PM ET
BOISE, Idaho (AP) - Grandparents and other close relatives would be placed at the top of the Department of Health and Welfare's list of people eligible to become the foster parents of at-risk children.
The House on Friday passed a measure meant to avoid, if possible, separating children from close relatives who are willing to step in and care for them if the parents are unfit to do so.
The senior advocacy group AARP hailed passage of the bill, saying grandparents raising their grandchildren represent the fastest growing type of family in the nation.
About 6.6 million grandchildren across the United States are now in households headed by their grandparents.
If a grandparent isn't available, great grandparents, aunts, great aunts, uncles, great uncles and other close relatives would come into consideration, according to the bill. It now goes to the Senate.
http://www.khq.com/Global/story.asp?S=12091754
RCMP probe infant's death in foster care
RCMP probe infant's death in foster care
CANWEST NEWS SERVICEMARCH 5, 2010
Alberta RCMP have confirmed they are investigating the death of an infant in foster care who died Wednesday.
Little information was available, but it is believed the child was taken to hospital after an incident Monday night.
Yvonne Fritz, Alberta's minister of children and youth services, said the child was younger than two years old.
The minister said the government will also review the death, a probe running parallel to the RCMP investigation.
© Copyright (c) The Victoria Times Colonist
Read more: http://www.timescolonist.com/RCMP+probe+infant+death+foster+care/2644777/story.html#ixzz0hJnOhv2r
CANWEST NEWS SERVICEMARCH 5, 2010
Alberta RCMP have confirmed they are investigating the death of an infant in foster care who died Wednesday.
Little information was available, but it is believed the child was taken to hospital after an incident Monday night.
Yvonne Fritz, Alberta's minister of children and youth services, said the child was younger than two years old.
The minister said the government will also review the death, a probe running parallel to the RCMP investigation.
© Copyright (c) The Victoria Times Colonist
Read more: http://www.timescolonist.com/RCMP+probe+infant+death+foster+care/2644777/story.html#ixzz0hJnOhv2r
Thursday, March 4, 2010
Stolen Children, Foster Children and Adopted Children -- The Sad Realities of CPS and the Foster Care System
Stolen Children, Foster Children and Adopted Children -- The Sad Realities of CPS and the Foster Care System
Posted: 03 Mar 2010 11:40 PM PST
By: Brenda Alexander
March 4, 2010
© All rights reserved
Note: If you like this article and want to post it on your blog or website, please feel free to do so. You do not need to ask my permission although credit and a link back to me would be appreciated but it's not mandatory. I'm not going for a pulitzer prize here, just stating my feelings in regards to CPS stealing and selling our children.
There's a term that's used by social workers for parents who have fought CPS and regardless of the outcome of their case, they're called "veteran parents." I think that's an apt name as we all know fighting CPS makes us feel like we've been in a war. We have post-traumatic stress disorder as well as any number of other mental health issues. We suffer from depression, anger, frustration, terror and at times we're seriously concerned that we might be paranoid. I'll tell you just like my husband's attorney told us, "just because you're paranoid does not mean that someone isn't out to get you." Never is that more true than when fighting CPS for custody of your children.
There's a myth going around that states if you lose your children to CPS, you must have done something horrible to deserve it. Well, that's just not the reality. The truly abused children are the ones that are allowed to remain in their own homes as they are simply too damaged to bring in any money on the foster/adopt market. CPS only wants the blonde-haired, blue-eyed, genetically sound, healthy children, especially those under the age of 5, as they're the ones in demand. Visit Adopt Us Kids and there's a form on there where you put in a special order for the child of your dreams. Once you've been approved as an adoptive parent (i.e., you have a lot of money), then they find a family with a child that fits the description, removes the child, terminates the parent(s) rights and wham! you got your kid! It's as simple as that. It's a hell of a lot better than having your own cos who knows, you might not get what you want that way but this is a sure-fire way of getting quality children at rock bottom prices. Isn't being online great? Nowhere else but in America can you special order a kid online. We should be so proud!
Now we are going to deal with foster children who are taken not to be adopted out but rather so they can be used as human guinea pigs. Big pharmaceutical companies don't have a ready supply of parents willing to let them experiment on their children so they have to find them somewhere. While I am unable at this time to prove my theory as fact, I am quite convinced that they give social service agencies (CPS) kick backs in the form of grants to place foster children on high powered, dangerous pharmaceuticals, especially anti-psychotics and anti-depressants. It's been proven that anti-depressants cause suicidal thoughts and ideation in children yet they continue placing foster children on these drugs.
Gabriel Myers was one such child. At the age of 7, he got into an argument with his 19 year old baby-sitter and went into the bathroom of his foster care providers and hanged himself from the shower head. He was taking a cocktail of drugs including Symbyax. The following statement came off the website Symbyax.com...
"Antidepressants may increase suicidal thoughts or behaviors in some children, adolescents and young adults especially within the first few months of treatment or when changing the dose. No increased risk has been shown for adults over age 24, and risk decreased for those over age 65. All patients starting therapy should be monitored appropriately and observed closely for new or worsening depression symptoms, suicidal thoughts or behavior, or unusual changes in behavior. Symbyax is not approved for children and adolescents."
It makes no sense to me that he was placed on any drugs, much less this one. Are they just seen as throw-away kids? Children that no one wants? How can anyone with a conscious do this to a child? He was only 7 years old when he died all because some social worker, most likely a sociopath, removed this child from his home supposedly because he was in severe danger only to be placed in a home where he died! Why was the State of Florida NOT held accountable for his death? No one cares except, of course, his real parents. It's not going to make any real difference in how things are done. Foster children are still going to be placed on drugs, parental rights terminated, foster children adopted out and "loved" until they turn 18.
Unfortunately I have read too many blogs and websites created by foster care providers. In one, a foster/adopt mother in Texas made the statement she regretted every adopting her oldest 2 foster children. She called them liars and slangers and posted their pictures up for the world to see. She stated she couldn't wait until they turned 12 so that she could put them in a group home. She said she was a bad mother. Well, duh! Of course she's a bad mother. Actually, she's not even their mother, not in any real sense of the word.
I am the mother of 5 children all with very different personalities. Some were easier than others to raise but they all came with their own set of challenges. I love them all in spite of their faults. My love for them didn't disappear on their 18th birthday. I didn't throw them out of my home. I didn't demand the government give me more money to keep them in my home. In fact, the government didn't give me anything to raise my children. My husband and I had to work to give them what they needed and some of what they wanted.
But that's not the way it is in foster care. Foster care providers are not "parents." Calling them foster mom or dad is politically incorrect. They get anywhere from $600 to $900 per month, per child. They also get WIC (when appropriate), SSI, Medicaid, child support, Title IV-E funding as well as others and when the foster care providers adopt the children, they get a baseline of $4,000 to $6,000. Of course the more "special needs" labels you can attach to the child, the higher your base pay rises. It is not unheard of for some children to bring in upwards of $100,000 from ASFA adoption bonus money alone.
For those who are not familiar with ASFA, it stands for the Adoption and Safe Families Act which was signed into law by President Bill Clinton in 1997. Basically it states that if a child has been in the foster care system for 15 out of 22 months and it is determined that the parents aren't doing even the minimal amount of work required to regain custody, they can, at that time, be placed up for adoption. To further this goal, that's when they gave the individual states' the baseline as incentives to find homes for these poor, wretched waifs.
There's a big problem with this law. The very children this law was designed to help are the ones who are still languishing in the foster care system. Most have been in there for at least 10 years. They're switched from foster home to foster home, what few belongings they have are in a plastic bag, and they stay there until either the foster care provider can't take care of them anymore or refuses to take care of them anymore. They act out and have problems bonding with their caretakers. These are the children that are used as human guinea pigs, given all these different drugs and getting tons of money from the drug companies and no one cares what it's doing to them. They're viewed as unwanted, unloved, uncared for and so what if the drugs kill them, they're never going to amount to anything anyway. It will be one less person draining our nation's resources.
The problem with this theory is that they are NOT unloved and unwanted. They have parents who loved them and did the best they could. If even half of the money given to foster care providers was given to biological parents, the vast majority of problems would go away and children could safely remain in their real homes. Substance abuse issues can be handled by sending the whole family into rehab. There's a few out there that take in the entire family, the Salvation Army being one of them. It's a very intense 6 month program and once you've successfully completed that, you move into transitional housing, also known as step-down. You live there for up to 2 years and are eligible for grants to go to school, job placement programs, all sorts of things to help make sure families are staying together. I will be writing an article regarding substance abuse and CPS in a later post so be on the look-out for it.
Another problem I see with foster care is that all these caretakers are swearing that they do it for love. Well, I guess in once sense that's true. They do "love" that money they're raking in. Now, I admit if you have just one foster child in your home, the $600 to $900 per month seems like chump change. However, the average foster home has 5 foster children living there at any point in time. So even if they receive the minimum, that's $3,000 per month, which is a lot more than most biological parents earn together in any given month.
That pays their mortgage, car payment, utilities, and there's right much left over for luxuries. Remember they don't have to pay for food as they get up to $300 per month, per child in food stamps. That varies from home to home though and the food stamps are supposed to go to the foster child only. Of course that's not reasonable. No one expects the families to cook 2 separate meals but it is suppose to equal out at the end of the month.
One of my best friend's has a 17 year old grandson who was adopted out of the foster care system and sneaks away to call her and his mom as often as he can. He called her recently asking if she would buy him a belt because he only had hand-me-down pants and they were 2 sizes too big. The adoptive parents would not buy him a belt. Nor was he allowed to wear his winter coat except when they went out as a family. They live in a very mountainous area. It's cold where they are but he's only allowed a windbreaker to wear to school. He got caught talking to his grandmother the other day and now they're trying to put him in an institution.
See, he will be turning 18 in November. He is going home. There's a new law that gives foster care providers their monthly stipend on up to the age of 21 IF they allow the children to stay past their 18th birthdays. Of course his adopted parents want to continue receiving money for him so they're trying to get him diagnosed as incompetent so he can't legally leave his foster care provider's home. Gone now are the days when monthly checks stopped at the time of adoption. No, they continue receiving a monthly check until the child turns 18 or 21, depending. How many biological parents do you personally know that have kicked their children out of their home, with no job, no money and nowhere to go on their 18th birthdays? I'm guessing none because that's how many I personally know. We don't magically stop loving our children on their 18th birthdays. Some children do move out but that's their choice, not ours. Many go on to college and live on campus or with roommates. Some even go back-packing in Europe. However, the vast majority of children not going to college are staying at home well past their 18th birthdays. There's nothing wrong with insisting they go to work and pay rent either. It teaches them fiscal responsibility. I just find it so amazing though that the love for a foster child just one day stops. How people can be like that and still sleep at night is beyond me. My oldest just turned 30 and I still love him. I always will and he, like all the others, have a place to live if they ever need it. Why? Because I'm their mother, that's why. It's what we do.
One last thing I want to touch on in this article is that the definition of child abuse and neglect varies from state to state, city to city, and county to county. Where it's legal and okay to spank your child here, it's illegal over there. The definitions are subjective and vague. They're left open to interpretation by the social worker in charge of your case. If you get one that's bitter and angry over a failed marriage, then he or she may take that out on you and your family. Often they try to force parents to separate in order for one of them to regain custody. They claim you're being physically and/or verbally abused and since it's impossible to prove a negative, there's very little you can do to combat these claims in court.
Social workers have absolute immunity from perjury. They can lie, twist facts, exaggerate and fabricate evidence and even if you can prove their lies, they're never held accountable. They make you think they have more power than law enforcement personnel and demand entry into your home without a warrant. It is vital for every family to know what their rights are, what to do and what NOT to do if CPS comes knocking. Don't wait until they investigate because then it's too late. No one is immune. I'm sure Charlie Sheen and Tiger Woods thought they were immune too but they know differently now.
So if you have a friend, family member, neighbor or co-worker who is fighting CPS for their children, rather than being judgmental, find out what they're investigating and why. The vast majority of abuse allegations are done so maliciously and falsely. A lot of people make these calls to get even but it's the children you would be hurting the most. Don't look for ways to get even, look for ways to forgive. That's much healthier for all in the long run.
Posted: 03 Mar 2010 11:40 PM PST
By: Brenda Alexander
March 4, 2010
© All rights reserved
Note: If you like this article and want to post it on your blog or website, please feel free to do so. You do not need to ask my permission although credit and a link back to me would be appreciated but it's not mandatory. I'm not going for a pulitzer prize here, just stating my feelings in regards to CPS stealing and selling our children.
There's a term that's used by social workers for parents who have fought CPS and regardless of the outcome of their case, they're called "veteran parents." I think that's an apt name as we all know fighting CPS makes us feel like we've been in a war. We have post-traumatic stress disorder as well as any number of other mental health issues. We suffer from depression, anger, frustration, terror and at times we're seriously concerned that we might be paranoid. I'll tell you just like my husband's attorney told us, "just because you're paranoid does not mean that someone isn't out to get you." Never is that more true than when fighting CPS for custody of your children.
There's a myth going around that states if you lose your children to CPS, you must have done something horrible to deserve it. Well, that's just not the reality. The truly abused children are the ones that are allowed to remain in their own homes as they are simply too damaged to bring in any money on the foster/adopt market. CPS only wants the blonde-haired, blue-eyed, genetically sound, healthy children, especially those under the age of 5, as they're the ones in demand. Visit Adopt Us Kids and there's a form on there where you put in a special order for the child of your dreams. Once you've been approved as an adoptive parent (i.e., you have a lot of money), then they find a family with a child that fits the description, removes the child, terminates the parent(s) rights and wham! you got your kid! It's as simple as that. It's a hell of a lot better than having your own cos who knows, you might not get what you want that way but this is a sure-fire way of getting quality children at rock bottom prices. Isn't being online great? Nowhere else but in America can you special order a kid online. We should be so proud!
Now we are going to deal with foster children who are taken not to be adopted out but rather so they can be used as human guinea pigs. Big pharmaceutical companies don't have a ready supply of parents willing to let them experiment on their children so they have to find them somewhere. While I am unable at this time to prove my theory as fact, I am quite convinced that they give social service agencies (CPS) kick backs in the form of grants to place foster children on high powered, dangerous pharmaceuticals, especially anti-psychotics and anti-depressants. It's been proven that anti-depressants cause suicidal thoughts and ideation in children yet they continue placing foster children on these drugs.
Gabriel Myers was one such child. At the age of 7, he got into an argument with his 19 year old baby-sitter and went into the bathroom of his foster care providers and hanged himself from the shower head. He was taking a cocktail of drugs including Symbyax. The following statement came off the website Symbyax.com...
"Antidepressants may increase suicidal thoughts or behaviors in some children, adolescents and young adults especially within the first few months of treatment or when changing the dose. No increased risk has been shown for adults over age 24, and risk decreased for those over age 65. All patients starting therapy should be monitored appropriately and observed closely for new or worsening depression symptoms, suicidal thoughts or behavior, or unusual changes in behavior. Symbyax is not approved for children and adolescents."
It makes no sense to me that he was placed on any drugs, much less this one. Are they just seen as throw-away kids? Children that no one wants? How can anyone with a conscious do this to a child? He was only 7 years old when he died all because some social worker, most likely a sociopath, removed this child from his home supposedly because he was in severe danger only to be placed in a home where he died! Why was the State of Florida NOT held accountable for his death? No one cares except, of course, his real parents. It's not going to make any real difference in how things are done. Foster children are still going to be placed on drugs, parental rights terminated, foster children adopted out and "loved" until they turn 18.
Unfortunately I have read too many blogs and websites created by foster care providers. In one, a foster/adopt mother in Texas made the statement she regretted every adopting her oldest 2 foster children. She called them liars and slangers and posted their pictures up for the world to see. She stated she couldn't wait until they turned 12 so that she could put them in a group home. She said she was a bad mother. Well, duh! Of course she's a bad mother. Actually, she's not even their mother, not in any real sense of the word.
I am the mother of 5 children all with very different personalities. Some were easier than others to raise but they all came with their own set of challenges. I love them all in spite of their faults. My love for them didn't disappear on their 18th birthday. I didn't throw them out of my home. I didn't demand the government give me more money to keep them in my home. In fact, the government didn't give me anything to raise my children. My husband and I had to work to give them what they needed and some of what they wanted.
But that's not the way it is in foster care. Foster care providers are not "parents." Calling them foster mom or dad is politically incorrect. They get anywhere from $600 to $900 per month, per child. They also get WIC (when appropriate), SSI, Medicaid, child support, Title IV-E funding as well as others and when the foster care providers adopt the children, they get a baseline of $4,000 to $6,000. Of course the more "special needs" labels you can attach to the child, the higher your base pay rises. It is not unheard of for some children to bring in upwards of $100,000 from ASFA adoption bonus money alone.
For those who are not familiar with ASFA, it stands for the Adoption and Safe Families Act which was signed into law by President Bill Clinton in 1997. Basically it states that if a child has been in the foster care system for 15 out of 22 months and it is determined that the parents aren't doing even the minimal amount of work required to regain custody, they can, at that time, be placed up for adoption. To further this goal, that's when they gave the individual states' the baseline as incentives to find homes for these poor, wretched waifs.
There's a big problem with this law. The very children this law was designed to help are the ones who are still languishing in the foster care system. Most have been in there for at least 10 years. They're switched from foster home to foster home, what few belongings they have are in a plastic bag, and they stay there until either the foster care provider can't take care of them anymore or refuses to take care of them anymore. They act out and have problems bonding with their caretakers. These are the children that are used as human guinea pigs, given all these different drugs and getting tons of money from the drug companies and no one cares what it's doing to them. They're viewed as unwanted, unloved, uncared for and so what if the drugs kill them, they're never going to amount to anything anyway. It will be one less person draining our nation's resources.
The problem with this theory is that they are NOT unloved and unwanted. They have parents who loved them and did the best they could. If even half of the money given to foster care providers was given to biological parents, the vast majority of problems would go away and children could safely remain in their real homes. Substance abuse issues can be handled by sending the whole family into rehab. There's a few out there that take in the entire family, the Salvation Army being one of them. It's a very intense 6 month program and once you've successfully completed that, you move into transitional housing, also known as step-down. You live there for up to 2 years and are eligible for grants to go to school, job placement programs, all sorts of things to help make sure families are staying together. I will be writing an article regarding substance abuse and CPS in a later post so be on the look-out for it.
Another problem I see with foster care is that all these caretakers are swearing that they do it for love. Well, I guess in once sense that's true. They do "love" that money they're raking in. Now, I admit if you have just one foster child in your home, the $600 to $900 per month seems like chump change. However, the average foster home has 5 foster children living there at any point in time. So even if they receive the minimum, that's $3,000 per month, which is a lot more than most biological parents earn together in any given month.
That pays their mortgage, car payment, utilities, and there's right much left over for luxuries. Remember they don't have to pay for food as they get up to $300 per month, per child in food stamps. That varies from home to home though and the food stamps are supposed to go to the foster child only. Of course that's not reasonable. No one expects the families to cook 2 separate meals but it is suppose to equal out at the end of the month.
One of my best friend's has a 17 year old grandson who was adopted out of the foster care system and sneaks away to call her and his mom as often as he can. He called her recently asking if she would buy him a belt because he only had hand-me-down pants and they were 2 sizes too big. The adoptive parents would not buy him a belt. Nor was he allowed to wear his winter coat except when they went out as a family. They live in a very mountainous area. It's cold where they are but he's only allowed a windbreaker to wear to school. He got caught talking to his grandmother the other day and now they're trying to put him in an institution.
See, he will be turning 18 in November. He is going home. There's a new law that gives foster care providers their monthly stipend on up to the age of 21 IF they allow the children to stay past their 18th birthdays. Of course his adopted parents want to continue receiving money for him so they're trying to get him diagnosed as incompetent so he can't legally leave his foster care provider's home. Gone now are the days when monthly checks stopped at the time of adoption. No, they continue receiving a monthly check until the child turns 18 or 21, depending. How many biological parents do you personally know that have kicked their children out of their home, with no job, no money and nowhere to go on their 18th birthdays? I'm guessing none because that's how many I personally know. We don't magically stop loving our children on their 18th birthdays. Some children do move out but that's their choice, not ours. Many go on to college and live on campus or with roommates. Some even go back-packing in Europe. However, the vast majority of children not going to college are staying at home well past their 18th birthdays. There's nothing wrong with insisting they go to work and pay rent either. It teaches them fiscal responsibility. I just find it so amazing though that the love for a foster child just one day stops. How people can be like that and still sleep at night is beyond me. My oldest just turned 30 and I still love him. I always will and he, like all the others, have a place to live if they ever need it. Why? Because I'm their mother, that's why. It's what we do.
One last thing I want to touch on in this article is that the definition of child abuse and neglect varies from state to state, city to city, and county to county. Where it's legal and okay to spank your child here, it's illegal over there. The definitions are subjective and vague. They're left open to interpretation by the social worker in charge of your case. If you get one that's bitter and angry over a failed marriage, then he or she may take that out on you and your family. Often they try to force parents to separate in order for one of them to regain custody. They claim you're being physically and/or verbally abused and since it's impossible to prove a negative, there's very little you can do to combat these claims in court.
Social workers have absolute immunity from perjury. They can lie, twist facts, exaggerate and fabricate evidence and even if you can prove their lies, they're never held accountable. They make you think they have more power than law enforcement personnel and demand entry into your home without a warrant. It is vital for every family to know what their rights are, what to do and what NOT to do if CPS comes knocking. Don't wait until they investigate because then it's too late. No one is immune. I'm sure Charlie Sheen and Tiger Woods thought they were immune too but they know differently now.
So if you have a friend, family member, neighbor or co-worker who is fighting CPS for their children, rather than being judgmental, find out what they're investigating and why. The vast majority of abuse allegations are done so maliciously and falsely. A lot of people make these calls to get even but it's the children you would be hurting the most. Don't look for ways to get even, look for ways to forgive. That's much healthier for all in the long run.
Drug War On Moms Toddler, Newborn Wrongly Torn From Family in Stepped-Up Screening of Pregnant Women
US CA: Drug War On Moms
URL: http://www.mapinc.org/drugnews/v08/n631/a04.html
Newshawk: Herb
Votes: 1
Pubdate: Sun, 29 Jun 2008
Source: Los Angeles Daily News (CA)
Copyright: 2008 Los Angeles Newspaper Group
Contact: http://www.dailynews.com/writealetter
Website: http://www.dailynews.com
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/246
Author: Troy Anderson
DRUG WAR ON MOMS
Toddler, Newborn Wrongly Torn From Family in Stepped-Up Screening of Pregnant Women
Awakened by late-night pounding and his doorbell ringing, Palmdale resident Jesus Bejarano found a social worker and two sheriff's deputies demanding he turn over his 20-month-old daughter, Kelly.
The social worker said Bejarano's 29-year-old wife, Cheila Herrera, had tested positive for amphetamines and PCP at Antelope Valley Hospital after giving birth to the couple's son a week earlier. Their son, Jesse, who was born prematurely and was still at the hospital, had already been placed in protective custody.
"It was terrible," Herrera said of the Feb. 14 ordeal. "It was pretty shocking to us. We didn't know what to do or say. We called my mom, saying, 'They are taking our baby away.'
"We started calling friends, but no one we know has gone through something like this. We were crying. We thought, oh my God, they took our baby."
Last month, the couple sued Los Angeles County government for unspecified damages, saying Herrera had never used drugs and the social worker ignored a battery of expensive tests that proved the initial drug-test results were wrong.
Experts say the case highlights widespread problems with California's system of drug-testing pregnant mothers, using urine-screening tests that produce false-positives up to 70 percent of the time, and inconsistent compliance by hospitals with a state law designed to regulate the process.
"The system sounds problematic ... because they are doing urine-only screens, and if they are not doing confirmation tests, they are going to have a lot of false positives," said Dr. Barry Lester, a national expert on drug-exposed babies and a professor of pediatrics and psychiatry at Brown University in Providence, R.I.
The Palmdale case comes two decades after concerns about "crack babies" swept tens of thousands of children into child-protective systems across the nation. Today, many medical experts say those concerns were overblown, with children showing no consistent birth defects or brain damage after being born to mothers who tested positive for crack use.
But experts say that in recent years a similar sweep has focused on "meth babies." Up to 80percent of mothers in Los Angeles County whose babies are taken tested positive for methamphetamine, a drug that experts say produces very high rates of false positives.
Removing the Child
In Los Angeles County, the number of infants removed from mothers who tested positive for drugs at hospitals nearly tripled from 209 in 2003 to 568 last year, according to county data. California officials said they do not track similar figures statewide.
"Nine times out of 10, they remove the child," said Martha Molina Aviles, deputy to Supervisor Gloria Molina. "So we have been asking the ( Department of Children and Family Services ) a lot more questions about substance-abuse issues.
"How do they test? Are they randomly testing? What kind of tests are they doing? We certainly would support, whenever possible, to do confirmatory tests."
Under California legislation passed in 1990, it is against the law for a children's services agency to take a baby from a mother based solely on a single, positive drug test.
The law says there also must be proof the baby is at risk of abuse or neglect. And the law requires hospitals to conduct an assessment of the mother to determine if the baby is at risk before calling children's services authorities.
Known as the Presley Bill, the legislation came after a sudden increase in hospital reports to child welfare authorities of perinatal substance abuse.
But in a 1994 analysis on behalf of the state Department of Alcohol and Drug Programs, reviewers found widespread misunderstanding of the law, no mechanism to monitor implementation and a lack of funding for training or technical assistance for counties and hospitals.
"It's like the wild, wild West out here," said Beverly Hills attorney L. Wallace Pate, who is representing the Palmdale couple in their suit against the county.
"Nobody is following the law. The judges seem to be handling these positive toxicology screens like a drug war on women.
"They are telling moms, 'You tested positive for drugs, you are a bad mom, and we are going to take your kids away.' But under the law, the mom has to be abusive or negligent in the care of the baby." Principal Deputy County Counsel Rosemarie Belda said she couldn't comment on the Palmdale couple's lawsuit because it involves pending litigation.
But officials at the Department of Children and Family Services and the Interagency Council on Child Abuse and Neglect said that, despite the state legislation, hospitals are not consistently filling out the required assessment forms.
"Some hospitals are not submitting these protocol forms at all," ICAN Executive Director Deanne Tilton Durfee said.
Issue of Liability
DCFS and hospital officials say physicians have discretion whether to request a second screening test for pregnant mothers who test positive for drugs.
But James Lott, executive vice president of the Hospital Association of Southern California, said most hospitals in the county are not performing the assessments before calling the DCFS because, if something adverse happens to the baby or the assessment is inadequate, the hospital could be held legally liable.
"Hospitals don't like being put in this position, and so many hospitals will consider the positive toxicology test all the screening they have to do," Lott said.
"And that will be, can be and often is the sole determinant in regard to referrals ( to DCFS ), and then they let the ( child welfare ) investigators sort the rest of it out.
"The hospitals are erring on the side of safety for the child. And they could be faulted for the screening process. The only objective, fact-based criteria the hospital has is the toxicology test. Screening can be determined to be subjective."
Lott also said he doesn't believe hospitals are violating the law.
"The law does not say you cannot make a referral without having done the screening," Lott said. "It says you should do the screening if you are going to make a referral.
"I know that sounds twisted, but anyone can make a referral without a screening, and it's up to the investigators to decide ( whether to detain the baby )."
Lott also said many hospitals don't always have the laboratory expertise to conduct confirmatory tests. And while dependency court attorneys say they have been requesting more confirmatory tests recently, they acknowledge the practice is still relatively rare.
Dr. Charles Sophy, medical director of DCFS, said his agency is concerned that many hospitals aren't following the law or performing confirmatory drug tests.
"I think oftentimes hospitals want to err on the side of caution, and as mandated reporters they call us immediately," Sophy said. "And somewhere in the process either the confirmation doesn't get done or they never get to the next step ( of assessing the risk of child mistreatment ).
"But the more awareness we can raise, the better off we are in terms of keeping families together."
He also noted his agency is caught in a tough situation: It must decide whether to detain a baby at the hospital, but can't order confirmatory tests at that time because the mother is still under the care of her doctor.
"We can suggest they do a confirmatory test, but they don't always do it," Sophy said. "We don't want to inappropriately take children from their families. The disruption is not worth it. So we try to confirm as much as we can."
If the agency decides to take a baby into custody, after the mother is discharged from the hospital she often is required to undergo weekly drug testing that serves as a confirmatory process, Sophy said. "I'm concerned there are false positives sometimes, but usually there are more false negatives because of the games people play," Sophy said.
"Unless the test is actually witnessed at the hospital, certain games can be played to alter the tests. There are all kinds of ways people can change the results."
But child welfare experts, advocates for pregnant women and attorneys who handle such cases say problems with the system and testing methods are resulting in the unnecessary removal of babies from mothers across the nation.
"Thousands, if not hundreds of thousands, of families have been undermined by unnecessary child welfare investigations based on nothing more than a single, unconfirmed drug test," said Lynn M. Paltrow, executive director of National Advocates for Pregnant Women in New York City.
And Richard Wexler, executive director of the National Coalition for Child Protection Reform in Alexandria, Va., said similar systemic problems are found across the nation.
"While it may be harmful for a pregnant mother to use marijuana or other drugs, it is far more harmful to that child to have to endure the trauma of foster care," Wexler said.
"This doesn't mean you simply leave a baby with an addict. But it does mean that drug treatment for the mother should be the first choice, instead of foster care for the child. And those are cases where there really is a problem."
Maternal Drug Use
In Los Angeles County, Sophy attributed the near tripling in the number of detained babies to increased drug use by pregnant mothers and a campaign to encourage hospitals to report positive toxicology results.
Sophy said 70 to 80 percent of the cases have involved mothers who tested positive for methamphetamine use, and he said about 40 percent of the mothers are placed in substance-abuse treatment programs.
"About 40 to 60 percent of them end up back as intact families," Sophy said. "We work really hard to get these parents connected to services because we want to reunify them."
ICAN's Durfee said maternal drug abuse in Los Angeles County was the leading cause of accidental death in 2006 among babies and children younger than 5. There were 25 deaths, up from 15 the previous year. Twelve of the deaths were associated with methamphetamine and 12 with cocaine.
But Wexler and Lewis said researchers also have found it difficult for medical examiners to determine whether the deaths resulted directly from substance abuse or from conditions associated with poverty and lack of care before and after birth.
"I'm not saying maternal drug use is harmless," Lewis said. "It can have an influence on fetal growth, birth weight and neurological function.
"But we are saying there are other influences on fetal growth that may be more costly, in terms of their damaging effects, than drug use."
Lisa Fisher, spokeswoman for the California Department of Alcohol and Drug Programs, said most medical and addiction experts now say fears have been overblown about the long-term effects of drug exposure on babies.
"I think a lot of people would agree with ( Lester )," Fisher said.
For Bejarano and Herrera, the research is little consolation.
The day after placing the couple's children in agency custody, Pate said a social worker received results of a background check showing the parents had no criminal or child-abuse history.
The social worker also received test results showing Herrera had no drugs in her system, she said.
Still, instead of returning the children to the couple, Pate said the social worker told the parents Kelly could stay with a relative while they participated in a voluntary family reunification plan.
Pate wrote in the lawsuit that, after the couple refused to take part in the reunification program, social workers filed a detention report with the court alleging Herrera had used drugs while pregnant.
The suit alleges DCFS filed a fabricated court petition to illegally detain their children based on a false-positive drug test.
In February, a judge found the grounds for detaining the children were not met and ordered their immediate release from foster care.
In late March, the judge threw the case out of court.
Herrera said she is relieved the ordeal is over, but her daughter still has nightmares and wakes up in the middle of the night screaming.
"Is she thinking of when she was in the DCFS car, and the door closed, and she was driven away from us to be placed in a home with a whole bunch of strangers?" Herrera said.
"Now, even if we are right here at the house and hear the doorbell, we jump. Is it a visitor, or is it someone else?"
[sidebar]
AT ISSUE
Excerpts from California law regarding hospital drug-testing of pregnant mothers and assessment of risk to children:
California Penal Code 11165.13.
A positive toxicology screen at the time of the delivery of an infant is not in and of itself a sufficient basis for reporting child abuse or neglect.
However, any indication of maternal substance abuse shall lead to an assessment of the needs of the mother and child pursuant to Section 123605 of the Health and Safety Code. If other factors are present that indicate risk to a child, then a report shall be made.
However, a report based on risk to a child which relates solely to the inability of the parent to provide the child with regular care due to the parent's substance abuse shall be made only to a county welfare or probation department, and not to a law enforcement agency.
California Health and Safety Code 123605.
( a ) Each county shall establish protocols between county health departments, county welfare departments, and all public and private hospitals in the county, regarding the application and use of an assessment of the needs of, and a referral for, a substance exposed infant to a county welfare department pursuant to Section 11165.13 of the Penal Code.
( b ) The assessment of the needs shall be performed by a health practitioner, as defined in Section 11165.8 of the Penal Code, or a medical social worker. The needs assessment shall be performed before the infant is released from the hospital.
© The purpose of the assessment of the needs is to do all of the following:
( 1 ) Identify needed services for the mother, child, or family, including, where applicable, services to assist the mother caring for her child and services to assist maintaining children in their homes.
( 2 ) Determine the level of risk to the newborn upon release to the home and the corresponding level of services and intervention, if any, necessary to protect the newborn's health and safety, including a referral to the county welfare department for child welfare services.
( 3 ) Gather data for information and planning purposes.
SOURCE: www.leginfo.ca.gov/calaw.html
MAP posted-by: Richard Lake
http://www.mapinc.org/drugnews/v08/n631/a04.html
URL: http://www.mapinc.org/drugnews/v08/n631/a04.html
Newshawk: Herb
Votes: 1
Pubdate: Sun, 29 Jun 2008
Source: Los Angeles Daily News (CA)
Copyright: 2008 Los Angeles Newspaper Group
Contact: http://www.dailynews.com/writealetter
Website: http://www.dailynews.com
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/246
Author: Troy Anderson
DRUG WAR ON MOMS
Toddler, Newborn Wrongly Torn From Family in Stepped-Up Screening of Pregnant Women
Awakened by late-night pounding and his doorbell ringing, Palmdale resident Jesus Bejarano found a social worker and two sheriff's deputies demanding he turn over his 20-month-old daughter, Kelly.
The social worker said Bejarano's 29-year-old wife, Cheila Herrera, had tested positive for amphetamines and PCP at Antelope Valley Hospital after giving birth to the couple's son a week earlier. Their son, Jesse, who was born prematurely and was still at the hospital, had already been placed in protective custody.
"It was terrible," Herrera said of the Feb. 14 ordeal. "It was pretty shocking to us. We didn't know what to do or say. We called my mom, saying, 'They are taking our baby away.'
"We started calling friends, but no one we know has gone through something like this. We were crying. We thought, oh my God, they took our baby."
Last month, the couple sued Los Angeles County government for unspecified damages, saying Herrera had never used drugs and the social worker ignored a battery of expensive tests that proved the initial drug-test results were wrong.
Experts say the case highlights widespread problems with California's system of drug-testing pregnant mothers, using urine-screening tests that produce false-positives up to 70 percent of the time, and inconsistent compliance by hospitals with a state law designed to regulate the process.
"The system sounds problematic ... because they are doing urine-only screens, and if they are not doing confirmation tests, they are going to have a lot of false positives," said Dr. Barry Lester, a national expert on drug-exposed babies and a professor of pediatrics and psychiatry at Brown University in Providence, R.I.
The Palmdale case comes two decades after concerns about "crack babies" swept tens of thousands of children into child-protective systems across the nation. Today, many medical experts say those concerns were overblown, with children showing no consistent birth defects or brain damage after being born to mothers who tested positive for crack use.
But experts say that in recent years a similar sweep has focused on "meth babies." Up to 80percent of mothers in Los Angeles County whose babies are taken tested positive for methamphetamine, a drug that experts say produces very high rates of false positives.
Removing the Child
In Los Angeles County, the number of infants removed from mothers who tested positive for drugs at hospitals nearly tripled from 209 in 2003 to 568 last year, according to county data. California officials said they do not track similar figures statewide.
"Nine times out of 10, they remove the child," said Martha Molina Aviles, deputy to Supervisor Gloria Molina. "So we have been asking the ( Department of Children and Family Services ) a lot more questions about substance-abuse issues.
"How do they test? Are they randomly testing? What kind of tests are they doing? We certainly would support, whenever possible, to do confirmatory tests."
Under California legislation passed in 1990, it is against the law for a children's services agency to take a baby from a mother based solely on a single, positive drug test.
The law says there also must be proof the baby is at risk of abuse or neglect. And the law requires hospitals to conduct an assessment of the mother to determine if the baby is at risk before calling children's services authorities.
Known as the Presley Bill, the legislation came after a sudden increase in hospital reports to child welfare authorities of perinatal substance abuse.
But in a 1994 analysis on behalf of the state Department of Alcohol and Drug Programs, reviewers found widespread misunderstanding of the law, no mechanism to monitor implementation and a lack of funding for training or technical assistance for counties and hospitals.
"It's like the wild, wild West out here," said Beverly Hills attorney L. Wallace Pate, who is representing the Palmdale couple in their suit against the county.
"Nobody is following the law. The judges seem to be handling these positive toxicology screens like a drug war on women.
"They are telling moms, 'You tested positive for drugs, you are a bad mom, and we are going to take your kids away.' But under the law, the mom has to be abusive or negligent in the care of the baby." Principal Deputy County Counsel Rosemarie Belda said she couldn't comment on the Palmdale couple's lawsuit because it involves pending litigation.
But officials at the Department of Children and Family Services and the Interagency Council on Child Abuse and Neglect said that, despite the state legislation, hospitals are not consistently filling out the required assessment forms.
"Some hospitals are not submitting these protocol forms at all," ICAN Executive Director Deanne Tilton Durfee said.
Issue of Liability
DCFS and hospital officials say physicians have discretion whether to request a second screening test for pregnant mothers who test positive for drugs.
But James Lott, executive vice president of the Hospital Association of Southern California, said most hospitals in the county are not performing the assessments before calling the DCFS because, if something adverse happens to the baby or the assessment is inadequate, the hospital could be held legally liable.
"Hospitals don't like being put in this position, and so many hospitals will consider the positive toxicology test all the screening they have to do," Lott said.
"And that will be, can be and often is the sole determinant in regard to referrals ( to DCFS ), and then they let the ( child welfare ) investigators sort the rest of it out.
"The hospitals are erring on the side of safety for the child. And they could be faulted for the screening process. The only objective, fact-based criteria the hospital has is the toxicology test. Screening can be determined to be subjective."
Lott also said he doesn't believe hospitals are violating the law.
"The law does not say you cannot make a referral without having done the screening," Lott said. "It says you should do the screening if you are going to make a referral.
"I know that sounds twisted, but anyone can make a referral without a screening, and it's up to the investigators to decide ( whether to detain the baby )."
Lott also said many hospitals don't always have the laboratory expertise to conduct confirmatory tests. And while dependency court attorneys say they have been requesting more confirmatory tests recently, they acknowledge the practice is still relatively rare.
Dr. Charles Sophy, medical director of DCFS, said his agency is concerned that many hospitals aren't following the law or performing confirmatory drug tests.
"I think oftentimes hospitals want to err on the side of caution, and as mandated reporters they call us immediately," Sophy said. "And somewhere in the process either the confirmation doesn't get done or they never get to the next step ( of assessing the risk of child mistreatment ).
"But the more awareness we can raise, the better off we are in terms of keeping families together."
He also noted his agency is caught in a tough situation: It must decide whether to detain a baby at the hospital, but can't order confirmatory tests at that time because the mother is still under the care of her doctor.
"We can suggest they do a confirmatory test, but they don't always do it," Sophy said. "We don't want to inappropriately take children from their families. The disruption is not worth it. So we try to confirm as much as we can."
If the agency decides to take a baby into custody, after the mother is discharged from the hospital she often is required to undergo weekly drug testing that serves as a confirmatory process, Sophy said. "I'm concerned there are false positives sometimes, but usually there are more false negatives because of the games people play," Sophy said.
"Unless the test is actually witnessed at the hospital, certain games can be played to alter the tests. There are all kinds of ways people can change the results."
But child welfare experts, advocates for pregnant women and attorneys who handle such cases say problems with the system and testing methods are resulting in the unnecessary removal of babies from mothers across the nation.
"Thousands, if not hundreds of thousands, of families have been undermined by unnecessary child welfare investigations based on nothing more than a single, unconfirmed drug test," said Lynn M. Paltrow, executive director of National Advocates for Pregnant Women in New York City.
And Richard Wexler, executive director of the National Coalition for Child Protection Reform in Alexandria, Va., said similar systemic problems are found across the nation.
"While it may be harmful for a pregnant mother to use marijuana or other drugs, it is far more harmful to that child to have to endure the trauma of foster care," Wexler said.
"This doesn't mean you simply leave a baby with an addict. But it does mean that drug treatment for the mother should be the first choice, instead of foster care for the child. And those are cases where there really is a problem."
Maternal Drug Use
In Los Angeles County, Sophy attributed the near tripling in the number of detained babies to increased drug use by pregnant mothers and a campaign to encourage hospitals to report positive toxicology results.
Sophy said 70 to 80 percent of the cases have involved mothers who tested positive for methamphetamine use, and he said about 40 percent of the mothers are placed in substance-abuse treatment programs.
"About 40 to 60 percent of them end up back as intact families," Sophy said. "We work really hard to get these parents connected to services because we want to reunify them."
ICAN's Durfee said maternal drug abuse in Los Angeles County was the leading cause of accidental death in 2006 among babies and children younger than 5. There were 25 deaths, up from 15 the previous year. Twelve of the deaths were associated with methamphetamine and 12 with cocaine.
But Wexler and Lewis said researchers also have found it difficult for medical examiners to determine whether the deaths resulted directly from substance abuse or from conditions associated with poverty and lack of care before and after birth.
"I'm not saying maternal drug use is harmless," Lewis said. "It can have an influence on fetal growth, birth weight and neurological function.
"But we are saying there are other influences on fetal growth that may be more costly, in terms of their damaging effects, than drug use."
Lisa Fisher, spokeswoman for the California Department of Alcohol and Drug Programs, said most medical and addiction experts now say fears have been overblown about the long-term effects of drug exposure on babies.
"I think a lot of people would agree with ( Lester )," Fisher said.
For Bejarano and Herrera, the research is little consolation.
The day after placing the couple's children in agency custody, Pate said a social worker received results of a background check showing the parents had no criminal or child-abuse history.
The social worker also received test results showing Herrera had no drugs in her system, she said.
Still, instead of returning the children to the couple, Pate said the social worker told the parents Kelly could stay with a relative while they participated in a voluntary family reunification plan.
Pate wrote in the lawsuit that, after the couple refused to take part in the reunification program, social workers filed a detention report with the court alleging Herrera had used drugs while pregnant.
The suit alleges DCFS filed a fabricated court petition to illegally detain their children based on a false-positive drug test.
In February, a judge found the grounds for detaining the children were not met and ordered their immediate release from foster care.
In late March, the judge threw the case out of court.
Herrera said she is relieved the ordeal is over, but her daughter still has nightmares and wakes up in the middle of the night screaming.
"Is she thinking of when she was in the DCFS car, and the door closed, and she was driven away from us to be placed in a home with a whole bunch of strangers?" Herrera said.
"Now, even if we are right here at the house and hear the doorbell, we jump. Is it a visitor, or is it someone else?"
[sidebar]
AT ISSUE
Excerpts from California law regarding hospital drug-testing of pregnant mothers and assessment of risk to children:
California Penal Code 11165.13.
A positive toxicology screen at the time of the delivery of an infant is not in and of itself a sufficient basis for reporting child abuse or neglect.
However, any indication of maternal substance abuse shall lead to an assessment of the needs of the mother and child pursuant to Section 123605 of the Health and Safety Code. If other factors are present that indicate risk to a child, then a report shall be made.
However, a report based on risk to a child which relates solely to the inability of the parent to provide the child with regular care due to the parent's substance abuse shall be made only to a county welfare or probation department, and not to a law enforcement agency.
California Health and Safety Code 123605.
( a ) Each county shall establish protocols between county health departments, county welfare departments, and all public and private hospitals in the county, regarding the application and use of an assessment of the needs of, and a referral for, a substance exposed infant to a county welfare department pursuant to Section 11165.13 of the Penal Code.
( b ) The assessment of the needs shall be performed by a health practitioner, as defined in Section 11165.8 of the Penal Code, or a medical social worker. The needs assessment shall be performed before the infant is released from the hospital.
© The purpose of the assessment of the needs is to do all of the following:
( 1 ) Identify needed services for the mother, child, or family, including, where applicable, services to assist the mother caring for her child and services to assist maintaining children in their homes.
( 2 ) Determine the level of risk to the newborn upon release to the home and the corresponding level of services and intervention, if any, necessary to protect the newborn's health and safety, including a referral to the county welfare department for child welfare services.
( 3 ) Gather data for information and planning purposes.
SOURCE: www.leginfo.ca.gov/calaw.html
MAP posted-by: Richard Lake
http://www.mapinc.org/drugnews/v08/n631/a04.html
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