#1)  No matter what stage your “case” is in, the Number One (#1) thing YOU MUST DO- Document, Document, Document. This costs nothing and is the MOST IMPORTANT thing you can do in your defense. Keep detailed records of who said what, when. ESPECIALLY document face-to-face and conversations on the phone. Record or video tape if you have it. CPS workers “make mistakes”, LIE, and TWIST your words. See Washington State Extended Families for a nice essay on how to do Documentation.


#2 )  If there is a lawyer in your area who HATES CPS and knows how to put up a DEFENSE, hire him now and help him defend you. If you have to sell the car, mortgage the house, clean out your retirement fund, borrow from relatives- pay his retainer. NOTE- If you ARE a LAWYER who wants to learn HOW, see-Legal Information. If you get a court-appointed attorney, you may or may not receive a “vigorous defense”. About the standard pay they receive is $500 total, so the pay is no motivation to them. You might get a young, idealistic one fresh from law school, and he may be pretty aggressive. Some older ones who are not calloused may also really go to bat for you and the children and provide Competent Counsel. In all cases, Help him defend you Also see Make Your Court-Appointed Attorney Work For YOU at fightcps.com NEW! August 8, 2008 How I Found Attorney Who “Hates” CPS If there is NO such lawyer (there’s not very many), or you are penniless, ~you are going to have to learn how to DO IT YOURSELF in pro per or pro se ~ Be aware that some “courts” may be so “unencumbered by the Constitution” that a lawyer “may” risk his Bar License by providing a “vigorous defense”. (See What Happens in the FOG) There are also stories about CPS KIDNAPPING THE LAWYER’S CHILDREN AND ASSASSINATING HIS CHARACTER TOO. We have heard of CPS doing the same thing to JUDGES, Doctors, Police officers, other CPS people (Whistle-Blowers), and even State Representatives who challenge CPS’ lies and fascist activities. That’s why just filing your papers with the court clerk may be the only way to GET THE TRUTH ON THE RECORD. That is why the “Sui Juris” method was developed. If you don’t get anything ON THE RECORD, you will likely have NO appealable issues in the future. See this and ESPECIALLY THIS What Happens in the FOG- Beginning with an anonymous hotline “tip” of suspected abuse, a parent enters a gray area of American jurisprudence. And it is not “murky” to his benefit. Child Abuse, when alleged, is not a criminal matter. It is blithely characterized as a “Civil” matter, much the same as a lawsuit to collect on a breach of contract. Thus, the Constitutional protections afforded in a criminal case are not necessarily extended to those accused of Child buse. INNOCENCE IS NO DEFENSE!!  Don’t kid yourself. This is not the Happy, Fair Courts.To fully understand what Family Courts REALLY ARE- see Volksgerichtshof ~By the way~Then the Nazi’s picked up the Jews and sent them to Concentration Camps, they called it
Schutzhaft, literally translated “Protective Custody”


#3 )  Write your own version of history in a Sworn Affidavit and FILE IT with the Court, the CPS, the DA, and whoever else that has ANYTHING to do with your case. You are SWEARING to the truthfulness of your statements. The CPS witches aren’t swearing to ANYTHING (what is SACRED to them that they COULD swear on? The Humanist Manifesto II?) You had better be telling the truth with no “embellishments” and citing FACTS you can back up with evidence or witnesses’ sworn statements. Say NOTHING self-incriminating. If you have something to hide, you aren’t going to lie your way out of it. Grammar Quick Help Class 101 How your papers LOOK matters! The importance of your Sworn Affidavit cannot be over- emphasized! THE ONLY WAY you have appealable “issues” in the future is to get your facts ON THE RECORD in court.


#4 )  SHUT UP— SHUT UP— SHUT UP! Quit talking with the CPS monsters. You are waiving your FIFTH AMENDMENT CONSTITUTIONAL RIGHT and Miranda Rights every time you answer a question. Personal and phone conversations are where “mistakes” (inventions and fabrications) happen when THEY write their report about the conversations. Words you say float up into the rafters and come back twisted against you. If you feel you have to talk with them, record it or videotape it. And don’t forget to DOCUMENT it. CPS is NOT your friend! Women especially fall into this trap. Especially in cases where a child is ALLEGEDLY abused or molested by a family member. DO NOT pour your heart out to a CPS worker or CPS contractor Mental Illness clinician. Do that, and you will join the ranks of “co-perpetrator” lamenting “I was so, so foolish. I was an IDIOT. I thought they were there to HELP me. I thought the CPS worker CARED. I thought I had PROFESSIONAL CONFIDENTIALITY with the psych shithead.”
 CPS will use every word you say to make your child a Legal Orphan, because THAT’S what they are being PAID for.Ignore or forget this at your and your children’s EXTREME PERIL.


August 21, 2008 NEW CASELAW
Case Name: U.S. v. Craighead, District: 9 Cir , Case #: 07-1-135
Opinion Date: 8/21/2008 , DAR #: 13245
Case Holding:


Interrogations occurring inside the home are custodial, requiring Miranda advisements under the Fifth Amendment, if the circumstances turn it into one of a “police-dominated” atmosphere. Speaking personally, if there was no cop there, I would darn sure turn it into a “police dominated atmosphere”, by calling 911 and report that my home was being trespassed under the Color of Law with no Warrant.


IF They DO have a warrant, SHUT UP, SHUT UP, SHUT UP.


#5 )  BE POLITE! The highest crime you can commit is “Contempt of Social Worker”. We have reports of POLICEMEN telling people that the Constitutional Rights and Miranda Rights are only for TV, and what they are doing is “The Real World”.


See The Oath of Office EVERY OATH of OFFICE in the USA includes “support the Constitution” Since many of them seem like childish morons, SOCIOPATHIC, and plainly nasty with no discernable social “skills”, this can be a difficult task.


“I would love to answer your question, but I cannot do that without violating my Fifth Amendment Rights and my Miranda Rights”


“I would love to let you in my house to look around without a Search Warrant. But I cannot do that without violating my Fourth Amendment Rights”


“There is a secret pride in every human heart that revolts at tyranny. You may order and drive an individual, but you cannot make him respect you.” –William Hazlitt


We believe the court-ordered psych exam is a violation of your 5th Amendment rights. Don’t entertain the folly that psychiatrists are your friend. No, you do not enjoy professional “confidentiality” with them. They are the foremost tool of character assassination.


#6 )  Insist on LETTERS to and from the agencies. They can’t alter their words printed on paper that have been mailed to you. Nor can they alter your words either. KEEP COPIES of your letters to them.


#7 Get your records- FOIA/Privacy Act/ Open Records. Anything they FORCE you to sign, sign it “Under Duress”. You can also Rescind your previous signatures.


#8 )  Clean up your house and your life. Obviously, if your house is a mess or your life is a mess, your CPS worker is going to use every bit of it against you. There is (so far as we know) absolutely NO LAW about “dirty house”, but they make a big deal out of it. Shacking up with a boyfriend is the path to hell. Boyfriends have NO “natural affection” for your children, and they are the #1 baby rapists and child abusers and killers, at the TOP of any statistical data. So this is something YOU CAN DO SOMETHING ABOUT. Clean up. Quit smoking. Whatever you are doing that you KNOW is wrong, the choice is between your laziness, habits, lifestyle choices, CATS, and YOUR KIDS. You choose. If you can’t, then don’t complain about what happens.


Also see AFRA Dress Codes. How you dress and conduct yourself in interviews, at court, or with the Mental Illness Clinicians- matters. : WHERE IS THE LAW about a “messy house”? What are the STANDARDS? What’s the criteria for determining a “messy house” or “dirty house”? How many (if any) pets can a family have? What’s the standard about cat litter boxes? How often is a toilet supposed to be scrubbed? How many Cheerios are allowed on the floor under the kitchen table? How many dust bunnies are allowed under the heat radiator? Under the refrigerator?

BY ERIN WILLIAMS
09 Apr, 2010 11:03 PM


SEPARATED parents ordered by a court to have supervised visits with their children are waiting up to four months to see them at a Ballarat contact centre because of a lack of government funding.


Calls for more resources to extend facilities at Ballarat Child and Family Services were made earlier this week after it was revealed there were a lack of government-funded contact centres.  Full Story Here

By NATALIYA VASILYEVA and KRISTIN M. HALL, Associated Press Writers Nataliya Vasilyeva And Kristin M. Hall, Associated Press Writers – 1 hr 27 mins ago



MOSCOW – Russia threatened to suspend all child adoptions by U.S. families Friday after a 7-year-old boy adopted by a woman from Tennessee was sent alone on a one-way flight back to Moscow with a note saying he was violent and had severe psychological problems.


The boy, Artyom Savelyev, was put on a plane by his adopted grandmother, Nancy Hansen of Shelbyville.


"He drew a picture of our house burning down and he'll tell anybody that he's going to burn our house down with us in it," she told The Associated Press in a telephone interview. "It got to be where you feared for your safety. It was terrible."


Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov called the actions by the grandmother "the last straw" in a string of U.S. adoptions gone wrong, including three in which Russian children had died in the U.S.


In an exclusive interview with ABC News' George Stephanopoulos, Dmitry Medvedev said the boy .....read more

Cory Hurley

Corner Brook, N.L. — The Canadian Press
Published on Saturday, Apr. 03, 2010 1:00PM EDT
Last updated on Saturday, Apr. 03, 2010 1:04PM EDT


Newfoundland pair learn they have been within shouting distance from one another


The world can seem like such a big place when you are searching for someone missing in your life, but then again sometimes that person turns out to be right before you.


Stephen Goosney, 29, and Tommy Larkin, 30, were born a year and a half apart. They were both adopted and began life knowing they were missing vital pieces of their personal history.


The two men told the Corner Brook Western Star they began the process of finding out who they were several years ago, both citing medical history as their primary reason behind the search.


They soon uncovered their past — just across the street from one another.


The pair discovered from an adoption agency that they had been within shouting distance for seven months.


“It was a good feeling, knowing there was actually someone looking for me too,” Mr. Goosney said in an interview with the newspaper.


There was hope they would be living close together, but an understanding that, even if they were adopted by Newfoundland and Labrador families, there is a good chance they could be far apart.


However,   read more here

The woman embezzled more than $100,000 while working for state social services.


By Mike Gangloff


There was much that remained unclear Wednesday about Eileen Patricia Maldonado's decision to put herself on the dole.


She had lived a life of service as a foster mother and a benefits specialist at the state Department of Social Services office in Roanoke, where she awarded grants to the needy. But then she began sending checks to herself, clearing something in the low six figures before being caught.


In January, Maldonado pleaded guilty to five counts of embezzlement. Back in Roanoke Circuit Court to receive a sentence of less than a year in prison, Maldonado wept as she tried to explain what had happened.


To Assistant Commonwealth's Attorney Wanda DeWease, Maldonado's actions were "probably as elaborate and sophisticated a scheme as had been perpetrated" and evidence of "greed ... unlike any greed that's ever been seen by the court around here."   read more here

By Elizabeth Piazza The Daily Times



Posted: 04/03/2010 12:00:00 AM MDT


FARMINGTON — A foster father who previously faced 85 counts of criminal sexual penetration against a minor was arrested Thursday and charged with six new counts of the same crime after a different victim videotaped one of the incidents.


Todd Mortensen, 45, confessed only to the recent assaults, which reportedly took place between March 22 and 30 in Mortensen's home, where the 12-year-old victim lived as a foster child, San Juan County Sheriff's Capt. Tim Black said. The New Mexico Children, Youth and Families Department removed the child from the home.


Mortensen was booked at the San Juan County Adult Detention Center on six charges of second-degree criminal sexual contact of a minor younger than the age 13. He is not facing the previous 85 counts dismissed by prosecutors in 2005, but the District Attorney's Office is looking into the old case, District Attorney Rick Tedrow said.


Mortensen, a nurse at San Juan Regional Medical Center since May 2008, resigned Thursday, hospital spokesman Dennis Mathis said.


"He did not work with children," said Mathis, who declined to say in which department Mortensen worked.


Mortensen is a former foster parent, but he has not held a license with the New Mexico Children, Youth and Families Department for several years, said Romaine Serna, spokeswoman for the department.


Mortensen and his wife, Lisa, have had dozens of foster children in their home over the years. They adopted several of them, including one still living in the home.


"He was licensed and did adopt children through Children, Youth and Families Department," Serna said of Mortensen. "The individual that studied the family did not have any concerns at the time. They passed all the clearances and residence checks."


The 85 charges filed in 2003 are public record and are accessible on the state's court records Web site, nmcourts.com.


The 12-year-old victim was not fostered through the Children, Youth and Families Department, Serna said. She believes the arrangements were conducted privately with another family.


Mortensen had two more female foster children living in his home at the time of his arrest, Black said.


"We are pulling the other two 16-year-old girls out and turning them over to CYFD because we don't know why they are there," Black said. "They were not officially placed by CYFD and we don't know exactly where they belong."


CYFD is conducting an investigation into Mortensen's background and is....read more here

Former Riverside County CPS worker to stand trial Local News PE.com Southern California News News for Inland Southern California

Thursday, April 08, 2010, 15:00


A SENIOR social worker at Plymouth City Council has been accused of claiming she made home visits to children on 70 occasions when she had not.


Charon Rae Salisbury allegedly indicated that she had completed her home visits to eight children on the Child Protection Register – but it is now being alleged that she didn't.


Ms Salisbury is to appear before the General Social Care Council's misconduct panel next week accused of not making 'sufficiently frequent visits' to the children.


She allegedly made entries on the city council's in-house recording system, Care First, to indicate she had made home visits to the children on 70 occasions – but it is alleged she had not made those visits.


The GSCC's list of allegations, prepared before the social care regulator case, outlines that Ms Salisbury was the allocated social worker for the eight children on the council's Child Protection Register in 2007 and 2008.


The allegations state that she is accused of not making 'sufficient frequent visits' to the children in line with child protection procedures and plans between October 1, 2007, and March 26, 2008, for three of the children – and between December 21, 2007, and March 26, 2008, for the other five children.


On various occasions for each of the eight children, Ms Salisbury indicated she had completed home visits – but it is alleged 'you had not', according to the list of allegations.


The allegations also state that Ms Salisbury indicated to her line manager that her visits to the eight children were 'up to date' during supervision sessions on five occasions in 2007 and 2008, but in those sessions she allegedly did not disclose that she had not 'personally undertaken the visits' to the children on the dates in question.


The Herald understands that Ms Salisbury no longer works for the city council following a period of suspension.


The hearing is due to be held between April 12 and April 16, at a venue which is yet to be confirmed.


A Plymouth City Council spokesman said: "We can confirm that this individual has not been a practising social worker for Plymouth City Council since April 2008."

BEDFORD HILLS — On the day the government took them away, 5-year-old Tanya Cooper and her little brother had just eaten all they had — some butter stolen by the acting mother of the home, their 7-year-old sister.


Because there was no pattern to their mother's drug binge disappearances — sometimes it lasted days, sometimes longer — there was no way to know whether she was gone for good.

So the older sister did something she had never done before. She left her siblings alone and went next door to call Child Protective Services.

"She said (to us) 'These people who are coming to the door are not going to hurt us or anything, but we have to do what they say,' " Cooper remembers her sister saying. " 'You guys are hungry and I don't know what to do.' "

The life that followed in the foster care system was a saga of struggle and structure for Cooper, who felt blessed to be in a home in Bedford Hills where she was cared for, even though she was raped by two foster brothers in that home for years.

She found by modeling in Paris that she could escape the anger she developed as a teenager, only to have the rage resurface when she became a mother herself at 23.


Finally, through therapy, higher education, faith and friends, the light came on in Cooper's life.
"There is no point going through anything you went through if you can't say that you have helped someone or changed someone's life," Cooper said.

And so, at age 45, with the death last summer of her dear younger brother, Robert, still stinging, Cooper is trying to make that difference.

She maintains two blogs — one for ex-foster kids who have aged out of the system and one for teenagers who are getting ready to be on their own.
She is working on a book that is part memoir, part self-help about the lessons she learned as a survivor and the keys to coming out of the system strong.

And in May, to kick off National Foster Care Month, she will be a featured speaker at a foster care conference in Cleveland along with rap pioneer Darryl "DMC" McDaniels.  More of ths story

Parents quotes: "“If you raise your children to feel that they can accomplish any goal or task they decide upon, you will have succeeded as a parent and you will have given your children the greatest of all blessings.”"

1 day 11 hours ago
Michelle Ruiz

AOL News (April 3) -- When 12-year-old Alexa Gonzalez was caught doodling on her desk at Junior High School 190 in Queens, New York, she expected detention and an afternoon on desk-cleaning duty. Instead, she was arrested, led out of her school in handcuffs and detained at a local police precinct for hours, she said.

Two months after the incident, Gonzalez and her mother, Maraima Comacho, are suing the New York City Education Department and the New York Police Department for $1 million in damages, claiming excessive use of force and violation of the girl's rights in the ordeal, which Comacho has called a "nightmare."

"We want to stop this from happening to other young children in the future," the family's lawyer, Joseph Rosenthal, told the New York Daily News.

Gonzalez describes the ordeal as traumatizing and excessive, saying that after her Spanish teacher caught her doodling on her desk with erasable green marker, she was "physically dragged by a teacher and an assistant principal" to the dean's office, where school safety officials searched her by placing "their hands inside the rear and front pockets of her jeans." Police were then summoned to arrest her.

Gonzalez told the Daily News she broke down as she was led out of her school in handcuffs.

"I started crying, like, a lot," said said. "I made two little doodles. ... It could be easily erased. To put handcuffs on me is unnecessary."

The legal papers filed by Rosenthal said Comacho was not permitted to accompany her daughter to the precinct and was instead told to go home and wait for a call. The documents also said that Gonzalez was detained in "an enclosed room" at the precinct and handcuffed to a pole for more than two hours.


In February, New York City officials acknowledged Gonzalez's arrest was a mistake, with a City Education spokesman saying, "Based on what we've seen so far, this shouldn't have happened."

Police spokesman Paul Browne told the Daily News that officers should have used better judgment after being called by the school.

"Even when we're asked to make an arrest, common sense should prevail, and discretion used in deciding whether an arrest or handcuffs are really necessary," said police spokesman Paul Browne.

Now Comacho wants the City to pay for their mistake, to the tune of $1 million for the ordeal that led to her daughter's suspension and a trip to family court, where Gonzalez was given eight hours of community service and ordered to write a book report and an essay about what she learned from the experience.

The suit says officers "knew, or should have known" that Gonzalez had simply doodled with a "soluable, erasable marker."

What were the doodled words that led to her arrest?
"I love my friends Abby and Faith," Gonzalez said she wrote, adding "Lex was here. 2/1/10" and a smiley face.

April 3rd ,2010
LAGRANGE, Ga. -- The Troup County Sheriffs Office has located a missing 9-year-old girl but is continuing to search for her mother.


Sheriff's office officials told The Columbus-Ledger Enquirer the girl was found Friday afternoon in a home in LaGrange. The girl, , Breann Helms, and her mother, Melissa Helms, had been considered missing since about 2 a.m. Friday.

That's when the car they were last seen in was pulled with five people inside, but not the mother or daughter. The five people in the car were arrested for drug related activity.

The child had been last seen leaving her grandmother's house with her mother Thursday afternoon.

Read more:

NYS appellate court agrees with dad's petition to halt adoption proceedings without his permission
March 30, 6:01 AM Albany CPS and Family Court Examiner Daniel Weaver 

The Supreme Court of the State of New York, Appellate Division, Fourth Judicial Department in the Matter of Nicole J. has reversed an order by Monroe County Family Court Judge, John J. Rivoli, which dispensed with the consent of Nicole's biological father and allowed her adoption to go forward.


The father's attorney made his first appearance in Monroe County Family Court on December 1, 2008 on behalf of the father, only to be told that a hearing would be held the next day. He requested an adjournment until January 12, 2009 because he wa unaware that a hearing was scheduled for the next day. The judge denied his request and proceeded with the hearing.

In reversing Judge Rivoli's order, the appellate court said that the family court abused its discretion in denying the request for adjournment. The court went on to state:

"There is no evidence in the record that the father had notice that the hearing was scheduled to occur on December 1, 2008. Moreover, the record establishes that the proceedings were not protracted, that this was the father's first request for an adjournment and, indeed, that the court had adjourned proceedings concerning the child's biological mother to the precise adjournment date sought by the father. Under these circumstances, we conclude that the court should have granted the request of the father's attorney for an adjournment to enable the father to prepare for the hearing (see generally Matter of Stephen L., 2 AD3d 1229, 1231). We therefore reverse the order and remit the matter to Family Court for a new hearing."

Less traumatic procedures will be introduced by the Victorian Government to help children at risk of abuse. Child protection workers will be able to mediate with families on such tender issues, like whether a child is removed from his or her home. Hence, under the radical changes planned by the State Government, mediation instead of the adversarial court system will be used.


This way, children and their families can avoid going to the court, revealed Attorney General Rob Hulls. He shared that it is very shocking for children to sit in court for the court's proceedings.


He said, "It's very important that we have these new child protection resolution conferences, where people can sit around the table away from the court in an environment where it's far more amenable to trying to resolve the matters in the best interests of the child".


Child protection resolution conferences will be set up at which the parties involved in a case and their lawyers will meet in a non-court setting with a judicial convener. All the people related to the child will be involved including the parents, foster carers and child protection workers.

The Atlanta Journal-Constitution

The Senate voted Thursday to protect Georgians from evildoers, covert corporations and rogue doctors, seen and unseen, with the passage of a bill that would make it illegal to implant a microchip into someone without their permission.

Jack Kingston: No death panels in an ‘unfinished’ health care law Blog: Gold Dome Live »


Senate passes hospital tax bill after bitter fight


The bill, ironically sponsored by Sen. Chip Pearson (R-Dawsonville) and Senate Majority Leader Chip Rogers, would make it a misdemeanor to implant someone against their will with a microchip, sensor, transmitter or other tracking device. The Senate passed the bill 47-2.


“We are sending the message that Georgia is committed to upholding its citizens’ constitutional rights and protection of their person,” Pearson said. “Advances in technology are moving fast, and while most of these are for the good, we must be careful that it doesn’t come at the harm of citizens.”


But is this really a problem in Georgia?


Pearson said that he knows of no case in Georgia where someone has been involuntarily microchipped. He added that during his preliminary meetings on the bill, no one came to complain about it, and he has heard of no conspiracy plots or theories to put implants in massive amounts of Georgians. The notion that legions of people have been forcibly implanted by the government, aliens or nefarious corporations runs rampant throughout the Internet and in science fiction movies. Think Neo and his forced implantation by Agent Smith in "The Matrix."


“I have no firsthand knowledge of anything,” Pearson said. “I am simply trying to get ahead of this and protect the people. We don’t know what is going to happen.”


Pearson added that any information put inside a chip and then implanted into someone’s body can just as easily be stored somewhere above the skin.


“The benefits of a microchip that can be internally implanted are also available in many external forms,” Pearson said.


There have been a handful of corporations worldwide that have begun developing technology to inject people with implantable devices. In 2004, the VeriChip was approved by the FDA. Proponents say that implantable chips could help in identifying victims of major tragedies like Sept. 11 or the Haitian earthquake, or even wandering Alzheimer’s patients.


Pearson’s bill would clear the way for people who want implants. The bill does not prevent anyone from being able to voluntarily have a microchip implanted -- as long as the implantation is performed by a doctor and is regulated by the Georgia Composite Medical Board.

But opponents say that the devices can lead to unwanted surveillance and even cancer. There are some who say that it has religious implications and that the implantable devices are the "Mark of the beast."

If the bill, SB 235, gets past the state House, Georgia would join Wisconsin, North Dakota and California as states that have passed laws prohibiting the forced implantation of microchips in people.

Pearson said the bill has actually been floating around the Capitol for several years. In 2007, Rep. Ed Setzler (R-Acworth) introduced a bill in the House that didn’t go anywhere.

Pearson is hoping that his bill will be received favorably in the House.


But some critics of the bill wonder what the point is.


This is a solution in search of a problem,” said Sen. Vincent Fort (D-Atlanta), one of only two senators to vote against it, along with Sen. Ronald Ramsey (D-Decatur). “We are spending our precious time -- with a billion-and-a-half-dollar deficit -- with something that is not a problem.”

Foster parents would get less cash under Ind. cuts


By CHARLES D. WILSON and CARLY EVERSON
Associated Press Writers


INDIANAPOLIS -- Indiana is trying to shift hundreds of foster children with medical, emotional or behavioral problems into cheaper care for children without special needs, a move that cuts payments to families who care for the state's most challenged children.

The change would give foster families less money to pay for therapy, food and clothing and other costs. And some fear that fewer families could volunteer for the job in the future because they'd have to cover the bills themselves.


Foster parents who provide homes for special-needs children are paid up to $100 a day. Under the state's new plan, many would receive $25 or less.

"Twenty-five bucks a day - it's not a lot," said foster parent Terry Blackburn of Brownsburg, Ind., who has fostered more than 100 children with his wife, Ruth. "If you go buy a pair of shoes and a pair of pants for the kid, you've already spent your $25."

The changes, made quietly without public attention, come as officials are attempting to cut $56 million from the cost of providing for the more than 10,000 children who are in the state's care because they could not remain with their families. The Department of Child Services announced plans in late 2009 to cut payments to those who provide homes for the children by 10 percent. Overall, the cuts would reduce the state's costs by about 8 percent by June 2011.

Many other states, including Arizona, California, Missouri, Ohio and Utah, also have cut spending on children's services because of budget problems. Some states have reduced payments to foster homes or group facilities or considered laying off caseworkers.

"The states are getting pounded, and this is one of the few times I've seen child welfare really get hit," said Michael Petit, president of the advocacy group Every Child Matters.

According to children's advocates, Indiana put its new policy on special needs children into effect at the beginning of the year when it directed private agencies that specialize in finding foster homes for hard-to-place children to begin offering traditional foster care as well. Then, the state began shifting special-needs children into the lower-cost care.

Children who have special needs include pregnant teenagers, victims of sexual abuse, infants born to drug-addicted moms, those with severe medical problems or with behavioral problems that lead them to act violently.

According to placement agencies, a 1-year-old boy born with cocaine and marijuana in his system and behavioral problems was placed in traditional care at one facility. Two siblings who had been sexually abused by relatives, including an 11-year-old girl who vandalized her foster home and threatened her foster mother, also were reclassified.
The state wouldn't say how many children have been reclassified. But one placement agency official said almost half his special-needs children were downgraded; another official said all the children at some agencies were affected.

DCS Director James W. Payne said in a Dec. 1 letter to providers that the agency had "reluctantly" ordered the 10 percent cut. Indiana's reimbursement rate for the traditional care, which would drop from $25 to $22.50, would remain among the nation's highest, he said. His letter did not mention shifting the special needs children.

"These have been incredibly difficult deliberations and everyone involved recognizes the magnitude of the decisions being made," the letter said.

A federal judge has temporarily blocked the cuts and reclassifications after foster parents and private agencies filed suit. The state is appealing the order.

Citing the litigation, DCS spokeswoman Anne Houseworth declined to comment on the cost-cutting measures. But she said the state's goal is to provide children the care they need while paying less when appropriate.

Foster parents and children's advocates say if the state prevails in court and proceeds with its plan, many children who need help won't receive it, and some won't find homes at all.

"They can't just lump all foster children together as one classification. It just doesn't work," said Judy Hurst of Carthage, Ind., who has cared for more than 300 foster children with severe needs in the last 20 years.

Hurst said she does not know how she and her husband, Denny, could continue at the lower rate.

They keep the doors locked and security cameras rolling at their house east of Indianapolis. Foster children have stolen from them or damaged their home. The Hursts currently are caring for a pregnant teenager and a boy Hurst describes as "probably the most abused child we've had in our 20 years."

"We've devoted our whole life to other peoples' kids," she said. "We don't want to stop doing this. We don't want to stop working with kids."

Chris Morrison, executive director of the Indiana Foster Care and Adoption Association, said foster and adoptive families can't shoulder the costs of the special therapy needed.

"There's this philosophy that's trying to be promoted that you're adopting out of love and therefore all of this should come out of your pocket. It's not a genuine reality," she said.

Read more

The psychiatrist who treated the Broward foster child who killed himself last year is now in hot water with the FDA.
Seven-year-old Gabriel Myers hanged himself with a shower cord in a Margate foster home.
BY CAROL MARBIN MILLER
cmarbin@miamiherald.com
Seven-year-old Gabriel Myers hanged himself with a shower cord in a Margate foster home.



Posted on Tuesday, 03.16.10
A South Florida psychiatrist who was treating a 7-year-old foster child before the boy committed suicide last year has received a warning from federal drug regulators who say he failed ``to protect the rights, safety and welfare'' of children enrolled in clinical drug trials.




In a strongly worded letter dated Feb. 4, regulators at the U.S. Food and Drug Administration said Dr. Sohail Punjwani over-medicated children who were enrolled in clinical trials for undisclosed drugs. One girl, the letter said, slashed her wrists while hallucinating.
Another, a 13-year-old, ``experienced sedation and dizziness during the study,'' the letter said.
The warning letter, a harsh and rare form of discipline by the agency, says Punjwani failed to ``adhere to the applicable statutory requirements and FDA regulations governing the conduct of clinical investigations.''
``Your failure to conduct the requisite safety measures contributed to the unnecessary exposure of pediatric subjects to significant overdoses, which jeopardized the subjects' rights, safety and welfare,'' the letter says.
Punjwani did not return calls from The Miami Herald seeking comment.
Punjwani, who practices in Tamarac and has offices elsewhere in South Florida, was treating 7-year-old Gabriel Myers when the boy hanged himself with a shower cord in a Margate foster home. The boy's death prompted a yearlong probe by a Department of Children & Families task force, as well as proposed legislation before the Florida Senate.
Before Gabriel's death, Punjwani had prescribed several powerful mental health drugs -- some of which had not been approved by the FDA for use on children and had been linked to dangerous side effects, including an increased risk of suicide among children.
Punjwani also was sued last summer by a Tamarac mother who claims her son, 16-year-old Emilio Villamar, died after being over-medicated with a group of mental health drugs at a Fort Lauderdale psychiatric hospital.
The letter mailed to Punjwani does not specify the names or types of drugs the doctor was testing, and a spokeswoman for the FDA, Sandy Walsh, said such details are kept confidential to protect drug companies.
Walsh said the FDA does not send out such warning letters often, and the agency considers breaches of its regulations to be ``very serious.'' The letter was signed by Leslie K. Ball, a doctor who heads the compliance office of the Division of Scientific Investigations, and Constance Cullity, a doctor who is also a compliance officer.
For years, drug makers did not study most medications on children, largely due to ethical concerns over using kids as test subjects. More recently, however, Congress passed laws to encourage pharmaceutical companies to test their drugs for safety and efficacy with children by extending patents on drugs approved for adults.
In a trial for one drug that was not identified, Punjwani gave one child dosages ``in excess of... specified limits,'' the letter says.
The child was discontinued from the trial before it was completed, the letter says, ``due to worsening auditory hallucinations that apparently caused the subject to lacerate her wrists.'' The girl was ``overdosed'' on the drug for more than two weeks.
The letter says Punjwani submitted a corrective action plan to the FDA and revised his procedures to better protect his research subjects from dosing missteps. ``However,'' the letter says, ``we are concerned that the response is not adequate to prevent future recurrence of the violation.''
The clinical trials for a different drug were to adhere to a series of protocols that specified what dosage of the drug was to be used, depending on the child's weight, the letter states. But for six of seven children -- chosen at random -- who received one of the tested drugs in Punjwani's study, the dosage exceeded what was spelled out in the protocol.
One child who weighed 103 pounds, for example, ``was overdosed on study medication for 20 consecutive days while participating in the study,'' the letter states. The child is identified only as ``Subject 1001.''
A child identified as ``Subject 1003,'' who was 15 at the time of the trials, ``was overdosed on study medication for 21 consecutive days while participating in the study,'' the letter says. ``Subject 1004,'' a 16-year-old, ``received doses in excess of the maximum target dose for 3 consecutive days while participating,'' the letter says.
A 10-year-old, identified as ``Subject 1007,'' was ``overdosed'' for nearly two weeks while on the study, the letter states.
Department of Children & Families Secretary George Sheldon, who appointed a task force last year to study Gabriel's death, said Monday he is asking the FDA to compare a list of Florida foster children with lists of children enrolled in Punjwani's clinical trials. Sheldon said he was acting on concerns that children in state care may have been involved in clinical trials, which is against state law.
The FDA letter, Sheldon said, ``raises clear ethical issues and judgment issues that we need to clearly understand.'' If foster kids were enrolled in clinical trials, he said, ``we will need to take it to another level.''

By CAROL MARBIN MILLER
cmarbin@MiamiHerald.com


Juvenile court judges cannot jail delinquent foster kids in county lockups just to keep the kids from running away, a Miami appeals court ruled Wednesday, ending a years-old practice that child welfare authorities have employed to protect runaway kids from themselves.

In a short decision involving a 12-year-old girl in foster care -- identified in records only as J.J. -- the Third District Court of Appeal said delinquent children can be held in secure detention only under ``strict statutory criteria.'' Protecting the child from herself is not one of the accepted criteria, the court wrote.

``Although we sympathize with the trial court's motive -- getting J.J. to stay in one place long enough to get the help she needs -- detention is not authorized under these circumstances,'' the opinion stated. It was signed by Judges Gerald B. Cope, Jr., David M. Gersten and Barbara Lagoa.

The opinion, a ruling on a habeas corpus petition, does not specify what charges J.J. was facing. But at a conference before a Miami-Dade judge, who is not named, the girl's guardian and school principal complained they were ``concerned for her safety and well-being.

``They indicated that J.J. needs medical and dental examinations, psycho-educational testing to determine appropriate school placement, and a psychiatric evaluation,'' the opinion states. But J.J.'s ``conduct'' made it impossible for her foster care caseworkers to get such testing done.

``With the best of intentions,'' the opinion states, ``and an effort to do what is in J.J.'s best interest, the trial court ordered her secure detention.''

J.J.'s situation is not unusual: Throughout the state, hundreds of children in state care have had some contact with the juvenile justice system.

``Some children need assistance beyond what they can get in their residential setting,'' said DCF's child welfare chief, Alan Abramowitz. But, he added, DCF has alternatives for getting such help.

First, caseworkers can ask a judge to order a dependent child into a residential treatment center for long-term psychiatric care. Under state law, such children are entitled to a lawyer and a hearing before they can be committed to a treatment center against their will.

DCF also can have a troubled child committed to a psychiatric hospital under the state's involuntary commitment law, called the Baker Act, Abramowitz said.

``We have a lot of safeguards,'' Abramowitz said. ``We want the youth in our dependency system not to be punished because they were abused or neglected.''

Of the roughly 2,500 children in the Miami-Dade's child welfare system under 18, about 7 to 10 percent have been involved with the juvenile justice system at some point, said Fran Allegra, who heads Miami's privately run foster care agency, Our Kids.

``Generally,'' Allegra said, ``these teenagers have resided in group care and have been in the system for a long time.'' Miami is one of seven U.S. cities that will be part of a Georgetown University study of how to improve coordination of services for youth in the delinquency and foster care systems, she said.

Miami-Dade Public Defender Carlos Martinez, whose office represents J.J., said jailing children to protect them from themselves is both costly and counterproductive. Children in the detention center, he said, cost the county $281 per day.

``Locking a child up increases the likelihood of future criminal activity,'' Martinez said. ``This is the latest in a long line of appellate court opinions instructing a juvenile judge to follow the law. We remain vigilant.''

Frank Penela, a Tallahassee spokesman for the Department of Juvenile Justice, said his agency has not sought to lock up children who don't meet the criteria for secure detention.

``We just follow the letter of the law,'' Penela said. ``Current law establishes detention admissions criteria. Today's ruling reflects that law and we agree with the decision.''

Read more: http://www.miamiherald.com/2010/03/31/1556728/runaway-foster-kids-cant-be-jailed.html#ixzz0jvIpED3B

October 5, 2009



Victory: Shackling Pregnant Prisoners in Labor Found to be Cruel!


On Friday, the United States Court of Appeals for the Eight Circuit (the federal level appellate court that reviews decisions from federal district courts in North Dakota, South Dakota, Iowa, Nebraska, Missouri, Minnesota, and Arkansas) issued the long-awaited decision in Nelson v. Norris. In this case, Shawanna Nelson argued that being forced to go through the final stages of labor with     Read More

The Atlanta Journal-Constitution

A foster mom who left a 9-month-old girl in a closed minivan, where the infant died of heat stroke, has been sentenced to probation, a fine and a community service.

Wendy Osborne, 31, received 12 months' probation and a $1,000 fine and was ordered to complete 200 hours of community service after pleading guilty to involuntary manslaughter, a misdemeanor.

"There is no way the court can lessen the anger and frustration of those who loved the child," Judge Bob Adamson said at last week's sentencing in Jackson County Superior Court, according to the Braselton News. "This act is at the highest level of criminality of a misdmeanor involuntary manslaughter charge. If not for the recommendation of the district attorney, the court would have considered [jail] time in this case."

Osborne told authorities she returned from a doctor's appointment about 2:30 p.m. Sept. 2, 2008, and took her two adopted 3-year-old girls into her Nicholson home. She forgot about the baby in the car seat.

Osborne said she fell asleep, waking around 5 p.m. Then she remembered the baby in the minivan. The girl, Jessica Marie Scovil, was pronounced dead by emergency personnel called to the scene.
Osborne told authorities she had been sick for several days and was taking medication, which might have contributed to her drowsiness.

The infant had been living with Osborne for five months. Her birth parents were on the verge of regaining custody at the time of Jessica's death, relatives told the court.

"I will never understand how anyone could leave a 9-month-old baby in a hot van to die," said Jessica's grandmother, Georgia Nicholas, according to the Braselton News.
Osborne and her husband, Chris, had fostered several children before Jessica. Osborne even helped train new foster parents.

Before sentencing, witnesses testified on Osborne's behalf. "I can't imagine that any punishment you can give her can be worse than what she's already been through," said Osborne's pastor, the Rev. Kent Barry, according to the Athens Banner-Herald. "She deals with this every day. She still has her two [5-year-olds] to care for, and when she looks at them, she can't help but see Jessica."