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Ride for Accountability
February 7, 2010
John Dunn has planned a Ride for Accountability of Children's Aid
Societies (RACAS) this summer. You can read the agenda in his announcement (pdf).
According to the enclosed letter, financial support has not been
adequate, and more is needed if the event is to proceed. Many readers of
this column have been reduced to penury by their encounter with children's
aid, but a few are able to afford a generous donation. Information for
donors is in the announcement.
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Saturday, February 06, 2010
Citizen Encourages Support for RACAS
A letter from a citizen in the community.
When the idea of a provincial ride for accountability was brought up, there seemed to be good support. But the facts suggest that there is a good possibility that this will have to be canceled. John has put himself out there in every way that he knows to in order to bring hope and some momentum to the issue of responsible accountability. What seem to be remiss is the fact that nothing will change unless we are all prepared to contribute or help to fund this project.
With respect for John he does not have the tenacity or the stomach to insist that he need financial support because he feels that he does not want to impose, moreover John is very cautious that he does not come across as being demanding for funds, because he knows how hard it is to find those extra dollars. I also recognize this fact...but the reality is, that such projects will not advance with out your support.
John is not aware that I am posting this message and he may not be pleased...but that's too bad. I have a question for all. Please respond with, either you intend to support this ride or not, if you can help raise some funds.
With all due respect your financial support is appreciated.
Sincerely,
Donald J. Lester
Posted by afterfostercare at 11:14 PM
False Reports
February 6, 2010
Four Philadelphia social workers, Mickal Kamuvaka, founder of MultiEthnic
Behavioral Health Inc and employees Solomon Manamela, Julius Juma Murray and
Mariam Coulibaly are on trial for allowing Danieal Kelly to starve to death under their supervision.
Part-time co-worker Kim Cooke, not on trial, has testified in the case that,
on orders from Kamuvaka, she regularly falsified written reports.
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Ex-Phila. caseworker tells of false reports
By Nathan Gorenstein, Inquirer Staff Writer, Posted on Sat, Feb. 6, 2010
A former caseworker for MultiEthnic Behavioral Health Inc. testified yesterday that she regularly falsified reports about home visits that never happened, but said she was never explicitly told to do so.
Rather, supervisors said to "do what you have to do" to complete records required by the city, said Kim Cooke, a part-time employee at the agency that closed in 2006 after the death of Danieal Kelly, a 14-year-old who starved to death in her mother's home.
Four MultiEthnic employees, including two cofounders, are on trial in U.S. District Court, charged with falsifying records and destroying documents to hide that they failed to provide care for at-risk children, including Kelly, who had cerebral palsy.
Between 2000 and 2006, MultiEthnic was paid $3.7 million by Philadelphia to provide in-home social services for about 500 families.
Witnesses testified that the agency was effectively run by Mickal Kamuvaka, 60, who holds a doctorate in social work from the University of Pennsylvania.
When Department of Human Services officials scheduled an audit of agency files, Kamuvaka allegedly would call the staff members together and urge them to help each other fill out the required paperwork. "We are all in this together. . . . They can close us down," Kamuvaka said, according to Cooke.
Did you create false records? asked Assistant U.S. Attorney Bea Witzleben. "Yes," said Cooke.
On cross-examination, Kamuvaka's defense attorney, William Cannon, asked Cooke, "Did anyone say to create a document?"
"Not like that," replied Cooke. "To me, it felt like you had to do what you had to do, you had to fill in the file."
She said one defendant, Solomon Manamela, told her to do what was "necessary" when he learned that Cooke had not made all of the required home visits. Manamela, 52, is also a MultiEthnic cofounder.
"He never asked me specifically," she said, but said, "do what you need to do."
"I started out as a good social worker," said Cooke. "I wasn't so good a worker at the end. You just got tired and burned out. . . . Paperwork-wise, no, I don't think I was a good worker."
Cooke said she was working three jobs at the time - one with the Philadelphia School District, one with another social-services agency, and 15 hours a week at MultiEthnic. When she could not visit a home, she said, she typically would contact the family members by telephone and quiz them.
Yolanda Carr, a receptionist and typist, said she worked 24 hours straight typing up quarterly reports in preparation for DHS audits that occurred about once a year.
Another former employee, Blendenna Carter, was hired as a receptionist and later promoted to caseworker, but said she received "not much" of the supervision promised by Kamuvaka. In the office, Kamuvaka "would be grading papers" for a teaching job at a local college, Carter said.
Once, Kamuvaka had her forge another employee's signature, Carter said. "She told me to practice, because I didn't write like that," she said.
Cooke said some documents bearing her signature were signed by someone else. Looking at a report from May 2006, she said the signature was not her own. "No, I write more loopy," she said.
Contact staff writer Nathan Gorenstein at 215-854-2797 or ngorenstein@phillynews.com.
Don't think this is an isolated case. A Florida story shows that the
practice of falsifying records is endemic.
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Falsifications bring change in child abuse cases
By JOSH POLTILOVE, jpoltilove@tampatrib.com, Published: February 7, 2010
TAMPA - The resignation of a child protection investigator accused of falsifying documents has prompted changes in how the Hillsborough County Sheriff's Office handles child abuse cases.
An internal affairs probe found that investigator Heather Stokes falsified and/or fabricated 25 investigations, seven of them completely.
Stokes said she made up details and forged signatures on one investigation because she was "overwhelmed" with cases, according to an internal affairs report. The seven-year veteran resigned a day after being confronted by investigators.
Stokes was one of two child protection investigators to resign since April after being accused of falsifying documents.
No children or families were harmed as a result of any of the fabrications, according to documents obtained by The Tampa Tribune.
But every child protection investigator must now photograph the child at the child's home, and that information goes in a case file, sheriff's spokesman Larry McKinnon said Friday.
Supervisors also now are tasked with randomly reviewing cases and making 25 to 30 quality assurance checks each month; investigators aren't alerted beforehand to which families will be contacted.
"We're imperfect," McKinnon said. "We try to police our own. And when we find errors, we're going to obviously try to correct them."
He said there's no indication of a deeper problem with the department's child protection services.
The sheriff's office assumed responsibility for child abuse investigations less than 10 years ago after state Department of Children & Families employees were accused of shocking shortcomings, including falsifying records.
The sheriff's office has about 85 child protection investigators and handles roughly 1,100 cases a month.
McKinnon said investigators' caseloads should not be considered overwhelming, despite the recent misdeeds.
"There's no excuse for inappropriate behavior, regardless of whether you're overworked or not," he said.
Not just a local issue
Investigators falsifying records isn't just a local concern. In a two-year stretch, more than 70 child welfare workers in Florida were caught lying about their efforts to protect children, according to an Orlando Sentinel report in July.
When questioned, those workers generally complained they had too many cases.
The internal affairs probe of Stokes revealed that in one case she fabricated what she documented concerning visiting a family on four occasions. The mother told investigators she had never met Stokes, or signed a child safety plan or a consent form for medical treatment.
Stokes admitted she had never visited the mother, father, children or home, saying she was "overwhelmed with her cases," the report states. She also said she forged the signatures of the mother and father.
Field training officers were assigned to audit Stokes' 59 cases from December 2008 through April, and found seven to be completely fabricated.
The internal affairs report does not identify the families involved.
Taking her medicine
Stokes resigned in April.
The sheriff's office forwarded its findings to the state attorney's office.
Stokes avoided criminal charges by entering a pretrial diversion program. She performed more than 200 hours of community service, said her attorney, Fred Carrington.
"Heather took her medicine, lost her job, her career and moved on with her life," Carrington said.
Another child protection investigator, Jerimee Joyner, resigned in June after nearly three years with the sheriff's office.
A colleague who was straightening documents on Joyner's desk found a piece of paper bearing the signature of Joyner's supervisor that had been taped to a form, a report states.
Joyner told investigators he didn't realize the form could be considered a falsified document. He said his supervisor wasn't available to sign the form, so "what I did was I kind of just made the forms and put them in the file so I could close the file."
Reporter Josh Poltilove can be reached at (813) 259-7691.
Family Purgatory
February 6, 2010
The Kelley family in Nebraska lost three children to child protection in
2001. Though it quickly became apparent that there was nothing wrong with
the parents, the child protectors stalled for eight years before restoring
the family. There is nothing unusual about this case, it could be a model
for typical CPS intervention in a family. The only unusual part is that the
press is willing to report the story.
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Family divided 9 years takes on the system
By Martha Stoddard, Published: Friday, February 5, 2010 4:13 AM CST, World-Herald News Service
LINCOLN - Lincoln police found Anthony and Arva Kelley's preschooler and two toddlers home alone one February night.
The house was "disorderly," with standing water in the bathtub, fecal matter on one bedroom wall and soiled diapers on the floor, an affidavit stated.
When no adults had returned within an hour, police took the children into state custody.
State officials were to keep the three children for the next nine years, even though the Kelleys eventually had four more children, none of whom was ever removed from the home or judged to be at risk.
And even though repeated reports said the three oldest children would be safe with their parents.
And even after top child welfare officials apologized to the parents because the case had gone on so long.
Now all seven Kelleys are suing the state. The parents and children seek damages, alleging that they were denied their constitutional right to family integrity.
The suit, which is expected to be filed today in Douglas County District Court, also alleges violations of the family's due process and equal protection rights.
The right to family integrity claim, more common in other states, has been made in only two other Nebraska cases, said Amy Geren of Omaha, the Kelleys' attorney.
The claim's success depends on showing that the only thing standing in the way of family reunification was the state's ineptness, Geren said.
"We're talking about a decade of serious interference with their fundamental rights," said Amy Williams, a law clerk in Geren's firm. "That family will never recover."
The list of defendants includes the State of Nebraska, the Nebraska Department of Health and Human Services, several current and former HHS employees and the children's former guardian ad litem.
Geren and Williams said they took the case because they were concerned about what they said were systemic problems with Nebraska's child welfare system.
"We're both really tired of seeing how the department (HHS) screws up families," Geren said. "You can only turn your back on that so many times and say, 'It's just that case.'"
The suit seeks general and specific damages, but the Kelleys say money is not their objective.
"It's about doing the right thing, folks," Arva Kelley said in an interview Thursday. "You can't just play with people's lives."
The Kelley's story began Feb. 12, 2000, when Lincoln police responded to a "check welfare" call at the Kelley home, according to the complaint and to other court documents.
Police arrived at 11 p.m. An hour later, they removed the children, then ages 4, 2 and 1.
The children remained state wards until last April, when the Lancaster County Juvenile Court returned custody to the Kelleys.
During the intervening years, according to court documents:
The court ordered the parents to meet requirements to get the three children back, but the requirements kept changing.
The case goals shifted, from family reunification, to guardianship by the foster parents, to termination of parental rights, to guardianship by the four sets of grandparents.
The family dealt with 11 caseworkers and four HHS supervisors.
Anthony Kelley was repeatedly ordered to undergo psychological evaluations.
He also was required to get substance abuse treatment, even though no allegations of alcohol use or abuse were included in the initial allegations against him.
He ran into months of waiting lists and Medicaid funding problems when he tried to get into local outpatient treatment programs.
He went to a private therapist only to have the court say he was in the wrong type of treatment. He had to start over.
He finally completed an outpatient substance abuse program with Lutheran Family Services in July 2002. But when he was unable to pay his bill, the agency withheld his documentation and the court refused to credit him with completing the program.
He tried to go through inpatient treatment, but two programs said it was not warranted for his level of alcohol use.
In 2005, Anthony Kelley finally obtained the certificate of completion for the outpatient program. But that wasn't enough for HHS or the court, which ordered still more evaluations.
The children had regular visits with the parents, including overnight visits during some periods.
In 2001, the court, on a recommendation by HHS, stopped overnight visits for Anthony Kelley because the couple had not completed weekly "visitation logs." The visits later were resumed.
In 2002, HHS staff raised concerns about the couple not having driver's licenses or a car large enough for all their children.
Over the years, reports from various parties said the children would be safe with their parents.
The children's foster parent said in May 2000 that the children belonged with their parents.
In May 2005, an HHS case worker reported that the "issues that led to the initial removal ... have been alleviated."
In 2006 - six years after the children were removed - the Foster Care Review Board recommended reunification, saying:
"Case manager turnover, changes in visitation schedules and in the permanency objective being sought appear to have been more detrimental to the children than if reunification had occurred at some point in the past."
The review board also noted that while the parents had not been consistent in participating in services, "progress has been made and no significant safety concerns have ever been reported."
Nearly a year earlier, according to the lawsuit, then-HHS administrator Nancy Montanez told the Kelleys that their children should be at home but that the department could not move them for legal reasons.
At a meeting in July 2005, then-HHS administrators Todd Reckling and Chris Peterson met with the Kelleys and apologized that the case was taking so long.
But in May 2006, according to the lawsuit, HHS staff told the Kelleys that they would lose custody of all their children if they did not agree to the grandparents becoming guardians of the three oldest.
The Kelleys eventually hired a new attorney, and the children were placed back in the home in November 2008. By then, the preschooler was 13 years old and her two brothers - toddlers when removed - were 11 and 9.
State involvement ended last April.
James Holt of Omaha, a therapist who worked with the family, said in an interview that the Kelley parents and children suffered psychologically because of the separation. One of the children was hospitalized in 2006 for severe emotional distress, according to the lawsuit.
"The children definitely have feelings of abandonment," Holt said. "The system divided and conquered."
The Kelleys now live in South Carolina, near both sets of grandparents.
Anthony Kelley said the youngsters are doing well, for the most part.
"Basically, we're still trying to catch up for lost time, though some things you can't catch up on," he said. "We're just blessed to have them."
Vern Beck Speaks on CAS
February 5, 2010
Thursday Vern Beck addressed a group in Simcoe Ontario on the abuses
committed by Ontario's children's aid societies. This is the meeting announced earlier.
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Against the CAS system
Posted By DANIEL PEARCE, SIMCOE REFORMER, Posted February 5, 2010
Judges altering court transcripts. Kids being beaten in foster homes. Children's aid workers lying on the witness stand.
Coercion, collusion, trickery -- it's all part of what Ontarians have experienced while dealing with Children's Aid Societies, a family advocacy group said here Thursday night.
"It's a real mess," said Vern Beck, a volunteer with Canada Court Watch. "The system is corrupt and you have to know how to fight back."
More than 40 people, most of them with their own stories of dealing with CAS, listened as the Oakville resident gave a power point presentation warning of what to do when child protection workers come calling.
His organization advocates on behalf of families, and its research has revealed a litany of problems with CAS agencies, he said.
"Corruption, cover ups, and abuse of children and families is a reality."
Beck explained how parents are disadvantaged from the start. They are asked to come to court to get their kids back with as little as one day's notice. They're not prepared, can't afford a lawyer and usually lose the first case, he said.
Investigations by his group, said Beck, suggest CAS workers "fabricate evidence -- that's how they build cases," while other professionals, including doctors, say what the CAS wants them to.
"Transcripts are being altered by judges and court reporters," he added.
The way to protect yourself, Beck said, is to secretly tape record all conversations with child protection workers.
"If you expect to deal with them, it is one of the most important tools you can get to defend yourself . . . I cannot emphasize enough the importance of electronic recording equipment."
Tape-recorded conversations have caught CAS workers in lies, he said, and allowed people to get children back.
Child agencies are out to apprehend kids because they get money from the government for every child they have in care, Beck explained.
"A CAS is a private company," he said.
Beck also warned against voluntarily getting involved with them.
"Once they have your consent, they'll put you through endless hoops: drug tests, parenting courses. It'll drag on for one or two years, sometimes longer."
In interviews with the Reformer, the people who gathered in the basement of the Polish Hall said they came to get more information on how to help themselves.
One woman said every time a worker visits, she is made to strip down her baby son, hold him up and "spin him around" so they can see if he has any bruises.
Another woman said she was in foster care her entire childhood and now as a mother has lost her two children to the CAS.
"I'm trying to figure out how to get them back," she said.
A man in his 20s said the meeting was too late for him: his four-year-old son is now a Crown Ward and he'll never get him back.
"They never gave me a chance (to raise him) on my own," he said. "They made me sign all my rights away."
Daniel Pearce
519-426-3528 ext. 132 dpearce@bowesnet.com
Foster Parent of the Year
February 5, 2010
Foster dad Garry Prokopishin is the cream of the crop, a director for the
Calgary & District Foster Parents Association once honored as “Foster
Parent of the Year”. Yesterday he was charged with a long list of
sex-crimes against his wards. Details in the story suggest that for twenty
years he kept teenaged foster boys in his home to satisfy his unnatural
lust. Now if he is the best foster parent ...
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Foster dad facing sex charges
By NADIA MOHARIB, QMI Agency
The Calgary house believed to be the home of a man charged with sex-related charges against minors.
STUART DRYDEN/QMI AGENCY
CALGARY -- Police accuse a Calgary man once named “Foster Parent of the Year” with numerous sex-related offences spanning several years.
As the disturbing allegations were revealed Thursday, those who know the 51-year-old long-time foster parent say they cannot believe the man they know as a pillar of the community could be guilty of engaging in sex acts with underage boys.
Garry Prokopishin, a director for the Calgary & District Foster Parents Association, is charged with luring a child via a data device, three counts of obtaining or attempting to obtain sex from a person under age 18 and sexual contact with a youth by a person in authority.
Police allege he offered cash in exchange for sex acts.
They also said they found evidence of inappropriate cell phone camera images.
The charges stem from an investigation started by child abuse detectives last summer after an agency, who they would not disclose, contacted them with concerns about the foster home in Beddington where Prokopishin and his wife took in high-risk youth, police spokesman Kevin Brookwell said.
“These are kids who have had some trouble with the law and issues with substance abuse they were working through,” Brookwell said.
Prokopishin was the primary care-giver for his three alleged victims, police said.
Police tracked down 13 of 55 foster children, all boys ranging from age 14 to 17, who lived in the home over the past 20 years as part of the investigation.
They still want to track down the other individuals fostered in the home over the years.
“Our investigators have literally travelled from one end of the country to the other to try to talk to these kids,” Brookwell said.
“There is the potential there could be other victims.”
The alleged offences happened between January 2006 and April of 2008.
The operation was shut down immediately after the investigation began.
Children and Youth Services Minister Yvonne Fritz learned of the charges Thursday and ordered an investigation into the case, spokesman Trevor Coulombe said.
“She wants to know what occurred from A to Z and wants the report in her hands as soon as possible,” he said.
Joanne Atkinson, general manager at a Royal Canadian Legion branch where Prokopishin worked in the dining room for the past 20 years, said she is shocked by the charges.
“I would find it hard to believe,” she said.
“Garry is a nice man.”
While many fellow foster parents are also incredulous there could be any merit to the allegations, Brookwell said the investigation was exhaustive, involving interviews with youth fostered in the home, friends and associates to garner “corroborating evidence” before charges were laid.
Prokopishin is out on $800 bail.
— with files from Bill Kaufmann and Kevin Martin
Another newspaper, the Calgary Herald, supplied a photo of Garry
Prokopishin.
Addendum: Lawyer Robert P Lee, who has spent years suing on
behalf of abused Alberta foster children, comments on the arrest.
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Critic says foster care system chronically dysfunctional
By NADIA MOHARIB, Calgary Sun, Last Updated: 5th February 2010, 6:30pm
On the heels sex-related charges against a Calgary foster parent, other victims of abuse in such care say they’re outraged problems within the system are never addressed.
Edmonton lawyer Robert Lee represents about 300 people abused in foster care and for the past seven years has had a class action suit against the Alberta government seeking compensation for the victims.
Disturbed by sex-abuse charges this week laid against a longtime foster parent Garry Prokopishin for alleged incidents with three male youth in his care, Lee said he’s also disappointed to hear provincial authorities once again vowing to deal with chronic issues within the system.
He said the system struggles with “well-meaning welfare workers trying to do their best with kids,” but hampered by heavy workloads.
And while the top issue is abuse — with countless cases where children’s complaints are not believed — it is followed by neglect, where they simply fall through cracks in the system, said Lee.
“There have been numerous reviews of the child welfare system over the last thirty years and unfortunately, those recommendations are not implemented,” he said.
This week, Calgarian Prokopishin, was charged with offering teens in his care money in exchange for sexual acts.
Police said the 51-year-old and his wife cared for 55 male youth over 20 years at their Beddington home.
Investigators interviewed 13 out of 55 former foster children before charging Prokopishin with luring a child by cellphone, three counts of obtaining or attempting to obtain sex from a person under 18 years of age and sexual contact with a youth by a person in authority.
Newly-minted Children and Youth Services Minister Yvonne Fritz announced a review of that case on Thursday, the same day police went public with the charges.
Friday, she stressed the review is not of the “entire foster-care system,” but rather the Calgary case to see whether policies and procedures were followed.
“It is focusing on this particular situation,” she said.
“It is an internal review and if changes are necessary I will make those changes immediately.”
Fritz also defended the foster-care system.
“We have very strong foster-care and very stringent screening process,” she said.
There are about 4,600 youth in foster care in Alberta.
The bulk have been abused or neglected and end up in care when guardians are unable or unwilling to look after them.
nadia.moharib@sunmedia.ca
Participate in a Documentary
February 4, 2010
Mary Janiga is in touch with a film maker interested in doing a
documentary on children's aid societies of Ontario. You can help by sending
your story (single paragraph, no long tales) to Mary at her email address in
the expand block. For an example of how effective a documentary can be,
watch Innocence Destroyed by Bill Bowen, on YouTube:
[1]
[2]
[3]
or local copies:
[1]
[2]
[3] all flv.
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Wednesday, February 03, 2010
ACCOUNTABILITY and ACTION
I am presently speaking with colleagues and associates within this Children’s Aid Society cause(if that’s what you would call it) and have been approached to provide documented evidence and proof of alleged abuses within the CAS system of Ontario.
Can I provide case scenarios and victim’s names of their side of the story of CAS’ victimization within their lives, giving them their own voice that they need to give?
I have many stories of the victimization of the Children’s Aid Society against families.
This can only be done through the producing of a documentary television movie here in Ontario. This is being proposed and researched right now.
If you would like to be a part of this ground-breaking documentary and information movie please contact me via email at maryjaniga@hotmail.com with a one paragraph or less (Not a full page) about your “CAS Horror story” along with contact information such as phone number, address and your permission for me to pass on your information to the producer and director of this movie, it would be greatly appreciated.
I will be meeting with my associates in the coming weeks so it would be good to go with 50 – 100 stories instead of just a few of the many stories that must be told. This is our chance to get the accountability we so deserve in our fight against the Children’s Aid Society.
Thank you for your support!!
Voices of Innocent Families
February 4, 2010
Radio station CHCD-FM (CD 98.9) in Simcoe Ontario reports Brian Caldwell
is leading a group opposing children's aid.
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Norfolk County : Group Voicing Out Against Children's Aid Society
Posted by Adam Liefl,
A local group advocating for the creation of a governing body to look into operations at the Children's Aid Society is looking to help locals know their rights through an information session. "Voices of Innocent Families" member, Brian Caldwell, says until the government passes a Bill that would see outside policing of the activities at the Children's Aid Society, he will keep working to educate the public on their rights. Among those, Caldwell says, is the right to electronically record any court proceedings and meetings with CAS workers. Meanwhile Executive Director of the Children's Aid Society of Haldimand and Norfolk, Janice Robinson, said in a statement that the organization supports the right of individuals to register their complaints regarding services to them directly, through a formal complaint process or to the Child and Family Services Review Board. Robinson understands Court Watch to be an advocacy group who are currently working with parents to develop strategies for recording information when they are involved with CAS. Meanwhile, Caldwell says 9 our of 10 children in the care of the CAS should not be there, and claims the organization is abusing parents' rights and simply walking out the door with their kids. Robinson says the organization is always interested in providing services to their families and children within a respectful relationship. HNCAS was not invited to the meeting and have not been asked to participate. The "Voices of Innocent Families" information session is scheduled for tomorrow night at 7pm at the Delhi Polish Hall with a guest speaker coming from Canada Court Watch.
on 2010/2/3 12:32:49
Jilted
February 3, 2010
When lesbians Taylar Nuevelle and Janet Albert broke off their
relationship, Taylar got even by stalking Janet, going so far as to file a
false claim with child protective services saying that Janet abused her
young son.
For ordinary people, CPS would spend months or years harassing Janet.
But this time it was different. Janet was a Washington DC judge, and Taylar
has been convicted of stalking.
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Taylar Nuevelle was convicted on Tuesday, February 2, 2010 of stalking Judge Janet Albert.
Woman Found Guilty of Stalking DC Judge
Updated: Tuesday, 02 Feb 2010, 6:43 PM EST, Published : Tuesday, 02 Feb 2010, 6:41 PM EST, By PAUL WAGNER/myfoxdc
A D.C. woman has been convicted of stalking a magistrate judge following a week long trial in D.C. Superior Court. Guilty verdicts were returned Tuesday against Taylar Nuevelle, who had also been charged with burglary and unlawful entry.
The trouble began in 2008 when the judge ended a romantic relationship with the defendant.
What followed, prosecutors say, was a series of actions designed to destroy the judge’s life.
The testimony showed Taylar Nuevelle was furious with Judge Janet Albert for ending their year long relationship.
So much so investigators say she waged a campaign to torment and frighten the judge, bombarding her with emails, text messages and phone calls. She even filed lawsuits and a claim of judicial misconduct.
After the verdicts were read, Taylar Nuevelle was taken into custody and ordered held without bond until she is sentenced in April. She faces up to 15 years in prison.
The 40-year-old consultant to non-profits was convicted despite taking the stand in her own defense. Claiming the emails, texts and phone calls were all about getting her property back-- clothes and other items she had left at the judge’s house.
But the prosecutor said it was much more sinister than that. Nuevelle, the prosecutor said, waged a campaign of harassment, going as far as to call Child Protective Services and make two unfounded claims against Janet Albert. The judge has a young son.
Taylar Nuevelle was found unconscious in the attic of the judge’s Northwest D.C. home two days after their breakup.
Oshawa Rally
February 3, 2010
A rally in support of bill 93, providing for provincial ombudsman oversight
of children's aid, has been scheduled for Friday afternoon March 19 in Oshawa Ontario.
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Rally at Memorial Park to Support Bill 93 (Oversight of CAS)
| Type: | Causes - Rally
| | Network: | Global
| | Date: | Friday, March 19, 2010
| | Time: | 2:00pm - 5:00pm
| | Location: | Memorial Park - Simcoe and John Streets (Oshawa)
|
Description
This rally is to raise awareness and promote support of Bill 93 to amend the Ombudsman Act to include independent oversight of the Children's Aid Society.
Please come and show your support!!
Matthew Reid Inquest
February 2, 2010
Testimony has started in the inquest into the death of Matthew Reid,
smothered to death by a fourteen-year-old foster girl in 2005. It may be
more of a cover-up than public disclosure, since publication of names has
been banned. The first day's testimony showed that Reid had been molested
earlier by a different foster girl.
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Foster mom relives tragedy
SOCIAL SERVICES: Inquest opens into smothering death of boy in foster home
Posted By TIFFANY MAYER, STANDARD STAFF, Posted February 2 2010
Friend.
The three-year-old boy signed the word across the dinner table to the daughter of his Welland foster mom.
He did it to show he understood the young woman's message to him -- also said with sign language to quiet the talkative tot -- that the 14-year-old girl joining them at the table, who arrived that mid-December day in 2005 to stay with them, was a friend.
The next morning, foster mom Margaret Hamilton found the gregarious boy lying on his bedroom floor, cold and grey.
He had been smothered by his friend, a Crown ward in the care of Family and Children's Services Niagara, who confessed her crime in a note left near the boy's body and calmly brushed her freshly washed hair in her bedroom as Hamilton and her daughter frantically called for help.
The girl, who cannot be identified, was given a seven-year sentence in November 2007 for second-degree murder.
On Monday, during the first day of a coroner's inquest that will examine the events surrounding the tragedy, Hamilton relived the events leading to the Dec. 15, 2005 death of the boy, who was in the care of the Haldimand-Norfolk Children's Aid Society.
Due to a publication ban, the boy can't be named.
The inquest, presided over by Dr. James Edwards, is being held at the Quality Hotel Parkway Convention Centre on Ontario Street. It is expected to take three weeks.
A five-person jury will hear from about 30 witnesses, including police, a forensic pathologist, social workers, educators who worked with the girl, foster families and, possibly, the perpetrator herself.
At the end of the proceedings, the jury can choose to make recommendations that can be used to prevent similar deaths.
The circumstances surrounding the death "cry out for some kind of examination," coroner counsel Eric Siebenmorgen said.
As she answered Siebenmorgen's questions, Hamilton talked about the notes she took when she got the call that FACS Niagara would like to make use of a bed in her Welland home. It was a bed that she decided to reserve for the agency after moving to Niagara from neighbouring Haldimand County a year earlier.
She had been a foster parent with Haldimand-Norfolk CAS for more than four years when the 14-year-old girl, who had recently been raped and was arrested for stealing a van, would be coming to stay with her.
The list of issues plaguing the teen was long and troublesome to anyone unfamiliar with caring for foster children, Siebenmorgen noted.
But fetal alcohol syndrome, attention deficit hyperactivity disorder, disruptive, hostile and threatening behaviour -- behaviour that escalated before her period and required antidepressant and anti-anxiety medication to quell -- and functioning at the level of a child half the girl's age didn't faze Hamilton.
"I fostered a lot of teenage girls, a lot of runners, and almost always seemed to have good rapport with them," she said.
What she did question, though, was how the girl was with young children, Hamilton told the inquest.
The boy, who had recently been returned to Hamilton's home after time with his biological mother, had been roughed up by an eight-yearold girl who had stayed briefly with Hamilton a couple weeks earlier.
"I wanted him to get settled and feel comfortable," Hamilton said. "I didn't want anything upsetting him .... The response to that was, 'No, she likes little kids.' "
But looking back, as Siebenmorgen asked her to do, Hamilton said she felt the half-hour that the girl's caseworker spent at her home when dropping off the teen seemed short and rushed.
That evening, as dinner was eaten, TV was watched and everyone called it a night, nothing seemed out of the ordinary, until she went to rouse the boy the next morning and get him ready for a pre-school Christmas party.
In hindsight, Hamilton said she would have liked to have seen some of the notes in the girl's file with FACS, written between 2000 and 2003, before agreeing to accept her. The teen was the first foster child from FACS Niagara that Hamilton welcomed into her home.
Two incidents in particular concerned Hamilton: a report of the girl allegedly putting another child's head through a window and another accusation of her pushing a child down stairs.
"I believe if I had those notes, I wouldn't have chosen to have someone with that background in the home, just because there was a small child in my home," Hamilton said.
The inquest continues Tuesday with cross-examination by counsel for the boy's biological family.
Addendum: A report on Tuesday's testimony.
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Inquest into child death continues
Posted By KARENA WALTER, QMI AGENCY, Updated February 3, 2010
The foster mother who raised a three-year-old boy at the centre of a coroner's inquest recalled an easy-going, likeable child Tuesday who enjoyed cuddling.
"He liked almost every-body. He was easy to get along with," said Margaret Hamilton. "He liked cars. He liked Dora (the Explorer)."
She recalled one humorous moment when the boy, whose name is under a publication ban, was moving on the floor in an attempt at dancing.
"I said to my daughter, what is he doing? She said 'He's break-dancing.' He liked to dance."
The boy's body was found on Dec. 15, 2005 on his bedroom floor in Hamilton's house. He had been smothered by a 14-year-old girl who arrived in the foster home less than 24 hours before.
The girl, whose identity is protected by a publication ban, was handed a seven-year sentence in November 2007 for second-degree murder.
The coroner's inquest began Monday at Quality Hotel Parkway Convention Centre on Ontario Street and is expected to last three weeks.
Ten parties have standing in the inquest, including Family and Children's Services Niagara, under whose care the girl was, and Haldimand and Norfolk Children's Aid Society, which was responsible for the boy.
The five-member jury heard Tuesday that Hamilton was an experienced foster parent under Haldimand-Norfolk CAS, fostering 46 children before moving to Welland.
Sheila Newbatt, a resources worker form the Haldimand- Norfolk CAS testified Hamilton decided to stay with the agency and they discussed sharing her home with the Niagara agency.
They decided to let Niagara FACS use a bed in Hamilton's home for a child in her area.
Newbatt said on Dec. 9, a request came from Niagara FACS for a bed at Hamilton's home for a girl who was a Crown ward, with fetal alcohol syndrome and was developmentally challenged.
Newbatt said she told Niagara FACS a bed was available but there was a toddler in the home.
Newbatt said Hamilton called her on the morning of Dec. 14 to say the child may be coming. Newbatt said Hamilton told her she asked the person who called her and she was told the only time the girl was rough was with schoolchildren who would bug her.
Later that morning Newbatt told her supervisor the girl was in jail for stealing a car so they weren't sure if she'd be out that day. She later got a call from Hamilton saying the child was on her way, and Newbatt notified other people in her department that one of Hamilton's beds had been filled.
The next morning, she received a call from another foster parent at 8:30 a.m. telling her Hamilton sounded like she was in distress.
"Before I could call Margaret I was called into the supervisor's office to be told (the boy) had died," she said.
The inquest continues Wednesday.
Wednesday's report gets back to calling the dead boy Matthew Reid.
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Another foster home was an option for child killer
Posted February 3, 2010
The former foster mother of a 14-year-old girl was willing to take the teen back two days before she killed a boy in another home, an inquest jury heard Wednesday.
Resources worker Vesna Stec of Family and Children's Services Niagara said she called foster mom Violet McArthur to see if it was an option to return the girl to her Niagara Falls home. McArthur didn't hesitate.
"(The girl) had been in the home for two years and she absolutely, without question, would have taken her back," Stec told a coroner's inquest.
But despite the offer, the girl was placed in a Welland foster home, where, in less than 24 hours, she suffocated three-year-old Matthew Reid.
Matthew, who can be identified with permission from his family, was found smothered on the floor of his bedroom on Dec. 15, 2005.
His death is the subject of the inquest that began this week in St. Catharines at the Quality Hotel Parkway Convention Centre.
The teen girl, whose identity is protected by the Youth Criminal Justice Act, was found guilty of second-degree murder and given a seven-year sentence in 2007.
Stec worked in the placement department of FACS Niagara and picked up the girl's file on Dec. 12, 2005. She was advised by a co-worker the week before that FACS Niagara could speak directly to Margaret Hamilton, a highly recommended foster mother with the Haldimand-Norfolk Children's Aid Society who had moved to Welland.
Stec spoke with Hamilton and was confident Hamilton would take care of the girl.
But because Stec wasn't clear if the girl was being placed in a new foster home at the request of her most recent foster parent, she called Violet McArthur, learning she was willing to take her back.
Stec said McArthur told her the girl's negative behaviour was confined to 5% of the time. The teen participated in volunteer work at a soup kitchen, with scouts and in dance classes. The next day, Stec said the girl's care worker called her and said it wasn't an option for the teen to return to McArthur's home.
She said the worker said the girl was threatening to run away if she returned to the house.
Stec said she indicated to the worker that McArthur had already gone to some extreme measures to deal with that by sleeping on the couch, offering to sleep on the floor and having family members search for the girl. "She was very committed," Stec said.
The worker said they needed something more secure, Stec said.
"We have kids that run all the time," Stec said during questioning. "As much as we put things in place and try to accommodate their issues, they still run."
She said in cross-examination that the decision on placing the girl ultimately came from the worker and supervisor.
Dr, Kathryn Hunter, a child psychiatrist who worked with the girl from age 11 to 18, was asked if the girl wanted to go back to McArthur's house.
"She always had a very strong connection with Violet," Hunter said. "(The girl) would be angry at different people at different times depending on the situation."
Hunter made a note in September 2003 that the girl was hit by a car when running away and that she agreed that running could have consequences.
The inquest will continue Thursday.
kwalter@stcatharinesstandard.ca
Violet McArthur, the foster mother of Matthew's killer up until a week before his death
testified about her ward.
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First outbursts, then remorse
Posted By Karena Walter, Posted February 4, 2010
The words of self-hate were like a mantra.
The teenage girl would chant them over and over in a crumpled heap, sobbing on the floor. She was worthless. She was useless. She needed to be flushed away.
"I used to sit on the floor and cry with her," Violet McArthur, the 14-year-old girl's former foster mother, said at a coroner's inquest Thursday.
The mantra of self-abuse would inevitably follow an outburst in which the girl threw her own items around the room. But those tantrums seemed to happen less frequently over time, McArthur said.
McArthur gave the jury at the inquest into the death of three-year-old Matthew Reid an intimate look at the foster girl who came to call her mommy.
The girl, who cannot be identified, was given a seven-year sentence in 2007 for the second-degree murder of Matthew at a Welland foster home.
The boy was found on his bedroom floor on Dec. 15, 2005, smothered with his pillow.
The inquest jury heard Thursday that the girl lived with McArthur for almost two years, up until the week before the death, when she was arrested for stealing McArthur's van.
McArthur believed and desired that the girl would be returned to her house after being released from jail, but instead she was placed in the Welland foster home of Matthew on Dec. 14, 2005.
McArthur testified when the girl first arrived at her door, she was frightened and shy, dressed inappropriately for the cold weather. That first night, the family dog curled up next to her in bed. During the first few months, she seemed to really enjoy school, and McArthur said getting her to go was never a problem. She enjoyed learning.
The girl got along with McArthur's 10 grandchildren, one of whom was only two years old and lived next door. She also played with other teenaged children in the foster home and looked after her pet cockatiel.
The angry outbursts, in which the girl threw objects, would last 20 minutes to an hour, McArthur said.
"It was easiest just to let it run its course," she said. "If you tried to interfere, it seemed to go on longer."
A child psychiatrist put the girl on medication, and McArthur said over time the outbursts seem to lessen. By fall of 2004, after a summer of camp, boating and climbing trees, McArthur said the girl didn't repeat the mantra of blame anymore. "It eventually died away."
But by December 2004, as Christmas approached, the girl became anxious. McArthur said the girl's stepfather died around that time. As well, she was concerned about not seeing her brother, was upset a friend in the foster home left and worried about not having presents.
The girl was assigned a child youth worker to look into the outbursts and to give her some one-on-one time.
The worker noted McArthur said the girl had difficulty controlling her anger and the outbursts increased. It got to a point where McArthur couldn't leave the girl alone.
In January 2005, McArthur was shocked when she was presented with a report by a psychometrist that said the girl functioned at the level of a six- or seven-year-old and would never progress beyond that. McArthur thought the girl was doing well and moving towards independence.
The episodes continued, including breaking branches off a neighbour's tree, slamming a radio on a street and dumping a bowl of cereal on a three-year-old's head because he repeatedly kicked her. Police were called another time to settle the girl down. McArthur said the girl was always very remorseful after she'd done those things and was very hard on herself.
The girl asked if she could stay at the home forever and if she could call McArthur Mommy.
The plan for the fall was for the teen to go to a special class at a different high school, something McArthur said the girl was excited about. "I think (she) struggled desperately, she wanted to be like normal teenagers and probably didn't understand she didn't have the capacity," McArthur said.
"She just wanted to be normal."
But by October 2005, the girl was suspended from school twice, once for swearing at an administrator after being accused of hitting a girl with a book, another time for running away. She was asked not to return.
McArthur said her behaviour changed after that and she started running away again.
In early December, she met a man who sexually assaulted her. The next night, she snuck McArthur's keys out of her purse, climbed out a window and took off in the van.
The inquest continues Monday.
kwalter@stcatharinesstandard.ca
Woman Chases Off Social Worker
February 1, 2010
Two Kentucky social workers were stalking when Brigette Howard, who was
not their target, chased them away at gunpoint.
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Recent incident stresses need for social worker safety
Posted January 27, 2010, By Becky Graham, Posted by Sarah Harlan
HENDERSON CO., KY (WFIE) - It was a scary moment for some social workers in Henderson.
Sheriff's deputies said a woman with a gun chased them.
The woman, 50-year-old Brigette Howard, has been arrested, but the incident does bring up the issue of social worker safety.
In 2006, Boni Frederick proved social work was a deadly profession.
The Union County woman was brutally murdered while on duty.
Months later, Kentucky passed the Boni Frederick Memorial Bill, which promised to improve the safety of her peers, but one recent incident has Henderson officers wondering if social workers are in fact any safer.
Henderson social workers know the protocol. If they feel uneasy about a house call, immediately call for back up.
"Their job is absolutely dangerous and they have to take every precaution they can take because they're not in the position we're in," Col. David Crafton with the Henderson County Sheriff's Office said. "They're not armed."
Tuesday, two Henderson social workers did just that.
Deputies said Ashlee Alexander and Rhonda Hagan pulled over in front of a house on Kentucky 416 to wait for law enforcement to assist them on a visit, but before they got there, the unexpected happened.
"They were near a house that belonged to Ms. Brigette Howard," Crafton said. "Ms. Howard came out of the house and came toward the social workers with a rifle. The social workers then drove away."
Col. Crafton said Howard kept chasing the car on foot with the gun.
When the driver stopped the car, the women said they showed Howard their social services I.D.s and told her they weren't coming to see her, but they said she wouldn't put away the gun.
"They had to put it in drive and drive rapidly past her," Crafton said. "She was blocking the way."
Howard was arrested, but a Henderson Police officer wants to know where the additional protection promised to these men and women by Boni's Bill is.
"I think they are fine if they are expecting danger, but it's when they get to these locations and there is something they're not anticipating," Sgt. John Nevels with the Henderson Police Department said.
The complaint is being echoed statewide.
Kentucky lawmaker Tom Burch, who introduced Boni's Bill, said only $2 million of the $6 million allocated for extra protection for social workers materialized, and that money was spent poorly.
Burch said he wants to introduce a new Boni's Bill.
"I've often thought they outta have some sort of panic button or alarm or something like that just in case they get in a situation like Ms. Frederick was," Nevels said.
14 News contacted the Kentucky Cabinet for Health and Family Services and they said great changes come from Boni's Bill, including more training for their employees.
Lawsuit Against Phony Doctor Carter
February 1, 2010
Greg Carter, a Whitby psychologist, has been
arrested for fraud, obstructing justice and perjury. If you have been
affected by this man please call David Bulmer at 905-263-4127. David has a
lawyer in Toronto who is putting together a class action suit. David has
been gathering evidence for the last eleven months and went to the Ontario
College of Psychologists and the Durham Regional Police in November 2009
with his information. The Police investigated for two months verifying his
information before charging Mr Carter. They are requesting any other
victims of this man's testimony in custody cases contact them.
Burned at the Stake
January 31, 2010
Child Protective Services in Michigan placed Calista for adoption with
Marsha and Anthony Springer. This week CPS investigator Patricia Skelding
testified that before Calista's adoption was complete, CPS knew about the
Springers' practice of chaining the girl to a bed. CPS ignored the abuse
and finalized the adoption. Four years later sixteen-year-old Calista
Springer was incinerated in a fire while chained to her bed.
Though there is no chance of real accountability, CPS is clearly
responsible for the death of this child.
A news article is enclosed below. The corroborating testimony of Marilyn
Lafler is on YouTube or our local copy (flv).
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Day Three in Springer murder Trial: CPS worker testifies the county knew Calista was chained in '04
Thu January 28, 2010
KALAMAZOO--Shocking testimony revealed today in the murder trial of Calista Springer.
According to a former Child Protective Services investigator of 18 years, Patricia Skelding, St. Joseph County was aware that Calista was being chained to her bed before they closed the case back in 2004.
During the investigation into those allegations of abuse in the Springer home Calista had reported that she was being restrained to her bed by a chain.
“I believed and trusted the people in my office and community mental health that they knew what they were doing when they diagnosed her and that the overall end was that she needed to be protected, she needed to be safe, and she needed to be restrained and that the parents couldn’t be up 24 hours a day supervising her,” said Skelding.
“And so it was accepted that everyone knew that and so during my investigation when my supervisor handed me the referral she didn’t say anything about the part of Calista being chained to her bed, as if we’d already known that.”
Skelding became involved in the case after allegations surfaced that Calista reported she was not only restrained to her bed but was also being under fed, unable to use the restroom at night, forced to clean her mess if she did soil the mattress and even claimed her mother had once awaken her after she fell asleep while reading by pulling her hair with such force that it left a bald spot.
These claims were later found to be unsubstantiated and the case was closed.
The trial continued into the afternoon, hearing testimony from Calista’s teachers and educational professionals indicating that she was performing at grade level, despite being two years older than most of the students in her grade.
Several witnesses portrayed Calista as a quiet child, somewhat introverted, but eager to please and be praised. There was testimony that although there were some behavioral issues, mostly regarding petty theft or touching other student’s items, nothing was highly abnormal for a child her age at that time.
In regards to the stealing, Calista’s 5th grade English and social studies teacher, Stacy Sheehan, indicated that she was both open and honest about her wrongdoings when confronted and was “very willing to give items back.”
The prosecution seemed to end the day on a high note with the introduction of a 6th grade writing assignment of Calista’s from 2005. Peggy Roach, a 6th grade teacher at Centerville Elementary, testified that as part of the first day of class she gives her students five minutes to write a journal entry about themselves, telling the students that it would only be seen by her.
Calista wrote the following to Roach:
“I have a problem with stealing and lying. My birthday is May 22. I live in the Vincent house across the courthouse and diagonal to the Baptist church. I have a relative that was in your homeroom. I have two sisters, Courtney and Heather, two cats and a dog.”
To which, Roach responded, “who’s your relative who’s in my homeroom. Thank you for being honest about stealing and telling lies. That is the first step to working on your problem. If you need to talk to someone let me know.”
Calista responded, “…I have problems with my family and I miss my old school. I’m tired of my family and I feel like doing these things; runaway, kill myself and hide, throw all the boys out of the school except TJ and Josh. I cannot stand my family at all. I need some time alone from my family. I need to talk to someone. I want to get out of this prison at home. I want to be free instead of being in a prison. I want to be free as possible like any other teenager.”
It was this response which may have been very telling of her state of mind back in 2005.
Testimony will continue tomorrow as Calista’s closest friends are expected to take the stand.
Please Don't Feed the CAS
January 30, 2010
Simcoe County CAS, based in Barrie, has gone hat-in-hand begging for a
$10,000 loan from the town of Collingwood to get through its financial difficulties. Attila Vinczer
[1]
[2]
has written a letter to Collingwood
(pdf) urging them to refuse the loan. Another document contains the
referenced working paper by the Family
Justice Review Committee (pdf). Even better than refusing the loan
would be for Collingwood to insist on improvements within Children's Aid as
a condition for financial support.
Addendum: According to Attila Vinczer, on February
1 Collingwood voted against funding CAS. CFSA Submissions
January 30, 2010
The Ministry of Children and Youth Services will conduct a
five-year-review of the Child and Family Services Act as required by law.
In December the Ministry solicited
comments to be delivered by the end of January. Here are two submitted
comments, one by Canada Court Watch
(pdf), the other by Robert T McQuaid in the expand block.
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January 29, 2010
Laurl Broten
Minister of Children and Youth Services
Child and Family Services Act Review
email: CFSAreview@Ontario.ca
Subject: Five year review of the child and family services act
Honorable Minister:
The Child and Family Services Act (section 224) provides for a periodic
review of its operation. By web posting you have invited email comments.
Last February Irwin Elman, Ontario's Provincial Advocate for Children
and Youth, stated that 90 children had died in one year in the care of
Ontario's Children's Aid Societies. In a rebuttal a few days later the
Ontario Association of Children's Aid Societies pointed out errors in Mr
Elman's assessment, stating that children's aid society involvement in
some of the children occurred only after their deaths, so that only 53
died in the care of children's aid. Depending on which set of numbers you
use, the death rate in foster care is seventeen or only ten higher than
the death rate in the general population. Notwithstanding this
unconscionable level of abuse, most children in long-term foster care
reach the age of majority still alive, but lesser forms of abuse,
impossible to measure on their own but reasonably scaled up at the same
rate as deaths) lead to insurmountable problems once the children age out
of the system. An article by Lori Culbert in the Vancouver Sun for June
27, 2008 said that for foster children aging out of care jail was more
likely than high school graduation. There are many other negative
outcomes such as homelessness, prostitution, mental hospitals and untimely
death.
The child protection system qualifies as the greatest danger to the
welfare of Canadian children. It is driven by the perverse incentives of
bureaucracy. When a children's aid society provides assistance to
children in their parents' home, their funding is subject to cuts in
future years by the legislature. But when crown wardship severs the bond
between child and parents, their future welfare depends on the generosity
of the legislature in providing funds. Elected officers, such as you, are
never stingy with this kind of funding, feeling that the welfare of foster
children will be enhanced by generosity with appropriated funds. The
funding is large enough to serve as an incentive to children's aid
societies to take yet more children.
The only real way to stop this cycle is to end the use of appropriated
funds for the care of children, turning the job of feeding orphans back to
private charities, as it was before the development of provincial welfare
systems. Since you are unlikely to do that, here are some lesser reforms
that may improve the lives of children.
- Open the process.
The process should be open to public scrutiny at all stages. An
open-records rule for Children's Aid Societies might become
ineffective through foot-dragging, but applied to the courts it could
work.
Most courts dealing with criminal and civil matters are now open to
public scrutiny, and family courts should be as well. Then anyone
could sit in a family courtroom and more important, he could examine
the document file where most of the legal action takes place, viewing
the same record presented to the judge. For children as well as
adults, public trial is an ordeal, but secret trial is worse.
Such a reform could provide a remedy for families falsely accused,
through reference to the court record exonerating them. Rogue
Children's Aid Societies would come to public attention quickly, and
scholars could sample the files to measure the level of effectiveness
of child protection.
- Allow the provincial ombudsman to review children's aid.
The ombudsman is shut out of children's aid by law. Expanding his
mandate could allow many of the abuses to come to public view in a
form that would allow for early legislative correction.
- Limitation or elimination of immunity for caseworkers
Currently, child-protection workers are immune from all legal
actions unless they can be shown to act in bad faith, placing them
beyond the reach of the law even for rather blatant wrongdoing. In
private meetings between caseworkers and parents, they regularly bully
parents with their power. One caseworker told a father: "Fathers
have no rights"; another was only slightly exaggerating when she
boasted: "We have as much power as God". Giving the caseworker, not
the taxpayer, civil responsibility for wrongdoing would effectively
eliminate most abuse by caseworkers.
- Never suggest divorce
One activity that needs to be stopped is forcing a divorce on a
couple against the will of both, a shotgun divorce. In tiny Dufferin
county, a dozen instances were reported in just three years, a rate
that suggests thousands of such cases for the province as a whole.
- Do not seize children until after hearing both sides
The law now in most places requires judicial authorization before
child removal, but excepts children in immediate danger. In practice,
children are always picked up first on pretense of emergency, and
court hearings are after-the-fact. Owing to caseworker immunity, they
cannot suffer from any misrepresentation.
The law could be changed to eliminate the exception, delaying child
abduction until a judge has signed a warrant on probable cause. This
may have limited effectiveness, since societies with millions of
dollars in revenue may get friendly judges to rubber-stamp their
requests. A more meaningful reform is to require an adverse hearing
in which the parents can present evidence in opposition before the
issuance of an apprehension order. This would at least protect
innocent families with means to hire competent counsel.
- Trial by jury before crown-wardship
Juries, not judges, should have the final word on removing parents
from a child's life and turning them into crown wards. This
protection exists now for liberty and money, things normal parents
value less than their children.
- Require that the child be in the courtroom during proceedings about him.
This procedure is followed now in criminal matters, though not in
the more consequential custody cases. There have been many instances
in which a child was advised he had a legal right to be in the
courtroom, but was still excluded. Requiring the child's presence
would prevent consideration of the case of any child currently out of
the jurisdiction of the court, even when the court had jurisdiction in
the past. And as long as the child is old enough to understand, he
could witness the proceedings in his own case.
- Fully investigate all child deaths, including those in care
The large number of deaths in children's aid care has little impact
because the public only sees (disputed) numbers. Publishing the names
and circumstances in each death could lead to reforms cutting the
death rate. I note that a dead child cannot suffer emotional harm
from publication of his case details.
- Refusing psychotropics is not neglect
Failure to follow a doctor's orders is now treated as neglect, so
when a medical professional prescribes psychotropic drugs for a child,
parents cannot refuse to administer them. In a few American states,
parents now are granted authority to refuse such drugs, without that
being treated as a reason for child protection intervention. Ontario
should give parents the same authority.
- People should be able to see their own records at all levels
The records open to an adult should also include the records made
of his life while in foster care. Now the disclosure of records is
discretionary with CAS, allowing them to conceal wrongdoing by social
workers and foster parents.
- Outlaw anonymous reports, and fully disclose reports to family
Anonymous reports of child abuse should be disregarded. Right now,
an anonymous report is an easy way to sic CAS on a personal enemy.
And parents kept in the dark may suspect the wrong accuser. In June
2003 the press reported that mother Marguerite Dias lost her children
to Toronto Children's Aid. She (falsely) suspected a neighbor,
Madeline Monast, attacking her with a machete and cutting off both
hands. Had the identity of the accuser been disclosed to the mother,
the neighbor might have kept her hands.
- Eliminate mandated reporting
Because of mandated reports by child care professionals (doctors,
teachers, day-care operators), parents are fearful of taking an
injured child to a professional. Every child care professional knows
of cases in which persons have been prosecuted for non-reporting,
inducing them to over-report, causing extra work for CAS, and more
fears for parents. Recent trends are toward more mandatory reporting
in a system that needs less compulsion and more voluntary action.
Love does not come out of the barrel of a gun.
- Notify parents when children are removed
Several parents have reported not learning of an apprehension until
their children failed to return from school, when they began frantic
inquiries. Parents deserve to be notified immediately when their
children are taken into custody.
- Provide meaningful accounting of the distribution of public funds
Currently, the published accounts do not answer the most basic
questions about CAS operation: How much is spent on foster care? How
much on group homes? How many child-days of care are provided? How
many child-protection cases were opened? There are lots of numbers
printed in the financial statements, but they do not answer the real
questions.
- Allow other family (grandparents) to get kids when parents are unfit
The law formally favors this now, but it is infrequent.
- Do not separate parents from children when placing with family members
When the child of a teenaged single mother gets placed with his
grandmother, the mother should continue to see the baby.
Should you need clarification or additional information, you are
welcome to call or write.
Yours truly,
Robert T McQuaid
558 McMartin Road
Mattawa Ontario P0H 1V0
phone: 705-744-6274
email: rtmq@fixcas.com
Addendum: Recommendations (pdf) from the Foster Care Council of Canada
Addendum: A message sent in English gets a
bilingual thank you/merci. Lets you know they are paying attention.
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| From: | "@MCYS-G-CFSAREVIEW" <CFSAreview@ontario.ca>
| | To: | <rtmq@fixcas.com>
| | Subject: | RE: Five year review of the child and family services act
| | Date sent: | Fri, 5 Feb 2010 15:35:34 -0500
|
Thank you for your submission / Merci pour votre soumission
Alamo Families Terminated
January 30, 2010
Six families all members of the Alamo Ministries had their parental
rights terminated yesterday in Arkansas. The judge found that that they had
defied his earlier order to leave church property and secure employment
elsewhere. CPSWatch founder Cheryl Barnes was ejected from the courtroom.
For an opinion piece, refer to Daniel Weaver.
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Parental rights of six Alamo church members terminated
By Andrew Davis
A judge on Thursday terminated the parental rights of six members of the Tony Alamo Christian Ministries, clearing the way for the members’ children to be put up for adoption.
The rulings by Miller County Circuit Judge Joe Griffin followed the recommendation of the Arkansas Department of Human Services, which said the parents had failed to comply with orders that they move off of church property and find jobs outside the ministry.
The rulings, which came after three days of testimony in Miller County Circuit Court in Texarkana, affected the parents of 13 children from four families.
After the hearings ended, shortly after 9 p.m. Friday, the parents hurried away from the courtroom, declining to comment as they left. One mother, Mirriam Krantz, sobbed uncontrollably, clutching her husband’s arm as he led her to a sport-utility vehicle.
Cheryl Barnes, litigation specialist for the parent advocacy group CPS Watch Legal Team, called the rulings unnecessarily harsh. She noted that Tony Alamo, the ministry’s leader, is expected to spend the rest of his life in prison. She said the parents will appeal the termination of their parental rights.
“The chances of these kids being exposed to Tony Alamo are slim to none now, and it’s just a tragedy that these families have been destroyed,” Barnes said.
A sheriff’s deputy said Griffin would have no comment on his ruling.
The proceedings were closed to the public, and Griffin has issued a gag order barring parents, attorneys and others from speaking with reporters about the case.
Julie Munsell, a spokesman for the Arkansas Department of Human Services, said children whose parents’ legal rights over them are terminated would typically not put up for adoption until the appeals are resolved. She said she couldn’t comment on the ministry children’s cases because of the gag order and laws requiring child welfare proceedings to be kept confidential.
The children were taken into custody in Fouke and Texarkana in September and November 2008 amid an investigation into allegations of physical and sexual abuse.
Tony Alamo, the ministry’s 75-year-old leader, was sentenced to 175 years in prison in November after being convicted of taking five underage girls across state lines for sex.
Last year, judges in Miller County ruled that the parents could be eventually reunited with their children, but only if the parents moved off of church property and found jobs outside the ministry. While some parents have complied with the orders and have been reunited with their children, others say the orders infringe on their religious freedoms.
In November 2009, the Arkansas Court of Appeals upheld the removal of five of the children, all girls. However, the court did not rule on the parents’ constitutional argument because the court said the parents did not raise the issue at the trial level.
Several other appeals are pending, and the ministry has also challenged the removals in a lawsuit in federal court. The Human Services Department has asked for the lawsuit to be dismissed.
Thank you for coming to the Web site of the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette. We're working to keep you informed with the latest breaking news.
This article was published January 29, 2010 at 11:01 p.m.
Damage Control
January 30, 2010
Wanda Secord, from Durham Region News
More on the scandal surrounding phony
psychologist "doctor" Gregory Carter. For six years he had a lucrative
practice providing evaluations for the Durham CAS. Each time CAS got
custody of a child, the province provided funding of $30,000 per year, plus
whatever extras CAS could justify by putting labels on the child. Along the
way, other parts of the family destruction apparatus drained the family
funds until they were penniless. Wanda Secord, Durham CAS executive
director, was the person who got to spend the provincial money. Now she is
claiming the status of innocent victim, trying to right the wrong done by Mr
Carter. Below is an article in the Toronto Sun by a reporter who
interviewed Secord. Our comments are interspersed in red.
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Arrest sparks review of Durham CAS custody cases
By DON PEAT, Toronto Sun, Last Updated: 29th January 2010, 10:44am
The Durham Children's Aid Society is diving into six years' worth of files to determine the role a Whitby man accused of posing as a psychologist in court may have played in child custody cases.
Greg Carter, 63, was charged this week with three counts of fraud, two counts of obstructing justice and two counts of perjury. He'll be back in court in March.
Wanda Secord, executive director of the Durham Children's Aid Society, told the Sun Thursday the society is "very concerned" about the criminal allegations and the College of Psychologists' complaints against Carter.
She should be concerned. She was the chief beneficiary of
"doctor" Carter's chicanery, but shows no indication in this interview of
willingness to accept responsibility for the fiasco.
"We're taking this matter very seriously," Secord said. "We are looking at our files to determine what role (Carter) played in the cases and then we'll undertake a review if necessary."
So far, the society doesn't know how many cases he was involved in.
Carter was contracted by the society to provide services like behavioural assessments from 2003 to '09.
The CAS terminated his contract in the spring because of complaints, Secord said.
But she said the society did check with the college and at the time Carter was a member in good standing.
He's registered as a psychological associate -- not a psychologist.
Police allege Carter presented himself as a psychologist and called himself a doctor during testimony in court.
Secord added Carter was "well established in our community, having provided services to a number of other services, such as school boards and the court systems. He was a well-respected and an established practitioner in our area."
This suggests "doctor" Carter was a member of the Den of Thieves, the group of professionals
switching roles from case to case, always with the objective of draining
the family financially and raiding the taxpayers for reimbursements.
The work he conducted for the society fell within the range of a psychological associate, Secord said.
But she couldn't say whether the society was aware whether Carter ever claimed to be a psychologist in court for one of its cases.
Maybe she should read the papers. Christie Blatchford
reported in the Globe and Mail that in one case Ontario Superior Court
Justice Craig Perkins referred to him 32 times as "Dr Carter".
Despite the controversy, Secord said the society isn't reviewing the qualifications of all its professionals under contract.
The most revealing statement of all. Mrs Secord does not
care whether her experts are qualified. She will only check up on them if
a public scandal develops.
"We have not at this point but that's food for thought," she said.
Jail safer than CAS
January 29, 2010
A Sarnia Ontario teenager in CAS custody found it so dangerous that he
begged a judge to send him to jail for his protection. The judge punished
the boy by sending him back to his CAS group home.
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Youth demands jail
Posted By NEIL BOWEN, THE OBSERVER, January 29, 2010
A 13-year-old who demanded jail time for stealing an iPod so he could be protected from bullies was sentenced Thursday to six months probation.
The youth pleaded guilty to stealing a classmate's iPod and violating a court order to live at a designated address.
The theft was reported and school staff identified the boy as a suspect. Officials at at a group home at which he was living were notified and found him listening to the iPod.
He was grounded but ran away from the home for a short time.
Defence lawyer Don Henderson the youth feels safer in secure custody compared to group homes, where he is bullied.
He spent about a week in custody awaiting resolution of his case.
Justice Deborah Austin said she understands it's tough for him to be the youngest in a group home, but that doesn't allow her to place him into custody. She sentenced him to probation with the condition he perform 16 hours of community service.
She also scheduled a hearing in two weeks to review residential placement for the youth, who is under the supervision of the Children's Aid Society.
The youth justice act prohibits publication of his identity.
nbowen@theobserver.ca
Lose Kid, Jail Mom
January 29, 2010
New York ACS took Patrick Alford from his mother and placed him in foster
care in another part of the city. They lost track of him when he ran away.
After police searched a swamp for his body using boats and helicopters, his
name got on our list of dead foster kids. So did ACS apologize to the
mother? Of course not. They have put her in jail until she reveals the
whereabouts of her son. It could be a long wait if the boy is in the swamp.
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Judge jails mother, believes she knows location of 7-year-old Patrick Alford
BY Barry Paddock, Michael J. Feeney and Jonathan Lemire, DAILY NEWS STAFF WRITERS, Friday, January 29th 2010, 4:00 AM
Oates for News
Jennifer Rodriguez, mother of missing 7-year-old Patrick Alford (below), is escorted by police from Staten Island Family Court.
The biological mother of a 7-year-old who vanished from his foster home last week has been jailed by a judge who insists she's hiding the child.
Patrick Alford disappeared Friday night from the Brooklyn apartment building where he was placed with a foster family three weeks earlier.
His mother, Jennifer Rodriguez, 23, lost custody after she was arrested on theft charges and the Administration for Children's Services decided she had neglected her son.
The NYPD believes the boy may have run away alone and could be in danger. They deployed boats in the swamps near the foster family's Starrett City home and helicopters in the skies to search for him - but Patrick has yet to be found.
ACS officials and Staten Island Family Court Judge Terrence McElrath - citing Rodriguez's statements to case workers and court officers - insist that Rodriguez knows where Patrick is.
McElrath sent her to Rikers Island on Tuesday - and said yesterday he's keeping her there on contempt charges until the boy turns up.
"Did she comply with order to produce the child? No," McElrath said.
Being led out of the court, Rodriguez blurted out to reporters, "Get me out of here - call my aunt, she has him, she knows where he is."
The aunt, Blanca Toledo, 51, told the Daily News from her Brooklyn home last night that she doesn't have the boy - and has already told that to cops multiple times.
"My niece and I have a love and hate relationship," she said through tears. "I guess she has nothing else to say."
Toledo, who cared for Patrick before he was put in foster care, said the family is furious at her because she told ACS about attempts Rodriguez allegedly made to "kidnap" the boy.
Cops also interviewed a relative in Baltimore based on a tip - but he wasn't there, police said.
Patrick was last seen with his foster mother, Librada Moran, 58, in the lobby of the Spring Creek Development at 9p.m. Friday, police said.
"The foster mother was putting out the trash," said Police Commissioner Raymond Kelly. "Next thing you know, he's gone."
jlemire@nydailynews.com
With Sarah Armaghan
Addendum: Mother Jennifer Rodriguez was released
from jail on February 2.
Foster Luxury
January 29, 2010
Children in Ontario's foster care system often get accommodations in sub-standard housing, get a typical
allowance of $10 per week and sometimes get a nutritionally inadequate diet. Here is a
story of a foster teenager who gets a three-bedroom 1,800 square foot home
to himself and lives on an allowance of $150 per week. He has two
caseworkers looking after him, one during the day and another at night.
What makes him so special? He is an accused sex criminal. No, this is not
a spoof from the Onion.
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Sex crime suspect, 14, lives 'like a king'
14-year-old alone in group home, By TOM GODFREY, QMI Agency
Tracy MacIsaac of Peel Children's Aid wouldn't comment on allegations that a teen facing sex charges is living in a $350,000 home, collecting $150-a-week in allowance.
(Dave Abel/QMI Agency)
TORONTO - A 14-year-old boy facing sex charges in Toronto is the sole resident of a $350,000 Mississauga group home and gets $150 a week for allowance, officials say.
The youth, who can't be identified because of his age, is supervised by a case worker during the day and another at night, the Toronto Sun learned on Thursday.
The home is run by the Children's Aid Society.
The case surfaced two weeks ago after the youth was arrested in Downsview by police and charged with sex offences against a male family member.
Det.-Const. Michelle Bond of 31 Division Family Services Unit said the boy was charged under the Criminal Code for sex offences and is before the courts. He was released at a bail hearing providing he remains at the home.
Officers from 31 Division said they were called to a North York address by a person urgently requesting help.
Sources said the boy was allowed to visit family members as part of a rehabilitation program when the incident occurred.
He has been living at the group home in a new Peel subdivision since 2008.
Officials were surprised to learn the youth was the only resident of a home that "any family would want."
The boy, who has the latest computer games, receives his allowance in addition to having his meals prepared and laundry washed, sources said.
"He lives like a king," one insider said. "I am concerned as a citizen as to how much money is being spent on this case."
"About 90% of the neighbours on that street won't know there's a group home among them," one worker said. "It is in a nice neighbourhood with new homes."
Sources said a number of CAS group homes in the GTA are for use by single youths. This one is a three-bedroom home, about 1,800 square feet, not intended for more than one resident.
Peter Spadoni, a spokesman for the ministry of children and youth services, said his officials couldn't comment on the case as it involves a youth before the courts.
"We just don't have enough information and it is not something we would talk about," Spadoni said on Thursday.
Rob Thompson of the Toronto Children's Aid Society couldn't comment because of privacy laws.
"Once a person is in the care of the CAS, the amount of information that can be given out is almost zero," Thompson said.
Tracy MacIsaac of Peel Children's Aid said she also couldn't comment because of privacy laws.
Homeschoolers Flee Germany
January 28, 2010
The United States has granted asylum to the German Romeike family fleeing
from persecution for homeschooling.
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US grants home schooling German family political asylum
Couple who fled to Tennessee fearing persecution for keeping their children out of school win first case of its kind in US
Daniel Nasaw in Washington, guardian.co.uk, Wednesday 27 January 2010 19.45 GMT
Uwe Romeike and his wife Hannelore work with their children.
Photograph: Wade Payne/AP
A US judge has granted political asylum to a German family who said they had fled the country to avoid persecution for home schooling their children.
In the first reported case of its kind, Tennessee immigration judge Lawrence Burman ruled that the family of seven have a legitimate fear of prosecution for their beliefs. Germany requires parents to enrol their children in school in most cases and has levied fines against those who educate their children at home.
Christians Uwe Romeike, a piano teacher, and his wife, Hannelore, moved to Morristown, Tennessee, in 2008 after German authorities fined them thousands of euros for keeping their children out of school and sent police to escort them to classes, Romeike said. They had been holding classes in their home.
Along with thousands of torture victims, political dissidents, members of religious minorities and other persecuted groups who win political asylum every year, the Romeike family will now be free to live and work in the US. The case does not create a legal precedent unless the US government appeals and a higher immigration court hears the case.
"Home schoolers in Germany are a particular social group, which is one of the protected grounds under the asylum law," said Mike Connelly, attorney for the Home School Legal Defence Association, who argued the case. "This judge looked at the evidence, he heard their testimony, and he felt that the way Germany is treating home schoolers is wrong. The rights being violated here are basic human rights."
In 2006 the Romeikes pulled their children out of a state school in Bissingen, Germany, in protest of what they deemed an anti-Christian curriculum.
They said textbooks presented ideas and language that conflicted with their Christian beliefs, including slang terms for sex acts and images of vampires and witches, while the school offered what they described as ethics lessons from Islam, Buddhism and other religions. The eldest son got into fights in school and the eldest daughter had trouble studying.
"I think it's important for parents to have the freedom to chose the way their children can be taught," Romeike told the Associated Press.
About 1.5 million US children are taught at home. In Morristown, a town of about 27,000, the Romeikes have connected with other home schooling families, organising field trips and other activities.
The German consul general for the southeastern US said in a statement that mandatory school attendance ensures a high education standard for all children, adding that parents have many educational options.
In 2008, the US government received more than 47,000 applications for political asylum and granted 10,743, including four from Germany.
Connelly said this was the first time home schooling had been the central issue in a US political asylum case.
Amber Alert
January 27, 2010
An Amber alert was issued today for three-year-old Madison Young of
Etobicoke Ontario, and the girl was picked up hours later unharmed. As
usual in this kind of case, news sources erase the original record almost
immediately, but we did find one copy of the alert and a news article with
pictures, both enclosed below.
The real reason for the "abduction" is in the news from another source
below:
The Children’s Aid Society had obtained a court order granting them temporary custody of the child. Arrangements were made for the mother to drop off her child to CAS offices on Tuesday, said Det. Sgt. Madelaine Tretter with 22 Division.
She never showed up.
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Ontario Provincial Police - Amber Alert
Posted on: Wed, 27 Jan 2010 11:21:00 EST
TORONTO, Jan. 27, 2010 (Canada NewsWire via COMTEX) --
THE Toronto POLICE SERVICE HAS REQUESTED AN "AMBER ALERT" FOR AN ABDUCTED CHILD IN THE 120 Seventh Street Etobicoke (in the area of the Home Depot) AREA.
Last seen in the Home Depot parking lot area last night (26Jan2010) with an unknown female.
Victim details:YOUNG, Madison, DOB: 2006/11/03 (f) 2 feet tall, 31-40 lbs, chin length brown wavy hair, brown eyes. Clothing possibly wearing a pink winter jacket.
Childs mother Sarah YOUNG age 33 yrs, (f) light black skin, freckled face, brown eyes, wears glasses, long brown partly gray curly hair, approximately 99 lbs, May or may not be with child or with unknown female.
(Photo available from the Toronto Police Service)
Believed to be in the company of: Unknown Female and or mother Sarah YOUNG
Vehicle Information: Sky Blue SUV, (no additional information)
If observed call 911.
This Amber Alert broadcast request will end at 3:30 PM, unless a further extension is requested.
SOURCE: Ontario Provincial Police - Amber Alert
SOURCE: Ontario Provincial Police
MEDIA Contact: Toronto Police Service Phone: (416) 808-2254
Missing girl found safe, mother taken to hospital under police guard
Ryan Cripps, Global News: Wednesday, January 27, 2010 5:12 PM
Police have now found a 3-year-old and her mother after an Amber Alert was issued on January 27, 2010.
Photo Credit: Toronto Police Handout
The search for a missing 3-year-old girl is now over, after the little girl and her mother were found at a Mississauga hotel on Wednesday afternoon.
An Amber Alert was issued Wednesday morning for the little girl, who had last been seen three days ago at her home on Seventh Street, near Lake Shore Blvd. W. & Islington Ave. in Etobicoke.
The girl and her mother were located at about 3:00 p.m. and taken to a Toronto police station in Etobicoke.
"The little girl was very cheerful," said Detective Patrick McGrade of Toronto police at a news conference late Wednesday afternoon.
"We provided her with a couple of teddy bears and a couple of books."
Det. McGrade said the girl is now in the custody of the Catholic Children's Aid Society and is in good health.
The girl's mother, upon arriving at Toronto Police 22 Division, complained of a medical condition. She was treated by EMS and taken to a local hospital under police guard.
Det. McGrade said the mother "is going to be questioned" after she is released from the hospital.
Police had been searching a three kilometre radius around the little girl's home. Officers on foot were being assisted by the mounted unit and the K-9 unit.
Police say a warrant was issued for the apprehension of the 3-year-old girl, and arrangements were made by the Catholic CAS to have the mother turn over the child to them.
When they went to the mother's home, the mother and child were not there and police were contacted.
Addendum: The mother who cared for her own baby
has been arrested as a kidnapper.
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The mother was taken to hospital on Wednesday, Jan. 27, 2010 after being taken into custody.
Mother charged in aftermath of Amber Alert case
Updated: Thu Jan. 28 2010 2:06:25 PM, ctvtoronto.ca
A Toronto mother has been charged with parental child abduction after disappearing with her daughter, triggering an Amber Alert on Wednesday.
Police issued the alert on Wednesday morning, saying they were worried about the three-year-old girl's safety.
A maid at the Avenue Motel in Mississauga noticed the pair on Wednesday afternoon and contacted police. When police arrived, they found the mother trying to hide with her daughter in a stairwell, CTV Toronto reported.
Det. Patrick McGrade said Wednesday that the little girl was cheerful when they found her. "We provided her with a couple of teddy bears, a couple of books," he said.
The mother complained of a medical problem after being taken to 22 Division headquarters in Etobicoke and was transported by ambulance to St. Joseph's hospital.
Her daughter will be placed in a foster home as a temporary measure.
The 33-year-old mother was supposed to surrender her daughter to the Children's Aid Society on Tuesday. The agency had obtained a temporary custody order.
However, she never showed up.
By 11 a.m. Wednesday, police obtained permission to issue an Amber Alert, which allows them to highly publicize the fact that a child is missing and possibly in danger.
With a report from CTV Toronto's Jim Junkin
Impostor Shrink Arrested
January 26, 2010
Wanna know why those parenting capacity assessments always favor
children's aid? Maybe it's because the shrinks conducting them are fakes.
Alleged doctor Gregory Carter provided reports and services for his
client, the Children's Aid Society of Durham. His credentials were fake,
and he has been arrested.
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Ron Pietroniro / Metroland
WHITBY -- The office of Gregory Carter is in the Dundas-Centre Medical building at 220 Dundas Street West. Mr. Carter has been charged by the Durham Regional Police. January 26, 2010.
Whitby 'doctor' faked credentials, police allege
January 26, 2010, By Jeff Mitchell
DURHAM -- Police have laid criminal charges against a Whitby man, alleging he committed perjury by presenting false professional credentials while testifying in child custody cases.
Gregory Carter presented himself as a psychologist and dubbed himself a doctor while testifying about the suitability of people to care for children, police and other complainants allege. Mr. Carter, who has a long-standing practice in Whitby and associations with agencies including the Durham Children's Aid Society, was charged Monday with fraud, perjury and obstructing justice.
The development came as a relief to one Clarington man who has complained to both police and Ontario's College of Psychologists. The man lost custody of his granddaughter after a 2006 family court trial in which Mr. Carter testified on behalf of the birth father.
"I'm quite pleased," said Mr. B., whose full name can't be used to protect the child's identity. "He's been doing this for years and no one has stopped him until now."
He suggested court cases Mr. Carter has been involved in ought to be subject to review.
Mr. Carter, 63, did not return messages left Tuesday at his home and at his Whitby office. The allegations against him have not been proven in court.
Mr. Carter is registered with the College of Psychologists as a psychological associate. According to the college's website, he is authorized to work with children and families, but is prohibited from independently diagnosing symptoms or disorders, and is required to perform duties under the supervision of a qualified psychologist.
The website also indicates at least two complaints have been made, alleging Mr. Carter breached the limitations placed on him.
Mr. B. said Mr. Carter presented critical evidence during his family's custody battle in a Durham family court proceeding, including an assertion Mr. B. is "narcissistic" and hostile towards the child's father. In explaining his decision, a judge said Mr. Carter's testimony "tips the balance" in favour of the father, according to a transcript.
Mr. B. feels the case was decided by testimony from a witness who wasn't qualified to offer an opinion. The outcome was devastating to him and his wife, he said.
"A 10-year-old girl has been forced against her wishes to leave the only home she has ever known and we have been left both emotionally and financially ruined in our retirement years," Mr. B. said. He said he and others have contacted a lawyer about launching a civil suit.
In a letter responding to Mr. B's complaint Mr. Carter indicates he completed a Masters Degree in 1978 and pursued further education, including a doctorate obtained from Pacific Western University in 1991. Pacific Western, renamed California Miramar University in 2007, was the subject of controversy in 2004 when American media outlets alleged the school was a "diploma mill" offering expedited credentials for a price.
Mr. Carter operates a practice out of a professional building on Dundas Street West in Whitby. He is past president of the board of Durham Mental Health Services and has been associated with the Durham Children's Aid Society. Among his duties for the CAS was carrying out parenting capacity assessments, said spokeswoman Andrea Maenza.
Such assessments play a role in determining if children remain with their parents or are made wards of the Crown, she said. While performing assessments Mr. Carter had limited access to CAS records, she confirmed.
Mr. Carter's involvement with the CAS was suspended recently and the agency is awaiting the outcome of the college's investigation into complaints against him, Ms. Maenza said.
"We've made no judgment," she said. "We'll let the college takes its course ... and then we'll determine whether or not we'll pursue any other contracts with him."
Rob Adams, executive director of Durham Mental Health Services, said Mr. Carter has served as a volunteer director, assisting with agency governance and strategic direction.
"He had no involvement in the agency's day to day operations or client services and supports," Mr. Adams said.
Mr. Carter is scheduled to appear in court in March. A police investigation continues; call 905-579-1520, extension 2704.
Addendum: The testimony of the phony shrink forced
a father to share custody of his children with their mother in a decision
made after the father had pointed out Carter's fake credentials to the
court. A real shrink says the mother now is a danger to the care of the
children. She allegedly restrained the nine-year-old by throwing him to the
ground and sitting on him. Children's aid has refused to remove the
children from the mother.
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Dad lost his kids due to bogus doctor
By MICHELE MANDEL, QMI Agency
An alleged victim of Greg Carter's - who cannot be identified - holds a business card identifying him as Dr. Carter.
(Ernest Doroszuk/QMI Agency)
WHITBY, Ont. -- A child custody battle is an ugly, twisted jungle at the best of times, but a Whitby father never stood a chance after family court accepted a disparaging assessment done by a man posing as a psychologist.
And ignored the one by the true PhD.
Now the terrified 48-year-old dad must share custody of his two young boys with a woman who the real psychologist has warned is mentally ill and poses a danger to their care.
Greg Carter, 63, has been charged with three counts of fraud, two counts of obstructing justice and two counts of perjury for allegedly impersonating a psychologist.
He is also facing a complaint of professional misconduct by Ontario's College of Psychologists.
"Nobody should go through what I went through," says "Mr. S", the angry father who can't be named because the case involves the Children's Aid. "If he had kept his unqualified opinion to himself, my children would be safe and we wouldn't have lost all our money to lawyers."
The dad had his suspicions after Carter presented an assessment to family court that said the father had a narcissistic personality disorder -- despite never meeting him -- while administering one test on his ex-wife to completely dismiss an exhaustive, 37-page evaluation by a highly respected psychologist who diagnosed her with a borderline personality disorder.
Rattled by his findings, Mr. S. contacted the College of Psychologists of Ontario and discovered that Carter was not a psychologist at all, but a psychological associate whose registration stipulated that he was not allowed to make an independent diagnosis without the supervision of a qualified psychologist.
He had also told the court that he had a PhD from Pacific Western University, the now-defunct school that awarded degrees based on "life experience" and was branded a "diploma mill" in a report by the U.S. Senate Committee on Governmental Affairs.
"I can't believe nobody checked his credentials until I came along," says Mr. S.
What's even more astounding is that Justice Alexander Sosna was then presented with a letter from the College outlining Carter's restrictions -- and the fact that he wasn't a psychologist as advertised -- but still chose to accept the bogus doc's assessment and set aside the damning one by the real psychologist.
The judge, who has a background in criminal, not family law, rejected the dad's bid for sole custody, threw him out of the matrimonial home and ordered him to pay his ex-wife's $13,000 in legal costs within 90 days or he wouldn't be able to see his kids at all.
He had to go to the bank to get a loan because the protracted custody battle had wiped out his $400,000 in savings. But the drain on his finances pales beside his constant fear of what will happen to his sons in their mother's care.
He doesn't understand why a former criminal lawyer is ruling in family court.
"Carter is just one piece of a whole broken puzzle," insists the beleaguered father.
But an integral piece. Mr. S. went on to launch a complaint of professional misconduct against him with the College as did the real psychologist.
"He has been masquerading as a psychologist for some time and had deceived myself and the public about his credentials," the doctor wrote Mr. S. "His conduct is simply unethical."
Carter did not respond to messages left at his home and his Whitby office.
He did offer a tepid mea culpa in a December 2008 letter. "While my concerns are not groundless, I now believe that expressing them in written form based on the information I had was wrong. I owe Mr. S. an apology for that mistake."
But his apology will not give Mr. S. sole custody of his children or undo the harm Carter has allegedly caused in at least two other child custody disputes, including one where his testimony led to a granddaughter being wrenched away from her grandparents after she'd spent most of her 10 years in their care.
"What's an apology if you don't fix the problem you created?" demands the heartbroken father. "He's got to have affected hundreds of people. He's been doing it for 18 years."
And that is why all of his cases need to be reviewed if he is found guilty.
In the meantime, what about all the poor children?
In Mr. S's case, the Children's Aid is now involved after the mom allegedly restrained the 9-year-old by throwing him to the ground and sitting on him. In a list of written expectations on a CAS contract, his ex-wife has been told that her discipline "at no time shall include sitting on either child."
The worried dad has pleaded with them to remove the boys from her care, especially now that Carter's assessment has been discredited, but they refuse.
They say there is nothing they can do but monitor the situation. After all, there's two conflicting psychological reports and the judge accepted the one by Carter.
They don't seem unduly concerned that he's a man now facing charges for fraud.
Shackles
January 26, 2010
For at least fourteen years all juveniles transported to and from courts
in New York traveled in shackles. Since children appearing in New York City
courts usually came from upstate, this meant hundreds of miles of travel
while shackled.
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City Room - Blogging From the Five Boroughs, January 26, 2010, 1:30 pm
Juvenile Offenders Shackled Illegally, Judge Rules
By NICHOLAS CONFESSORE
Legal Aid Society
A juvenile prisoner in handcuffs, waist chains and leg shackles.
The agency that runs the state’s juvenile prison system routinely violates the law by shackling youthful offenders when taking them to court even in cases in which the youth poses no obvious threat, a state judge ruled on Tuesday.
The ruling, by Justice Milton A. Tingling Jr. of State Supreme Court in Manhattan, would repeal a policy of the state’s youth prison system that has been in place since at least 1996. The case, a class-action lawsuit on behalf of about 500 youths held in units run by the state’s Office of Children and Family Services, was brought by the Legal Aid Society.
The suit’s named plaintiff is John F., a teenager who was kept in shackles — hands and feet cuffed, with a belly chain linked to the handcuffs — for roughly 15 hours on one day in November 2007.
Justice Tingling issued his decision as a summary judgment against state officials, who did not contest the facts of the case, meaning it is unlikely that they would win an appeal.
“The court’s recognition that O.C.F.S. cannot treat children this way is part and parcel of a culture of abusive practices that is not rehabilitative and does not reorganize that these are children who are in the care of the state,” said Nancy Rosenbloom, the Legal Aid lawyer leading the case.
A spokesman for the agency said that officials there could not comment until they had reviewed the decision.
The agency’s current policy requires any child in custody to be shackled while being taken between state facilities or from a facility to anywhere else, such as a courthouse. While most of the prison units are far upstate, most of the youths are from New York City and must be transported hundreds of miles for routine appearances in Family Court.
The shackling policy even covered youths being held at what are known as nonsecure facilities.
“We had evidence of kids not being able to drink their milk on the way to court because of the chains,” Ms. Rosenbloom said.
Justice Tingling found that the policy violated the state’s own law on shackling youths in custody, which dictates that shackles be used only as a last resort, for youth who are out of control and dangerous, and then only for half an hour. Shackles can be used during transport only, the judge found, when the youths pose a physical threat.
While the ruling covers shackling only during transportation to and from court, and only children from New York City, it will most likely force the Office of Children and Family Services to revise its overall policy on shackling.
Below, a diagram from a training manual from the Office of Children and Family Services illustrates how to shackle children.
CPS Kills Mother
January 26, 2010
The coroner will record it as a suicide, but CPS killed Arizona mother
Brenda Suzanne Ownby.
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Woman hit by multiple vehicles on I-17 after jumping from car
by Natalie Rivers, Posted on January 25, 2010 at 12:32 PM, Updated yesterday at 8:06 PM
PHOENIX - A fatality on Interstate 17 resulted in the freeway being shut down for much of the late morning and afternoon near the accident scene at Thomas Road.
Lt. Robert Lee Bailey said at about 10:15 a.m. the Department of Public Safety received a call of a person who fell out of their vehicle and on to the roadway on the northbound lanes of the I-17 under the Grand Avenue overpass near the HOV lane.
According to DPS the woman was stuck by one vehicle and that vehicle was rear-ended by a utility truck.
DPS confirmed the Phoenix woman had just lost custody of her children and apparently committed suicide by jumping out of the back seat of a crew-cab truck she was riding in with her mother and sister.
The woman has been identified as Brenda Suzanne Ownby, 36. She died on scene.
According to Ownby's family she had been quiet and hadn't said much after leaving court before the incident.
The freeway re-opened just before 2:30 p.m.
CAS Abuses Children
January 26, 2010
Canada Court Watch reports on two cases in which children are abused, in
one case by their mother who is a CAS worker, in the other case by a foster
mother.
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Teens claim CAS workers concealed abuse and criminal assault by their mother
(January 20, 2010) Court Watch interviewed two teens independently on videotape who both claimed that they reported to CAS workers that they were physically and emotionally abused by their mother over a long period of time but that CAS workers told them that this was OK because their mother was under stress because she had left the home and taken the kids with her. In one incident the children said that they told CAS workers how the mother put one boy's head face down in a sink of water, not once but four times repeatedly while he choked and gasped for air to keep himself alive. The teens described how their mother had a temper which she could not control. Court Watch suspects that CAS workers kept silent for political reasons because the mother works as a child and youth worker herself and works closely with the CAS. The testimony from these children will be emailed out to all the MPP's in Ontario and will shock all those who read it. This story is yet another example to support why CAS workers must be required to electronically record their meetings with children. It's time to put an end to CAS cover-up and abuse of children. To you CAS workers who read this site, we now know who you are and you know who this mother is. As is right, there will be a formal complaint made against you in the near future so get ready for your CAS agency to be exposed for doing shoddy work in the community to protect children.
More very recent CAS foster home abuse
(January 22, 2010) Court Watch was contacted by a teen who has reported that residents in the CAS foster home were only allowed one glass of milk per day by a single foster mother who ruled over the kids with an iron fist. According to the foster teen because the mother was single, paid CAS staff were constantly coming into her home to sit the foster children in care. All of this at taxpayer expense of course! It was reported that this foster mother took trips to Germany each year with the money she made of the CAS foster kids. The one teen reported that she was forced to wear another foster teens old shoes. While the Ontario Government pays CAS to feed and cloth children, CAS foster parents are pocketing the extra money and making the kids suffer. It was also reported that this foster mother beat and kicked the kids in care but as usual nobody listened, not even the Office of the Children's Lawyer. The teen started writing down in her journal about some of the abuse she was being exposed to only to have CAS workers come into her room and steal her journal to ensure that information does not get out into the public.
Abuse of children in care is going on right now and the Ontario Government does nothing.
Addendum: Here is yet another case from Canada Court Watch:
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CAS workers blackmailing children in care
(January 28, 2010) Court Watch was contacted by a teen today who has reported that children in care at his foster home are being threatened with having their access visits with their parents cancelled if they attempt to exercise their lawful right to contact their biological parents outside of the times that CAS has decided. The teen has provided us with names and the address of the foster home and details of the threats.
Below Charles Dickens comments on starving children for profit:
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Upon this the parish authorities magnanimously and humanely resolved, that Oliver should be "farmed," or, in other words, that he should be despatched to a branch-workhouse some three miles off, where twenty or thirty other juvenile offenders against the poor-laws, rolled about the floor all day, without the inconvenience of too much food or too much clothing, under the parental superintendence of an elderly female, who received the culprits at and for the consideration of sevenpence-halfpenny per small head per week. Sevenpence-halfpenny's worth per week is a good round diet for a child; a great deal may be got for sevenpence-halfpenny, quite enough to overload its stomach, and make it uncomfortable. The elderly female was a woman of wisdom and experience; she knew what was good for children; and she had a very accurate perception of what was good for herself. So, she appropriated the greater part of the weekly stipend to her own use, and consigned the rising parochial generation to even a shorter allowance than was originally provided for them. Thereby finding in the lowest depth a deeper still; and proving herself a very great experimental philosopher.
Please, sir, I want some more.
Bayne Trial
January 25, 2010
The Schedule for Court Days for the Bayne Child Custody Trial is as
follows: Feb 2 -5; Feb 8 - 9; Feb 11-12; Feb 22-23; Feb 25-26. You
are welcome to attend, to hear the witnesses' testimonies, the cross
examinations, and to be an encouragement to the Baynes by your presence at
the Chilliwack Court House.
There is a new website on the case, A Plea for Justice. Enclosed
below is a report by Ron Unruh on the trial and a note from a former victim
on the testimony of Dr Colbourne.
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Sunday, January 24, 2010
For Love and For Justice / Part 91 / Zabeth and Paul Bayne
The trial is scheduled to last sixteen days and these days are to stretch through January and February. The first three court days were held on Wednesday 12th , Thursday 13th and Friday 15th . The focus of the early days of the court case have been upon the testimonies of social workers and the regional Director for this case. That is precisely how it came down.
The Baynes’ demand for their children has been a public and high profile claim particularly during the past year. Global and CBC news networks have done stories on the Baynes’ contest with the Ministry of Children and Family Development. The Baynes themselves have maintained an online presence through websites and Facebook pages. People like me have easily recognized the injustices within this case and have sought to explain facts, some of us doing it objectively and others expressing objectionable opinions. Always the Baynes have asserted that MCFD’s legitimate task of protecting children was based on a wrong medical diagnosis and then a series of skewed MCFD decisions not in the interest of the Bayne family but in the interest of building a case for MCFD’s seizure and custody of three Bayne children. Little effort was made by MCFD to truly know Paul and Zabeth, their characters, principles and values and family commitments. The Baynes’ vigorous and persistent fight for their children over the two and one half years of this torment was perceived by MCFD as a declaration of war rather than being seen through the understanding eyes of social workers with authentic sensitivity to humanity. I am sorry to have witnessed that. I am appalled that this flaw appears to be a common feature in child protection networks across our country, in every province, in the UK and in Australia. Do some googling and you will soon be confronted by an avalanche of worrisome reports about insensitive and inept case handling and worse, incarceration of parents falsely accused.
Ministry of Children and Family Development attorney, early in the court proceedings, applied for a ban on all publicity and news coverage. During a 15 minute presentation, Bayne’s lawyer Doug Christie ardently opposed this application, arguing for the public’s right to be informed about a case as significant as this and about a Ministry that is charged by the public to fulfill its responsibilities. Christie contended that the media has a right to participate, report and defend its reported accounts. He further stated that it would be inappropriate for the Judge to make a decision on this application within fifteen minutes of hearing the application. The judge then adjourned for 30 minutes and upon his return indicated that he would not so soon approve the application for the ban because it might affect this case and others that would follow this one. If the MCFD intended to pursue the ban application, then the media must also be allowed to defend its position. MCFD attorney Finn Jensen then told the court that he would not proceed with the application. So this was dismissed. In truth this may result in better accountability through public exposure.
CBC ran a story on the opening day of this court case and that content was sympathetic to the Baynes’ claim that the children should be returned to them.
Posted by Ron at 6:28 PM
Since we don't know whether the author of this not wants to be
identified, the name is concealed.
I was reading the posting about the Bayne trial and was shocked that
they have Dr Colburne involved, if its the same Dr I knew 24 years ago in
Vancouver. She got my first child taken from me by lying to the courts in
documents for the MCFD and I believe I in fact have some of her testimony
still in a file that I kept. It took me 6 months to get my child back, no
thanks to her. She mislead the courts and submitted false affidavits
about me and in fact some of the stuff in her reports were second and
third hand information, not even direct information that she witnessed or
got from me.
If it is the same Dr then the BC government needs to do the same as
they did with that Dr Smith back east and review all cases that involved
her and the MCFD in regards to people losing their children based on her
testimony.
Long Arm of the Social Worker
January 23, 2010
Scottish social workers intervened to prevent the marriage of Mark
McDougall and his pregnant partner Kerry Robertson, and alerted them that
their baby was in danger of seizure at birth. They fled to Ireland where
the baby was born on January 15. Irish social workers took the baby at age
four days.
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Mother 'not clever enough to raise child' has baby snatched by social workers after running away to Ireland to give birth
By Alison Smith Squire, Last updated at 1:13 PM on 22nd January 2010
A couple who fled to Ireland after social workers threatened to remove their baby at birth have had the newborn snatched after all.
Kerry Robertson, 17, who has mild learning difficulties, and Mark McDougall, 25, went on the run after British social services said she was not clever enough to raise a child.
But just four days after Ben was born, Irish social workers marched into the maternity ward and forced them to hand him over.
Proud mother: Kerry Robertson and Ben, who she isn't allowed to bring up
They were told they were acting at the behest of their British counterparts.
The couple, from Fife, Scotland, have been on the run for three months.
In September, their wedding was halted just 48 hours before the service when social workers claimed Miss Robertson was not bright enough to understand the marriage declaration.
Then in November they were told that her ‘disability’ meant their baby would be taken away at birth.
With Miss Robertson 29 weeks pregnant, they fled their house in the middle of the night and travelled to Ireland.
Ben was born healthy and weighing 7lb 3oz last Friday.
Last night Miss Robertson said: ‘When the Irish social workers said I had to give the baby to them, I felt sick.
‘I didn’t want to hand him over and I started crying because I couldn’t believe what they were saying. I thought I had misunderstood.
‘I had just been breastfeeding him.
Just before they took him away, I told Ben I loved him and gave him a kiss.’
Mr McDougall added: ‘Kerry let out a dreadful cry when she realised what was happening – it was terrible. She is just in pieces.
‘We believed that the Irish had more traditional values than social workers in the UK. We found a two-bedroom cottage in a beautiful village in Waterford overlooking the sea.
A family divided: Father Mark with Kerry and the baby, who is now in foster care
‘Kerry booked herself in with the local GP and at last we began to feel as if we were safe.’
An anonymous benefactor has been funding the couple after they left home with just £200, and has even paid for the house.
Artist Mr McDougall has also been selling pictures while friends and family have donated clothes, baby gear and further money.
Miss Robertson has been cared for by her grandmother since the age of nine months after her own parents were unable to look after her, with her care overseen by Fife Council.
She began getting contractions last Friday and the couple went to the local hospital, where she gave birth after a natural labour.
‘Both of us were overjoyed,’ said Mr McDougall. ‘Ben was absolutely perfect.’
But on Tuesday morning two Irish social workers – a man and a woman – came to the hospital and delivered the bombshell.
Mr McDougall added: ‘It seems that through Kerry’s medical records – although we have been on the run she has always ensured she had all the checks and scans on the baby – Fife Council had been alerted.
‘The social workers said that now Ben was born, Fife had put him on the at-risk register and he was subject to a care order.
As the social workers told us the news, the two midwives who have been caring for Kerry were so distressed that they fled the room.’
Ben is being cared for by foster parents.
Family law experts said that if Fife had genuine concerns about the baby it had a duty to pursue the couple even once they had fled its jurisdiction.
Under a 1980 European convention on child welfare, they would have contacted the Irish authorities to alert them and the Irish would then have sought an order from a judge allowing them to intervene.
Irish social workers now have to investigate for themselves and have until Monday to make a decision on the case or apply for an extension.
The couple have been allowed to see their son for two hours every other day.
Miss Robertson said: ‘Holding him made me upset all over again. I’ve told the social workers I don’t want him to have bottled milk or a dummy. I feel breastfeeding is so important and at least then he is still having some of me.’
Mr McDougall claimed the care order had the wrong baby’s name on it and the wrong date of birth. He added: ‘Kerry and I are now absolutely furious because we believe our baby has been kidnapped by social services.’
LibDem MP John Hemming, who has been supporting the couple, said: ‘There is no evidence that Mark and Kerry cannot be good parents and I just hope that the Irish authorities can resolve this as quickly as possible.’
The Irish authorities refused to comment last night.
Stephen Moore, executive director of social work at Fife Council, said: ‘I can confirm that although the Robertson family are not presently within Fife, we are committed to working closely with professional colleagues elsewhere to ensure safety and welfare of the child and indeed the whole family as this is of paramount concern to us.
‘I would urge Kerry to use all the support that is being made available to her and her baby and to get appropriate help should she need it.’
Addendum: The family has the baby back, but under
intense supervision.
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The woman told that she was too stupid to keep her baby boy
By Alison Smith Squire, Last updated at 8:10 AM on 28th January 2010
The Moses basket sits beside the bed, its new blankets carefully arranged awaiting its owner's arrival.
Piles of newborn baby clothes - mostly in shades of blue - lie neatly folded on a chair.
Like any new mother, Kerry Robertson spent weeks excitedly preparing for her first child's arrival - and yet 13 days after his birth, all the carefully arranged baby paraphernalia remains unused.
And yet today Kerry and her partner, Mark McDougall, 25, will finally be able to lay their son Ben down to sleep in the basket they bought for him with such hope.
Loving mother: Kerry Robertson, 17, was told she would not be able to bring up her baby son Ben because she has mild learning difficulties
Kerry, who has mild learning difficulties, and Mark went on the run from their home in Fife, Scotland, last November after British social services said she was not clever enough to raise a child.
They hoped that by escaping to Ireland they would be left alone to be a family together. But when Ben was four days old, social workers caught up with them, marching into the maternity ward and forcing them to hand him over.
Only after a court hearing last Friday were the parents told they will get their child back - albeit under supervision.
Today, Kerry will move into a mother and baby unit where the 17-year-old will be under constant surveillance - but that is undoubtedly the lesser of two evils for the couple, given that they feared they might lose custody of the child they fought so hard to keep.
'To say it's been a roller coaster is an understatement,' says Mark. 'Witnessing them take Ben from Kerry made me cry. He was sleeping in her arms after his feed and looked so peaceful.
'I tried to argue with them, but they said no. It's only after they've read medical reports from the hospital, in which the midwives and medical staff said we are loving parents, that it appears they've decided we can have Ben back after all.
'Kerry will be able to care for Ben all day, every day and I'll be allowed to stay at the unit as often as I like.
'Needless to say, we can't wait to be reunited with our beloved son.'
This isn't the only battle the couple have fought to ensure Kerry leads a normal life.
She has been brought up by her grandmother since she was nine months old, with the care overseen by Fife social services.
But she says that, as an adult, there were no signs of the problems to come until social services heard she was pregnant and getting married.
Devoted: Kerry and partner Mark McDougall, 25, pose proudly with their baby son. The couple fled to Ireland after social services said Ben would be taken away
Last September, in an unprecedented step, the couple's white church wedding was halted just 48 hours beforehand, in a row over whether Kerry was intelligent enough to marry.
Shortly after, Fife social services told the couple they believed that, because of Kerry's learning difficulties, her unborn baby would be taken into care.
The claim that Kerry is too stupid to get married or have a baby is something she and Mark, an artist, vehemently refute.
'Social services are ruining my life,' she says. 'First, I was stopped from getting married and then they took my baby.'
Kerry and Mark say she has never even had a formal psychological assessment. And the couple point out that before Kerry became pregnant herself, she worked as a childcare worker with children at a local school - and in fact, with considerable irony, holds a certificate in child care.
Kerry says: 'It's true I didn't get many qualifications at school, but I never had very good teaching.
'I did study for my childcare qualification, I can read and write. I send texts, go on the internet and do everything for myself.
'I usually cook for us. I chose most of the clothes for our baby and sorted out all the piles of nappies, tubs of baby creams and toys. I wanted everything to be ready for him when we brought him home.'
Indeed, upon first meeting, Kerry strikes you as no different to many other young woman. Slim and quirkily dressed, it's clear that, like anyone of her age, she loves to experiment with make-up and clothes.
Nevertheless, she is painfully shy - it is Mark's belief that it is this which gives social workers the impression her learning difficulties are worse than they are.
But gain her trust and she chats away happily like any other teenager. In fact, I don't believe anyone meeting her in a group of young people would even identify learning difficulties.
As for Mark, he has an impressive clutch of GCSEs under his belt, as well as two As in his Highers - the Scottish equivalent of A levels - in art and English.
He is an accomplished artist who makes a reasonable living selling his sketches and charcoal pictures worldwide - he showed me a picture he drew of newborn Ben, and it is a very accurate likeness.
Mark says: 'Neither Kerry nor me have ever had any conviction for cruelty or violence. I don't understand why the authorities have treated us like this.'
So what is the truth?
The Mail, it must be stressed, is not privy to all the information social services hold on this couple. Kerry admits she is no Einstein, but she seems like any other teenager.
Seeing her with Mark, hand-in-hand on the sofa at their rented house in Ireland, some would say they seem more mature than many young lovers.
Binge-drinking, casual relationships and parties couldn't be further from their minds. Both say they prefer an evening in with friends. If anything, they could be described as somewhat old-fashioned.
Mark says: 'When we discovered Kerry was pregnant we wanted to get married. It was important to us that our baby was born to married parents.'
That wedding was set to take place in a church, organised by Mark's father, who had arranged for the congregation to produce a homemade buffet for their reception.
Although Kerry was brought up in the care of her grandmother, she comes from a close-knit community with a large extended family of aunts and uncles. Her younger brother, who's nine, still lives with her grandmother.
The couple met last January through friends. 'I certainly didn't think Kerry had learning difficulties,' says Mark.
'At first she just seemed quiet, but I soon discovered a quirky sense of humour, and that's what attracted me to her.'
Family: Ben was born on January 15 weighing 7lb 3oz
By March, they were a couple and the following month Kerry moved into Mark's one-bedroom flat. It was shortly after this that Kerry became pregnant.
Kerry says: 'When I told my grandmother I was pregnant, she got a care worker to take me to the GP.
'It was then that the care worker said to me: "You know you won't be able to keep this baby don't you?"'
Mark adds: 'It was only at this stage I realised how seriously social services viewed Kerry's so-called condition.
'It was a very upsetting time, as the care worker suggested to Kerry it might be better if she had a termination.
'But neither of us wanted an abortion. Kerry said she could never do that.'
So the couple pressed on with the pregnancy and, as they heard nothing more from social services, put their worries to the back of their minds.
Mark says: 'When Kerry was three months pregnant, we decided to marry.
'I bought Kerry an engagement ring - a little pink one with a diamond-type stone - and we held a party.'
The pair set the date for the wedding in September. Mark recalls: 'Kerry had bought her dress, the church was booked, a cake made and the reception organised.
'But two days before, there was a frantic knocking at our front door and we were confronted by two social workers who told us our wedding was illegal.
'Kerry and I were devastated, but we had no option but to cancel our big day.'
It later transpired Fife social services had made the extraordinary step of writing a letter of objection to the registrar, claiming Kerry was too dim to understand her vows.
The couple have since attempted to marry again, but have been told that, as an order is still in place, a wedding is forbidden.
But if that weren't enough, in October, when Kerry was five months pregnant, the couple were called into a meeting with social services and told their baby would be taken into care at birth.
Kerry says: 'I couldn't stop crying. By then, I'd already found out I was having a little boy and we had decided to name him Ben. I'd felt him kick inside me.'
Mark adds: 'There was no mention of trying to help Kerry or give her the chance to be a mum.
'At that time, they said Kerry would be allowed only a few hours with him. It seemed then he would go to foster parents, and there was the fear he would be adopted and we would lose him for ever.
'It didn't seem to matter to social services that we loved one another and wanted to get married.'
The worry was so great that Mark began researching on the internet other cases in which parents had faced losing their babies in this way.
He says: 'I discovered that many couples had been forced to flee the UK and go to other countries where the authorities take a different view and are keen to keep families together.
'It seemed a huge step to take. Neither Kerry nor myself wanted to leave home, where we had family and support. But in the end we felt we had no choice.'
The couple decided to go to Ireland, where they believed their case would be looked on more sympathetically.
So in November, having held a tearful farewell gathering - and with just £200 in their pockets, a suitcase and a bag of sandwiches made by Kerry - the pair stole out of their house in the dead of night.
The couple made it to Belfast, where they stayed for eight weeks.
'Not having social workers knocking on our doors, wanting meetings all the time, was fantastic,' says Mark. 'For the first time in Kerry's pregnancy, we could enjoy it.'
The pair were financed by friends and family - although Mark continued to sell his artwork.
'I missed my grandma, my little brother and my family terribly,' says Kerry. 'It was hard to be away from them at Christmas. But I consoled myself that it would be worth it. I could hold Ben in my arms and not worry he would be taken.'
Kerry and Mark made the final leg of their journey to Waterford in the Republic of Ireland - which is not governed by UK laws - two weeks after Christmas, with the birth of the baby looming.
Accomplished artist: Mark drew a sketch of his son while in hospital
There, with the help of a donation from a secret benefactor, they were able to find a safe house.
Mark recalls: 'We rented a beautiful little house. Waterford is a seaside resort and we decided to make a new life there.'
On Friday, January 15 at 8.41pm, their hopes were realised when, after a natural labour, Ben was finally born.
The happy couple took photos of their 7lb 3oz bundle. And for three days all appeared to be well.
Mark visited the hospital daily, and close friends who knew where they were sent congratulations cards. Meanwhile, Kerry took to breastfeeding and caring for Ben without any problems.
Behind the scenes, however, social workers were gearing up to strike.
Through medical records, the Irish authorities had discovered that social workers in Fife had an interest in Kerry.
'It seems they contacted Fife, who told them they feared because of Kerry's "disability" our baby could suffer physical or emotional neglect,' explains Mark.
The following Monday, the couple were told a social worker would visit them the next day, and at that point they were not unduly concerned.
'We are honest, so we were happy to co-operate fully,' says Mark. 'We would have been pleased to be monitored.
'Even putting Kerry into a home for new mums with babies so she could prove she can be a good mother would have been fine.
'We understood that the Irish social workers needed to make their own inquiries, and were perfectly happy to do whatever it took to keep Ben.'
So they were totally unprepared when, at the 9.15am meeting on the Tuesday, they were forced to hand over their baby. Since then he has been looked after by foster carers.
They have been allowed two-hourly visits with Ben. But even now, as they're about to be reunited with their baby, there is no denying that the episode has been highly distressing.
Kerry says: 'I was so upset when I saw him the first time with the social workers because he had a dummy in his mouth.
'I told them I didn't want him having a dummy. And he is being bottle fed, but I wanted to breastfeed him.
'I'm just so happy that I'll be with my baby. I don't know how long I'll be at the unit. I'll miss Mark if he's not allowed to stay over - but Ben comes first.'
There's no denying that she and Mark sincerely hope today heralds the start of life as a normal, happy family.
How to Stay Solvent
January 22, 2010
The CAS in Barrie claims it is running out of money and will be closed by
the end of February. I wrote in and suggested they stop spending money on
high priced lawyers to keep families apart. Also to stop spending money on
cars, meals and vacations. It sickens me that the paper didn't bring this
up to begin with. — Melody Blackier on Facebook, January 21.
Here is a video of the police removing
Melody's cousin Natalie (flv) a year and a half ago, and our article Police Remove Girl. How much more
money do they need?
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CAS nearly bankrupt: official
Posted By DOUGLAS GLYNN, Posted January 21, 2010
Simcoe County Children's Aid Society is facing bankruptcy next month and the fate of more than 400 children in its care is uncertain.
"As of Feb. 28, this agency can no longer pay it creditors," said Midland Mayor Jim Downer, a member of the CAS board. "That raises concerns about whether we will be able to pay the people who care for these children. If that happens, there will be nowhere for them to go."
Mary Ballantyne, the CAS's executive director, said the agency "will continue to try and work with government and our creditors to ensure this doesn't happen. It is not in anyone's interest to put Simcoe County children at risk."
The agency -- whose current annual budget is $40,949,211 -- served 10,890 children in 2008-09. As of Dec. 31, 2009, there were 442 children in its care.
Mayor Downer, who sits on the finance committee, says the province increased the agency's workload in 2009-10. "At the same time, it cut funding by 10.4 per cent, or $4.26 million. We re facing a projected $4.9 million shortfall."
In the past when there has been a deficit, he said the province has come in at the 11th hour and erased it. There's no indication of that happening this time.
The 10-year veteran board member says the province doesn't seem to recognize the agency has no control over the caseloads. We're required by the province to look after children who can't look after themselves.
"I watch spending closely. There are no consultants used. We scrutinize spending every month. I know what the staff face on a daily basis. These people work tirelessly, sometimes all hours of the night on emergency calls."
Downer says two things are contributing to the shortfall: a $16 gap in the daily funding for children in foster care and a government requirement to provide more services.
"Simcoe County CAS receives receives $73 a day for a child in care, but the actual costs are $89. We absorb that $16 difference. That amounts to about $2 million a year.
"Children's aid societies in the Greater Toronto Area receive $103 a day for a child in care," he noted, saying that he can't get an explanation of why there is a $30 difference.
"Since the ministry announced funding cutbacks, the Simcoe County CAS has reduced costs by more than $1.2 million.
"We've clawed back everywhere we can," Downer said. "We've frozen some salaries and reduced administration. We've cut to the bone."
For instance, he said the cost for average case in 2008-09 was $7,261, compared with a provincial average of $9,557.
Downer says the province has appointed a three-member commission to advise agencies how they can cut back. While he says the CAS board appreciates the commission's work, he views the move as: "smoke and mirrors."
"The funding shortfall has to be addressed immediately," he said. "Unless it is, Simcoe county's most vulnerable citizens will be at risk."
Simcoe North MPP Garfield Dunlop said he raised the issue in the Legislature in November and was told the government had put money into child care and that there would be no more funding
"It's evident the CAS needs money right now. You won't raise $5 million holding a bake sale. These are programs the Ontario government says the CAS must do.
"This government tells people it can do wonderful things for them. They say they will bring in all-day kindergarten. They have a $25 billion deficit, but will do it anyway.
"Yet," Dunlop added, "when it comes to the most marginalized, most disadvantaged children in the province the same government says there's not enough money to look after them. There's just one contradiction after another. This guy (Premier Dalton McGuinty) has gotta go. His government is out of touch with the public."
Dunlop said he will raise the issue again when the legislature resumes Feb 16, but he is not optimistic the government will act.
Pills for Payukotayno
January 22, 2010
Laurel Broten has responded to the suicide epidemic in Ontario's north. Instead of dealing with the
community problems, she is dispatching four mental health workers to
Payukotayno James and Hudson Bay Family Services. What is the chance that
prescription pill popping will lower the suicide rate?
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CTV Toronto
Northern CAS to get help with suicide 'epidemic'
Updated: Wed Jan. 20 2010 1:41:14 PM, The Associated Press
TORONTO — A struggling Children's Aid Society in northern Ontario will get four new mental health workers to help it deal with what's being called a suicide "epidemic" in the James Bay area.
The province's Ministry of Children and Youth Services has granted a request from Payukotayno James and Hudson Bay Family Services director Ernest Beck for the additional workers, at a price of approximately $400,000.
The four will work with the community and the Children's Aid Society office to try to come up with a way to deal with the growing problem of youth suicide.
Critics have been urging immediate action, saying children who are at risk of being left in abusive homes or contemplating suicide will have no one to turn to.
In December, Payukotayno and the Tikinagan office in Sioux Lookout got a $4.4-million lifeline after the James Bay office warned it would have to close down without more operating funds, despite a growing number of suicides.
Those funds will keep Payukotayno in operation until the end of March while the government works on a longer-term strategy.
NDP critic Gilles Bisson has been calling for a long-term plan to deal with underfunding at other Children's Aid Society offices in the north before similar crises erupt elsewhere.
Children's Aid Societies in several other areas face funding shortfalls, and are contemplating cuts to core services including abuse prevention programs and court-ordered visits to children in foster and residential care in the face of a $67-million shortfall.
Offices such as Centre Jeanne Sauve, which serves the francophone community in Kapuskasing, are also struggling, and threatening to lay off staff by February.
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