About ten years ago, my elder daughter picked up her son from his junior high school and headed home. In the car with them was my daughter’s infant, swaddled within the confines of a federal- and state-mandated and approved infant car seat. A stop at the pharmacy was necessary and the infant was fast asleep in the relative security of her car seat.
My daughter parked the car, leaving strict instructions with the twelve-year-old to stay in the car, doors locked, and finish his homework. He was seated next to his sister (in her rear-facing car seat) so he could see every move the baby made. Confident in her son’s ability, my daughter hurried into the pharmacy.
During the few minutes my daughter was inside, a professional busybody (PBB) noticed the infant and took immediate action. Completely ignoring the presence of a twelve-year-old boy in the vehicle beside his sleeping sister, this PBB haughtily stood beside the vehicle and used her cell phone to dial DHS (Department of Human Services) or CPS (Child Protective Services) or whatever it’s called in her state. (Are there actually people who keep CPS on speed-dial?!)
From the moment my daughter emerged from the pharmacy, the PBB verbally accosted her, intent on making a scene. PBB railed at my daughter for leaving an infant “unattended” in a vehicle. PBB went on to inform my daughter that the proper agency had been notified and agents were on their way to remedy the dangerous situation.
My daughter’s initial response was to explain the infant was not alone. PBB answered, an eight-or-nine-year-old isn’t “old enough” to care for a baby. With this, my daughter realized she wasn’t dealing with a rational individual and she prepared to drive away. But the PBB would have none of it; she threatened my daughter against leaving before CPS agents arrived.
Thankfully, my daughter is a wise woman. Even though PBB recorded the car license plate, my daughter took her family home. Whether there was a follow-up phone call from CPS, I can’t remember, but the whole affair was troubling.
Over the years, I have seen children yanked from good homes on far too many occasions. Back in January, I posted about an Arkansas family whose seven children were taken from the home (supposedly for what was to be only a 72-hour check). These children are still not restored to their parents and home … but no formal charges have been raised.
I have also witnessed parents being bullied and demeaned, cowed by fear into complying with whatever demands the CPS authorities dictate. The threat is always, you do what we say or we’ll remove your children from your home. As the CPS remains veiled from public view and they rely on constraints of “confidentiality,” these agencies are conveniently shielded from scrutiny.
Children with health issues are especially vulnerable. Teenager Justina Pelletier experienced a 16-month separation from her family because CPS authorities (and medical personnel) disagreed with the parents about both diagnosis and treatment. A much younger child in California suffering with a heart condition was removed from his parents’ custody, again due to disagreements over treatment.
A year ago, National Review author Melissa Moschella wrote about another family challenged by a Legal Kidnapping. More recently, twins were removed and the issue appears to have been the family’s choice of home birth, although the twins were delivered safely and without complications, as on-site paramedics confirmed.
It seems to me the incidence of CPS/DHS/DCF interventions is increasing almost beyond comprehension! What troubles me most is parents are rarely tried and convicted of crimes – but their children are abruptly removed from homes (sometimes with a mass show of law enforcement and peripheral agency presence) – without so much as a simple explanation! There is no due process, and if it suits an agenda, these authorities seem ready and willing to utilize deception.
In such cases, children are often traumatized and confused. No one should dare claim this is “in the best interests of the children” as members of these agencies often suggest, cloaking their seizure actions with the veneer of nobility.
Author Carlos Morales is a whistleblower who documents, in a book titled Legally Kidnapped, how CPS wreaks havoc with their unwarranted intrusions into families. Based on his experience as a CPS operative, Morales tells a tale of horrendous injustices done in the name of “child protection.”
In my view, as long as DHS/CPS/DCF continue their mission of search-and-destroy, they are NOT a friend of the family. Their intimidating practices – and the intrusiveness of PBBs who abet their intimidation – will gain power for their agencies while at the same time doing significant damage to the children they say they want to “help.”
I’m reminded of a familiar Reaganism about the nine most terrifying words in the English language: I’m from the government and I’m here to help. If you answer the door and someone makes that claim, protect your own children by closing the door as quickly as possible! Then call a highly-qualified bada$$ attorney.
I think children are taught to use CPS as a threat against parents. I hear it often when kids don’t get something they want. It has become just a part of our culture which is why so many accept it.
Right you are. I have seen this very thing happen with my friends. In the end, their teenage daughter (who made a frivolous accusation & later admitted it was untrue) was removed from the home. Her parents and older brother were shattered but the damage could not be undone.
Thanks for reading and for your comment!
True story, with one minor correction: our son was 14 years old, and our daughter 18 months old at the time. Busybody strikes me as far too kind a word. This person claimed to be a state employee while never showing identification, shouted at me, demanded to know my son’s age. Despite being told he was 14, she went on to file a false report stating he was “7 or 8 years old.” Filing a false report (AKA lying to the government) is a criminal offense, but she was never prosecuted for her material misstatement of fact. Apparently one can lie with impunity when the taxpayers pay your salary. She was however visibly pregnant. Add to that all the aggrieved self-righteousness that goes along with professional status in the “helping professions” and her aging burgundy Mercury SUV, and I think my skinny blond self returning to my children in a late model BMW — something perfectly legal at their ages — just sent her over the edge.
There most certainly was follow-up: a doorstep visit (at which we were thankfully absent), a number of phone calls, and boilerplate forms, on which they had white-out covering the names of another family, which we would clearly read. We were able to stop their illicit curiosity about our private family choices by faxing them copies of our children’s birth certificates and making quite clear in our communications (to the State Director of that agency) that their employee was out of line and we would press for her prosecution if they didn’t clear this up immediately. Stressful and intrusive as it was, we were fortunate to know the law and aggressively defend against their meddling with OUR children.
Most people have never had a personal encounter with CPS, and view them as some sort of crusaders helping children. They could not be more wrong. I strongly encourage good people to seek the facts and learn how these agencies PREY on CHILDREN. A good place to start is
https://amiablyme.wordpress.com/
and the 1994 documentary Conspiracy of Silence:
https://www.youtube-nocookie.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=vBSIDQt5Dwc
Credible sources on such facts are frustratingly difficult to find, and cover-ups by state agencies are routine. Why? Sen. Nancy Schaeffer’s death under mysterious circumstances after investigating abuses in Georgia CPS suggests that powerful people are unwilling for these matters to receive scrutiny.
I urge everyone, and in particular new parents, to think very carefully about your interactions with government at any level. You have very little to gain, and possibly everything to lose, in registering your child’s birth with the government. You register “your” vehicle and “your” house with the government but for what? Continual fees and taxation, controls and if you don’t comply with all those, confiscation? What precisely are you doing in applying for a birth certificate?
http://deanclifford.info/media/seminars/
http://sedm.org/Forms/09-Procs/PathToFreedom.pdf
You have added a vital store of information here! Thank you! Thanks for your personal story and the links. We’d all be wise to guard ourselves and our families against such encroachments and the notion our children (and we) belong to the State.