Child protection. Child protection The law says that a child or young person at risk of harm or neglect, as a result of a single incident or a number of ongoing incidents, must be protected. Child abuse includes: hurting or threatening to hurt a young person physically, sexually or emotionally exposing a child to the risk of significant physical, sexual or emotional harm, such as: being caught in the middle of family violence allowing people with a history of child sex offences to be in the home having care of a child while under the influence of alcohol or other drugs having care of a child whilst living with an untreated mental health issue neglecting a child, for example: not giving a child enough food, clothing, shelter or necessary medical care failing to provide proper supervision.
Was this helpful? How could we make this page better? Newspaper accounts of child deaths often suggested that A. With so many serious and intractable issues to deal with in family court, the Bronx Defenders found it particularly infuriating when A. The record was so spare. There was nothing to show that this mother—they wanted me to make all these inferences!
And I struggled and struggled and struggled. It had become rare for a child to be removed solely because the parent was smoking marijuana, but if kids had already been removed and the parent tested positive it was often a reason not to give them back. This seemed to Mendenhall so grossly unreasonable that she would sometimes lash out at the A. How can it be? Blaming parents for the side effects of poverty was bad enough, but to censure them for doing what middle-class people did all the time without any fear of prosecution was too much.
There was no leeway, no give, no mercy at all, if you were poor. She knew that A. But there was a certain personality type that inclined toward that kind of work. My dog was sixteen and I kept her alive till she was seventeen—doing O. Because A. At first, it was hard.
I cried about my hair. Why would you want me to feel like nothing? I already feel like nothing. But then she grew close to a couple of the counsellors; she felt they understood her and gave her good advice. They believed in her and thought she should get her children back. Little by little, she started to unfurl. I also think that she suffered from some form of depression, which was taboo for her. Tiana was being fed through a tube into her stomach now, and Mercedes studied up on it so she would know how to take care of her.
Mendenhall argued that the only remaining barrier to reuniting the family was housing, and Sherman charged the foster-care agency with arranging it. The agency resisted—it believed that the children should be adopted by their foster mother—but she ordered it to comply. Now it was only a matter of finding an apartment: after three and a half years, it would be just a few more months before the family could be together.
We ate, we laughed, we talked. My aunt has one of them big dummies with no arms that they have in defense classes, and Camron was fighting that—they put boxing gloves on him and he went at it and had a ball. He was play-wrestling with my brother. Tiana, she was playing with toys with my cousin. Leslie was eating, talking to my mother, talking to my aunt.
Then, two days later, the agency told Mercedes that Camron had said that during the Thanksgiving dinner she had taken him into the bathroom and punched him in the stomach while her mother held his shirt up.
More accusations followed: Leslie said that she had been abused, sexually and otherwise, by Mercedes and other people in her family.
But as soon as one was closed another accusation would be made, and no reunion could take place before the new report was properly looked into.
It seemed that nobody really believed that Mercedes had abused her children, because she was never arrested, and during this period she gave birth to a fourth child, Amaya, and Amaya was never taken away. But the reports continued. But the foster mother reported that Mercedes sexually abused the children during those supervised visits. Reports started coming in against the foster mother and her husband, too.
There were several calls to the hotline from mandated reporters—people, such as teachers and social workers, who were obligated to report suspected abuse—accusing her or her husband of mistreating the children. When Sherman did hear, she berated the agency for not telling her sooner, but she decided that since it still seemed likely that the children would be reunited with their mother, they should not be moved to yet another home.
Even the agency was worried about what was going on. The agency itself had called in one of the maltreatment cases against the foster mother; it was concerned about her habit of filming the children when they were having tantrums.
It also felt that her husband was not behaving enough like a father. When the caseworker visited, he would be in another room. Mercedes had started missing visits again and turning up late, and after several warnings Judge Sherman became so concerned about the traumatizing effect her behavior was having on the children that she cancelled visits altogether. Mercedes was so far gone in despair by that point that she almost gave up.
I get there. Lord knows, I love my kids. Everything they threw at me, I dealt with. After I busted my ass to make sure I got where I needed to be, they just snatched it back like it was nothing. The children grew worse and worse. Camron threatened to kill his foster mother and her husband, and the month after the Thanksgiving dinner, when he was six, he ended up in a psychiatric hospital. Later on, he started threatening to kill himself, too, and he was hospitalized again and again. When Camron was nine and in a psychiatric ward, his foster mother took the girls and went on a vacation that she had planned, so he was all alone.
She called the next day, and the next, but then the foster-care agency told the hospital that she was not allowed to have contact and her calls were blocked.
My attitude is running through them. I gave my mother hell. I will get it, because I been there. These are my kids. She was living with Amaya in a shelter in Manhattan, near the F. The point of no return was getting closer. The agency asked the court to place Camron in a long-term residential treatment facility. When the foster agency gave her a stack of medication-consent forms to sign, she first Googled each of the drugs they wanted to give him.
There were four or five of them, and she looked up the side effects, the tics he might develop if he missed a dose, the withdrawal symptoms he would go through if he stopped taking them. Some of the antipsychotics sounded scary to her, especially for a kid as young as Camron. That give boys breasts. They wanted to do the Ritalin for the A.
The closer I can get to the organic stuff, I try to. He just sit there, his mouth open. For Mercedes, spring was the hardest time of year, because of birthdays. She would spend her food stamps on a birthday cake and they would celebrate together. I just lost the will to live.
I refuse to lose her. I fucking refuse to. Thus, physical violence is one of the main reasons CPS can take your child away. If sexual abuse has occurred between a child and someone else in the home, at least one person will have to be removed.
In some cases, both the offender and the victim may be removed from the home. Children who have been the victim of sex trafficking or other human trafficking can also be taken into custody immediately. In some circumstances, drug use can also be one of the reasons CPS can take your child.
In some states, marijuana does not count. In other states, it has to be proven that the drugs were used in the presence of the child. Allowing your child to remain on the premises where methamphetamine was manufactured can also result in a removal since that is specifically listed in Texas law.
Many people confuse poverty for abuse, but poverty is not abuse. In order to be abusive, it must be intentional. However, extreme neglect is one of the more common reasons why CPS can take your child. Extreme neglect includes things like:. Extreme environmental danger is another one of the reasons CPS can take your child. This includes things like firearms and illegal drugs being left in the open, where the child can access it.
This also includes things like extreme filthiness, pest infestations, lack of sanitary facilities and more. Mild environmental danger, like computer cables on the floor, will not result in child removal. This includes allowing DHHS to remove your child from your home and place them:. Your child will be cared for until the judge or DHHS decides that the problem in your home has been resolved and your child can go home. If the judge signs a PPO that allows your child to be physically taken from your home, you will be given the name and office phone number of the caseworker and your child's location.
DHHS doesn't have to give you this information if the caseworker believes that this would cause a threat of serious harm to the child or another person. The Order must also say that a visit between you and your children must be scheduled within 7 days, unless the Judge finds a very good reason not to schedule this visit. The Court will schedule a hearing to be held within 7 to 14 days to give parents an chance to be there.
Each parent has the right to be represented by a lawyer. Even if the parents are married or live together, each parent will get their own lawyer. If you cannot afford to pay, you can ask the Court to appoint you a free lawyer. If you do not already have a lawyer when you get this, read your copy of the Petition carefully. It will include a Notice of Hearing. If this Notice does not say that the Court has appointed a lawyer for you, contact the Court immediately to ask for a lawyer.
You will meet with a "financial screener" and fill out and sign an affidavit showing the Court that you do not have enough money to hire a lawyer. If the Court agrees that you cannot afford a lawyer, it will appoint one for you. Talk to your lawyer as soon as possible to get ready for your first hearing.
There will be many court hearings throughout the whole DHHS case. The lawyer will represent you during all of the court hearings.
If the Court enters a PPO removing your child from your care, the judge will appoint a guardian ad litem GAL to represent your child's best interests. The GAL is a neutral person, meaning they are not on the parents' or DHHS' side, but find out information for the Court about your child to help the Court make decisions.
The role of the GAL is to get to know your child by meeting with them, with you, and with other people who know your child. The GAL must then give the Court a written report, stating a plan that they believe is in your child's best interests. For example, they could say that the child should return to your home or that the child should stay in foster care.
The GAL should make an updated report for every major stage of the case. You and your lawyer should review the report before every court appearance. Make sure it is accurate and covers everything. For example, if the GAL has met with the other parent and not you, that is a problem. The GAL must visit with your child within 7 days of being appointed by the Court and at least once every 3 months during the case.
This hearing is sometimes called a C-1 hearing. You must be notified of this hearing. The court may review reports and records, which could not be used in other types of court hearings. At this hearing, DHHS must prove that it is more likely than not that:. In very serious cases, DHHS will also present to the court its decision not to provide try to bring your family back together. This is called "reunification services.
Again, DHHS must prove that your child is in "immediate risk of serious harm. If the judge does not believe that there is such a risk, the PPO will end and your child must be returned to you.
But this is still only the beginning stage of your case. A few weeks later, the court will hold a case management conference. It is not a formal court hearing. It is a more informal meeting where the Judge explores if you and DHHS can make an agreement and avoid a court hearing.
Now the judge decides whether your child would be "in circumstances of jeopardy to their health or welfare" if returned to you. DHHS has the legal burden of proving this. If the judge decides that the child is in jeopardy, they will issue a Jeopardy Order. This Order describes how your child is in jeopardy while in your care and what must be done to protect them.
This can range from DHHS supervision of your family while your children remain in your care to removing your child from the home.
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