● Remember when Tennessee pulled over a couple for no good reason and then took away their children? In that one, the offense was Driving While Black. We don’t know the race of the couple in this case reported by Tennessee Lookout; but in every other respect, it’s eerily similar.
● And there was this in Washington State, as reported by the Seattle Times:
Concluding a federal lawsuit that has spanned nearly a decade, a jury found Tuesday that the Washington State Department of Children, Youth and Families wrongly removed an autistic boy from his immigrant parents’ home and awarded the family $7 million.
● Courts in New York, Texas, Arizona and at least 11 other states demand that fathers control the mothers of their children, punish fathers who don’t and, worst of all, deprive children of loving parents who have done them no harm. New York’s highest court is being asked to put a stop to what amounts to Handmaid’s Tale jurisprudence. I have a blog post about it.
● What might it look like if mandatory reporters really did become mandatory supporters? In The Imprint Sarah Winograd, co-founder of Together With Families, offers an example from Georgia. Most notable: All the necessary resources were mobilized without so much as a call to the family police agency. But it’s disturbing that the school that referred the mother to Together With Families even threatened to make such a call.
Still, as this story, also from Georgia, reminds us, it’s a hell of a lot better than what happens when the family police do get involved.
● The Colorado Legislature named a “task force” to study why children run from “residential treatment” and what could be done about it. I have a blog post about the disconnect between what the young people themselves said and the proposed solutions. The young people said they run because they want to go home. The task force said: Fence ‘em in and lock ‘em up!
● And I
have a blog post about whether this is what it’s going to take before we
ever again see basic federal data about foster care:
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| "Psst. Hey, bud. Ya wanna see an AFCARS report?" |
In this week’s edition of The Horror Stories Go in All Directions:
● From KPNX-TV, Phoenix, concerning a 14-year-old murdered after she ran from her group home:
Mesa PD records show over the past three years, police have been called at least 89 times to the group home where Emily Pike lived before she was murdered.
● From KTUL-TV, Tulsa:
A woman who started a foundation to help foster kids aging out of the system was arrested on charges of child endangerment, child abuse, and neglect.
