Posted on 05/22/2008 10:46:31 AM PDT by ElkGroveDan
According to the following article, the underage girl you are speaking of is NOT pregnant:
Lawyer: FLDS girl isn’t pregnant
By Brooke Adams
The Salt Lake Tribune
Salt Lake Tribune
Article Last Updated:05/22/2008 04:25:24 AM MDT
SAN ANGELO, Texas - A lawyer for a 14-year-old FLDS girl argues her client - listed by the state of Texas as an underage mother - is not pregnant and does not have children.
Attorney Andrea Sloan with the Texas Advocacy Project said the girl has taken a pregnancy test to confirm she is not pregnant.
Texas child welfare officials originally claimed 31 girls from the YFZ Ranch between the ages 14 to 17 were either pregnant, have children or both.
So far, however, they have acknowledged that 11 girls are actually adults. At least six more are likely to get that designation today, when status hearings resume at the Tom Green County Courthouse.
Sloan said her client is the youngest girl included on the list. While a judge told her the girl’s status was not relevant to Wednesday’s hearing, Sloan said the record should be corrected because Texas Child Protective Services has used the girl to mislead the public. Doing so would improve the mother’s chances of regaining custody of the girl, Sloan added.
District Judge John Specia told Sloan to work with CPS to get the girl’s status clarified.
In afternoon hearings, state attorneys acknowledged another three mothers are adults: Barbara Joy Jessop, Lenora Jeffs and Janet Jeffs Jessop.
Judge Jay Weatherby ordered CPS to quickly move Barbara Joy Jessop and her 8-month-old daughter quickly to a family shelter where she will be allowed more freedom than the facility where they are currently housed.
Attorneys for parents and children continued Wednesday to seek modifications to the boilerplate service plans the state has set up, arguing neither the claims nor remedies fit their clients.
And the requirements may set parents up for failure, attorneys said, as they crisscross Texas trying to hold down jobs and visit their children.
Parents’ suggestions for modifying the plans have been rejected by the judges.
Caseworkers acknowledged they had little to do with crafting the one-size-fits-all plan, which they said was put together by “culturally sensitive” experts.
A CPS spokeswoman told The Salt Lake Tribune that psychologists and psychiatrists from across the country helped write the plan, but said specific names of those individuals weren’t available. The plan calls for the parents to undergo psychological evaluations, take parenting classes, get jobs and live independently.
Many FLDS women have already moved, gotten jobs and begun lining up evaluations in hopes they will be accepted by CPS.
Sarah Draper, 37, has moved to Abilene, Texas, and taken a job as a registered nurse to be near her four children, who are in Henderson Home.
“I feel very blessed,” she said, praising the facility and its activities, which have included trips to the zoo and a local fire department.
Inexplicably, caregivers there told Draper on Monday her children would no longer be allowed to participate in off-campus excursions. No one could explain why or who ordered the change.
“And frankly, I would rather have my children going to the fire department than sitting in front of television all day,” she said.
brooke@sltrib.com
Is that a rhetorical question??????????
If you really want to know, why not search my posts?????????? :-)
My take is that the fathers would seem to be unfit and an immediate physical threat to the children but the same can’t necessarily be said about the mothers, especially with respect to the younger children. If the fathers are out of the picture I am unclear on the threat to the children from the mothers.
I told everyone that I could not see how there was enough evidence to take the actions that the Texas authorities took, and that they jeopardized the whole case by over stepping the bounds of their authority.
Stupid is as stupid does.
Before they are deprogrammed and want a normal existance.
Yep, along w/ me and anyone else who even questioned 'the authorities'.
Society's training in 'democracy' is going quite well by that standard.
If the mother’s were raped and it was allowed by the parents then, yes, they should all be taken away until it’s investigated. A short time away from the parents is in the best interest of the children.
I believe that the “child protectors” are totally out of control and are capable of any fiction to make their case.
I'm not claiming to be unusually knowledgeable about this case and haven't followed it closely.
But I think it's very possible that the mothers were under undue influence/coercion from the men, and with the males out of the picture the threat evaporates.
The actions weren't based on evidence you saw, the actions (warrant) was based on what the Texas Rangers saw and documented in their affidavit. Hindsight games are fun, but what options where there based on what the Texas Rangers reported? Should we have left the children in that situation while more investigations where going on? What if this wasn't a 'religious' compound, what if it was just some creep who lives down the street? Would we be so concerned about his right(sic) to marry a 14 year old then?
Provided that there is some real proof of that allegation.
This reminds me of when the court ruled that Elian Gonzalez had a right to a hearing on where he wanted to live. Since they did not order Clinton to leave him alone thugs were dispatched to do Castro’s bidding at his expense. Here the court made a statement of principle but did not demand that the kids be returned. A day late and a dollar short.
“The appellate court ruled the chaotic hearing held last month did not demonstrate the children were in any immediate danger, the only measure of taking children from their homes without court proceedings.”
Precisely. That’s what I’ve been trying to explain to freepers. The only ones even arguably in danger of underage marriage were girls at or near puberty. And, even then, not all FLDS girls choose to marry before they are of age. I don’t think they force the girls. One can certainly argue persuasively that the young girls are not in an position to make a decision — that is the whole idea behind “age of consent laws” — but the “rape” that has occurred there, as I understand it is purely statutory. It is not the forcible rape of little kids that some freepers have been shouting about, with no substantiation.
There was absolutely no excuse for taking the little ones or the boys.
Sanity finally returns.
Does this mean we don’t get our 21st Century Salem Witch Trials?
The child protectors think it takes a village. They abhor real famalies thinking the state like that of the Soviet Union, can do a better job.
The really sad thing is that many of us thought that some serious crimes did occur at the farm. This verdict is precisely what we were afraid of when we slammed the CPS and the local authorities for their actions.
If you don’t do it right, you stand to jeopardize the whole case. And here we are.
Pie, meet face. Hope you enjoy it folks.
Elian?
How is Elian doing these days?
If you are so concerned, go on down to your nearest public housing project and take down the ages of all the mothers present. I still have not heard of them going there and taking all the underage mothers out of those conditions.
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