Posted on 06/30/2003 10:11:00 AM PDT by hsmomx3
President Bush, yesterday, signed the Keeping Children and Families Safe Act of 2003 (S.342). The new law will help protect innocent families against overly intrusive social workers. "Over the years thousands of homeschool families have been victimized by social workers operating on nothing more than a tip from an unknown stranger," said Michael Farris, General Counsel for Home School Legal Defense Association (HSLDA). Michael Farris joined President Bush along with Health and Human Services Secretary Tommy Thompson, Senator Judd Gregg, House Majority Leader Tom Delay and Representatives Boehner and Hoekstra for the signing ceremony, which was held in the Oval Office.
The Keeping Children and Families Safe Act reauthorizes and modifies the Child Abuse Prevention and Treatment Act (CAPTA) and related law. These programs generally support activities to prevent and treat child abuse and family violence. In his statement the signing President Bush said, "I commend Congress for passing the Keeping Children and Families Safe Act of 2003 and am pleased to sign it into law. The Act will allow us to strengthen state and community-based programs that prevent child abuse and family violence and treat victims."
HSLDA believes those who abuse children should be severely punished. Yet in its 20-year history, HSLDA has handled thousands of cases arising from anonymous tips made to social workers concerning the conduct of homeschooling families. These tips, often supplied by those holding a grudge against home education, are often investigated aggressively. Social workers frequently demand to inspect the bodies of homeschool children or to interview very young children outside the presence of their parents.
"Such aggressiveness, in a system which presumes guilt, can result in needless pain and anxiety for families," said Farris.
HSLDA championed three new changes in S.342. First, social workers will now be required to tell families the nature of the accusations against them at their first contact. With this information, families will be able to legally challenge the social worker and demand that a warrant be obtained before interviews or investigations are conducted. Since warrants can only issue from a judge on the basis of probable cause, overzealous cases can now be efficiently weeded out.
The second provision will require that social workers be provided with additional training in the constitutional rights of citizens. Social workers will be advised that the Constitution protects citizens against unreasonable searches and seizures. The third pertains to citizen advisory boards which can hear complaints against overly aggressive social workers.
In November 2001, HSLDA Senior Counsel, Chris Klicka, testified before the House Committee on Education and the Workforce Subcommittee on Select Education about this legislation. His testimony was influential in convincing the subcommittee to add these significant amendments to the bill.
"With these provisions clearly showing the intent of Congress, families in all 50 states will have more protection from overly aggressive social workers," said Klicka. "This is a breakthrough for parents' rights and will enable HSLDA to be better armed to defend members families."
HSLDA will be working with both the federal Health and Human Services Department and with the state legislatures to implement and codify this new language.
Only a baby step. IMHO, CPS should get out of the investigation business and only provide for placement and care of children who are truly abused. Let the local police take care of investigations. If abuse is indicated, the parents should be charged with criminal charges and prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law.
As it stands now, CPS too often files civil charges that the parent cannot afford to defend themselves against. This is a blatent violation of Constitutional Rights as you can be falsely and anonymously accused and your children can be seized without probable cause. You are denied a jury trial, the right to face your accusers and the right to provide witnesses on your behalf. You are assumed guilty, the burden of proof is on you, hearsay is admissable in court and the caseworkers have no qualms about lying in court. More info on this can be found at FightCPS.com
This is barely better than nothing. Giving "additional training" to government-funded crusaders is hardly going to protect parents. As long as these people have immunity from most lawsuits related to their abuse of parents' rights, what's the downside for them?
If the legislators were serious about reforming this system, they would define and criminalize child abuse, allow professional investigators, otherwise known as police to do the investigation, and strip away the immunity from social workers who try to exorcise their own emotional demons by illegally ripping families apart.
In one case, we tried to work within the CPS system to fight the allegation and keep the kids out of CPS clutches. We failed utterly. The kangaroo courts ensure that everything is stacked against the innocent parents. In that case the kids ended up spending 3 years out of the home in foster care when, in the end, CPS finally admitted that the charges were unsubstantiated and released the now every damaged children back to their parents. Lesson learned, you can't work within the CPS system - you will lose.
In the second case, having learned that important lesson, we kept the children away from CPS (no manufacturing of evidence or fishing expeditions by caseworkers and "therapists"), immediately brought in a competent attorney willing to go to the mattress with CPS, and we pushed everything into criminal court as soon as possible. The finding of innocence was pretty much a foregone conclusion (gosh, those darned rights sure do get in the way of an overzealous or crooked caseworker) and the kids were never touched by CPS.
On a sidenote, we went back to sue the caseworker, her supervisor, and everyone else involved for violating the family's rights and when we attempted to obtain the court transcripts AND audio recordings wherein the caseworker and her supervisor openly committed perjury numerous times in court, the tapes were blank and the transcripts were lost. The trial was in 2002 and the stuff was gone within months. The system is corrupt through and through and families are daily being destroyed by it.
Not the roll of the Federal Government, but your sentiment is correct. In reality, this has mostly been done in various state laws and court precedents the problem is that most people are ignorant of those laws and precedents as are their attorneys. A good attorney will force CPS to file an actual criminal charge and then push the issue over to law enforcement who usually have to follow the laws and protect the rights of the falsely accused. I'm not saying that there isn't corrupt police who will make things worse, but I do know that your chances are better once you get things out of the unfair CPS system and into the criminal courts.
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