Posted on 09/19/2003 9:53:48 PM PDT by Robert Teesdale
To All:
This thread is from a discussion that began from an announcement on the Colorado chapter page. LiteKeeper properly requested we move to a thread, as it was becoming an actual discussion there.
Accordingly, here is the latest post. And the Colorado Announcements page is here, where you can review the beginnings of this discussion.
Best regards to all,
Robert Teesdale
Chairman
American Party of Colorado
www.theamericanparty.us
chairman@theamericanparty.us
--------
Patriotic American:
Personal attacks merely demonstrate, Sir, that your arguments are more emotional than rational. I am neither an idiot, a propagandist, and certainly not a skinhead.
To suggest so is both pointlessly insulting and also factually bereft. I have no patience for bigotry, prejudice, or other absurd and ridiculous conduct. And neither the Party or our officers will tolerate it, as has been made quite clear in the Party Leadership and Party Values section of our site.
You ask for examples? Case in point: My ex-wife had her visitation with our son terminated twice by the social worker assigned to our case, based solely on her order and with absolutely no hearings in any courtroom or any signed documents from any judge. In fact, there was no documentation at all - merely a verbal order given to me and to my ex-wife.
Did it have legal binding force? Strictly speaking, perhaps it did not. I cannot cite the statute that gives a social worker that constituted authority. However, what is clear is that she unmistakably represented that she possessed that authority; unmistakably exercised it; and unequivocally demanded compliance with it.
That my custody case benefited from it at the expense of my ex-wife's case, is irrelevant. It was wrong. As helpful as it was to my case, I was displeased and offended at how it played out. My research online, in courtrooms listening to Dependency and Neglect hearings, and talking to various social workers and CASAs has since demonstrated to me that the system is simply top-heavy with many of the same sort of mentalities that infect the Bureau of Alcohol Tobacco and Firearms.
One believes it has a mandate to disarm. It shoots people and burns homes to the ground at any sign of defiance or resistance. The other believes it has a mandate to remove children in the name of forcing the same sort of groveling before the State. It destroys families and permanently traumatizes children and parents both.
I won sole custody and sole decision-making for my son, permanently, in May of this year. The case number is 01-DR-1055. Feel free to look it up.
I know another family that is involved in a custody conflict. Their two children were in my home, under the care of myself and my fiancee, for approximately 30 hours each week for several months this year. Social Services twice removed the children from the father without a court order and placed them with the mother; the first time this occurred, my home ended up being where they were placed during working hours.
Their names and case number is not, bluntly, your business. Especially with your apparent attitude in this matter.
The father's supposed wrongdoing? Reporting suspected sexual abuse by the mother's boyfriend to Social Services, after being instructed to do so by the children's physician. They called it "alienation" while ignoring the disgustingly unfit conditions in the mother's crowded and filthy apartment.
Yet another father I know had a social worker leave her card on his front door. He left several messages for her, the last one stating that "I see no reason to speak with you." The social worker subsequently attempted to question his child at school without his knowledge. Fortunately, the child refused to answer questions and told the caseworker that his family life was not her business.
Result? A Dependency and Neglect was filed, and the caseworker attempted to have the child removed from his custody. The accusation? "He was uncooperative."
Note at this point that the social worker had not seen the home; had no effective interview with either the child or the parent; and was basing her attempt to harm that family upon the father's disinterest in accomodating her bureaucratic designs.
The father refused to sign their pro-forma Dependency and Neglect paperwork. I was there in the courtroom listening to the hearing. He refused to work with Social Services. He told them he would fight it with everything he had, and began to do precisely that.
End result? They withdrew the Dependency and Neglect petition and have left him and his family alone since.
This tells me - and any other objective observer - that a) the social worker had no real fear that the child was in danger; b) had no information that there was in fact anything wrong; and worst: c) was willing to sunder and sever a family merely because her ego was not stroked in a sufficiently acquiescent manner.
That is abuse of State power.
I certainly understand that your spouse is a social worker. Neither I, nor the Party, nor its officers have opposition to social workers per se. They fulfill a necessary and important function in our society.
But they must obey the rule of law. And unequivocally, to use the threat of tearing a family apart in order to force compliance with the personal political or social agenda of the caseworker, is wrong.
Sir, in the last several weeks since the Party has announced action on this issue, it has been inundated with stories from family after family from across the entire United States. They are horrifying. Many of them, no doubt, had legitimate issues that required active social services involvement. But when one reads the statistics - such as over 80% of Nebraska children released from foster care listed as "missing"; the majority of state social services failing the Federal performance levels; when a caseworker in Louisville - who I have met, and briefly worked with in my capacity as caretaker for the aforementioned two children - is indirectly responsible for the deaths of two children on her caseload and is still working without even having to undergo paid administrative leave - one begins to suspect, just perhaps, that the matter requires some attention.
The Party is not advocating hanging social services workers from lampposts. What we are demanding is an independent review board to hear and investigate complaints of malfeasance and abuse by social workers.
Do you believe that social workers are paradigms of professional responsibility? Do disagree that they should be held accountable for their conduct?
The Governor of Colorado has ordered that "government must measure its every action against one simple standard: If it harms the family, it shouldn't be done."
That is pointless rhetoric without teeth behind it.
The common thread that runs through all these disturbing and sorrowful stories we are hearing, Sir, is that they have nowhere to turn to have their story told.
Their pain is indescribable. Their terror and sorrow are beyond description. They are terribly, terribly alone.
The Party intends to give them a voice. And will do so.
My very best regards, Sir -
Robert Teesdale
Chairman
American Party of Colorado
chairman@theamericanparty.us
Hello there good sir.
I am a Canadian and have see the abuses of CPS/CAS workers here... I was raised as a child of the system and then went on to have a child that went up for adoption through no fault of my own. In the midst of that case they used my past as a child OF THEIR own failed system.. (I had a foster-mother that was charged and pled guilty to sexual exploitation of a minor.) since then they have tried to prove a pattern of abuse, which incedentally I have never done nor will I ever do. Then years later i moved to a place up here where a friend of mine had two children, and she was told (Based on my CAS record from YEARS BEFORE) that I would not be allowed to be around her kids.. No reason, no direct accusation at all, and a breach in confidentiality. Then at the first meeting with this worker, she only threw past things at me.. NOTHING new. And at the end of the interview asked me if I thought that the CAS did a better job than my mother could have.. If you have been following me thus far you would agree that its not possible.. Subsequently she used me as a tool to apprehend her kids. Went to the kid’s schools and took the kids. Then showed up to my friend’s house with TWO police officers, and NO warrant. That didn’t come until 4-5 days later. I am pretty sure that the proper protocol even in Canada is that you need a warrant.. The unfortunate thing is that when you look at the Family and Children’s Services act, it actually allows for kids to be taken WITHOUT a warrant.. As well.. The CAS here usually takes children first and then asks questions later. So evidently.. Even here in Canada there is a HUGE abuse of power... I live in Ontario, and it is the ONLY province in Canada that does NOT have an Ombudsman to oversee ALL CAS cases.. And though some would argue that there is one.. The problem is that ONLY the kids can request them to investigate.. Not the parents.. So how then does an infant or a young child that doesn’t understand what’s going on in the first place ask for a review? The Obvious answer?? They Can’t.. So then we are back at misuse of power and injustice.. Need I say more?
I do not believe that every worker is bad.. I just think that the ones who do in fact abuse their power (in any way) should no longer be permitted to work in the field. Instead of destroying families they need to be working to help fix the problems that got them involved in the first place. PROPERLY...Not half assed either.. Most people HATE the CPS/CAS so it makes it harder.. But that is built on the mistrust that has been bred for years by such abuses..
In conclusion, whether its the US, Canada, UK or anywhere else.. There is some major work that needs to be done in the field of Social Services within the system to rectify the mistakes that have occurred to ensure that they are not repeated time and time again..
May this find you all well, and in peace..
Aiden Cade
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