San Diego County Grand Jury Cites Further CPS Misconduct
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Despite more than two decades of repeated investigations by the San Diego County Grand Jury of misconduct by the County of San Diego Child Welfare Services (aka San Diego CPS) agency, the abusive agency and its illegal and harmful actions continue unabated. Safeguards to fix errors and abuses have been perverted into meaningless mechanisms to cover up wrong-doing and insulate the County of San Diego and individual social workers from criminal prosecution and civil litigation. The agency is unrelenting in its refusals to correct its own problems, and continues to run roughshod over the law, civil rights, and best interests of children. The County of San Diego and its derelict Board of Supervisors also avoid taking necessary actions to correct the problems.
Two reports have been released in 2008 and 2009 that indicate how San Diego CPS frequently:
- Removes children from homes without revealing the reasons
- Fails to document reasons for CPS actions in writing
- Fails to provide written communications and instructions to parents
- Claims to courts and others to have communicated in writing to parents, but no such evidence of this alleged written communication could be found by the Grand Jury. This implies that CPS social workers lied and/or perjured. This is consistent with past findings in previous Grand Jury investigations that CPS social workers routinely lie and perjure to the detriment of children and parents.
- Fails to objectively and competently investigate complaints regarding CPS and its social workers after children are removed from homes.
- Uses the removal of children from homes on inadequately investigated allegations as an excuse to stop further investigation.
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CPS Refuses to Communicate Effectively with Parents
CPS social workers avoid using written communications with parents. It appears part of the purpose for this is to leave parents uncertain of what is happening and stymied in their responses because they lack critical information that should have been provided to them.
(from San Diego County Grand Jury 2008 Report: NOTIFICATION AND TRAINING IN CHILD PROTECTIVE SERVICES, page 2)
The complainants were a small group of individuals from all areas of the County and from different ethnic and economic groups. Their common ground was that they all had been accused of child neglect or abuse resulting in children having been temporarily removed from their custody. A common complaint was, at the time the children were removed, that they did not receive verbal or written notification specifying the reasons for removal. There was also an indication that the parents or custodians experienced ongoing difficulties in communicating with the social workers assigned to their cases and more difficulty in receiving written notices updating the status of those cases.
…
Fact: Four of the six complainants were not told why their children were being removed nor were they notified in writing.
Finding: Of the cases we examined, the Grand Jury found no record of written notification at the time of removal.
CPS Refuses to Record Interviews and Use Written Communications
It is unlikely that the following behavioral patterns apply to all CPS workers. In a system of hundreds of employees it seems likely there must be a few “good apples”. Yet they appear to be rare. If a citizen of San Diego believes the stereotype of CPS social workers as duplicitous abusive liars who will harm children and parents and do so without reasonable care for facts and without available means of recourse, it is with good reason.
CPS social workers do not record interviews and refuse to allow recordings of interviews when people request to make such recordings. Based upon these Grand Jury reports, statements from parents who have been abused by CPS, and documents in CPS case files, it appears that this conduct occurs for the following reasons:
- Social workers do not want to be held accountable for getting facts straight, so they are intent on covering up original physical evidence except for that evidence that they can control and manipulate as they see fit.
- Social workers want to be able to bias reports and findings in any way they see fit, the facts be damned. They do this via biased choice of words, false implications and statements that would leave an objective reader of a report believing things that are not true, intentional or seriously negligent false statements, and distortions and fabrications of statements of others. They omit mention of their own lying and manipulations and abusive conduct. Once they have “documented” a case with inaccurate, biased, and defamatory misinformation in their self-serving and biased manner, then there is no original source material upon which abused families can rely upon to correct the systematic misinformation promulgated by CPS. This then functions as an excuse for why they will not reopen a biased and seriously flawed investigation.
- Social workers do not want recordings of their verbal statements because they frequently lie, make inflammatory remarks, exhibit blatant disregard for the law and safety of children, show evident sexism and bias particularly against fathers and men, and commit psychological abuses and use unwarranted threats against parents to manipulate and control them.
- Social workers want to be able to manipulate 3rd parties contacted during the course of investigations to produce false “evidence” to be used against parents whom they have already decided with prejudice to target for deprivation of civil rights, suspension or termination of custody, or other unjustifiable actions.
- Social workers and the County of San Diego want to avoid prosecution and civil litigation for violation of the US Constitution and Federal Civil Rights legislation. If proper documentation of their actions and words and those of others were kept, it would significantly assist families abused by CPS in criminal prosecutions and law suits against individual social workers and the County of San Diego.
CPS Has No Effective Oversight
There is no effective oversight of San Diego CPS and its social workers. Instead, there is refusal to perform objective and competent investigations of their abuses and errors. The agency’s supposed complaint investigation system, the “CPS Ombudsman” office, simply functions as a rubber stamp and biased self-defense mechanism covering up abuses and errors by CPS and abusive social workers.
As the Grand Jury stated:
(from San Diego County Grand Jury 2009 Report: ENHANCING OMBUDSMAN’S RESPONSIBILITIES WITHIN CHILD WELFARE SERVICES, page 2)
When errors are made in CWS operations they are often highly visible and can have a devastating impact on the children and families involved. In addition, they have a negative impact on the overall credibility of the department. Where independent review exists it gives people confidence that no cover-ups are occurring. When there is no investigation, objectivity can be called into question. Objective investigations give the public confidence no cover-up exists.
Based on recent newspaper articles and citizen complaints, there is a public perception that CWS’s internal investigations are biased in favor of the agency. Interviews with CWS managers revealed that internal investigations are limited to a review of the case file and no additional field investigation occurs. When specifically asked if they sought out the truth, managers indicated that once a child was no longer in the home, active investigation of the initial circumstances of a case ceases.
San Diego CPS: 20+ Years of Abusive and Illegal Conduct
The 2008 and 2009 reports are rehashes in many ways. Citizens continue to file the same types of complaints against this agency year after year because the County of San Diego refuses to fix the problems.
(from San Diego County Grand Jury 2009 Report: ENHANCING OMBUDSMAN’S RESPONSIBILITIES WITHIN CHILD WELFARE SERVICES, pages 1-2)
In response to concerns regarding CWS processes in the removal of children that developed while reviewing previous Grand Jury investigations, the 2008/2009 Grand Jury undertook a study of the history of Grand Jury investigations as they related to CWS for the past 20 years. It has been noted that Grand Jury reports during this period discussed similar complaints and made recommendations to CWS about its initial contacts with families. Parents complain that these meetings are fraught with difficulties. They think that initial reports are not always accurate. To many parents, both the initial determination and the process leading to it are a source of confusion and misunderstanding. The initial determination is important because it serves as the foundation for Court proceedings, including placement of the child. In general, parents are not aware of any means to challenge the initial determination until a Court hearing.
…
The Grand Jury undertook this investigation after Jurors noted that CWS is the current recipient of complaints of a similar nature to those covered in previous Grand Jury reports. The current Grand Jury investigation indicates that decisions made by CWS personnel are not subjected to significant oversight although they are subject to limited internal review of the case file. Additionally, employees of CWS testified that they “have the ability to consciously manipulate the Risk Assessment tool(1) for the purpose of supporting any decision [they] …. make.”
1. Risk Assessment is a form that is used by CWS workers to assess the level of risk and may support the removal of the child.
Complicit Involvement of Rady Children’s Hospital and Chadwick Center
The staff of Rady Children’s Hospital and Chadwick Center have been involved in many abuses against families and children. The staff of these organizations appear to lack objectivity and allow themselves to be entangled in CPS misconduct for their own financial gain.
Instead of helping children, they aim to help CPS. These are two very different goals. The first is to help children recover from any trauma that may have occurred, the second is often to traumatize children and brainwash them to assist CPS is generating evidence falsely to be used against CPS’s chosen targets, even if their targets did nothing illegal.
CPS and law enforcement feed incomplete and biased information to therapists who are supposed to be helping children. Often truly abusive parents have engaged in brainwashing tactics on their children, also, hoping to help build false accusations against the other parent. These behaviors all result in the focus of the therapy being on building a CPS or criminal case often against a parent who did not do anything illegal, not discovering what really happened or did not happen and helping the children deal with it. Accused parents are not provided the opportunity to talk with these therapists or to find out what is being discussed, even though it may be substantially inaccurate.
Beyond the ability of accusing parents to brainwash their children directly, accusing parents or other accusers often have their words and statements fed to the therapists via CPS and law enforcement. The result is that these therapists lack objectivity and full information about a case. They are taught to regard the accused parent as a criminal and to speak about him or her in front of the children as such. They will consequently cause more damage to the children involved. They push children to make false statements and develop unfounded fears, causing what may turn into a lifetime of trauma for these children. The trauma may not be from anything done by the accused parent or caregiver, but rather from the psychological assault on the children committed by the therapists at the behest of CPS and law enforcement.
(from San Diego County Grand Jury Report of 1993-1994: Dale Akiki Case and Prosecutorial Misconduct)
The Grand Jury was able to determine that therapy frequently is not used to its fullest treatment benefit, but is an adjunct to develop evidence for the prosecution of child molestation cases. The many issues involving conflict of interest, hidden agendas and misguided treatment by therapists are addressed in this report as well as the dispelling of the myth that satanic ritual abuse is prevalent in child molestation cases in San Diego County.
…
The Grand Jury’s investigation of the prosecution procedures started with the role of the investigators who respond to the first report of molestation, and the relation to the social worker who participated in the first response. The Jury then went on to review the operation at Children’s Hospital with regard to the initial evidentiary interview and physical examination.
The Grand Jury spent a considerable amount of time investigating the role of therapists in dealing with children, and a review of the beliefs in ritual abuse and satanic ritual abuse. Many mental health workers were interviewed and testified before the Grand Jury. These included Marriage, Family and Child Counselors (MFCC), Licensed Clinical Social Workers (LCSW), clinical psychologists and psychiatrists.
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Therapists are utilized by the court and the District Attorney’s office to provide healing and treatment for young children who are victims of sexual molestation. In some cases these therapists have been used to encourage disclosures by children of events or perceived events relating to sexual molestation cases. The Grand Jury finds that “The San Diego Model” needs improvement when compared with the Orange County CAST model.
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The question of whether the prosecuting deputy district attorney had produced enough evidence to initiate proceedings against Dale Akiki is one that concerned this Grand Jury. This was especially true since there was almost no physical evidence, and in most instances disclosure by the children came only after intense therapy.
The Grand Jury has learned that the original prosecutor in the case had concerns about the believability, credibility and reliability of the children’s testimony. She lacked confidence in proceeding with the case because she believed that the children’s testimony was neither accurate nor consistent.
Rady, Chadwick, CPS, Police, and DA Dishonestly Tow Government Line
Many of the mental health professionals working with allegedly abused children in San Diego County are employees of Rady Children’s Hospital and its affiliate Chadwick Center. These so-called professionals are not objective parties. They have a vested interest in serving the goals of CPS and the government before the goals of helping children. Children do not pay for their services, the government does. They know who their customers are, and if their customers want them to harm children then they will gladly do it for a fee.
CPS social workers are often in frequent contact with these therapists. As the Grand Jury found, when a therapist does not agree with the assessment of a CPS social worker, the therapist stands to lose business from this disagreement. Consequently, these therapists align with CPS because it is in their financial interests to do so. This is yet another problematic practice that results in wrongful accusations, abusive child custody changes, wrongful prosecutions, and indeed in some case in the covering up of actual child abuse by the actual abusive parent because the CPS social worker in charge of the case refuses to act in an objective and responsible fashion.
When therapists and doctors from Chadwick and Rady are not sure what is going on in a family, they will allow police and CPS to influence them with intentional misinformation. As mandatory child abuse reporters, if these therapists and doctors are informed of something that could be abuse or neglect and fail to report it, they could be disciplined or prosecuted. Often they are not sure what is happening because they have incomplete information, so it is understandable that they may fail to file a report.
But when they realize they may have failed to follow the mandatory child abuse reporting laws and there are signs of real abuse and neglect that had been pointed out to them, they will turn on the party that may push for disciplinary action against them. It is a game of kill the messenger intended to cover-up to protect themselves and their government handlers. When enough of these dishonest doctors and therapists stick together with their distortions, fabrications, and attacks on a parent who has legitimate concerns backed by real evidence of child abuse or neglect, they can turn that parent into an accused target for the government to persecute. They are happy to do it to protect themselves and line their pockets with government money. They will write letters and reports which intentionally omit evidence which shows legitimate concerns of the target parent, and instead portray the target parent as crazy and abusive.
San Diego parents would be well-advised to never trust anybody at Rady Children’s Hospital or Chadwick Center or any other doctor or therapist who is involved in child abuse or neglect reporting. Even if a parent thinks they have good evidence of abuse or neglect and have shared it with these so-called professionals, it can and will be ignored and evidence fabricated or spun to portray them as the problem if the government handlers such as CPS social workers wish the doctors or therapists to do this.
Rady, Chadwick, CPS, police, the District Attorney, and others get together on Wednesdays at Rady Children’s Hospital for “seminars” on child abuse topics. Too often these are used as gab-fests for these corrupt and dishonest parties to influence each other inappropriately and to set the government position on particular families and cases to which all the parties must adhere at risk of discipline or loss of income.
As a parent who risks contact with these corrupt groups, you run the very real risk of being turned into a falsely accused child abuser. Every contact you have with these people can be spun to portray you inaccurately, and they will do it willingly so that even outside objective parties doubt what you say and believe the lies and distortions of Rady, Chadwick, CPS, and police staff. It may sound alarmist, but it is a real phenomenon that occurs because there are plentiful incentives for dishonesty and spin-jobs and inadequate mechanisms for punishing or removing those who engage in them.
Therapists Become Child Abusers
Therapists who are used by CPS and law enforcement agencies as described above may function as government-paid child abusers and brainwashers. In such cases, they force psychological trauma on target children until the children break and do what is demanded of them, even if they know they are lying. This includes repeating false allegations against the chosen targets of CPS and the police.
(from San Diego County Grand Jury Report of 1993-1994: Dale Akiki Case and Prosecutorial Misconduct)
CONTAMINATION
Contamination is the act of introducing outside influences into a person’s subjective experience so that either his memory of an event or his description of the event is altered.Kenneth V. Lanning is the Supervisory Special Agent assigned to the Behavioral Science Unit of the FBI at their academy in Quantico, Virginia. In his list of possible sources of contamination he includes “overzealous intervenors.” He points out how interested parties such as parents, other family members, doctors, therapists, social workers, law enforcement and prosecutors can create “intervenor contagion.”
Lanning describes how contamination occurs:
“Victims have been subtly as well as overtly rewarded and bribed by usually well meaning intervenors for furnishing details. In addition, some of what appears to have happened may have originated as a result of intervenors making assumptions about or misinterpreting what the victims are saying. The intervenors then repeat, and possibly embellish, these assumptions and misinterpretations and eventually the victims are ‘forced’ to agree or come to accept this “official” version of what happened.”
In the Akiki case it appears that contamination occurred at many levels. First, the parents had several meetings where the accusations against Dale Akiki were discussed. Although the parents were cautioned not to talk about these events with the children, the fact is that at least some of the parents did. One father even supplied an audiotape of his session with his child.
The therapists were also a source of contamination. Therapy is not only a possible source of contamination, it is by its very nature a form of contamination. Therapy is an active effort to provide the client a new framework to understand the events in their lives. Therapeutic change on the part of the client is based on suggestibility. In order for a person to benefit from therapy, some degree of suggestibility must exist within the client. Unless people were suggestible, therapy would not work. Contamination in therapy can occur through overt and covert methods.
Therapists can also contaminate each other, and this is then passed on to the client. When one therapist deals with more than one client connected with a particular case, it is possible that information “extracted” from one client interview can consciously or subconsciously be transferred to a second client. In addition, when several therapists dealing with different clients in the same case get together, the possibility of the transfer of misinformation or misinterpretations exists. The possibility becomes even greater when all the therapists have a common bias, such as accepting ritual abuse allegations as established fact.
The best example of contamination in the Akiki case was the fact that the therapists were not only trying to treat the children but they were also attempting to be criminal investigators. The prosecutor asked the therapists to provide more disclosures of abuse. One therapist reported that she encouraged parents to use the “empty chair” technique with their child at home so that the child could accuse Dale Akiki, and act out her anger toward him in effigy. The parents were urging the children to provide more and more allegations that could be used for trial. The pressures on the children were enormous.
SUGGESTIBILITY
According to Elizabeth Loftus, Ph.D., Professor of Psychology at the University of Washington and author of several books and articles on memory, “There is enormous variability in the age of earliest memory from two years to eight years and occasionally later.” Young people go through a period of development when their vocabulary has not been fully formed and where they do not really understand how the world works, so they make up explanations for what they observe, which may not be very logical.
Psychological studies do not show a simple relation between age and suggestibility. A person’s perception, memory and verbal report of an event can be influenced by numerous factors unrelated to the truth of the incident. Pre-event and post-event information, interviewer bias, repeated yes-no questioning and the wording of a question can influence the recall and reporting of an event. Research shows that young children are generally more suggestible
than older children, and that children can be made to distort information based on what they believe the interviewer wants to hear, and this can occur consciously or unconsciously.
The dilemma faced by the prosecution is how to extract believable testimony from very young children. To aid them in this effort the prosecution often turns to therapists.
WHAT IS A THERAPIST?
The term “therapist” represents a function, not a title. Persons of several backgrounds and training are considered capable of treating a child victim as a therapist. These include social workers holding the credentials of Marriage, Family, Child Counselor (MFCC) and Licensed Clinical Social Worker (LCSW), either of whom need to have a Master of Social Work degree. A therapist may also be a psychologist with a Ph.D., or Psy.D. or a psychiatrist (MD).
San Diego County therapist, Michael Yapko, in his book, states there are essential key points that therapists need to remember. Some of his findings include the statements that, “Therapists often hold erroneous views on the workings of memory, repression and hypnosis; most therapists surveyed admitted they do nothing to differentiate truth from fiction in their clients’ narratives; Therapists and researchers have no reliable means to distinguish authentic from false memories and clients’ need for acceptance is a powerful factor that leads them to conform with therapists’ perceptions.”
The author stressed that, “Therapy typically involves more art than science, and how it is practiced is largely a product of a therapist’s subjective beliefs.”
Families of child victims may privately hire a therapist of their own choosing; however if the therapist is to be paid through the Child/Victim Witness Fund they must select from a list of therapists who are approved by the Juvenile Court. In order to receive court approval, the applicant must complete an extensive and thorough application showing his/her educational training, existence of a State license, specialties and experience. They must also affirm that they have viewed a three-hour videotape and the accompanying syllabus of a training seminar for therapists. The Jury found that an inexperienced intern could be covered by this Court approval under the blanket of a licensed therapist simply by filling out a short two-page application. There is no screening of the amount of supervision the intern receives.
In fact, there is no evidence that the applications of the licensed therapists receive more than a cursory screening or that there is any periodic peer review of the therapist’s performance. The only peer review protocol that the Grand Jury found was developed to assist the presiding judge of the Juvenile Court to communicate with the mental health community on issues relating to the writing of reports, the format and guidelines adopted for that purpose, and to educate them concerning the interaction between the work of the court and that of the therapists. There was no provision for judging the work of the therapist as a therapist unless a complaint was received, and then the matter was referred to the presiding judge for action that he/she might feel was appropriate.
Therapists Fail to Adequately Document Their Work
Government-paid therapists and those paid by accusing parties, often malicious parents in a divorce, often fail to adequately document any of their work. They do not audio record or video record sessions, and they may take few if any notes. The result of this sloppiness is that the “evidence” which exists comes down to hearsay perceptions of the therapist who can spin and distort statements to be whatever is necessary to endear themselves to CPS. A “good therapist” from CPS’s perspective is one who documents whatever CPS wants them to say and hides whatever disagrees with CPS.
Even therapists who do not believe there is any abuse happening are forced to report abuse by mandatory child abuse reporting laws. This is what happened in the Dale Akiki case, one of the most egregious wrongful prosecution cases involving child abuse allegations in the history of the United States.
(from San Diego County Grand Jury Report of 1993-1994: Dale Akiki Case and Prosecutorial Misconduct)
MISGUIDED THERAPY
In the Akiki case, when suspicion of molestation first surfaced, the pastor of the church called in a therapist who was a consultant to the church to interview the children. After interviewing them, he turned in a report of suspected molestation, as required by law, to the authorities and referred the children to another therapist who saw each child one time. He later told the prosecuting deputy district attorney that he did not feel that Dale Akiki had been involved in any molest. Many of the children underwent a videotaped evidentiary interview at the CCP at Children’s Hospital.
After that the children were placed in treatment with the various therapists mentioned above. The Child Victim-Witness Protocol, supposedly followed by the District Attorney’s office, calls for therapists to assume that they may be called as witnesses in a trial and that they, therefore, should maintain “concise, clear and factual records.” In the Akiki case, there was little or no documentation of any of these sessions which went on for an extended period some of them twice weekly for years. There were no videotapes or audiotapes, and notes were either illegible or non-existent.
In addition to trying to provide healing therapy, some therapists were also engaging in investigative techniques, trying to extract disclosures of molestation from the children. Therapists can get children to say just about anything. When children initially say that nothing happened to them, a misguided therapist labels them as being in denial. Then “therapy” is sometimes continued for months or sometimes years until the children disclosed answers the therapists want to hear.
In the case of Alicia W., which was studied by a previous Grand Jury, the child was kept from her parents and “treated” by a therapist who told her that she would not be allowed to return to her parents until she admitted that her father had raped her. The child originally disclosed that a stranger had entered her bedroom window, but no one believed her until conclusive physical evidence proved that her statements were true.
Records show that most of the therapists involved in the Akiki case attended the seminar where the training video for therapists was filmed. The Jury found that the training video was excellent, but concluded that there was a blatant disregard of its contents when it came to working with the children.
Tactics such as the brainwashing and threats used on Alicia Wade are emotional and verbal abuse against a child. They are paid for with San Diego County taxpayer dollars. As a result, all taxpaying citizens of San Diego are forced to contribute to the child abuse epidemic in the county because they help fund child abuse by the government.
Therapists who engage in these forms of child abuse refuse to document them in any way. The result is that they help protect themselves from prosecution and lawsuits to hold them responsible for the child abuse they have committed under government direction. Usually this cover-up succeeds very well. The exceptions are few and far between, but include cases such as the Wade family lawsuit that resulted in CPS-hired therapist Kathleen Goodfriend losing her license and being held liable for a judgement of $1 million for her abusive treatment of Alicia Wade.
CPS agencies across the state are on record as opposing liability for misconduct of social workers and the people they hire to abuse children under the guise of “therapy” as is shown by the record for California Assembly Bill 1355 in 1995:
(from California AB 1355)
DIGEST: This bill specifies that immunity from prosecution does not include specified acts on the part of a juvenile social worker, child protection worker or other public employees.
Senate Floor Amendments of 9/8/95 recast provisions that are not covered by immunity.
ANALYSIS: Existing law confers an absolute immunity on various persons who are required by law to file reports under the Child Abuse and Neglect Reporting Act. Other persons who file reports under the Act, but who are not required to do so, are liable only if the report is false, and the person knew the report was false, or recklessly disregarded the truth of falsity of the report. [Penal Code Section 11172.]
Existing law also immunizes various persons who, in good faith, file reports under the Child Welfare Services Act. It also immunizes the same persons for “participation in any judicial proceeding resulting from” such a report. [Welfare and Institutions Code Section 165113.]
This bill provides that, notwithstanding any other provision of the law, the civil immunity of juvenile court social workers, child protection workers, and other public employees authorized to initiate or conduct investigations or proceedings shall not extend to any of the following:
1. Perjury.
2. Fabrication of evidence.
3. Failure to disclose known exculpatory evidence.
4. Obtaining testimony by duress.
As used in this section, omaliceo means conduct that is intended by the person described in subdivision (a) to cause injury to the plaintiff or despicable conduct that is carried on by the person described in subdivision (a) with a willful and conscious disregard of the rights or safety of others.
Note: This bill has been amended in the Senate Judiciary Committee. As it was voted on in the Assembly, the immunization was the same as the civil immunity provided to peace officers.
Background
In Superior Court v. Goodfriend (1993) 169 Cal.App.4th 169, the Fourth District held that the Act (specifically Penal Code Section 11172) “… is a reporting statute and its protection runs to reporting: it does not apply to activities that continue more than two years after the initial report of abuse by parties who are not acting as reporters.” [p. 174.]
The Goodfriend case arose from the Wade family’s experience with the dependency system and has become infamous as an example of how much emotional and financial harm the current system can cause to a child and her family. The following account is taken from the Fourth District’s opinion:
On the morning of May 9, 1989, eight-year-old Alicia Wade complained of pain when she went to the bathroom. Her parents brought her to the Navy medical unit by 8:30 a.m. The family was then escorted to Children’s Hospital where staff determined that Alicia had been raped and sodomized, and filed a report under the Act. Alicia stated that a man had come through her bedroom window and hurt her.
Late that afternoon, a hospital worker and detective accused Alicia’s father of the molest. In an attempt to prove the father’s innocence, the parents agreed to have their home searched and talk with the police, and the father submitted to a rape test, a DNA test and three polygraph tests.
By May 11, the Department of Social Services (DSS) filed a dependency action and the following day had Alicia placed in temporary foster care. Meanwhile, DSS investigative employee Diane Anderson interviewed the parents and referred them to a private family counselor, Kathleen Goodfriend. At her first session with the family on May 11, Goodfriend accused the father of the assault.
In July 1989, the family’s attorney advised them to plead nolo contendere to a charge of neglect and assured them all other charges would be dropped. The attorney added that, assuming the parents passed a psychological evaluation and found a 24-hour caretaker, Alicia would be home within a week. The parents reluctantly accepted the plea bargain in order to get their daughter home and put the experience behind them. Notwithstanding that the psychological exam was favorable and the family had provided the names of three 24-hour caretakers, counselor Goodfriend refused to cooperate and DSS later backed out of the agreement.
For over a year after her attack, Alicia stood firm in her insistence that her father was not the assailant. Further, the same month that Alicia was attacked, a man entered the bedroom window of a four-year-old girl living across the street from the Wades, abducting the girl and attempting to rape her. The man, Carder, a registered sex offender, was arrested in June, 1989 and by August was charged with four criminal cases involving minors, but not with the Wade case. Goodfriend, the District Attorney and DSS were all aware of the Carder cases.
Goodfriend and the foster-parents put continuing pressure on Alicia to “confess” that her father was the one who assaulted her. Directing Alicia to say her father was guilty, Goodfriend repeatedly told the child: (1) she knew Alicia’s father had molested her; (2) Alicia would feel a lot better if she admitted it; (3) the “story” Alicia had been telling was not believable; (4) Alicia’s mother had been assaulted by Alicia’s grandfather; and (5) if she wanted to go home, Alicia would have to say her father was the perpetrator. At Goodfriend’s direction, every night when she was put to bed, the foster-mother told Alicia “over and over again” that Alicia’s father had raped her.
During all this time, Alicia was completely cut off from her family. Her mother did not see her for a full year and her father did not see her for two years.
Finally, Alicia yielded in June 1990, finally stating that her father was guilty. She testified against her father in July. In September, Alicia, her mother and brother entered “conjoint” therapy with Goodfriend. By November, the mother was so overwhelmed that she attempted suicide and was placed in a locked ward until January, 1991. Alicia’s father was arrested in December, 1990.
New counsel for father had Alicia’s nightgown, worn the night she was raped, tested and the DNA test proved that her father could not have committed the rape and, instead, Carder was among the nine percent of the population whose DNA would have matched that found on Alicia’s nightgown.
The Wade family sued and the trial court sustained the demurrers of the defendants based upon the various immunities provided in law. In their petition for writ of mandate, the family argued that, “the courts have moved beyond the Child Abuse and Neglect Reporting Act, Penal Code sections 11164 et seq., to come full circle so those who abuse children in the name of preventing abuse are immunized by the very law meant to protect children.” [p. 173.]
In finding liability on the part of Goodfriend and the foster-parents, the Fourth District noted that they came onto the scene after the initial reporting of abuse and “voluntarily assumed roles of those who, having received the report and determined the identity of the perpetrator, search for corroboration and/or attempt to pressure a witness to get a conviction.” [p.176.]
The demurrers to all causes of action against the social worker and DSS were sustained because of the statutory immunity.
FISCAL EFFECT: Appropriation: No Fiscal Com.: No Local: No
SUPPORT: (Verified 9/8/95)
Child and Family Protection Association
Coalition of Parent Support
Fathers’ Rights and Equality Exchange
Committee on Moral Concerns
Grandparents as ParentsOPPOSITION: (Verified 9/8/95)
County Welfare Directors
National Association of Social Workers
California State Association of Counties
California Independent Public Employees Legislative Council, Inc.
Service Employees International Union, Calif. State Council
County of SacramentoARGUMENTS IN SUPPORT: The author’s office believes that the absolute immunity of social workers, when coupled with their power and influence in a dependency case, has created a lack of checks that is needed to maintain an appropriate balance between these two types of harm. The author states it is his intent in this bill to provide that needed balance.
Supporters argue that judges simply “rubber stamp” the report and recommendations of the social workers in these cases.
ARGUMENTS IN OPPOSITION: The concern raised by opponents, and noted by the courts prior to Goodfriend, is that any limitation on their immunity would make social workers too fearful of lawsuits to appropriately intervene to protect an endangered child.
Opponents state that the decision to remove a child from his or her home, in the first instance, is made with little that is immediately verifiable in the way of information and the possibility of harm to the child may be such that a social worker would generally err on the side of caution and remove the child.
How is psychologically torturing a child for more than a year into making false accusations against a parent “in the best interests of the child”? The answer is that it is not, it is in the best interests of the social workers and government. They don’t care about hurting children if they can profit from it.
Although AB 1355 was signed into law in 1995 by Governor Pete Wilson, it has not had the effect of holding social workers liable for misconduct. This is because now social workers and the government keep cases out of juvenile and criminal court when they know they have lied and manipulated witnesses and evidence. By doing so, they can keep children from families for years and escape prosecution and civil litigation for their misconduct.
Prosectorial Misconduct by District Attorney
When an alleged child abuse case is passed along from CPS to the police for continued investigation, it seems that might eliminate some of the lack of objectivity and gender bias from the situation. But the reality is that it does not. The San Diego Police Department and related law enforcement agencies are in close contact with CPS, Rady Children’s Hospital, Chadwick Center, and the Child Abuse Unit in the District Attorney’s office. All of these groups frequently interact with each other and do so in a fashion that spreads bias and lack of objectivity.
This can and does lead to severe prosecutorial misconduct going so far as prosecuting people for child abuse crimes that it is unlikely they committed and which in fact may never have occurred at all. Often such wrongful prosecutions are done by intentionally hiding evidence from the accused with intent to win a case at the expense of justice.
(from San Diego County Grand Jury Report of 1993-1994: Dale Akiki Case and Prosecutorial Misconduct)
The Grand Jury notes that Brady v. Maryland indicates that it is the duty of the prosecution to disclose evidence favorable to the defense exists in constitutional due process, both in state and Federal jurisdictions. In California, such disclosure must be made voluntarily. It is held in People v. Wright, “We have imposed a stricter duty on prosecutors in this state, by requiring them to disclose material evidence favorable to the accused without request.”
…
The Grand Jury notes that the U. S. Supreme Court has stated, “The United States Attorney is the representative not of an ordinary party to a controversy, but of a sovereignty whose obligation to govern impartially is as compelling as its obligation to govern at all; and whose interest, therefore, in a criminal prosecution is not that it shall win a case, but that justice shall be done. As such, he is in a peculiar and very definite sense the servant of the law, the twofold aim of which is that guilt shall not escape or innocence suffer. He may prosecute with earnestness and vigor indeed, he should do so. But, while he may strike hard blows, he is not at liberty to strike foul ones. It is as much his duty to refrain from improper methods calculated to produce a wrongful conviction as it is to use every legitimate means to bring about a just one.”
The philosophy expressed applies equally to all public prosecutors.
The extent and consistency of disclosure by deputy district attorneys to the defense of material evidence, or information which might lead to material evidence, favorable to the accused has been considered by the Grand Jury. In the Akiki case, the prosecuting deputy district attorney failed to disclose in a timely manner the fact and result of a surveillance of the accused conducted prior to charging. Such disclosure ultimately was made under imposition of court order. Further, the fact of the investigation of alleged child sexual abuse by a known prior offender, involving a victim related to and occurring near the time of the alleged incidents in the Akiki case, was not disclosed to the defense. Moreover, the investigation of that reported occurrence was not pursued. These circumstances were learned by the defense through an anonymous tip.
Moreover, in an unrelated matter, the Grand Jury has taken notice of reversal by the Court of Appeal, Fourth Appellate District of a conviction because of failure of the District Attorney’s office to reveal information bearing on the credibility and professional competence of a principal prosecution witness. And, in the civil aftermath of an ill-fated sexual abuse prosecution, notice is taken of allegations of failure to disclose and lack of truthfulness on the part of a deputy district attorney as reported in the opinion of the Court of Appeal.
Yet, the Grand Jury has found that prosecutors both in this and other jurisdictions, as well as jurists, were of the opinion that those items of potential evidence which were withheld or ignored by the District Attorney’s office should have been disclosed promptly and voluntarily to the defense. As to the yet unproved allegations of suppression and lack of truthfulness, the Grand Jury can only express its grave concern.
Although the Grand Jury has observed some excellent lawyers in the District Attorney’s office, certain members of that office have become obsessed with the idea of “winning cases.” The fact that “It is their duty to see to it that those accused of crime are afforded a fair trial” has been forgotten or overlooked. Because the District Attorney’s office is charged not only with pursuing and prosecuting criminals, but also with doing justice, the fine balance that must be struck is easily outweighed by overzealous prosecution. An atmosphere of conviction, and conviction only, can be expected to produce inadequate investigation, incomplete disclosure to the defense and sharp practices. The District Attorney must provide leadership to change any such attitudes in his office at the earliest possible time.
San Diego County Board of Supervisors is Negligent and Knowingly Enables Abusive Tactics Including Civil Rights Abuses and Government-Sponsored Child Abuse
The failures and shortcomings in the CPS agency in the county have been brought to the attention of the Board of Supervisors repeatedly. Yet they do nothing effective to fix the problems, leaving CPS and its abusive staff free to continue to abuse the county’s children and parents.
There is no realistic doubt that the current San Diego County Board of Supervisors is substantially at fault for the abuses in the current system. Grand Jury reports have exposed the problems to them over and over again with substantial evidence of the misconduct of CPS and its sister child-abusing agencies. But little to no action is taken to correct the serious deficiencies.
The current Board of Supervisors consists of Greg Cox, Dianne Jacob, Pam Slater-Price, Ron Roberts, and Bill Horn. All five of the supervisors have been in office since 1995 or earlier, a period of time during which Grand Jury investigations have consistently shown that serious problems exist with CPS and that the agency blows off the recommendations to fix them on a routine basis.
The county supervisors have no incentive to clean up problems in the system because to do so, those problems must be discussed further. This is political risk-taking intolerable to them. They know they were in charge during this whole period of time and should have done something about the problems. Doing it now is effectively an admission that they were negligent in the past. Instead, they do all they can to bury these problems behind the scenes so that they are not politically damaged by their harmful and negligent conduct.
(from No Term Limits for San Diego County Supervisors)
Three of San Diego County’s five member Board of Supervisors were sworn in again today. There are no term limits for County Supervisors, and all of them have been on the board for more than 12 years. KPBS reporter Alison St John has more.
The Board of Supervisors uses county executives and county counsel such as Walter Ekard and John Sansone to cover up for themselves. These people year after year write “responses” to Grand Jury investigations that whitewash the wrongdoings, hide the responsibility of the Board of Supervisors, make excuses for the agencies not fixing problems, and enable the abuses and misconduct to continue. They also participate in cover-ups and enablement of wrongdoing by individual supervisors, too.
The San Diego County Board of Supervisors must be recalled or voted out of office if there is to be any meaningful reform of the abusive County of San Diego Child Welfare Services agency and its related government perpetrators of civil rights, family, and child abuse.
Secondly, the executive staff of the County of San Diego must have its head chopped off. The figurative guillotine should surgically excise Walter Ekard, John Sansone, and people in positions like them out of the top two or three levels of county government. They should be replaced with government officials who understand that they are responsible for ensuring County of San Diego agencies comply with laws, do not abuse the civil rights of families, and do not engage in child abuse and other illegal actions. The replacements for these corrupt executives should not come from within the County of San Diego as the county government is corrupt to its core and the culture of corruption and dishonesty is spread by the executives down the line to social workers as a matter of policy and “de facto” behaviors.
The Board of Supervisors and county executive staff replacements should come from groups that have exercised significant resistance to the wrongdoings of the County. Groups that have argued against civil rights violations, wasteful government spending, and police and law enforcement abuses are prime sources for candidates for these elected and hired positions.
There must also be much more transparency of government implemented in San Diego County. Law enforcement and CPS routinely use the law to hide their misconduct from the public. They cite “privacy concerns” as reasons to fail to release evidence that damns their conduct as corrupt and lawless. Even citizens who have been egregiously wronged have trouble getting to any of this evidence. Further, if they dare oppose the government, they risk retaliation. CPS and the police retaliate against “troublemaking parents” by taking away their children with no good cause and then turning what should be routine investigations that take a few weeks into many months or years of refusal to comply with the law, refusal to comply with judicial directions, and working relentlessly to build a cast of co-conspirators who will help defend each other from their misconduct and pin the blame for it all on the target parent.
San Diego’s children and their parents are not safe from government abuse at the hands of CPS and its allies until the agencies and people who engage in these unlawful and abusive activities are removed from their positions and punished or prosecuted for their misconduct.
Further Reading
Eileen Lasher on San Diego CPS/Family Law Court Misconduct
San Diego County Grand Jury 2008 Report: Notification and Training in Child Protective Services
County of San Diego Responses to 2007-2008 Grand Jury Reports
San Diego County Grand Jury Report of 1993-1994: Dale Akiki Case and Prosecutorial Misconduct
San Diego County Grand Jury Report of 1993-1994: Families in Crisis
San Diego County Grand Jury Letter Regarding CPS Abuses
Torture of the Wade Family by San Diego CPS
Child Welfare Urged To Tell Parents Why Kids Taken
No Term Limits for San Diego County Supervisors
Imposing Term Limits on County Supervisors
Bill Horn, arrogant pol; John Sansone, slippery pol enabler
Enter the daughter: Bill Horn scrambles to explain his relationship with his chief of staff
San Diego News – More on Horn/Wonsley financial irregularities story…
Thanks, Rodney! I’ve been thirty years in this system and I never understood (really!) what they were doing to me. CPS is the only agency I have dealt with that says you are guilty until proven innocent. And you are never innocent until you pay!
Why isn’t the governor or Federal agencies doing something about these and other abuses in our state? This is by no-means only happening in California. It seems to be country wide. How could this well-intentioned idea, have degraded into this gestapo-style modus? I find it hard to believe that our U.S. Congress is oblivious to these atrocities.
Thank you for providing such a thorough and informative site. I live in San Diego and am going through the nightmare of trying to get my children, (Jack,3 and Kendra,1 yr.), back from CPS. Thanks again for your info.!! Kimberly
I am a former prosecutor of juvenile dependency cases for the Los Angeles County Office of the County Counsel. I served in that role for two years, as long as I could stand it, before quitting and changing sides in order to represent parent, legal guardians, de facto parents, relatives of dependent children and others including some minors (though the courts are very resistant to outside counsel representing the children since they have their own in-house court-created firms, CLC 1,2 and 3.). I left prosecuting because of L.A. County’s Department of Children and Family Service’s (DCFS) policies of self-protection, and win-at-all-costs approach to cases which they filed in the court on behalf of the kids for whose protection and best interests they supposedly were looking out. Lying and manipulation of facts are minimally as rampant in DCFS’s reports as in San Diego’s CPS’s reports. They County Counsel’s here are generally noble, but they stand by the social workers in court even when they have serious reason to know that the social workers have manufactured, manipulated or omitted essential facts and evidence. They and the DCFS view it to be the defense attorney’s job to defeat them if they can, and when the defense attorney fails to do so, it is the defense attorneys fault, or the case was righteous. Thus, the Deputy County Counsels and DCFS social workers can sleep at night, despite their insideous disregard of families and children whose interests they are there to preserve and protect.
I and my law firm, Komanapalli Massey LLP, love to take on these sociopathic DCFS social workers and the attorneys who represent them. I find the use of the foster family agencies who harbor the children detained by the DCFS, or the independently licensed foster parents also employed by the DCFS, so long as they play along with the DCFS’s game plans, useful sources of truth, generally unintentionally yielded up, because they are usually not as trained in the art of deception as are the DCFS’s social workers. Parents attorneys and others with interests in kids caught up in the wretched dependency system without just cause ought to bear that tip in mind as they go about building a defense against the presumption of guilt imposed upon them at the outset of cases involving their child wards. It help to remind the foster parents, in order to obtain their assistance, that they can sue the DCFS for lots of money as soon as the DCFS retaliates against them in response for their betrayal — their audacious exposure of arrow-sharp truth aimed at piercing and deflating the ballooning deceptions manufactured by the commanding DCFS. Invariably, the DCFS does delist the foster parent who exposes the truth about kids statements and the manipulations thereof by the DCFS and those enlisted by the DCFS to help build their case against the parent or other caretaker whose rights and interests in the subject children, in maintaining their families unimpeded by a second-guessing, paternalistic government, the DCFS has wrongly infringed.
For the assistance of my law firm, Komanapalli Massey LLP, with your juvenile dependency case, email me at [email protected]. I will happily assist in your battle for the return of your child(ren). Best of luck to all suffering at the government’s meddling and deceitful hands.
Mark Massey’s California Bar Association page
This sort of thing goes on in the state of Tennessee all the time. Why our government won’t do anything about these legalized criminals is beyond me. Oh that’s right, CPS is a government agency and it is all about money.
Don’t forget the attachment of social dollars coming from this Democratic Society where money is paid within 72 hours and well checks are deemed appropriate to support the staff of psychiatrists that attach to Social Security Benefits and Medicare. Want to clean up waste in the government then look to HHS for the answer.
CPS was made to help truly abused children but today it is nothing but tearing families apart. Instead of getting these families help they ruin thousands of life’s just to put money in these evil crooked social workers pockets. And in which many of these social workers are liars and have no real compassion for these families!
My son Bo was in the system for 12 years. Thankfully he trusted us to come back home. He lived with an old
couple. The foster father died. The house had an extreme fire. He jumped on a broken trampoline and
dived from a house. He purposefully threw a baseball through a neighbor’s window, with no consequences.
One of the boys stole a car. He brags how sneaky his life was in the system. All the dangerous things that he did. He doesn’t know how to drive, cook, clean. He doesn’t know how to fill out an application, look
for work. He has no knowledge of girls or responsibility. He is damaged permanently by the CPS system.
They put him on drugs he didn’t know, expected him to take the drugs, as we were told he was sad. He was deprived of his Indian heritage. He is NOT a man. His grooming habits are sad. His memory is shot. His social graces are lost. He doesn’t care about people. And he has lost so much that even material things mean nothing except video game cards. He has no dreams or ambitions. He is afraid of rejection and is a potential bum in the making. Another homeless person.
I had a son that knew sign language, was polite and sweet as a ladybug. He was honest and aimed to please.
Now he is lost. And his brother is out next year, and he is the same way. To this day CPS scares me, not just for myself, but for the USA. I have others in the system still. I expect the same. Oh yeah, we were accused of having too little food. We completed their criteria 3 times and still the paper work was lost.
I hope our story is not repeated, but alas; now my son is going through the same thing. And they had their child taken because the mother slept after having the baby, rather than nurse him.
Thank you for your time.
[email protected]
I have to say, in our situation, CPS got it right. Those of you who cry that CPS tears families apart, keep in mind the sociopathic/narcissistic nature of a child abuser. They are often charming and everyone’s best friend and most people can’t believe what goes on behind closed doors. Then when they do lose their children, they cry foul hiding behind the facade.
My son in law nearly killed my 3 week old grandson. He could not wait for the CPS case to close so he can now sue CPS. He is evil defined, and not many people know it because of the face he shows. But I was there when the older child would stop on a dime if his father even looked at him. He was 16 months old at the time. I was there when there were two bite mark bruises on the child and when I took a picture of the second time, my son in law erased it telling me that I had no right to take a picture of his son without his permission. I was there when my daughter and I came back from a 4 day trip and both of his little ears were completely black (bruised) because he “fell”. I later found out he liked to flick him in the ears to get him to mind. He was 14 months old at the time. I was there when on three separate occasions, his little face was covered with broken blood vessels from crying hard, and my son in law said “he didn’t cry, I don’t know what you’re talking about”. I was there when my son in law was looking at him with fury because his sippy cup was leaking on the couch. I took the garbage out and when I came in the baby was screaming and his face was beat red. I asked why, and my son in law said “because he’s crying”, and when I said his face never gets that red when he cries, he said “oh I just washed his face, the water might have been a little too hot”. On his first birthday, we were out to breakfast and his father took him out to the car to change his diaper. When he came in he had a red mark on his forehead and another between his eyes. He later got a slight black eye. I asked what happened, my son in law told me that he had been thrashing around and must have banged against something. Later he admitted he had “plucked” (I call it thumping)him in the head because he wouldn’t hold still when he was changing his diaper. Of course no one was around when he admitted that to me. One time he got ready to “pluck” him in the head because he had crawled into the kitchen and he knew he wasn’t supposed to (under 1 year old at the time) and I told my son in law if he did it, I would call 911. And I talked to friend in a different state about what to do, and was told that nothing would be done if I didn’t actually see anything happen. My biggest regret in life – not calling anyway.
When my daughter and her family moved to San Diego due to a job transfer for her, my son in law refused to look for work and was the main caretaker of my grandson. My son in law convinced my daughter that I was jealous of their happy family and that I was trying to break it up, and I wanted my grandson for my own. She refused to believe me when I would tell her something was not right.
Fast forward to April of last year. Another baby is born. When he is 3 weeks old, he begins to cry non stop. Literally non stop. Then, he stops. He is catatonic and having seizures. My son in law doesn’t want to take him to the doctor. Finally they do. He has a skull fracture, several subdural bleeds, dead brain matter, retinal hemorrhaging, bruises on his face from where my son in law tried to force feed him. (They stayed back in their bedroom the entire time the baby was fussy so I did not see him until right before they took him to the hospital.) A hold is placed on the baby at the hospital. They take the older child too and send him to Polinsky (where he sucked his thumb going in and was scared to when he came out) then my parents came down and gave up several months of their life to take care of these children. I couldn’t have them because I lived in the home too and no one was admitting to hurting the baby. My grandson was on life support, and eventually taken off and then he was released.
A few days later he was readmitted with hydrocephalus and had to have a VP shunt put in his brain to drain the fluid. Something he will have for life. I remember coming home from work one day, and my son in law was moving furniture around in their bedroom. He doesn’t even wash a dish, so why was he doing this? I found it odd, really odd. He also came home the first night the baby was in the hospital and moved a coffee table to sit in front of the love seat instead of in front of the couch where it had been. The wonderful detective came over the next day to interview me. The first thing she asked me was if my son in law had moved any furniture. I said yes. She mentioned that she found it odd he had come home in the middle of the night when his son was in the hospital in PICU in critical condition. She also told me that my son in law had told the doctors and the detectives that the older grandson had head butted the baby a few days ago. She described what he had told her and the way he said it had happened could not have been possible with the position the coffee table had been in. She interviewed me (my oldest grandson was still with me at that point, he was taken later that day). When she left, she said she was authorized to remove him from the home, but she did not feel the need.
My son in law then spent the next two weeks frantically on the computer searching for any way my grandson could have the brain injuries. He tried to say he got the fracture during delivery. At this point we were thinking the same thing. Come to find out later, the skull fracture was too large to have been done in the birth canal. The following 1+ year, up to now, my EX son in law has done everything within his power to make our lives miserable. My daughter ended up getting the children back, she worked very hard to do it. CPS said they had never seen anyone work so hard, and even asked her permission to use her work as a teaching tool. We found out that the “norm” is for women to choose the abuser over the children, and that is why we have so many children in foster care now. (My son in law knew that, because he tried to make CPS think she was in contact with him and was going to reunite with him.)
My point in sharing my tragedy with you, is that sometimes it may look like someone is getting screwed over by CPS and it just is not the case. My son in law will no doubt find some slimy lawyer willing to take his case and willing to buy into his lies and rake my daughter over the coals even more than she already has been. We do have facts on our side. For example, he calls about once every 3 months and he will leave a voice mail that says “just trying to get in touch with the kids AGAIN” and sigh, so you know someone is in the background hearing him and thinking we never answer the phone or let him talk to the kids. He is probably even pretending to call all the time when someone is standing there, but he really isn’t. We have phone records to back that up! He even LIED TO A JUDGE, when it was brought up in court that he was not attending any of the medical appointments, he said to the judge “I don’t know what they are talking about, I go to all the appointments”, and he knows the doctors, physical therapists, etc. can testify that he has not been to any! But he will get some slimy lawyer to buy into it. I just hope that any attorney who takes his case, takes a look at the medical records, and keeps in mind that we have tangible data to disprove all the assertations he is making! To further prove what a slime he is, he proceeded to shack up with another woman, get her pregnant and had another baby before his brain damaged son even turned 1!! And, his girlfriend refuses to believe any of this (because he is a sociopath) and in fact, went to her parents to have the baby, stayed with them until CPS came out, then left and moved in with him the next day. CPS in that state still believes she is keeping the baby away from him. What kind of man brings another child into the world in this situation. He STILL did not have a job when the new baby was born!!!!!
So, before you start believing people’s pity stories, you may just want to look into the background of the situation and talk to several people involved, not just take the word of one person who is very likely a sociopath!!
The San Diego County CPS is very much corrupt. I am currently dealing with them and sadly so are my Grandchildren. I am currently not able to have any type of communication with them, unless I pay the CPS Social Worker money. What kind of bullshit is that??
What Mary is describing regarding San Diego CPS social workers demanding bribes from families is blatant corruption, is criminal activity, and should be prosecuted. However, given the collusion we have seen between some of the local police departments and CPS, the cops may be aware of how CPS social workers are demanding bribes from families and are allowing it.
I doubt you can trust the local prosecutor’s office, either. Even if you were to bring them evidence of this crime, for instance audio and video recordings of the social worker requesting a bribe, they may decide to prosecute you instead of the social worker. Their logic would be that the recordings are illegal and you are a criminal, they want to put somebody in jail, and they don’t want to embarrass their bosses in the San Diego County Board of Supervisors.
After countless Grand Jury investigations of San Diego CPS, the county supervisors fully know how CPS hurts families. But they are happy for it to continue because it helps them balance their budget via Title IV funding they receive for abusing children and terrorizing parents. That’s why you should vote against all county supervisor incumbents. Both Ron Roberts and Bill Horn are up for re-election in November 2010. Voters should vote them both out. While there’s no way to know for sure if Stephen Whitburn and Steve Gronke will be any better, simply shaking up the current board with outsiders is likely to create some resistance to the corruption-and-abuse-is-good thinking of the board.
The same county supervisors have controlled the region for more than a decade without any serious challenges. County employees were fed up and sponsored a term limits proposition in the June 2010 elections which passed.
You can see a hint of the sort of corrupt behaviors pervasive to San Diego County’s government from how its chief administrative officer used his job and county resources to fight the proposition.
Walter Ekard is part of the reason for CPS abuse of families and children and the corrupt nature of the county’s government. When the current board is replaced by new members, they would do well to get rid of him.
Your best bet may be to work with investigative news media, perhaps 60 Minutes or another group not influenced by dirty local politics, and also with the FBI or State Attorney General’s office.
@ Scared Grandma
I am the father in the case that this so called “scared Grandma” mentioned. This is one of the most elaborate instances of deception I’ve seen yet. Before you buy into this psycho’s pity stories, realize that even with the tangible evidence in front of her, she would rather protect her daughter at the expense of her grandchildren’s safety than to face truth. While all of these accusations are lies, there are only certain points that need to be addressed, as people believe what they want in the end.
My son was nearly KILLED when his mother went into a fit of rage as a result of his frequent crying in the first weeks of life. She slammed him with enough force to crack his skull.
According to a licensed clinical social worker on this case, this “scared grandma’s” daughter, the Mother in this case, displayed all the symptoms throughout out marriage of post-partum psychosis. Not depression, PSYCHOSIS. Both “Scared Grandma” and the Mother failed polygraph tests at San Diego Police Dept, a corrupt organization who in conjunction with CPS, covered up that fact and LIED to the dependency court REPEATEDLY. I have proof because “scared grandma” left her cell phone behind when she moved out of our home, allowing me to discover all the text messages where the Mother revealed her failure, and stated that she was even being interrogated! Yet the court report clearly says they PASSED?! This is one coverup that allowed me to get Federal authorities involved.
One one occasion, the Mother revealed that she nearly drove off a cliff in one of several suicidal episodes WITH my child in the back seat. One of several suicidal episodes. Yet a gullible social worker bought her phony tears and her supposed ignorance to any possible cause for my son’s LIFE THREATENING injuries.
Another example. To protray me as a psycho, the Mother lied to CPS and said that I MADE HER WALK right after a gall bladder surgery from Sharp to Rady’s Hospital, a COMPLETE lie that she immediately recanted. But did CPS put that into the report, NO! They put her lies in there for the judge to see, in addition to their own.
Yet CPS bought her lies no matter what the evidence against her, and proceeded to twist every detail of this case against me. They even went so far as to ask me to engage in a type of therapy, ruled by their OWN appointed therapist to be HARMFUL to me, as a condition of reunification. When this therapists findings became favorable, a 20 something social worker actually questioned the therapist, who has been practicing TWICE as long as she’d been alive, whether she thought I was MANIPULATING her?! Ridiculous! Yet, all the Mother’s therapist had to say was “nothing about her looks like a perpetrator”!
If anyone can tell me what a perpetrator “looks like”, please share. I would’ve never married this psycho let alone had kids with her.
The list goes on and on.
Look closely at what “scared Grandma” writes in this article above. You can clearly see the sheer amount of paranoia, even where she claims that I “have people listening in” so I can set them up. These are telltale signs of a guilty conscience. “Scared Grandma” would rather believe that her daughter could never commit such a crime against my sons, rather than protect them – and she knows it.
With regards to the statement about me being “slime” and “shacking up”, I don’t shack up with anyone. I find it laughable that “scared grandma”, the same person who locked her daughter out of the house as a kid so she could have sex with one of her many boyfriends, could even think to make any negative comment about what I do over here.
She displayed unnaturally possessive behavior towards my first son from the outset, so much in fact that she ended her 5+ year relationship because my son became more attached to her boyfriend than she wanted! Oh I have letters in writing about all this, and as an award winning journalist who depends on honesty for a living, I seriously doubt his words. Based on what I have seen and what I’m told about her therapy sessions, you’re capable of doing ANYTHING to push the male figure out of your life, or your daughters.
Bottom line, I love my children and would never hurt them. The FACT is, the children in my care suffered no injuries, until their Mother became the primary caretaker. This site is for people who have been victimized by a corrupt organization, not for the delusional to post their lies in an effort to try to vindicate CPS. You should save your breath for court “scared grandma”, because we are coming in hard against CPS and the people responsible for my children still being in danger. This will not end until I get justice for my children!
@ Scared Grandma
Oh, and one more thing. I need to correct one more lie that has been told here by “scared Grandma”. CPS in the neighboring state where I reside took an interest in the aforementioned case “scared Grandma” mentions due to the daughter I have in my care. Upon investigating, this agency referred to the other case as, and I quote, “a crock” and stated that San Diego CPS had no case at all in their eyes! Several workers were shocked at the treatment we received from the other agency (Even workers involved with the original case disapproved of the primary worker’s conduct). They left us alone fully aware that my child was in my care and that of her mother, and that she is healthy and well cared for.
I was fortunate, and I don’t take it for granted. But let me say this: Beware of the people around you, and who you let into your kids lives. There are sad, pathetic individuals out there who would do anything to ruin your life and steal your children, and this is by no means limited to CPS caseworkers. There are aunts, uncles, cousins, and even grandmothers who are capable of falsely reporting to CPS just because they want your kids. Guard your children, because in this day and age you just never know.
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How DCFS, the once noble organization, has become an uncontrollable monster destroying families & chasing federal tax dollars.
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The Daily News investigation found that up to half of the 75,000 children in the system and adoptive homes were needlessly placed in a system that is often
more dangerous than their own homes because of financial incentives in state and federal laws. These laws, according to state documents, encourage counties
and their private contractors to earn money by placing and keeping children in foster care. The county receives $30,000 to $150,000 in state and federal
revenues annually for each child placed.
Think that children are not routinely taken without real reason? Think you have freedom of choice on how to raise your kids? Think you cant lose your kids?
Did you know DCFS has Prosecutorial immunity? They are legally ALLOWED to and in fact, encouraged to lie? Even in extreme cases perjury is rarely, if ever
prosecuted. That they routinely falsify their reports submitted to the courts? That Supervisor NEVER get sued Judges WONT allow it–and those under them take
the fall for their lies. Until supervisors are held responsible the machine of destroying poor & MINORITY families–and the big business of foster care &
adoption will never end.
DCFS is a secretive organization that have secret laws–that if you unknowingly violate–your kids can be taken–privacy for them is code
WORD used to for protect themselves.
The producer of this film will donate all the proceeds of the film to a not-for-profit legal fund designed to protect poor families against the monster know
as DCFS.
Supported by books like a ‘CULTURE oF FEAR’ & the 2013 Lancaster Council Meeting of the Death of Gabriel who has 63 reports filed on his behalf and not one
social worker had the courage to protect him. Social Workers were once heroes only a minority stand against the evil that social services has now become.
Based on a true story after the father reports abuse against his children to the police & DCFS — the cover up begins. In a highly disturbing move the
authorities attempt to reunite the abused children with their abusers. The casts of characters are evil clowns, paper pushers. & People that would rather
keep their job than reveal the truth. Lets be honest would you risk your career?
Delmy Mendoza 35-40 Follower, ignorant, moronic, emergency response social worker, claimed she could “take custody of the children because these was no milk
in the fridge.” her copious pictures of the investigation–all go missing– puppet of
Detective Newman 50-55 white hair will do anything to cover his crimes, willing to engage in the planting of false evidence and/or the removing of evidence,
is so terrified of testifying he now claims he is disabled, his many taped interviews of the investigation all go missing–
Scott the social worker who refused to play along with the cover up and was replaced by Delmy Mendoza.
Jennifer Gysler nice on the outside attorney for the authorities will do what ever it takes to cover her client’s crimes, the guilt comes out on her face.
Alicia Campbell, 35-40 Mat Reporter, from Hillside, ‘physiatrist’ blackmails the children by telling them if they don’t make up lies about their parents they
will never see them again. “Say your dad sees flying pigs or you’ll never go home“. Her video taped interview completely contradicts her reports she
submitted to the courts. They could find no doctor that would corroborate with her ‘diagnosis.’” a lying manipulative & brilliant conniver. Perhaps
pathological in nature. Virtually every statement Alicia Campbell attributed to the foster care parents was denied by them.
None of the evidence that would go to exonerate the parents gets in her reports.
Aruna Patel, 35-40 corrupted Social Services “investigator,” incompetent who feeds witnesses their lies to ensure the fathers conviction. Set one witness off
against the other in a masterful coordination of manipulation. All her investigative notes-all go missing–just before trial–None of the evidence that would
go to exonerate the parents gets in her reports.
Elena Gomez’s 40-45 mock mediator, assisting in helping the Children & Family’s services propagandize, and have the children adopted in order to silence
them–All the evidence she received that would exonerate the parents –all go missing–
Stacy Holland Social Worker Supervisor, African American 35-40 tries to help the family though an explosive tape he makes gets released to the public, after
he realizes he will lose his job he falls in line like everyone else. (yes, we have a copy)
The Shills the foster family that discovers the shocking truth of why the children were really taken. 50-60 and now are no longer foster care parents.
Christopher Sosa 40-50 Supervisor who will sign off on any lies that is placed before him in order to protect his department. Knowing that SUPERVISORS are
NEVER –held responsible by JUDGES but only their subordinates–Christopher Sosa and the other supervisor go about using their underlings as covers for the
filthy lies. All the evidence she received that would exonerate the parents –all go missing-
Ana Hogien 50-55 Social Workers Supervises walks in lock step with the Department of Children & Family Services–possibly one of the supervisors who
manipulated the social workers notes–All the evidence she received that would exonerate the parents –all go missing–
Marianela Inchowski 40-40 Social Workers Supervisor
Who threw out every document the parents provided to them-she submitted none of the parent’s evidence to court. All the evidence she received that would
exonerate the parents –all go missing–
Tells the story of how 1) the police destroyed the security videotapes from the location the kids were taken into custody. -Why? 2) ALL the tape recordings
of the interviews with the two children, mother & father and police detectives went permanently ‘missing,’ why? 3) Social Services investigators notes were
destroyed days before trial, why? 4) How dozens of pictures taken by the social workers the day the children were removed now suddenly were “–never taken–”
-why? 5) –Every document, doctors business cards. Medical records, school records, etc, provided to social services were never turned over to the courts by
them-again why? If there was no cover up where did all the evidence go? If you have nothing to hide–hide nothing.
We have actual video of many of the events, courts documents & transcripts- to be portrayed in this based on a true story film.
Did you know social workers only get bonuses when they REMOVE children from their parents and get NOTHING when they reunite them? Shouldn’t there be bonuses
whenever they do the RIGHT thing? Whatever that may be?
If you have children its strongly urged you do not submit for this film. No children or minors will be cast in this film to ensure their safety from DCFS.
100% of proceeds made by the producer from this film will be donated to children’s & women’s charities.
Will be doing youtube & in person auditions
http://destroyingchildren.weebly.com/
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=quJlwtenWSY
Click for full story: http://www.scribd.com/doc/33306169
“DCFS is a money machine and our children are the vouchers. Do not kid yourself, DCFS is in this for the money, bottom line. It does not matter who is the
mayor, the head honcho of DCFS or the governor they will steal your children in hours. Then hide behind some well paid attorney equipped with the immunity
idol allowing them the right to whatever they want under the color of state law. While we toil in courts for years proving that we good parents all along, in
the hopes that we can restore our family. But our family will never be the same, the lies, defamatory statement and perjury will never go away along with
scars that will shape our children forever. DCFS has to made to be accountable and since the people Jdependency lawyers) are totally useless we must act with
purpose in every instance. All of the componets of themachine are getting paid by the reselling of our children and it must be stopped. Our children are not
for sale or trade, we must stand up to these officials and make them see what is happening is filling our prisons with offspring of single parent homes, do
the math and you bwill see. Please help us save our children.” B. Lempke
(from San Diego County Grand Jury 2008 Report: NOTIFICATION AND TRAINING IN CHILD PROTECTIVE SERVICES, page 2)
The complainants were a small group of individuals from all areas of the County and from different ethnic and economic groups. Their common ground was
that they all had been accused of child neglect or abuse resulting in children having been temporarily removed from their custody. A common complaint was, at
the time the children were removed, that they did not receive verbal or written notification specifying the reasons for removal. There was also an indication
that the parents or custodians experienced ongoing difficulties in communicating with the social workers assigned to their cases and more difficulty in
receiving written notices updating the status of those cases.
…
Fact: Four of the six complainants were not told why their children were being removed nor were they notified in writing.
Finding: Of the cases we examined, the Grand Jury found no record of written notification at the time of removal.
WE NEED HELP WITH A CPS CASE WHERE SO MANY WRONGS WERE DONE TO A MOTHER WHO HAS NEVER DONE DRUGS, ALCOHOL OR ABUSED HER CHILDREN. THE FATHER ON THE OTHER HAND AS A LAUNDRY LIST OF ARRESTS AND ABUSE AND HE WAS GIVEN THE CHILDREN AFTER INAPPROPRIATE RELATIONSHIPS WITH THE SOCIAL WORKERS.
WE NEED HELP ASAP AS THE FATHER IS ABOUT TO RUN WITH THE CHILDREN.