While Colorado has legalized marijuana and other states are moving to decriminalize or legalize its use, Texas takes a hard approach to pot. That was more than evident in the tragedy surrounding the death of a two-year-old little girl named Alexandria Hill who died from injuries in an abusive foster home after she was taken away due to her parent’s use of marijuana.
We have previously seen abuses of the child welfare system like the professor who had his custody taken away and was banned from his own home because his son unwittingly bought a hard lemonade rather than a regular lemonade at a Michigan football game. However, this case resulted in the death of this child who was first put through not one but two abusive foster homes.
Joshua Hill does not deny that he would sometimes use pot after putting his daughter to bed. This might be viewed as a minor issue in most states, but not Texas. Authorities removed Alex from the home and sent her to a foster home where she was abused. On visitations, Joshua Hill would find bruises on her and there would be mold and mildew in her lunch box. Finally, Texas removed her to the foster home of Sherill Small. It would be a death sentence for the little girl.
Alex was taken to the hospital and put on life support in a coma. Alex was hemorrhaging in her brain and eyes from blunt force trauma to the head. Those are classic symptoms of “shaken baby syndrome.” She lasted only a few days and died. They arrested Small for murder. Small and her husband, Clemon Small, reportedly handle five or six children as a source of income.
The case illustrates that the legalization of pot involves a myriad of issues beyond the question of arrests. Pot arrests lead to criminal records that bar employment and family law issues from custody to child welfare proceedings.
Of course, putting Alex in a succession of abusive homes was viewed as better than leaving her with parents suspected of pot use. Problem solved.
Source: KVUE
SWM Davis would be a shoo-in (well unless they succeed at their gerrymandering and suppressing the vote but they would have to find a way to suppress an awful of women)
I had an ex-girlfriend who was in an abusive foster home living right behind me and I missed the signs. 🙁
I was in foster homes too although most of them were decent – but being bounced around from home to home because the situation which made them put me in foster care left me hard to handle. And all of it could probably have been resolved by leaving me with my mother…but apparently the rest of my family wasn’t very keen on that because I was born out-of-wedlock… >_> (Well, I had religiots in the family.)
leej, Yep. Texas really needs a culture change. Hope Wendy Davis runs for governor.
There are two issues here. The mary jane causing a child to be taken from a parent and the other is the fact that two abusive foster homes befell the same girl, fatally in the last. Something is fundamentally broken there. 98% of foster parents are decent but there are some who use the foster children strictly as income and those are usally the worst kind.
I feel for this girl and her parents first and foremost. But a big part of me hopes the dad sues the pants of the state for this outrage. I don’t mean any kind of insult to those here who have done good work for their state’s child protective service, but my experience with them in WA was such that I can no longer hear the name and not get angry. They were the most totally incompetent agency I ever had the misfortune of dealing with. They were either lazy when it came to having to deal with a REAL case involving a sexual assault against a child, or they were nazis in badgering a parent over a totally nothing issue and their egos just wouldn’t let it go, or they wanted us to do everything for them, like calling up wanting us to be taxi drivers for a child to a foster home. Anything that might be embarassing to them, they would sweep the issue under the rug and pretend it went away, regardless of the child’s needs. I better stop now.
“but my experience with them in WA was such that I can no longer hear the name and not get angry. They were the most totally incompetent agency I ever had the misfortune of dealing with. They were either lazy when it came to having to deal with a REAL case involving a sexual assault against a child, or they were nazis in badgering a parent over a totally nothing issue and their egos just wouldn’t let it go, or they wanted us to do everything for them, like calling up wanting us to be taxi drivers for a child to a foster home. Anything that might be embarassing to them, they would sweep the issue under the rug and pretend it went away, regardless of the child’s needs. I better stop now.”
Darren,
I find it interesting that your experiences with WA CPS, mirror my own with CPS in NYC. Let me explain because I think it may add further insight to our readers.
When I graduated Social Work School and while I was working on my training as a Psychotherapist, I was marked by the NYC Human Resources Administration as someone to watch. My school was part of a work/study program funded by Title XX and I was granted a full scholarship after a competition with 25 others, who took three classes for nine graduate credits.
For the first time in my life I worked hard at school and in my placement jobs and had straight “A’s” winning the scholarship. I was promoted to Supervisor and sent to work in Special Services for Children’s elite Confidential Investigation Unit. The Director there seemed to hate me on sight when I reported. She was large and heavyset. I learned later that she too was a graduate of Columbia University School of Social Work.and that had been the cachet that made her career. This Unit investigated cases of abuse and neglect in Foster Care homes and facilities. This woman’s disdain for me was centered around the fact that I never had worked before in CPS investigation and also that I had the temerity to look her in the eye when we spoke. The others in the unit were thoroughly cowed by her.
Because I had been a well known Union activist was also a cause for resentment since when you do union work you learn not to be cowed by authority. I was there for going on six months and we began to have many clashes at that time when I discovered that the Unit’s purpose was really to cover up abuse in our Foster Care facilities since they were run by huge non-profits like Catholic Charities, that had much political clout in NYC. This was true of both the Jewish and Protestant agencies as well. I refused to engage in these coverups and this caused the director problems since I couldn’t be disciplined for really doing my job. At the six month point I finally had enough of her abuse and claim that I had no CPS experience so I put in for a transfer to the Brooklyn Field Office of CPS. My request for transfer out of Central Office to the boondocks was considered an amazing blunder on my part. While the money and title stayed the same all those who wanted to climb the bureaucratic ladder vied to get into Central Office and away from the field offices. I was doing the opposite. She disdainfully dismissed me when I left telling me I had destroyed my career.
Child Protective Services energized me because as a troubled child (not abused, yet neurotically troubled) I had made a vow to myself to never forget the pain I felt in childhood. To have the chance now to protect children awakened a feeling of mission in me that I hadn’t had up to that point in my career. The Brooklyn Field Office at the time was the largest facility of its kind in the nation and Brooklyn itself was in a time of great social stress and upheaval. The Office was a large five story building about a block square. The middle three floor contained CPS units, each consisting of 7 rowed desks. There was the Supervisor I’s, the unit clerk and five caseworkers in each unit. My Unit was in the back of the room so as I looked in from of me I could see about 40 units in rows. I would regularly come in about 8:00am every day and work through the pile of case records that my workers had written in from the previous day. I would read every line written in every case, sign the entries and below them give my follow up instructions. I would make notes as to which of my workers I would speak to directly. One of my workers had been an old friend from years before in the Welfare Department. He had been transferred to CPS about five years before me. He had a part time business on the side and he figured that now we had reunited and I was admittedly new to the job he could just get by.
His case write-ups were atrocious and it was known he never wanted to go “to court”, so he would ignore issues seen and provide such little detail he wouldn’t have a record to be hung on in case of trouble. His work was typical as I found. I kept talking to him nicely to give me more information and he would smile back at me in a way that conveyed “Yeah right, Mike”.
I had been there for three weeks and I realized that this was not only wrong but intolerable. One morning I asked him to accompany me to our staff lounge. Shut the door, picked him up by his lapels and threw him into the wall. I held him there and told him that he would follow my orders or I would get him fired. He stopped talking to me after that, for awhile, but his work improved drastically. The message got through to the rest of my workers and my unit developed a sense of comradely Commitment. I reinforced that by becoming the only Supervisor I to accompany the caseworkers out to the field on difficult cases, thus learning by actually doing and building my worker’s trust by sharing the dangers and depression of the job.
Since I was in early working on the cases and could observe the rest of the office I could see that the other Unit Supervisors would generally come in at 9:00am or later and socialize for much of the morning. Their desks were usually piled with unread case records as they drank coffee and chatted. It both astounded me and disgusted me that there was such a blase attitude among those who were in effect the Sergeants of the office and so directly affected worker morale. some of it no doubt was the shell shock of seeing so many serious cases, but a lot of it was apathy and laziness. They had a willingness to leave the burden on the worker’s back and when there was blame to be distributed it seem to always fall on the workers and not those who supervised them. It took me a year to become the Supervisor I in the office who other supervisors came to for advice. It was actually shorter in time because I was out for three months when I had my first heart attack at age 37.
A pilot project was proposed to develop a so-called High Risk Unit, that would be made up of elite workers and would use a new form the CPSRD.
This form was a brilliant development since it allowed any reader to follow how each case was investigated and forced the worker and supervisor to sign off at each step of the investigation. I loved it when I first saw it because of its utility and clear division of responsibility. I was chosen to supervise the unit I was allowed my choice of who I deemed to be the five best workers out of the 600 or so in the field office. Each morning I would choose my own cases from the ones that had come in overnight via telex.
Those cases were the deaths, third degree burns, serious fractures or worst sex abuse cases. The pilot lasted for one year. By years end all of my workers had been burned out and were either on sick leave, or had quit the Agency. My best worker resigned to work in the Post Office because the job was destroying her family life. In the last month I was making all the visits myself and taking all of the cases into court. At the end of the year an outside consultant studied the results and concluded that my unit had outperformed the ten other regular, random, CPS units throughout the City by a wide margin. This was based on outcome and upon the thoroughness of the case file. I was promoted to Central Office and my career really began.
Incidentally, years later at an HRA joint task force, I ran into my old boss from the Confidential Investigations Unit which she still ran. I outranked her.
thank the officials of Texas for keeping the death penalty on the books! these people need to be executed as soon as possible
Texas probably would that.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/08/05/john-errol-ferguson-executed_n_3709871.html?icid=maing-grid7%7Cmaing10%7Cdl14%7Csec3_lnk1%26pLid%3D353867
DavidB,
Happy 59, you’ve become a valued member of the mispochah.
david, Happy birthday and always remember, “La vita e bella!”
Kudos to you Mike Spindell.
Kudos to you Barnassey.
Kudos to so many here that share civil conversation with open thought.
Thank you Jonathon Turley for the opportunity.
….Oh Hell !! …. Kudos to life and the challenges it throws at us. We all can float to the surface and find exhilaration, when we learn what specifically in our lives keep tugging us under. …..
I turn 59 tomorrow at 1030 am.
Mike, I spent time with two therapists 15 years apart that were the best guides for me. / my health care and EAP at work allowed for them, my spirit needed help, and I was fortunate to find these two/ I found the surface. Now it’s up to me to keep above water and enjoy the sunshine and withstand the storms.
Better late than never. Peace and balance is within us all.
Happy early Birthday Davidbluefish
BARNASSEY God blessed and may he continue to do so. and like mike i can tell some stories about acs, i went up against them just 2 years ago and won, but not without a fight. they count on people not knowing their rights and they counted wrong with me. they took my daughter on a friday and she was back home by monday afternoon. the caseworker decided to tell some lies too make my case seem worse. the most laughable was she found a empty beer bottle next to my garbage can. the hilarious one she found a roach (marijuana) under my radiator now that was hilarious because one i dont smoke it. havent in 23 yrs. how she managed to see a roach so far back under the radiator i had to get on my hands and knees and dig it up is beyond me. she sent me for a drug test. not understanding that i was volunteering at a outpatient program at the time. so i asked them to do my test also. i took the tests 30 mins apart. the rehabs came back negative while hers came back with concentrations that you would need to snort or shoot cocaine for about a week straight on a non stop basis to have. by the time i got thru with her. she and her superviser were fired….
Barnassey and RobinH,
Both your stories ring so sadly true to me. Barnassey that you made it through the horror of the foster home and foster care system is a credit to your innate strength. It is hard to generalize, but I expect your experience reflects a good many others in this country’s child care systems, most often without the positive results of your coming to terms with your life. Foster Care should be a priority in quality control and financial support because in effect the State is taking children from parents to protect the child from harm. There should be a sense of great duty and care for those children. The reality is that is often not the case. The issues are such that perhaps I need to do a guest blog about why the State fails so often in providing good child care.
RobinH, your story reflects a dirty little secret about CPS, that also reflects the failures that hurt Barnassey. Many CPS workers and their supervisors are too quick to make uninformed judgments and get carried away with their authority. They don’t respect the civil rights of parents and fail to delve beneath the surface of the situation they faced. I always approached the possibilty of removing a child with trepidation because sometimes the judgments can go either way. I know that too many in CPS were cavalier in their work. When you are holding a family’s structure or a child’s future in you hands you need to be damned careful and some aren’t. Others are merely mean tempered bullies who enjoy the suffering they inflict. RobinH it sounds like you ran into the latter and I’m glad you struck back. There is so much I want to say but I really need to express it in a longer format to do justice to the subject. I’ll just finish here by expressing my sadness at what you both were put through. CPS should be a noble job that provides great service to protecting children and it is tragic that it fails so often in its duties.
Thank you. I honestly admit i survived because i am one stubborn guy at times. Ive been a Long time reader for prof. Turley’s blog. He has a lot of insight about things that often makes me ask the hard questions about things.
Barnassey,
I want to echo what has already been said. Thanks for sharing your story and congrats on overcoming the foster care system’s damaging effects on you.
Barnassey, Firstly thanks for your service. Secondly, thanks for talking about something that is probably pretty painful for you. We need the perspective of people that are from different backgrounds. Your input here is much needed and appreciated. Hopefully you come back often. And damn, man..if you think your comment was long look @ some of the ones on other threads. You’re Hemingwayish compared to some!
Well it is sad to see this happen but this has been happening in the black community for about 30-odd years. The only reason why this is in the news is due to the fact she is white, everything like this happened to me for 16 years in DCFS ( i prayed very hard for death from the things done to me). I was taken due to the fact my grandmother was mentally ill and self medicated as a result. My mom did not know of this. My grandmother ened up going to the hospital while my mom was off at school. I was taken bounced from foster home then from group home to group home as my resentment and anger grew. One way the MHT’s found to control it was to make me turn the hatred of my situation against my mother and family. over timei became so angry that no one wanted to deal with me and the standard practice was to drug me and isolate me. by the time i was 19 i was a sullen, hair triggered individual. The only reason why i changed was due to m mother starting a conversation with me and getting to know me (they had prevented her from seeing me based on “inadequate progress”). she eventually helped me get free of that by signing myself out from their care and took me to therapy. After a year of good progress i was much much more communicative. By 21 i was functionally fixed of those issues. I mustered up the courage and joined the navy served 7 years saw much of the middle east (i was an AT or Avionics Tech) and was made whole through tireless efforts to improve myself. I apologize if this was too long of a post but had to comment and tell my story. TL:DR This has been happening a long time and eventually the the same issues black Americans face would be faced by the rest.
Barnassey: Thank you for sharing your story and for surviving it.
That is a testament to your will and strength (and your mother’s) that you could turn your life around.
All ye sane folk: Flee Texas. Do it now.
Tragic and inexcusable. However, even considering this occurred in Texas, the fact that his child was taken because of cannabis use was tough for me to believe. A cursory check shows more complete reporting by other media. This gentleman and his girlfriend had a fight over who could best take care of the child. Other family members thought that it was a dangerous situation and called protective services. According to the father, PART of the reason the child was taken was his use of cannabis. If there were family members concerned about the child, it’s surprising they weren’t use as a temporary placement for this sweet girl. Maybe they too were unfit? However, when you enter the foster care jungle, this happens all too often. I’ll end as I began..tragic and inexcusable.
My late daughter-in-law worked for the Department of Children’s Services in her state. As she put it, “I work in the Dead Baby Division.”
It is sad to say that she never lacked for work. She traveled all over the state investigating cases of dead babies. Some were due to the DHS screwing up, and some where they did not get to the child in time to get it out of an abusive home. She died of a stroke at a relatively young age. One has to wonder if it was not at least partly due to stress.
Texas is the home of the stupid and bigoted right wing fanatics.It is certainly not surprising to learn how an innocent young child died as a direct result of the failure of the Texas Department of Child Protective Services to investigate the foster homes that they trust with the welfare of a child.
To do a much better job of providing a safe place for children,no matter the reason for the need for such a place is what we should be looking at. How is it that these foster homes are abusive?
This is crazy….