Toddler physically, possibly sexually abused; Family holds CPS responsible

[The Straight Story]

Toddler physically, possibly sexually abused; Family holds CPS responsible

Last Update: Mar 16, 2007 7:28 PM

BAKERSFIELD - A Tehachapi family is outraged Friday night after finding bruises on their little girl when she was returned to them from a foster home.

The 2-year-old toddler was placed with her grandmother earlier this week after Child Protective Services found bruising on the girl during a foster home visit last week.

The grandmother said the toddler was emaciated, bruised, her head shaved bald, and possibly sexually abused.

We want to warn you, some of the pictures may be graphic.

“I couldn’t even think,” said Heather Yeck, the toddler’s mother. “I was in shock. I couldn’t even cry. I was just sick.”

Her grandmother said the 2-year-old should not have been taken away in the first place. A Tehachapi Sheriff’s detective took the toddler away from her parents in late January and placed her in the hands of Child Protective Services when a thin fracture in the leg was found after she tripped over a wire—an indication of abuse in the past, but not so anymore. She reads a report from a county doctor.

http://www.kget.com/news/local/story.aspx?content_id=845d854c-851c-4044-b6aa-a76db3f426aa

The pictures are pretty graphic, so I did not want to post them. They are at the above link with the rest of the story.

[anitar1]

1. This is horrible and happens frequently all over this

country. I cannot count the times I have seen stories like this. and some here in my town. I have very little respect for CPS. They throw these kids in a foster home and forget them, until they makes their quarterly visit to the "safe Home" and discover a beaten , traumatized child. What kind of special do they hire for these jobs? This little girl will have problems all her life, thanks to CPS.No damned excuses. I am tired of excuses. Also, the foster parents will probably be chastised and given a clean slate.CPS and the police are totally blameless when an event occurs.

[Erika]

2. Yer many "fundies" don't even believe in birth control

Much less abortion. They should face the fact that many children would be better off never being born.

[MichiganVote]

3. Amen to that. CPS loves to target single mothers and black kids

Then they put them in shit foster care homes that people either run like a business or run for the purpose of abusing kids. People just don't realize the bullshit that goes on with this agency. And when there is a referral that is a slam dunk what do they do? Nothing.

I'm sure they get it right some of the time but my professional experience has shown me that this agency is just full of crap.

[Pavulon]

12. CPS targets white trash, black trash, and all other form

of human crap equally. Wife has done exams on kids with organ damage from physical abuse, rape, psych referrals. On little kids. CPS brings them in. Someone has to do it.

CPS is a low paying agency and I would wager their staff is made up mostly of women, some single black mothers..

It varies from county to county. In NC wake may act differently than durham county.

[MichiganVote]

16. No, CPS does not target all income levels equally.

[Pavulon]

18. Nope

because people who can not afford food are not generally making 6 figure salaries. CPS does not target. They take calls from people. They follow up calls. They do not go knocking on doors in the trailer parks and projects. Not in my state.

My understanding is that the majority of the calls are vindictive complaints, the rest vary from people who need help feeding and providing for their children. The minority of cases are true criminal acts.

"Target" is a loaded word. They do investigate people of all income levels

[Ian David]

4. Will Bill O'Reilly say that the little girl enjoyed it? n/t

[mntleo2]

5. Or they Place Them Back With Sick Parents

I'm in in the custody of a precious little girl who will be placed soon with her "father" and step mother, both with long police records and two other children living in their home. Dad is almost 40 years old, a "recovering" meth addict (but does not even have to be drug tested even though he just got out of jail for selling and using meth), pimped the baby's mother and probably the girlfriend, is HIV positive and very sexually active and does not have to tell women he is, and uses women to take his responsibilities.

When I tried to tell CPS, who are all men who "represent" the baby, that this pattern showed a great lack of respect for women and girls, that his addiction has a high rate of relapse rate (75-92%), and that my grand niece would make a fine income for a desperate meth head when she reaches about the age of 7 years old, I was shushed and told I was "demonizing" the man. Because DSHS, is so damn glad at the rare event of a man actually taking responsibility for for their kids, men are not as rigorously put through the paces as mothers even though they desert these kids and keep making more with younger women.

I have had this little girl since she was 2 months old, I love her dearly but in my state parental rights rule, which usually I would defend, especially for women. But this man has left at least 2 other cildren behind and does not even know where they are and the woman he is with is how shall I say this ~ not too bright, she obviously is desperate if she wants an HIV positive meth head pimp (if she even knows he is HIV positive, and if she does she is even more stupid than I thought).

Just last week a similar situation to what my little one will soon be facing happened where the father and girlfriend almost starved the father's child to death and the child was taken just in time. Other children in the home and "Daddy" was a meth addict who was "recovering". These men have no plans to actually care for their kids themselves, they think it is cheaper than being responsible for child support (which is rarely enforced anyway) and they always have to have some woman to do it for them and the State here thinks this is wonderful.

Let's face it, Child Protective Services is anything BUT protecting children, do not care about the children, it is all about their image and who or what will sue them, which they have made as impossible as they can, but they are still afraid of it.

Even though as a family member I know both parents well and know where all the "bodies are buried" I am not even allowed a voice in court, I cannot even hire a lawyer even if I could afford one. Even the baby is not even allowed a lawyer, she only gets a CASA volunteer who is nice, but she is a freaking volunteer, there is nobody else to speak for the child, and the State insists on being the only ones with a voice,

CPS is so broken (as are all DSHS departments from what I have seen). I detest them.

Cat In Seattle

[The Straight Story]

7. Damn Cat, sorry to hear about that mess

the system is a damned scary mess indeed.

[mntleo2]

17. Oh Lord, How I Know!

...and I believe that children need their parents usually.

But children do not need meth addicts and men who have a pattern of using women to take their responsibilities ~ and the mostly very young women who are stupid enough to be used as these men's work horses. I know good dads who are responsible and loving, don't get me wrong, but it is just a fact, there a millions more single mothers with absent fathers who will not even pay child support much less take their children on even for visitation. A far higher number of men leave their children behind and refuse to be responsible for them, then when they do, they STILL won't take the same responsibility as far more mothers do. They pawn these responsibilities onto someone else. Usually a younger woman who is stupid enough to do it for awhile anyway, until they realize they are left to take care of everything. That is when the child becomes neglected, because Dad is the one with custody, but leaves it to someone elses and then the kid doesn't have anybody.

The State wants me to stay involved with this child, but the stickler here is trying to deal with drug addicted parents who quite frankly I just cannot deal with anymore. I am so damn angry at the selfishness and negligence I see in so many men who are only too willing to not take their responsibilities. This dad would never take his child unless he did have somebody else he thinks is going to do the work. He has never done it for any other child he procreated, why should anyone, CPS included, think it is going to be any different this time? And they expect me to stand by and watch this?

And the HIV issue, oh god. I tried so hard to raise the issues of the father having two women (at least) going and the other girlfriend being exposed and not knowing it ~ or worse knowing it and still willing to go along with the plan of her taking responsibility of another child (as a mother of 2 herself before the age of 21). What does that say about her mothering abilities when she is willing to give herself over to that? Mommy and Daddy were taking care of her kids before she went to live with this man and become The Brady Bunch. She has essentially given herself a death sentence. But again I was "demonizing" the father. Nobody wanted to even talk about that and while I respect privacy medical issues, there are laws on the books requiring an HIV person to tell their sex partners they have been exposed and if they don't CPS should have the Health Department step in and make sure this woman knows, this is the law ~ but they won't. I am more than disgusted at CPS refusing to even talk about it and they pretend this will have no bearing whatsoever on this child's future.

God I hate these people. You have no idea how heartbreaking it is. Then they go overboard on someone like this child you wrote about, and I am not surprised ~ it is a mother who was living this nightmare. I know other mothers who have been through much the same thing, especially women of color. Because DSHS expects more out of women than they do fathers yet women get paid far less in the work world and are told raising their children is not working and they are is "doing nothing". DSHS is so damn glad that a father is even showing interest, they go gaga and just ignore the alarm bells sounding off under their noses.

Fathers are given carte blanc and nobody seems to see the sexism and what it does to these children. So men can go around spreading their sperm into anything that moves, leave kids behind, and still have more parental rights than their children's relatives who have been the ones there loving and taking care of these children while they go off partying and making more babies. I think ALL fathers should be held accountable, all of them. This is 100% the reason a woman has to turn to welfare for help because the fathers of these kids will not take responsibility.

DSHS knows I am a good parent and that this little girl is much safer with me and at risk with this father and this woman. Sooooo, if they know a child is safer, then it should be a no brainer where this child should be. This is what I am speaking about Child Protective Services not living up to their name in any way. I am telling them I love this girl to death but that addicts are not something I want to even come near. I would work hard, if I had custody where I had the power to make sure this little one was safe, to make sure the child had the parents in their life, if they could. But to be forced into the situation of not being able to do anything and watch this child go through what she never should have to, is beyond painful to contemplate much less live. Then after the kid is damaged and taken away again, they expect me to clean up that mess? I am strong, but not that strong. I am telling them I can't do it, I will have to let her go and it is killing me.

My 2 cents

Cat In Seattle

[mzmolly]

10. My Mother was in foster care for ten years in spite of having a loving capable grandmother

who wanted to care for her. Indeed the system is broken. I applaud what you do, but I don't know how you do it.

[NMMNG]

6. Dirtbags

I hope they get some serious jail time. :grr:

[SammyWinstonJack]

8. USA! USA! USA!

:puke: Outlaw abortions! USA! USA! USA! Billions for an illegal war and none for social services! USA USA! USA! :puke: Thanks a lot you self serving self absorbed greedy repukes! :grr:

[mzmolly]

9. Beyond horrible.

And sad beyond words.

[Lydia Leftcoast]

11. The street kids I knew had horror stories about foster care

I'm sure there are many loving foster parents, but many are like the distant relative of mine who talked about (and thankfully, never went through with) becoming a foster parent to a child who was a little older than her own so that she could both earn money and get the state to buy clothes for the foster child, which would then become hand-me-downs for her own child.

There's a desperate shortage of foster parents, and it seems to me they ought to make it more attractive to people who actually like children.

[rebel with a cause]

13. I worked for DCFS here in Illinois for a short period,

and the office I worked at was excellent. The caseworkers were caring hard working people and the kids there were well taken care of by them. Most of the investigators were also hard working and cared about what they were doing. Only the one man did less than what I thought he should do. I got really upset with him one day when I was manning the phones and he didn't go out quickly to investigate a young child that was a rape victim at an area hospital. I was only interning, but sometimes my mouth works quicker than my brain. Ok, maybe a lot of times it does.

After my time there, I worked at an agency that worked with youths that were wards of the state, and we dealt with caseworkers from all over the state. I learned quickly that the office I had worked at was the exception and not the rule when it came to DCFS caseworkers. Some of them were very good, but most of them were unorganized and neglectful in their duties when it came to the youths. Of course they were over worked with too many clients, but they still could have been more diligent when it came to their concerns. There were times when we did not get the paperwork for the youths until they had been in our care for weeks or sometimes even months. At one time the youths had become those considered dangerous, and we did not know just how dangerous they were until they had been with us for quite a while. It was a hard job and it was made harder by the un-organization of some of the caseworkers.

Well, anyway then there were the foster families. I knew some really great ones and some who scared me to death. People that adopted children through the state and received funding for the time they raised the child was sometimes even worse. the stories I could tell. Edited to add: Of course, the real parents for the most part were the worse. Only on rare occasion were they were capable of being good parents.

[qanda]

14. People should be able to take their kids to the hospital if they get hurt

Without having them snatched away from them and placed in harm's way.

[The Straight Story]

15. When my son was only a few months old he rolled off his changing table

and landed on the floor (of course). I was in the shower, he was on the table in the bathroom with me while the wife was changing him. She walked away, about 3 feet, to throw away his diaper when he rolled reaching for her.

We took him to the hospital as a precaution. She went back with him while i called into work to let them know I would be late (I was a deputy at the time). She came back mad as hell. Son was ok, but the doctor made the remark 'Yeah, I have seen cases of child abuse like this before'.

He is lucky I was not in the room - or he would have spent a night in jail :)

[Pavulon]

19. Wife used to do exams

on kids who showed signs of abuse. Sexual was easy to prove. They do tests and prove it. Shaken baby they do head imagery and show if the kids brain has been bounced off of the inside of is skull. Cigarette burns, broken facial bones, collapsed eye sockets from punches all show up.

Social services are required to deal with the motherfuckers who hurt their kids.

So if you take your kid in with 2 dislocated shoulders in 3 months expect a question.

[wicket]

20. Effing sick!!!

:grr: :grr: