So…if a government agency took your child away, what would you do?
“Well,” you say, “that would never happen to us.”
But what if someone made an allegation of abuse or neglect toward you? Then they could take your kids.
“But no one would ever do that to people like us,” you say.
And you could be very, very wrong. I’m a pastor, and it has just happened to us.
When we took our violent 8 year-old foster son to the hospital here, we were in the midst of adopting him. We had very real concerns about if we could continue to handle his violence, but most of all we wanted him to get some real psychiatric help. We pleaded for him to be admitted to a long term psychiatric facility.
He had been through a hellish existence already for just an 8 year-old. Someone had to help him, so we kept asking for help.
Evidently, we asked for too much.
Suddenly, TN DCS workers had him released from the hospital on May 7, against our wishes. They demanded he be brought back into our home, his treatment unfinished. A week later, they sent him back to Florida where we had moved from, telling us they’d determined “he was too dangerous for us”. So it seems he was dangerous enough to send out of their jurisdiction, but not too dangerous to be in home with my wife and two small girls for a full week.
When we continued to ask to adopt him after this, suddenly caseworker Brittany Duffield accused us of abandoning our child at the hospital. Seems they received an “anonymous report” the child was left unattended at the hospital.
But just today (06/20/24), in a meeting at Greeneville Community Hospital, hospital administrators confirmed their own records stating (verbatim) that my wife “refused to leave the hospital until sitters came to stay with our son”. It is a matter of their official records that we were at the hospital daily, and made sure there was always someone with our child.
We’ve learned from this situation that all TN DCS must do is find an “anonymous accusation”, and this raises “concerns” about your worthiness to care for your child. And note, they have conducted no open investigation, done no interviews with us, and never give us the right to face an accuser as any citizen would in a criminal court.
So…if someone makes an accusation against you, how would you defend yourself when there is no accuser, no evidence? In our case, the hospital’s evidence actually speaks in our favor, and yet our son is still in another state thrown into their foster care system.
“Well,” you say, “you would take it to your state representative, and to the governor if need be.” Good idea. We did just that. But when DCS raised their unfounded, unproved concerns about us with TN Rep David Hawk, his office quickly stopped returning our calls. Seems they will fight for you, at least until its clear it might become an actual fight.
When we sent our story to TN Governor Lee’s office, they did what you’d expect any political office to do: they forwarded it TO THE VERY AGENCY THAT WE WERE ACCUSING OF TAKING OUR SON! Right, they actually sent the complaint straight to TN DCS themselves. Seems government bureaucracies get to investigate themselves. How convenient!
Thankfully Governor DeSantis’ office is looking into our case, as is Rep Byron Donalds of our former district in Florida. But there is little they can do until TN DCS stops accusing us of things official hospital records refute.
Now we are in the next phase of this, which will involve an attorney. We have never hired one before, never sued anyone ever, and don’t like taking things to that level. But we see now more than ever a government agency like TN DCS can do whatever they wish to you and your family, simply when they get tired of dealing with you.
How people can be so breathtakingly callous is a surprise to me, but I’m learning. I understand that you may read this and thank God it’s not happening to you. I wouldn’t rest too easily. I never thought it could happen to me either.
#repdavidhawk #TNDCS #GovLee #FosterParenting
