According to an August 12 report from KXLY in Spokane, Washington, the Department of Child Protective Services for nearby Colville has come under investigation after a number of parents and legal guardians complained about the department’s practices: removing children from perfectly good homes, splitting families for no apparent reason, and treating legal guardians with great disrespect. Added to parental complaints is a letter by local area physicians claiming they have no confidence in the Colville DCPS office.
All by itself, the story should raise concerns, but Colville is not alone. From Atlanta, Georgia to Sacramento, California, civil child protection organizations all over the country are being investigated for abuse of their seemingly unlimited power. And a report released in the Journal of the American Academy of Pediatrics claims that as many as two-thirds of actual child abuse cases go unreported by physicians, in part because these clinicians have no confidence that CPS will do anything to benefit the child.
It makes you wonder about the Vancouver, Washington, couple who were arrested in Iowa on Monday (August 11) for kidnapping their own child from Washington CPS. Are they actually criminals, or heroes? Was CPS protecting the child from them, or were they rescuing their son from CPS? (Parentalrights.org does not claim to have sufficient facts to take sides in this case.) The fact is it is no longer safe to assume that the government wouldn’t be pursuing these parents if they hadn’t done anything wrong.
And now things have taken a turn for the worse in Minnesota. According to The Caledonia Argus, the Minnesota State Board of Public Defense has decided to address budget shortfalls for this year by discontinuing state-funded legal representation for parents in Child in Need of Protection or Services (CHIPS) or Termination of Parental Rights (TPR) cases. It seems that granting due process rights to parents whose children are being taken away is just a luxury, and one the state can no longer afford.
Of course, a lot of these problems could be cleared up if there weren’t so many CHIPS and TPR cases in the first place – if such cases arose only when there was actual evidence of abuse or neglect. Instead, today’s CPS workers are left to make judgment calls, removing children from their families because that worker was uncomfortable with the family’s religious, educational, or even financial policies.
This is only the tip of a tremendous iceberg which we will explore further in future articles, but the bottom line is this: by preserving the rights of parents to make decisions in the lives of their own children, while maintaining the government’s authority and responsibility to intervene in cases of actual abuse or neglect, the Parental Rights Amendment can help reduce and refine the caseloads of America’s CPS workers, so that children are truly being protected – both outside and inside “the System”.
Tags: child-parent bond, Constitutional Amendment, Danger to Parental Rights
Proadmin's Blog 
August 26, 2008 at 12:03 pm
The biggest problem with the CPS is that they use personal feelings instead of going by what the law says about abuse. IMHO
August 27, 2008 at 8:21 pm
Thanks for this information on the current cases filed against CPS. I’m sure that it is uplifting to those who want to join together to stop abuses by CPS.
August 30, 2008 at 12:53 pm
i to am dealing with cps in hyden kentucky. i moved to delaware and went back to kentucky to visit. i agreed(with stupidity) to let my daughter stay the summer to visit longer with her step sister ( who is a few years older than me) her step sister took my oldest son and i to the buss tation for a long ride home only to then file charges against me saying i abandoned my daughter and told the courts she had no idea where i was,but she wsa able to mail me my drivers lisence that i lost ,,,,it has been 6 years now and i am still fighting to get my daughter back as i have a court date on the 15th of sept. again,, threw all of this i never received court dates from the clerks office,the bus station was shut down once becuase of the wheather and the judge told me he did not care how i got there if i really wanted my kids back i would grow wings and fly if i had to(they took my oldest from me at the very first court date and arrested me for two weeks and two days for child support that i had just been court ordered to pay, it was choose between paying it or going to court to get my daughter),,,now they have both my children,,,and no one seems to be able to help me ,, i have went through all the lawyers here and cannot afford to pay fo ro ne out of town.
September 1, 2008 at 12:16 am
These are such sad cases. I hate hearing that parents are treated so unfairly (and too many people are apathetic or skeptics about what is really transpiring in our world today).
September 6, 2008 at 12:20 pm
If we can get McCain and the lady vice President in the office maybe they can change things for us poor folks.Give them this website I know I am and the other websites I am going to notified them these other websites and what is happening to us and our families.
September 8, 2008 at 9:58 am
I just found your site. My husband and I are going thru this mess. DSS took our 3 children from the home for abuse, sexual abuse and negelect. They are taking the oldest, 16 word only. We have never gone thru this before. My husband has a no contact order on the 2 youngest. He has not seen or talked to them in over 7 months. The lawyers are dragging everything out. I homeschooled all 3 and was a stay at home mom. We are getting the shaft.
September 8, 2008 at 10:08 am
The 2 youngest children have stated to everyone that the oldest was lying and that we didn’t do anything to them or her. But she called the DSS office and because we would not let her see her boyfriend or talk on the phone for hours, she wanted to get even and get revenge on her stepfather. The lawyer refused to give my husband a lie detecter test, dna or anything else. He has also spent 10 days in the county jail for these charges. We are at our ropes end and the foster care here in SC are also being looked into and they have been sued and lost to out of court settlements for wrongful doings. We are being blackmailed into doing things at the state’s request in order to get the kids back. But my husband my have to leave home. The courts or the lawyers refuse to listen or call witnesses for our behalf. They only want to listen to the 16 year old.
September 20, 2008 at 7:09 pm
Have you been updated on case out of Vancouver, Washington?
Do you know where they are at now?
I also reside in Vancouver , WA
September 22, 2008 at 5:25 pm
omg.. good work, brother
September 28, 2008 at 4:06 am
I have three children two of them diagnosed with ADHD and the third shows the symptoms of the disorder. The disorder is genetic in our family. I have found over the years of raising my oldest now 13 that the school as a manditory reporter plays a big part in involving CPS. I have fought tooth and nail with our local school district to put measures in place that will help my child to learn and grow as best he can. There is always some excuse for the school district to violate our child’s special education law rights by forcing the focus off of them by sicking CPS on me (and other parents in simular situations) with a trumpt up charge of neglect or possible abuse complaint. The Elementary School my oldest had gone to for first grade tried to go down that road then, but I said I guess we’ll have to get a lawyer. The school backed off. His whole first grade year was a complete nightmare. Now I have a set of 5 year old twins. They attended HeadStart this previous year and that was anothger big nightmare. The school just did not want to put anything in place to help my children displaying what they called behavior problems. The HeadStart did little to nothing in putting anything in place to assist my twins. No other resources were offered and the local school district put off trying to give any help as well. By the end of the school year the district finally put a small amount of help in place. When HeadStart decided to close their doors I got an unexpected visit from CPS about an incident that happened at the HeadStart Admin Office. The CPS investigator was very intimidating and was not satisfied unlesss I implicated myself in any wrong doings. I felt what a big slap in the face for doing the best job I could as a parent. I make mistakes but I love my children. I find the schools tend to take advantage of the system in their favor when difficulties arise between them and parents. This is not in the best interest of the children I feel because they are in the middle of a power struggle where the parents rarely win against the system.
October 5, 2008 at 11:15 am
This is a good clip on the UN…
We are not the interdependent country of the United States. We have a Declaration of Independence not “Interdependence” as Presidential Candidate Chuck Baldwin discusses.
When Americans citizens can contact their representatives in Congress and ask them not to vote a bill, that shuts down the email and switchboard, and they do it anyway, this is a sign of why there is a problem of protecting parents’ rights in America. Contact your representatives to support the Parental Rights Amendment
October 8, 2008 at 3:05 pm
My husband and I have five children between ourselves that CPS took in Feb. We had just had a case closed were they had told us that if the older three were taken around their step dad by their mother and we didn’t tell them we would be charged with neglect because he had molested their oldest sister. We found out through our kids that this was happening. We also found out that our two oldest boys had acted out sexualy with each other. We called the 1-800 number for fear of what we were told before. They threw out our call, did nothing to try to help our kids because we were just parents wanting help. We took our kids to the police, they did nothing. We went to their counsaler, she called CPS. They came and took all of the kids saying that we didn’t protect them from acting out with each other. Through all this mess we have found that the step dad has messed with our othre daughter as well as one of our boys. We have do not abuse our kids but we are looked st as the bad guys. We asked for help and they ignored us. We are done with all they have put in place for us to do to get our kids back. Now they are trying to say that we don’t disapline them and that’s why they wouldn’t recomend to a judge to send them home. Right. They are trying to come up with things to keep my kids. We need help! TX is hurting my children for their own selfish reasons.
October 9, 2008 at 10:00 am
i recently had my daughter taken away for no reson just because she says shes afraide to come home the bio father whos rigths i terminated in 1997 for child neglect witch he was charged got ahold of my 16 year old daughter 3 weeks ago and has been coaching her thru how to stay out of the home last fri it was court ordered i have contact with my daughter guess what they never put me on the list to talk to her instead they put the bio father whos rigths have been terminated this is wisconsin were this is happening is there anyone that can help me out there let me say they have told me theres no reson she cant come home but they contnue to give a abuser the right to see her and talk to her what do i do
October 9, 2008 at 11:44 am
oh my siduation get worse now socail services tells me they are going to place her with her abuser whos rigths i terrminated this gung ho social worker is digging for everything she can try to and meanwhile he continuse to brain wash my daughter and play the system and they just keep letting it happen what do i do
October 12, 2008 at 4:28 pm
My husband and I are going through with what some of you are going through they are blaming us for what our now 16 yr old son did to his now 11 yr old sister they were 12 and 8 at the time of the incident Moses Lake, WA CPS office is the one who took my kids away both the the oldest and youngest are ADHD and had intercourse and my daughter deliberatly forgot about it and didn’t say anything to my husband and I. How we found out was I received a phone call from the Middle School Principle that my son told a bunch of boys that he was having sex but he never said who with until the CPS worker got a hold of him and threatened him she told my son if she didn’t hear what she wanted to hear she was going to have my daughter examined and him held over by and investigator and have him examined too they don’t have physical evidence to back up that accusation they made against my son they convicted him on hearsay now they want to terminate our right’s even though we did everything they wanted us to do We didn’t do anything to our children we have three children all together. Please we need help we need the best darned attornies ever because the ones we have just aren’t working out they keep changing attornies on us all the time
October 13, 2008 at 9:03 pm
I am living a nightmare-please someone wake me up. Our story begins in October of 2007 when I listened to my liar (bad word, bad word) of a sister and she convinced me to call the cops on my husband. When I came to my senses, it was to late. My second(we have had two tyrant CPS workers helping one another to ruin our lives) tyrant CPS worker now has my husband and I reduced to 1 hour a week to see our two girls, 7 and 3 because she feels “their safety is at risk because supposedly my husband had a few words with tyrant(standing up for his rights) but nothing has occured per tyrant with the kids just her. Even though we have been supervised in prior visits starting in June of 2008 with no “safety concerns she still knocked us down from 2 hours every other day to 1 hour a week. It is our right to stand up for ourselves but tyrant and her dept don’t like that. The GAL, the judge and our two attorneys(court appointed) know the CPS tyrant is in the wrong but continues to let her strip us of every god given right of parents! There is no justice-is this America? I am very worried about my children. I fear for what that tyrant CPS worker is capable of. She has all the control. We have done everything short of killing ourselves to prove to tyrant and her dept. that the allegations are false and that we are caring and loving parents. The tyrant CPS worker even removed a supervisor who truly adored our kids because she was talking to us too much–what tyrant really meant is that the supervisor is on our side and she can’t stand that. Now my oldest might have to live with her grandpa who really is the abuser and her estranged father who hasn’t even called her on her birthday for the past 2 years because IT IS HIS GIVEN RIGHT AS A FATHER per tyrant. The first tyrant said I was neglectful when I didn’t protect my children-what about the loser father of 2 years who is neglectful-that doesn’t matter though because per the second tyrant it is his right to obtain and seek custody of her. If he is granted custody, my youngest will be put in foster care and lost in the system forever-the few hours we have seen her we have been telling her what her last name is over and over because if we don’t we will lose her and never hear of again! The tyrant refuses to let my inlaws have her on some bogus allegation that tyrant has yet had to prove in court. We cannot afford to obtain a lawyer to fight the new custody case in MN for my oldest because we are paying for two attorneys in the CHIPS cases in WI. I have a question for whoever is listening-why is it that tyrant CPS workers get to decide if you are capable of having your children returned to you when they never spend time with you and your kids–I have supervised visits through another agency. THE CPS system is breaking up families and no one is listening. It has to stop!
October 22, 2008 at 10:26 pm
today I went(NJ involvedwith DYFS) for
a treatment team meeting, as they have my
16yr.old, in the wrong place and it seems that I was told, “Your son does not want to see you.” Who is the parent? I am ordering him to be returned so pray for me. Anyway this kid with Aspergers is with a group of 30 who are so loud he cannot attend the school, so he schools in his room…anyway he is behind in Math .
The problem is that you don’t let them in without a warrant. I did. They had 7
unsubstantiated calls on us and kept on and kept on….now he is in the wrong place and I intend to keep fighting.Parental Rights need to be protected by law and they are. You need to appeal every decision “in forma pauperus” and you will be given a better court and better help. It just means that you are poor and our system is designed for everyone touse it.
October 26, 2008 at 5:23 pm
http://www.cchr.org/#/museum/schools
to the idiots that believe in so called mental illness
and all other stupid things
LOOK AT THE HISTORY OF THE INDUSTRY
and wake UP and grow up
and take responsiblility for your own children
http://www.henrymakow.com
October 26, 2008 at 5:23 pm
http://www.cchr.org/#/museum/schools
October 26, 2008 at 5:25 pm
C A S in canada
Child Abuse Systems
C P S in the states
CHILD PARENT SEVERING
November 8, 2008 at 1:50 am
I’m glad to hear that some people are aware of these problems now but the truth is that for black women and rich white women this has always happened and no one ever cared.This hole was dug to keep women under control by people who only see us as disposable property not living souls.They created a monster and it must be fed children. When the poor minority children are all in foster care, be it relative or not the monster start looking for more children as we all saw earlier this year in Texas.
It’s sad that so many lives have been destroyed,mine included, by racism and greed.How long have whites watched in silence as one black woman after another was thrown into the streets to fall victim to rape,drugs,poverty and homelessness.How many of you helped this system to belittle our progress and kill our dreams?
Do any of you really believe that would change under John McCain who promotes racism and discrimination?
Rather than lift the race of American blacks (not Haitians and Africans) and repair the lasting damage of slavery they brought whites down to the level of slaves. Now we all suffer as forigners come in and live off of the blood of our ancestors and steal our place in this world.
So whenever you think of how painful your situation is remember some of us have always had to endure this type of inhumane treatment.Our children were never included in emancipation or civil rights,ever.So this must change before all of the children are sold away.
It may sound crazy but I know and can prove foster care is the child of slavery.
Now we must work together for change and save our children’s children before it’s too late and we become a nation of slaves once again.
I’m ashamed to be part of a country that would cut off it’s nose to spite it’s face.The underlying problem is and always has been money.I had six children now they are federal grants for Ocala,Florida. They are no longer children to anyone except me.
Where do we go from here?
November 8, 2008 at 8:38 pm
My name is Mikeya and i was just sitting at my computer trying to think of something I could do in spite, of it being the weekend to help bring my children home, God moved my spirit to try to be more proactive to eat, sleep, breathe productive ways to help my family get back together, and i must say stumbling upon this site with all these Mom’s living my same agony brought tears and a great deal of pain, to think so many others have been force to live with this same pain is just as unbearable as the pain itself. I don’t have the solutions but as i child that grew up in these circumstances (in the system) i know first hand something has got to be done as sooner than later-i vow from 2day to spend the rest of my life fighting so that are sons and daughter’s don’t have to live through these same battle’s with our own government. Open to suggestions!