[MacosNerd]

msnbc is reporting that the Texas Court is ordering the return of sect children to parents.

So what do you think, of this ruling.

Did the state over-step its authority by taking the children away from their parents with virtually no proof (one anonymous call that the state failed to find the victim) or is the court off base, by order the return of the children to their parents.

[moonmonkey]

They should be kept from the children until they have modern hair, the hair is wrong.

[subego]

Originally Posted by MacosNerd 

Did the state over-step its authority by taking the children away from their parents with virtually no proof (one anonymous call that the state failed to find the victim)

Yup.

The state blew it. They clearly were on to something, but that's not enough. You have to be on to something and not blow it.

[laieboy]

Originally Posted by moonmonkey 

They should be kept from the children until they have modern hair, the hair is wrong.

Too funny!

[ghporter]

The state blew it, but it was the COURT that blew it just now. There is a problem, a major problem, with this group. I don't care if they rub blue mud in their navels and chant in Klingon to some deity or other, they are intentionally violating state laws about marrying underage females, and they seem to have some very odd ideas about "honesty"; all the kids are apparently coached to tell anyone who asks that they are 18, when they are obviously 12 or 13. This is a bad situation and it's going to get worse.

I don't think the state overstepped anything. I do think that this will spur the Legislature to actually provide some decent funding to Child Protective Services so that they can get enough people and train them thoroughly enough. Some of the CPS workers have been accused of mistreating the kids psychologically, but the accusers are not necessarily fully conversant with the situation either. And I don't see how anything a case worker could do would be anywhere near as harmful as telling a 12 year old girl that she's going to marry and have babies with this 25 year old man, then making her do it.

And moonmonkey, the hair is not the problem. Those DRESSES are! Eeek!

[andi*pandi]

the whole situation is screwy.

[Zeeb]

The state vastly over stepped its bounds. If there was a reasonable suspicion -- then each family should have been a separate case and investigated individually. It's like confiscating all children in catholic families everywhere because some priests couldn't keep their hands off the kiddies.

It's really sad because I think most of those children *are* being abused.

[ghporter]

Originally Posted by Zeeb 

The state vastly over stepped its bounds. If there was a reasonable suspicion -- then each family should have been a separate case and investigated individually. It's like confiscating all children in catholic families everywhere because some priests couldn't keep their hands off the kiddies.

It's really sad because I think most of those children *are* being abused.

The problem is that our CPS is chronically understaffed. So chronically that they don't keep people long enough for them to get enough experience to do things really well sometimes.

But there IS a reasonable suspicion that EVERY one of those families is abusing the kids, and doing it systematically, so ALL of them had to be taken from the families.

Your Catholic analogy isn't appropriate because there never was a suspicion that all priests were messing with kids, just that a few were and that the church was protecting them. Very different situation.

[Zeeb]

Good point about my analogy--I think you're right that it wasn't an appropriate comparison.

However, what was the reasonable suspicion that all the kids were being abused? I thought the Texas Supreme court was returning them because there *wasn't* a reasonable suspicion to hold them?

[SirCastor]

The state made a major mistake going in and seizing the children, in that they had no hard evidence. This is going to make it extremely difficult to make a move again, both in terms of the law getting permission, and in the preparation of the fundamentalists. A sting works because people don't know it's coming.

The whole operation was a bit too rushed. Granted, they didn't have much of a choice, but they were prepared for the situation, or it's aftermath.

Unfortunately, I think we're going to see some pretty harsh lawsuits levied against the State, if not by the fundamentalists, than by rights organizations (Clarification: I don't think most rights organizations support what the fundamentalists do, but the principal...)

[ghporter]

"Failed to show an immediate danger" is not the same as "reasonable suspicion." It's legalese for "almost but not quite" as far as I'm concerned. CPS gets reamed for not taking action time after time (when they have no information at all), and when they do have a real, widespread problem that they can do something about, the courts ream them again. I wonder why anyone still works in Child Protective Services.

The principal is STILL whether it's OK to marry girls as young as 12 and start procreating with them in the state of Texas. It's NOT OK to do that. As I understand it, it's common practice to "break" babies of crying by (I wish I was able to make this sort of crap up) basically holding their faces under running water until they stop crying. This doesn't come from some hysterical individual who thinks the FLDS needs to go down because of their hair and dresses. It comes from one of the mothers themselves. Crying is not only an appropriate exercise for a baby, it's developmentally necessary to produce effective breathing coordination, so "breaking" this, the only form of communication a baby has, is not only bad, it's serious abuse.

I don't think the ACLU wants to be in the same county as any of the FLDS people, and I can't blame them.