Terrilyn Simpson: Targeted by Maine DHHS

Date: Mon, 26 Sep 2005
From: TM SimpsonTARGETED BY MAINE DHHS
by Terrilyn SimpsonIt was over three months ago that a Maine Department of Human Services
caseworker named Angela Shaw and a co-worker arrived at the woman’s
Skowhegan area home and ordered her to sign a paper. The mother, originally
from the Philippines and now an American citizen, refused, explaining she
could not read and did not understand what the paper was. She understood
only some of what the caseworkers were saying to her. The two workers made
it clear she was signing before they left. Panicked and confused, the woman
eventually penned her name, thinking the workers would then go away. They
did and when they left, they took the woman’s two young sons with them.
Three teenage daughters visiting friends were additionally taken by the
department.Three and a half years after five-year-old foster child Logan Marr was
wrapped in 42 feet of duct tape and left in a basement to die by the
longtime Maine Human Services caseworker who’d become Logan’s foster mother
— and over two years after Governor John E. Baldacci boasted of fixing the
Department of Human Services by doubling it in size — Maine’s child
protective industry continues to be one of the most lucrative industries in
the state for the bureaucrats who run it. Maine gets $2 in federal funds for
every dollar spent on a child in custody and a plethora of agencies and
professionals continue to profit for counseling, evaluating, transporting,
scrutinizing, writing reports on and separating children from their
families. A number of attorneys have built lucrative practices on doing the
state’s bidding regarding the confinement of its children in the foster
system. Approximately $159 million missing from DHHS coffers for at least
several years has yet to be accounted for. And those working at and with
DHHS continue to be held accountable to no one as they control the fates of
some of the state’s most vulnerable citizens.The charges against the Philippine woman and the man who is the father of
the two youngest children and who has step parented and financially
supported the others for nearly 12 years, have been vague, contradictory,
unsubstantiated and peppered with hearsay. All the children have begged to
go home, some in lengthy letters to anyone who will heed their pleas. Two
middle daughters, ages 12 and 13, told a journalist that their guardian ad
litem, an attorney named Charles Reeves, was misrepresenting their accounts
of home life. They told him, they said, that he was fired and then called
another attorney and asked if he’d represent them. Although Attorney Brian
Condon agreed to do so pro bono, he’s been allowed no contact with his young
clients. State officials, including Reeves, have registered opposition
enmasse to Condon, reportedly complaining that allowing legal representation
for the girls could complicate the case for the state.One of the two girls has additionally reported she was threatened by a DHHS
caseworker supervisor named David White who she said told her if she did not
start telling him what he wanted to hear, he could have her put up for
adoption.And after taking her children, DHHS cut off the mother’s access, without
notice, to medications she needs to stay alive. Several years ago she
underwent two major surgeries for thyroid cancer. Her survival, according to
her doctor, is now dependent on thyroid replacement medications, information
to which the state surely had access. But shortly after her children were
taken by the state, all state coverage of the woman’s prescriptions was
pulled without explanation and DHHS workers, when contacted by phone, hung
up on her. By the time an independent advocate intervened, the woman was
critically ill. It took an additional two weeks of intense wrangling and
some tenacious intervention by a state worker outside DHHS to get state
medical coverage resumed. Taxpayers will pay thousands for medical treatment
which would have been unnecessary had the medications gone uninterrupted.And beyond the financial cost to taxpayers and the potentially long-term
damage to the mother’s health, standing up against DHHS has exacted a heavy
toll on the five children still in DHHS custody. Soon after the resumption
of medical benefits and on the heels of a reprimand to the DHHS Skowhegan
office for its handling of the medical case, and following an announcement
of representation by the girls’ new attorney and a complaint against White
for allegedly threatening the girls, the two girls disappeared for
approximately 10 days, were moved to five different foster placements and
have been cut off from all phone contact with their mother and were allowed
only a single two-hour visit with her in three weeks.The mother had contacted White the previous week and pleaded to be told
where her daughters were and asked repeatedly to see them. White adamantly
refused and repeated that refusal at least twice during the course of the
phone conversation. The very next day the girls were transported to a DHHS
visit center where they waited for nearly two hours for their mother to
appear. They were ultimately told she had simply failed to show — not that
White had told her they would not be there. The mother did not learn of the
DHHS ploy to play child against parent until the following week when she was
granted the single two-hour visit and her daughters asked why she hadn’t
shown up. Contacted by telephone, the guardian ad litem laughed at the
mother’s concerns and scoffed at her pleas for intervention.- Terrilyn Simpson, Editor
Common Sense Independent( copyright 2005 No portion of this article may be reproduced in any form without permission from the author. )[ 10-02-2005: Message edited by: Editor ]

[ 10-01-2005: Message edited by: Catherine Lavallee ]

Stories like these are very scary. I wonder if we will ever hear DHHS comment on this story or will they just make sure the kids get a quality placement with someone who is an ace with Duct Tape and high chairs?Tony

i swear there is a compaign issue here

I heard Ms. Simpson on WLOB's "Talkin' Maine", I kept waiting to hear the specific DHHS allegations. Many mothers, who had children removed from the home by DHHS, called the former WLOB morning show with Alan and Charley. Most were complaining and then on to explain that the allegations were that the children were being abused by a man, usually a "boyfriend" that was living in the home. Who made the original complaint?

quote:State officials, including Reeves, have registered opposition
enmasse to Condon, reportedly complaining that allowing legal representation
for the girls could complicate the case for the state.

Well imagine that. What can we do for these girls?

:?

"What can we do?"
It's time some DHS workers had a cross burn on their lawn. Send out the posse.

[ 10-01-2005: Message edited by: Catherine Lavallee ]

This behavior is no less than CRIMINAL!I said it on the "Talkin' Maine" show last week and I'll say it again: As a former Police Officer I believe that "Reasonable Suspicion" if not "Probably Cause" exists for some Dept. of Hell and Human Sacrifice rumpswab to be investigated, if not ARRESTED, for ATTEMPTED MURDER of this Mother, and KIDNAPPING of the children.These kids were at the very least psychologicly abused while in DHHS captivity (notice i don't say "care"), and their treatment is more what one would expect from the governments of Communist Cuba or China than the United States of America!This criminal syndicate posing as a government buraucracy is getting essentially a free pass to perpetrate their criminal abuses and attrocities (up to and including MURDER, apparently)on children and families of the State of Maine because our Atty. General and "Judicial" system must be equally as corrupt and "bought" by the elite powers that be in Augusta as is the DHHS.

I can't think of any other explanation, other than complete and utter incompetence.Frankly, I rather suspect that the reality is a certain combination of the above mentioned factors. I've seen and heard about enough; The proverbial dime has been dropped to FOX News. Time to go National with this, dadblast it!Kudos to Terillyn for prying up one corner of this big, ugly flat rock, which is obviously crawling with stinking, loathsome filth and corruption.The time has come to pop a stick of dynamite under the SOB and blow it sky-high!Let's stick together here, folks; what crawls out from that cesspool underneath ain't gonna be pretty. But when I think of what these kids and families are going through, it just breaks my heart.
And I'm mad enough not to care what sort of vengance the creeps might want to try to visit upon me. And I don't think that I'm the only one, am I?

FYI - This out of the "HOBBS Act", part of the Federal RICO anti-racketeering statutes:Commentary from: http://www.jaysnet.com/666rico.html*"Extortion under Color Of Official Right"*Many people are confused by extortion "under color of official right." Extortion under color of official right occurs when an agent of the government uses his or her legitimate governmental powers to obtain an illegitimate objective. For example, a police officer may have the authority to revoke a driver's license but he cannot offer to forego the legitimate exercise of his power in exchange for sexual favors from the driver. Likewise, a city council member may have the authority to rezone an area of town and thereby effectively put a company out of business, but the council member cannot threaten rezoning unless the company contributes to his re-election campaign. In short, governmental agents have a great deal of discretion when deciding how to exercise the powers of the government. When an agent engages in extortion "under color of official right," he is essentially using the governmental powers with which he has been trusted to gain personal or illegitimate rewards.***********************OK; insert "Social Worker" into that list of examples...It sure sounds as if this Phillipino Mother was "extorted" for her CHILDREN, for goodnes' sake!
What do we have of greater value than our kids??!!As if that wasn't aggregious enough to satisfy these tinhorn tyrants, they apparently tried to MURDER her "under color of official right" so that she would not be around to annoy them about the abduction of her children!Just because a Citizen is indigent or uneducated, that gives no one - "Official" or otherwise - a legitimate right to exploit, terrorize, and tyranize them! Do we have any legal experts out there in the AMG Community who would care to comment?
It appears that not even legal or elected representatives are able to penetrate the sinister DHHS veil of secrecy! Is there any way to get unbiased, non-predjudicial Federal Authorities involved - such as the FBI?Ironically, the MCLU came out in support of our esteemed Invesigative Journalist in the matter of her publication being banned / censored from State offices; have they been approached with the case of this victimized Phillipino/American Family?I'd be interested in their opinion.
If civil and human "rights" are not being violated here, than I'm missing something big. Obviously we don't have any enforcement capability within this Northern version of Cuba able or willing to serve the cause of justice in this instance. Why would the State (or the Mob) essentially investigate itself?Conversely; if anyone is "stupid" enough to resist these government abductors, it is Law Enforcement Officers who will do the DHHS Agent's bidding by snatching their young victims at gunpoint, under the assumption that they are rescuing them from an abusive domestic environment.No doubt this is sometimes, in fact, the unfortunate case; but as we are now discovering, it is not always entirely true, and children are being abducted and isolated from their Families on apparently very flimsy pretenses. I'm amazed that no one has been seriously hurt or killed over these fiascos yet. Give 'em time. Oh; wait!; I forgot to mention little Logan Marr, God rest her soul.There's one casualty so far. As word gets around as to what happens to children post-DHHS-abduction, I think that some parents may become more desperate and defensive - to the point of potential violence towards Social Workers or LEOs.If legal, peaceful, Constitutional redress of grievances are witheld from the aggrieved because of political corruption and incompetence, other options may be considered. Sort of like they were back in 1776, don't you suppose?Stay tuned...

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[ 09-28-2005: Message edited by: UncleJaque ][ 09-28-2005: Message edited by: UncleJaque ]

When the state sticks its snout into a families life, the only response is flight, and damned quickly or they will steal your assets of kids, then arrest you for daring to object.DHHS is what happens when you have a decades long record od single party government with most of the bureaucracy being part of that party.Government is the enemy.

In Terillyn's paper, the Common Sense Independant, I seem to recall a story about a family who tried the "flight" option.They made it as far as Rhode Island, IIRC, before the Gendarme's kicked in the door of their motel room and took the kids at gunpoint as they arrested the hapless parents.You could probably outrun an armed robbery rap more sucessfully than one would be likely to escape the clutches of the Dept. of Hell and Human Sacrifice. If you have yet to peruse a copy of the CSI, contact Terillyn for one; it is pretty much prerequisite foundational reading for the current case.I have yet to hear back from FOX News; they must be too obsessed with the Katrina scandal and Natali Halloway to be bothered with what's going on up here in the Peeple's Republik of Maine.

They waited too long and did not go far enough.

quote:Originally posted by David Hughes:
i swear there is a compaign issue here

Oh there is. Question is who will take the stand and speak out on it.Like government intrusion in general to many candidates play the go along game.

It's happening nationwide. I've been watching this garbage for a while. I believe the architect of the modern DHS/CPS is Janet Reno, from her time as a prosecutor in Florida. Take a look at the case, featured on Frontline, where children were coached into giving false testimony against adults. From that experience, CPS agencies across the country were then shown how easy it was to seperate children from their parents and then use them to pump money through the system and justify more social service jobs, agencies, and government-dependent nonprofits.A couple of weeks ago, I was talking to a fairly significant member of state government about the DHHS. He said, "We created a monster, now it's out of control." Some consider Maine's DHHS to be one of the best in the US.

quote:Originally posted by nascarfan207:
Oh there is. Question is who will take the stand and speak out on it.Like government intrusion in general to many candidates play the go along game.

Single issue candidates generally don't do well in elections. They do, however, serve the purpose of highlighting the issue in a manner that can force change. Think of Perot - running government like a business - was pretty much his issue. His candidacy did force some change.

quote:Originally posted by Michael Vaughan:
Some consider Maine's DHHS to be one of the best in the US.

Outside of the agency and Augusta?

Not everyone within DHHS are the monsters you all seem to villify so easily. Not every section of DHHS is involved with Child Protective Services. Some parts of DHHS do very good work in a responsible manner. Many individual workers work hard to assist our fellow Maine citizens every day. I find it disturbing to watch how AMG'ers villify all of DHHS, without recognizing that some of the workers are their neighbors; who try hard each day to do the work that they are responsible for each day. Think about those people who handle huge case loads of mentally retarded individuals, or those people with mental illnesses. Think about the stress you create for them every day when you lump thier work in with the particular programs you like to hammer on. I am right there with you about CPS; they need reformation. I am right their with you about the DHHS administration. But those direct care workers who struggle making low wages caring for people who no one wants to bother with are out there each day taking crap for just doing their jobs, which have nothing to do with CPS.You are all real funny with your catchy slogans such as Dept. of hell and human sacrifice; but you demean yourself just as much as you call attention to DHHS' problems.

Cigarsmoker, I don't disagree with the intention of your post. By all means painting the entire department with such a broad brush is rather short sighted to be kind.That said, the workers you are defending are in a far better position then we are to know how bad, or how good, it really is inside DHHS and yet they say nothing. If the problems are so obvious to those outside the department how much more obvious those problems are to those inside the department...and yet, they say nothing.There is a difference between just doing your job and letting your silence become part of the problem.

Does anyone know who made the complaint? I can't believe that this was the first meeting between the mother and the DHHS worker. I'm certainly no fan of DHHS and I hope this case takes them down. There has to be more to this story. A live-in boyfriend, at least 5 kids, a mother who has been in the country for more than a dozen years without a command of the language and on public assistance? The article leaves me with many questions.

quote:Originally posted by JIMV:
Outside of the agency and Augusta?

Yes, it seems reformers in other states think Maine is doing something right.Of course there are reforms taking place and we have nothing to compare it to.I found the DHS is not only consuming much of the budget, (and as a consequence adversely affecting the rest of State Government,) but also has largely compromised the judiciary by using up court time and rooms making business matters take a back seat.

why do I think there is a multi-part newspaper story here for a reporter willing to do more than to talk to one or two sources and/or regurgitate a press release?One thing I sorely miss about living in an area with a large newspaper is the lack of very indepth connect the dots style reporting on state and local government. You simply cannot uncover government abuse if you don't look for it. Who in Maine is holding government beauracracy accountable? The voters have the job of holding elected people accountable, but who's holding the beaurocrats accountable?I seriously doubt Baldacci, or any governor in modern times, knows what's going on in the entrench ( read unappointed, surviving change in elected leadership ) beauracracy of the state.

quote:Originally posted by David Hughes:
Cigarsmoker, I don't disagree with the intention of your post. By all means painting the entire department with such a broad brush is rather short sighted to be kind.That said, the workers you are defending are in a far better position then we are to know how bad, or how good, it really is inside DHHS and yet they say nothing. If the problems are so obvious to those outside the department how much more obvious those problems are to those inside the department...and yet, they say nothing.There is a difference between just doing your job and letting your silence become part of the problem.

the above message is repeated because it needs to be.

Terrilyn Simpson's "Common Sense Independent" is available for downloading in the right column of AMG's home page: http://www.asmainegoes.com skf

cupie doll to the first person who sees what's wrong with the follow from DHHS' child and family services website - hint: historically it's around 15%Last year, Child and Family Services received more than 17,000 new reports of child abuse or neglect. We look into child abuse reports on behalf of Maine communities, working to keep children safe and to guide families in creating safe homes for children. About 85 percent of the families we see need voluntary, community-based services to develop a safe and more stable home. The remaining 15 percent require court intervention, either to order specific action to make a situation safe or because the children cannot live where they are without danger of serious harm.

quote:Originally posted by David Hughes:
"... children cannot live where they are without danger of serious harm."

That statement strikes me as being a little odd. So does this explain why they rip kids out of homes and tie them up to a high chair with 47 feet of duct tape in the cellar and wait for them to die in the darkness? If Maine has "one of the best" HS system in the Country, I'd sure hate to see the worst! The Janet ElRenio connection makes sense; the violent abduction of Ilian Gonzalez and his being held incommunicado until he was sold back into slavery in communist cuba is quite reminicient of how some of the hacks at CPS apparently regard the human rights of children and families. How these kids are being brainwashed by their captors while held in seclusion away from their friends, families, and support systems really concerns me. According to Terillyn, most of them are drugged into a state of zombiism when - and if - their families ever see them again. The KGB essentially pioneered the use of psychotrophic drugs for brainwashing / compliance back in the 1930s, didn't they?
Sort of like how the former KGB Agents from Cuba kept Ilian doped up on "happy juice" for most of his stateside captivity. We are told that victims of CPS abductions are "never the same again" after their experience. Don't you ever wonder why?

why is the median length of stay in a Maine foster home 24 months twice that of the national median length of stay 12 months?why isn't the state reporting the reason for discharge from out-of-home care for 15 to 20 percent of children leaving the out-of-home care system?Why is Maine's rate of re-unification with parents at 36.8 percent while nationally it is at 57%?The above questions come from 1999 - 2002 data. Appearently it takes the data a couple of years to filter up to the national clearing data houses - lord knows why in this computerized age.But one question is valid regardless of the year the data is from - why remove children from their parents except in severe cases when study after study after study involving data drawn from the children leaving foster care has consistently shown that children in foster care are more likely to be physically and sexually abused then children in the care of their parents? Some situations are healthy for a child to be in but just because it isn't healthy does not mean the child needs to be removed and put into a situation that is statistically far worse. not being healthy does not translate into unhealthy. There is a level of potential damage in every childs life that goes up as income goes down. The question that seems to not be asked is how much of that potential damage is going to be real, lasting and significantly detremental to the childs ability to lead a normal life if they are not removed from their parents.Take the case of the mother with a 2 year old son who is living with her grandparents. The farmhouse they live in is old, in need of repair and housekeeping could be better. The step-grandfather has an assualt conviction on a teenage girl ( not sexual assualt ). The primary concern is the fire hazard of the farmhouse - local firemarshal stated one spark and the whole palce would be gone inside of 30 minutes. DHHS solution - remove the child. Now somehow, if it had been my decision, finding some section 8 housing for the mom and kid would have seemed more of a reasonable solution than removal of the child. There are other less costly options than foster care for a good chunk of cases.One more question, where is the press? Just looking at the available data says there is a story here - either Maine's system is deeply flawed or Maine parents are. Either one would be a good story for a paper to do.And let's say Baldacci did fix DHHS since the 2002 year data set, there's still a story about the turn around of the department - assuming it has actually been "fixed".The data says that something was wrong with Maine's system 2002 and before. Baldacci's fix may have worked and the state does have the data to show whether or not that fixed worked. Given that we only hear of serious abuses by DHHS every 2 or 3 years and we do not hear of situations where a failure to act by DHHS lead to a childs death you can't say honestly that DHHS is a failure. They aren't in a state of dissarray.What you can say is that *after* DHHS has taken action there seems to be two problems. First they do not do enough to reunite the familes - alternatively Maine parents are so screwed up that reunification is impossible, it's one or the other. Second is that DHHS is worse than a politician in admitting that they've made a mistake.I'd like to know if Maine parents are that bad or if DHHS is deliberately not reuniting parents in cases where if it had been any other state reunification would have happened.I'd also like to see a policy change at DHHS concerning mistakes. Where it's "ok" to make the mistake, it won't hurt your career, but it is not "ok" under any circumstances to continue that mistake.From what we know of this case, and we certainly do not know everything, it seems like DHHS made a mistake. It also seems like the DHHS employees who made the mistake are doing everything in their power to hide the original mistake. I'm "ok" with the original mistake, I'm not "ok" with trying to cover up that mistake.and UncleJaque, even the guy who advocated the current definition and interpretation of the federal statue define what "serious harm" is says that maybe they reached a little too far.

Foster parenting is big bucks for DHS. They have to keep a Quota so they can get the federal dollars and justify their salaries. I also hear that they get fed dollars for adoption of foster kids. This is big business for these Social workers.
j

[ 09-29-2005: Message edited by: Cigarsmoker ]