I think our view of 'children' is way to young-----that is why there are so many 'failures to launch'........I am not condoning child abuse but we cant even figure out what a 'sex offender' is........

http://www.news.yahoo.com

Quoted Text

Court: Texas had no right to take polygamists' kids

A Texas appeals court said Thursday that the state had no right to take more than 400 children from a polygamist sect's ranch, a ruling that could unravel one of the biggest child-custody cases in U.S. history.

The Third Court of Appeals in Austin ruled that the state offered "legally and factually insufficient" grounds for the "extreme" measure of removing all children from the ranch, from babies to teenagers.

The state never provided evidence that the children were in any immediate danger, the only grounds in Texas law for taking children from their parents without court approval, the appeals court said.

The state never provided evidence that teenage girls were being sexually abused, and never alleged any sexual or physical abuse against the other children, the court said.

It was not immediately clear whether the children scattered across foster facilities statewide might soon be reunited with parents.

Every child at the Yearning For Zion Ranch in Eldorado was taken into state custody more than six weeks ago, after Child Protective Services officials argued that members of the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints pushed underage girls into marriage and sex and groomed boys to become adult perpetrators.

"The existence of the FLDS belief system as described by the department's witnesses, by itself, does not put children of FLDS parents in physical danger," the court said in its ruling, overturning the order to keep the children by state District Judge Barbara Walther, a former family law attorney.

The appeals court also said the state was wrong to consider the entire ranch as an individual household and that any abuse claims could apply only to individual households.

Julie Balovich, an attorney representing 38 mothers of the children, said the appeals court "has stood up for the legal rights of these families and given these mothers hope that their families will be brought back together."

"It is a great day for families in the State of Texas," Balovich said.

She said Walther has 10 days to comply with the appeals court ruling.

CPS spokesman Patrick Crimmins said department attorneys had just received the ruling and would make any decision about an appeal later.

"We are trying to assess the impact that this may have on our case," he said.

Calls to FLDS officials were not immediately returned Thursday.

Roughly a third of the children taken from the west Texas ranch were babies, and only a few dozen were teenage girls.

Of the 31 originally believed to be underage mothers, 15 have been reclassified as adults — one was 27 years old — and the state conceded a 14-year-old girl had no children and was not pregnant, as officials previously asserted.

Five judges in San Angelo, about 40 miles north of Eldorado, have been hearing CPS's plans for the parents seeking to regain custody. Those hearings, which began Monday, were scheduled to run for two more weeks — though it was unclear how the appellate ruling might affect those cases.

The custody case has been chaotic from the beginning. The hearing in which Walther ruled that the children should all enter state custody ran two days.

Hundreds of lawyers crammed into a courtroom and nearby auditorium, queuing up to voice objections or ask questions on behalf of the mothers who were there in their trademark prairie dresses and braided hair.

CPS has struggled with even the identities of the children for weeks.

The sect children were removed en masse during a raid that began April 3 after someone called a domestic abuse hot line claiming to be a pregnant abused teenage wife. The girl has not been found and authorities are investigating whether the calls were a hoax.

The FLDS, which teaches that polygamy brings glorification in heaven, is a breakaway of the Mormon church, which renounced polygamy more than a century ago. Members contend they are being persecuted by state officials for their religious beliefs.

Quoted Text

Texas' FLDS case rejected: 'Simply no evidence'
Hearings are canceled, but the children's future remains unclear
By Brooke Adams
The Salt Lake Tribune
Article Last Updated: 05/23/2008 06:14:39 AM MDT


SAN ANGELO, Texas - Hours after a Texas appeals court ruled their children were wrongly taken from their polygamous sect's ranch, FLDS mothers were not yet ready to celebrate.
    That will come, they said, when the children are in their arms.
    "I will rejoice completely when I am able to hug my children," said Maggie Jessop, whose four children have been in state custody for more than six weeks.
    A pair of rulings issued Thursday by the 3rd Court of Appeals in Austin came unexpectedly in the midst of status hearings on children taken from the YFZ Ranch.
    In its unanimous nine-page decision, the three-judge panel said the Department of Family and Protective
Services' case was legally and factually insufficient and 51st District Judge Barbara Walther acted improperly when she ordered about 450 children to stay in state custody.
    The court said the state failed in a mass April 17-18 hearing to prove any of its key claims that the sect's beliefs, communal households or underage marriages put every child in the community "in urgent" danger.
    "There is simply no evidence specific to [the mothers'] children at all except that they exist, they were taken into custody at the Yearning for Zion Ranch, and they are living with people who share a 'pervasive belief system' that condones underage marriage and underage pregnancy," the courtsaid.
    It is not yet clear how soon children could return home, a timeline that depends in part on the next move by DFPS.
    Hearings were canceled for Thursday afternoon and today, as Walther conferred with the other trial judges considering the cases.
    
    After the ruling, Texas child welfare officials defended their removal of the children from the ranch near Eldorado and contemplated their next move. DFPS issued a statement that recounted why it took custody of the children.
    "While our only duty is to the children, we respect that the court's responsibility and view is much broader," it concluded. "We will work with the Office of Attorney General to determine the state's next steps in this case."
    If Walther does nothing, the appeals court will order the children returned to their parents, members of the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints.
    DFPS could seek a stay from the Texas Supreme Court or ask the appeals court for a rehearing; it has 15 days to do that.
    The order issued Thursday technically applies only to children of the 41 mothers listed in two appeals, one filed by Texas RioGrande Legal Aid (TRLA) and the other by Legal Aid of North Texas.
    Julie Balovich, a TRLA attorney, said she believes its legal reasoning applies to all the children. "It's a great day for families in a state of Texas," she said.
    She and Amanda Chisholm, also with the firm, were on their way to the ranch to meet with several women when she received word of the decision.
    "I just pulled over on the road to Eldorado and started crying," Balovich said.
    
    As Balovich spoke to reporters in San Angelo, FLDS women stood behind her beaming. Some were teary-eyed. "I was very, very, very thrilled and excited," said Martha Emack, 23, one of the mothers listed in the appeal.
    Balovich had been scheduled to argue Emack's case today. Emack has been separated from her two children, ages 2 and 1, since April 24. They are in an Austin shelter, where Emack visits them once a week.
    "They are very insecure and they want to be held and hugged and loved," she said.
    Brigham, her oldest child, was potty-trained before entering state custody but has regressed. When she leaves, he screams. "There wasn't once when I left him he wasn't crying," Emack said.
    The FLDS parents who came to the court hearings kept their composure throughout the proceedings. Prayers and faith kept them going, some said.
    "We are a peaceful people," Emack said.
    
    Texas officials raided the YFZ Ranch to investigate a later-discounted abuse allegation. Once there, they said they found evidence of a pattern of abuse - such as sex with underage girls - that justified removal of all children.
    "The very first interviews at the ranch revealed a pattern of underage girls being 'spiritually united' with older men and having children with the men," their Thursday statement said. Records found at the ranch listed "13 girls who were ages 16 and 17, including nine living at the YFZ Ranch. All nine of the girls living at the ranch were listed as wives in the document."
    But the appeals court ruled DFPS failed to provide, as required by Texas law, "any evidence of danger to the physical health or safety" of children on the ranch who had not reached puberty.
    The department also did not prove pubescent girls were in physical danger, the judges said.
    DFPS officials testified that five girls who became pregnant at ages 15 and 16 - coupled with an FLDS belief system condoning underage marriage and pregnancy - warranted immediate removal. But that simply wasn't enough, the judges said.
    "The existence of the FLDS belief system as described by the department's witnesses, by itself, does not put children of FLDS parents in physical danger," the appeals court wrote. "It is the imposition of certain alleged tenets of that system on specific individuals that may put them in physical danger."
    
    Lawyer Nancy DeLong praised the appeal courts' criticism of the en masse hearing in April.
    "I think this is a first step toward recognizing the hearing was not done correctly and that there are certain rights parents have," she said. "We're very hopeful the district court will abide by this decision."
    Anti-polygamy activists who had hailed the Texas action were subdued Thursday.
    "I'm very disappointed and I think we'll wait for the Supreme Court to rule on this," said Flora Jessop, a former member of the sect who has long urged such action against the FLDS.
    Utah Attorney General Mark Shurtleff testified before the Texas Legislature in 2005 when it crafted laws targeting the sect. On Thursday, he said that while he supported the state, he felt they were going to have to "prove, on a case-by-case bases, abuse or neglect or imminent danger. Where they were going with this group theory that . . . it's a pervasive practice and therefore we don't need to prove this particular child has been or will be abused - I just didn't think that was going to fly."

Quoted Text

Number of underage mothers claimed by Texas continues to dwindle
By Brooke Adams
The Salt Lake Tribune
Article Last Updated: 05/23/2008 09:48:05 AM MDT


SAN ANGELO, Texas - Tina Louise Steed had just one question for a judge who declared her an adult Thursday morning.
    "I'm wondering how come they wouldn't believe my ID in the first place?" she asked Judge Jay Weatherby.
    The Texas Department of Family and Protective Services acknowledged that Tina Louise and three other "disputed minors" are actually adult women - admissions that came as the Third Court of Appeals in Austin ruled it never had sufficient evidence to remove any children from a polygamous sect.
    At least three more women were to be declared adults Thursday afternoon or Friday, but those hearings were canceled after word of the decision reached the Tom Green County Courthouse.
    And more are on the docket next week.
    The admissions by the state left a rapidly diminishing count of women in a disputed age category that is central to its claim of underage mothers found at the YFZ Ranch.
    The state alleged that 31 women ages 14 to 17 were pregnant, mothers or both, a count that included 26 mothers whose ages were disputed.
    As of noon Thursday, just eight mothers remained in the disputed category.
    And an attorney for one 14-year-old said Wednesday her client also is wrongly being listed among the 31 pregnant or mothering teenagers.
    The women declared adults on Thursday range in age from 20 to 24; a coming hearing would have shown one remaining disputed minor is 27.
    Attorney Kim Bridges, who represents Priscilla Zitting's daughters, told Judge Barbara Walther Thursday she has never been able to get information on why the state deemed the mother a minor or why it had now changed its position about her status.
    The state listed Priscilla Zitting as "approximately 16" on one court filing for the status hearing, though it showed her correct 1988 birth year on a chart offered as evidence during a hearing before Walther in April.
    Adult status created a problem for the mothers, who are no longer eligible to remain in some shelters and face the prospect of being separated from their children who are older than 12 months.
    In at least two instances, judges told CPS in earlier hearings to work something out that would let the mothers and children remain or be placed together in an appropriate facility.
    The state also alleged that ranch residents, members of the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints, have physically abused and emotionally neglected their children. No evidence of either has been presented in the dozens of individual hearings held so far this week.
    Before the appellate ruling, attorneys for the parents and children complained the plans were vague and overly broad, but those arguments fell flat before the five judges hearing the cases.
    The hearings were hobbled by mix ups like this one:
    David Barlow Steed came to Texas to help support his sister, Lori,whose child is now in state custody. When he arrived at the courthouse, a baliff wrote his name on charging papers identifying him as the father of his sister's child.
    Just like that, Steed, who has never lived in Texas or been to the YFZ Ranch, found himself embroiled in the case. Weatherby planned to sign a document releasing Steed from the case Thursday afternoon.
    

Where's the mainstream media on these new reports??  Where are the likes of O'Reilly, Blitzer, King, Abrams, and the rest who joined in on the witch hunt?  Convicting these people before their day in court.  They took accusation based on a hoax phone call and ran with it.  They don't have the integrity to apologize for their compliance in these people's persecution.  If I recall, Larry King had the mothers appear on his show and virtually made a mockery of them to millions of viewer, with little sympathy for the ordeal they were going through.  






The Witchcraft Trials in Salem

Quoted from Shadow

I just read on the Drudge Report, http://www.drudgereport.com, that 31 of the 53 girls between 14 to 17 yrs of age taken from the Texas sect have either already had children or are pregnant. If that doesn't constitute child abuse I don't know what is. I've thought all along that when the adults in this sect wouldn't answer questions pertaining to the children having children something was very wrong going on in there.

TIME TO FIND A NEW MEDIA OUTLET!  We're go'in on 50 days and no charges filed.  As the State attempts to build it's case, it's actually getting weaker.

The C.P.S. is an arm of government that is allowed operate outside the Constitution.  They're a shoot first, ask questions latter Agency.  They fed the media this false information because they raided a community on a hunch, instead of hard evidence.  And you and 95% of the country bought into it.   With help from major media outlets perpetuating it.

Quoted Text

The state alleged that 31 women ages 14 to 17 were pregnant, mothers or both, a count that included 26 mothers whose ages were disputed.
    As of noon Thursday, just eight mothers remained in the disputed category.
    And an attorney for one 14-year-old said Wednesday her client also is wrongly being listed among the 31 pregnant or mothering teenagers.

http://www.dailygazette.com

Quoted Text

Carl Strock THE VIEW FROM HERE
Carl Strock can be reached at 395-3085 or by e-mail at carlstrock@dailygazette.com.

CHILD PROTECTION
    On an unrelated matter, I was heartened to see last week that a Texas appeals court put the ki- bosh, retroactively, on the forcible removal of some 460 children from parents in a Mormon spinoff sect.
    When the removal happened a month and half ago it struck me as the same sort of thing I have seen happen in Schenectady but multiplied by hundreds, and the same sort of thing that I know happens elsewhere: Take children out of their homes and away from the parents if there is the slightest risk of harm to the children without regard to how much harm the removal itself does.
    Just put yourself in the position of the 3-year-old you once were, or the 5-year-old, and imagine strangers coming into your house and physically taking you away, often by force, while your mother cries in protest, and sending you to live in the home of people you have never seen before, possibly hundreds of miles away, as happened in Texas.
    The workers at Child Protective Services seem never to consider this, nor do Family Court judges. There is such a profound national panic about the abuse of children, they do anything they can to prevent more of it, including perpetrating their own, different form of abuse.
    The Texas case was not fundamentally different from other cases I have heard about, just bigger — much bigger. I mean, imagine removing 460 children from a ranch, or commune, or whatever those people had, on the basis of one anonymous phone call from one girl who claimed to have been abused, a girl who has not yet been identified.
    I have seen over-reaching in my time, but this did beat all.
    Such arrogance. Such presumption. Such callousness. I would dearly like to see the Texas Department of Family and Protective Services held to account.
    And I would also dearly like to see the children returned forthwith.

CPS has guidelines to go by. If they are told of child abuse...by law, they have to act. Was this overkill in Texas? Perhaps. Time will tell. But until the guidelines are changed for CPS...they did their job.

This is a link to the copy of the Affidavit.

http://messengerandadvocate.files.wordpress.com/2008/04/flds-affidavit.pdf

Quoted Text

Just put yourself in the position of the 3-year-old you once were, or the 5-year-old, and imagine strangers coming into your house and physically taking you away, often by force, while your mother cries in protest, and sending you to live in the home of people you have never seen before, possibly hundreds of miles away, as happened in Texas.

classic alien abduction or is it an 'illegal alien' abduction?????

Quoted Text

Legal aid group: Texas officials offer 'diversionary reasons' to keep FLDS kids
By Brooke Adams
The Salt Lake Tribune
Article Last Updated: 05/29/2008 09:55:14 AM MDT


SAN ANGELO, Texas -- Texas RioGrande Legal Aid today filed a response to the state Supreme Court saying the Department of Families and Protective Services offers only "diversionary reasons" for why it would be impractical and wrong to return FLDS children to their parents.
    "The department cannot scatter hundreds of children -- including infants and toddlers -- to the four winds and then complain that it cannot put the pieces of the puzzle back together again," TRLA wrote.
    The legal aid firm represents 38 FLDS mothers whose children are in state custody. It filed the 17-page document in response to the high court's request that it counter the state's effort to overturn an appeals court ruling that some if not all of the more than 450 children taken into custody last month should be sent home.
    The state conducted the raid on the polygamous sect's Eldorado ranch in early April, contending the children were at risk of physical and sexual abuse.
    The 3rd Court of Appeals found a week ago that 51st District Judge Barbara Walther lacked sufficient evidence to support those claims for all the children. In hearings after the raid, Walther ruled the children would remain in custody.
    The DFPS has asked the high court to overturn the appellate court's subsequent order, saying it made a "poor analysis of misstated facts
in issuing its ruling" and abused its own discretion in reweighing the evidence presented in the trial court in mid-April.
    In its filing, TRLA contends the DFPS failed to satisfy a three-pronged test laid out by the state legislature aimed at protecting the parent-child relationship from unnecessary interference.
    DFPS says it has met those criteria: that everyone at the ranch comprised one large community and one belief system, and that the adults failed to understand how FLDS practices put the children at risk.
    TRLA also contends it's disingenuous for state officials to say they don't know which children belong with which parents.
    DFPS also has said it fears that if the children are returned, their families would flee Texas, but TRLA counters that the risk of flight issue is not reason to authorize continued custody.
    The issue before the court is not whether the department acted in good faith, but whether it met mandatory legal criteria for keeping the children, according to TRLA.
    TRLA also contends the state department puts forth a "jumble of assertions" about beliefs combined with its only potential evidence of physical abuse: five minor girls who were pregnant or had children. The department argues that this justifies removal of hundreds of children.
    DFPS offers no evidence of risk for boys or prepubescent girls, TRLA said. Moreover, it claims, targeting a group's beliefs runs afoul of the U.S. Constitution.
   Also this morning, national and state American Civil Liberties Union filed a friend-of-the-court brief supporting TRLA's position.
    "State officials have an important obligation to protect children against abuse," said Lisa Graybill, legal direction for the ACLU of Texas.
    "However, such actions should not indiscriminately target a group as a whole -- particularly if the group is perceived as being different or unusual," she wrote.
    It is not known when the Texas Supreme Court will issue a ruling.
  

http://www.dailygazette.com

Quoted Text

May 30, 11:09 AM EDT

Polygamist sect members waiting for children to be returned after Texas Supreme Court ruling

Texas High Court Says Sect Kids Should Go Back

     SAN ANGELO, Texas (AP) -- Now, the waiting begins. A Texas Supreme Court ruling paves the way for members of a polygamist sect to get their children out of foster care, but it remains unclear when that might happen or what kind of restrictions might be imposed.

"I'm happy (when) all the children are back to their mothers and we're home," said Martha Emack, who was visiting her 1-year-old and 2-year-old in foster care in Austin when word of the ruling arrived Thursday.

The court said child welfare officials overstepped their authority and the children should be returned to their parents, a crushing blow to the state's massive seizure of children from a polygamist sect's ranch in western Texas.

The high court affirmed a decision by an appellate court last week, saying Child Protective Services failed to show an immediate danger to the more than 400 children swept up from the Yearning For Zion Ranch nearly two months ago.

"On the record before us, removal of the children was not warranted," the justices said in their ruling issued in Austin.

The high court let stand the appellate court's order that Texas District Judge Barbara Walther return the children from foster care to their parents. It's not clear how soon that may happen, but the appellate court ordered her to do it within a reasonable time period.

Walther may still put restrictions on where the parents could live, for example, once the children are returned.

The ruling shatters one of the largest child-custody cases in U.S. history. State officials said the removals were necessary to end a cycle of sexual abuse at the ranch in which teenage girls were forced to marry and have sex with older men, but parents denied any abuse and said they were being persecuted for their religious beliefs.

Every child at the ranch run by the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints in Eldorado was removed; half were 5 or younger.

CPS officials said they were disappointed by the ruling but would take immediate steps to comply.

"We are disappointed, but we understand and respect the court's decision," the agency said in a written statement.

FLDS elder Willie Jessop said parents were excited about the court's decision but would remain apprehensive until they get their children back.

"We're just looking forward to when little children can be in the arms of their parents," he said. "Until you have your children in your hands, there's no relief. But we have hope."

The case before the court technically only applies to the 124 children of 38 mothers who filed the complaint that prompted the ruling, but it significantly affects nearly all the children since they were removed under identical circumstances.

The Third Court of Appeals in Austin ruled last week that the state failed to show that any more than five of the teenage girls were being sexually abused, and had offered no evidence of sexual or physical abuse against the other children.

The FLDS, which teaches that polygamy brings glorification in heaven, is a breakaway sect of the Mormon church, which renounced polygamy more than a century ago.

Roughly 430 children from the ranch are in foster care after two births, numerous reclassifications of adult women initially held as minors and a handful of agreements allowing parents to keep custody while the Supreme Court considered the case.

Texas officials claimed at one point that there were 31 teenage girls at the ranch who were pregnant or had been pregnant, but later conceded that about half of those mothers, if not more, were adults. One was 27.

Under state law, children can be taken from their parents if there's a danger to their physical safety, an urgent need for protection and if officials made a reasonable effort to keep the children in their homes. The high court agreed with the appellate court that the seizures fell short of that standard.

CPS lawyers had argued that parents could remove their children from state jurisdiction if they regain custody, that DNA tests needed to confirm parentage are still pending and that the lower-court judge had discretion in the case.

The justices said child welfare officials can take numerous actions to protect children short of separating them from their parents and placing them in foster care, and that Walther may still put restrictions on the children and parents to address concerns that they may flee once reunited.

Quoted Text

The ruling shatters one of the largest child-custody cases in U.S. history. State officials said the removals were necessary to end a cycle of sexual abuse at the ranch in which teenage girls were forced to marry and have sex with older men, but parents denied any abuse and said they were being persecuted for their religious beliefs.

Meanwhile----in the rest of the 'sane USA',,,,,My Babies' Daddys and My Babies' Mommys, freely roam the 'wild'......and Mr. Heffner and his cute girls next door and Mr. Flint and his posse' and Tila Tequila also roam the 'zoo' in their 'natural habitats', pulling down the highest ticket prices around for a peep......oh, and let's not forget about the defeat of the Texas (hold yerself) pole tax, that is to help pay for abused women and children.....ha ha ha ha

Not to mention the local yokel being the springboard for what folks----yup, BUSTERS LAW(a nice cushion for the local politicals, 'cause animals dont vote and couldn't decide a plumb line except for their next meal)......only to be caught with his pants down at his ankles lookin' for a ride to the moon.........

http://www.dailygazette.com

Quoted Text

Nancy Dockstader embraces her daughter Amy, 9, after they were reunited at a youth camp near Luling, Texas, on Monday. A judge ordered the return of more than 400 children taken from their parents at a polygamist group’s ranch because of suspected abuse, bringing an abrupt end to one of the largest custody cases in U.S. history. ERIC GAY/ THE ASSOCIATED PRESS