FLDS compound in Texas Court proceedings ONLY please!!!!!

[golfmom]

Shurtleff has to be the SINGULARLY MOST STUPID MAN in American. :banghead::banghead::banghead::banghead:

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/05/09/us/09cnd-polygamy.html?hp

Utah’s attorney general, Mark L. Shurtleff, sat before a room of perhaps 400 people, most of them fundamentalist polygamists, at a town hall meeting here on Thursday night. He asked for a show of hands. How many people, he wanted to know, were related to the children who were seized last month in a raid in Texas in an investigation of possible marriage and abuse of child brides?

Scores of hands shot up. Then Mr. Shurtleff asked his follow-up: How many of you would be willing to take those children into your homes? Without a moment’s hesitation, the same hands rose.

“We think it would be wonderful if that were to happen, and we’re going to continue to try to encourage that,” Mr. Shurtleff said, as the room exploded with applause.

 

[mykodiak]

He's blowing smoke in a pathetic attempt to re-build his reputation. Texas authorities will be VERY reluctant to hand over these children to someone that is merely "related". I think Mr. Shurtleff will also probably get a nasty response from Texas to any attempts he might make as a facilitator. I'm guessing something along the lines of: "PPPPFFFFFFTTTTTT!!!!"

What an IDIOT!!:loser:

 

[barb0301]

I think Mr. Shurtleff will also probably get a nasty response from Texas to any attempts he might make as a facilitator. I'm guessing something along the lines of: "PPPPFFFFFFTTTTTT!!!!"

What an IDIOT!!:loser:

I'm thinking something alongs the line of a very loud "DON'T MESS WITH TEXAS"

 

[golfmom]

This is Texas response that was further down in the article:

"Arizona has offered to assist, Mr. Goddard said, “but right now they’re claiming they’re an independent republic and we need to establish diplomatic relations.”

 

[SewingDeb]

I took it to mean that the Arizona Attorney General is saying that Texas is claiming to be an independent republic. Somehow I doubt that.

 

[RainbowsAndGumdrops]

The FLDS are an independent country?

 

[faw720]

He's blowing smoke in a pathetic attempt to re-build his reputation. Texas authorities will be VERY reluctant to hand over these children to someone that is merely "related". I think Mr. Shurtleff will also probably get a nasty response from Texas to any attempts he might make as a facilitator. I'm guessing something along the lines of: "PPPPFFFFFFTTTTTT!!!!"

What an IDIOT!!:loser:

I can't imagine that Texas would be dumb, mean, or crazy enough to hand the children over to polygamous relatives. The kids would be back in the exact situation as before. I would think that the best outcome would be for the kids to be placed with mainstream Mormons so that they could retain the best that the faith has to offer. I don't understand the Mormon faith, but I know enough to know that Jeffs & his kind have polluted the religion for their own selfish & perverted means.

 

[yolorado]

He's blowing smoke in a pathetic attempt to re-build his reputation. Texas authorities will be VERY reluctant to hand over these children to someone that is merely "related". I think Mr. Shurtleff will also probably get a nasty response from Texas to any attempts he might make as a facilitator. I'm guessing something along the lines of: "PPPPFFFFFFTTTTTT!!!!"

What an IDIOT!!:loser:

Texas has taken a sensible approach. They had a complaint. They didn't call. They didn't write. They didn't just talk to YFZ 'authorities' and take their word that everything was hunky dorey (the way AZ and UT have for years.) TX went in and, though they didn't find the source of their complaint, they found proof TX laws had been and were being violated by the cult systematically. They didn't mess around. They took the kids. Now going forward, they're going to start with proving who the children's parents are before negotiating 'return' with the group, or anything else. Given rumors of 'reassignment' and underage sex, no other approach makes sense. I've become more and more frustrated the more I read by the prior inaction of the governments of AZ and UT against this cult which has violated the laws in those states with near impunity. The AZ attorney general is not changing my bad opinion by suggesting putting children back into a community against which the same type of abuse allegations have persistently been made. Many of the 'fathers' at the YFZ ranch had 'family' in 'Short Creek' according the Bishop's lists. Some of the men who left Texas might be hanging out in Hilldate and Co City now. They might have been at the meeting. It's insane that the AZ AG might be proposing a return to the very same abusers! Luckily, I doubt TX will have any of that. Yay TX. Finally someone stands up against this cult. Finally, a government authority stands up for these children and their rights and freedoms. Finally. Wonder how many hands would have shot into the air if Shurleff had ask for lost boys to be taken back.

 

[mysteriew]

Wonder how many hands would have shot into the air if Shurleff had ask for lost boys to be taken back.

Good point! Maybe we should ask him that!

 

[mykodiak]

Nahhh, Texans will brag about our beautiful state and almost anything else that one wants to toss into the conversation, but we're not apt to throw any dumb "independent republic" cr*p into this sort of legal battle. We don't pull our guns until we know we can hit the bulls-eye. We're also not going to turn the children over to ANYONE before they have proven beyond a shadow of a doubt that that person is the best option for the child. (Can you tell I'm just a smidge proud of my home state? :crazy

I foresee Greg Abbott's response to any contact made by Shurtleff to be "Thank you, but you had your chance and blew it. We intend to do it right, so please go away." We don't want to burn our bridges, but we're not going to give Shurtleff any chance to muck up the process.

 

[Floh]

Nahhh, Texans will brag about our beautiful state and almost anything else that one wants to toss into the conversation, but we're not apt to throw any dumb "independent republic" cr*p into this sort of legal battle. We don't pull our guns until we know we can hit the bulls-eye. We're also not going to turn the children over to ANYONE before they have proven beyond a shadow of a doubt that that person is the best option for the child. (Can you tell I'm just a smidge proud of my home state? :crazy

I foresee Greg Abbott's response to any contact made by Shurtleff to be "Thank you, but you had your chance and blew it. We intend to do it right, so please go away." We don't want to burn our bridges, but we're not going to give Shurtleff any chance to muck up the process.

Well, heck! I'm just a smidge proud of your home state too! :woohoo:

 

[mollymalone]

Interview with an ad litem involved with the flds children

http://www.digitaljournal.com/article/254425
Natalie Malonis: An attorney ad litem in this context is an attorney appointed by the court to represent a child in custody proceedings instituted by the State (CPS or DFPS). My responsibilities are to determine whether my clients have the capacity to formulate objectives of litigation, and if so to express those to the court. In certain circumstances when a child lacks the capacity to direct litigation, because of age or mental status, etc, an attorney ad litem has some latitude to substitute the attorney's judgment for the child's.

 

[mollymalone]

http://www.marshallnewsmessenger.com/news/content/region/legislature/stories/05/10/0510eldorado.html

Polygamist ranch is considered one household, state says.

Agency says mothers' behavior forced the judge to conduct mass hearings.Attorneys for the mothers responded in court documents filed Friday, saying CPS did not have sufficient evidence "to justify the mass separation of every single child" from his or her mother. "To distract attention from this inconvenient fact," the mothers' lawyers wrote, the agency focuses "on the mothers' purported beliefs, rather than on their actions or omissions."

 

[yolorado]

If the parents weren't co-operating with the authorities to the point that CPS couldn't even find out who each child's parent was, if CPS was't even sure that some of the children had parents at the ranch, I'm not sure how they were supposed to treat the compound as separate households. How would they know which children went where or with whom if they couldn't be reasonably assured of accurate info from the residents. CPS has implied that adults may have been moving kids around during the raid and sometimes seemed to be coaching the children to lie and dissemble while often appearing to do the same themselves. If you are CPS and you can't determine whose children are whose, if adults aren't co-operating, and if men are telling girls who look 13 to say they are 18, what else can you do but take them all?

 

[SewingDeb]

Texas: FLDS mothers in a 'conspiracy of silence,' cannot challenge children's removal

Until women from a polygamous sect "unequivocally" identify their offspring, they have no standing to contest a judge's decision to remove the children from a west Texas ranch, state officials argue.
The Texas Department of Family and Protective Services contends in a court filing released today that FLDS mothers have engaged in a "conspiracy of silence" that forced the en masse custody hearings they now want to do over.

and

But in an answer to the state filed today, TRLA attached a list of each mother and her children to refute the state's claims they are unwilling to identify their offspring.

http://www.sltrib.com/ci_9207759

 

[mysteriew]

Texas: FLDS mothers in a 'conspiracy of silence,' cannot challenge children's removal

Until women from a polygamous sect "unequivocally" identify their offspring, they have no standing to contest a judge's decision to remove the children from a west Texas ranch, state officials argue.
The Texas Department of Family and Protective Services contends in a court filing released today that FLDS mothers have engaged in a "conspiracy of silence" that forced the en masse custody hearings they now want to do over.

and

But in an answer to the state filed today, TRLA attached a list of each mother and her children to refute the state's claims they are unwilling to identify their offspring.

http://www.sltrib.com/ci_9207759

It's about time they identified their kids! But it still leaves the problem of CPS identifying the kids. With the mothers changing the kids names, changing ID bracelets, CPS can't really be sure that one child is named this or that. And I think that FLDS is just waiting for CPS to ID the wrong child in court. But it isn't going to surprise me if it happens.

And I still don't believe that the FLDS should be permitted to speak up for any child if they did not submitt DNA. Also no father should be permitted to speak up for any child that he doesn't have a DNA match with.

 

[mysteriew]

http://www.marshallnewsmessenger.com/news/content/region/legislature/stories/05/10/0510eldorado.html

Polygamist ranch is considered one household, state says.

Agency says mothers' behavior forced the judge to conduct mass hearings.Attorneys for the mothers responded in court documents filed Friday, saying CPS did not have sufficient evidence "to justify the mass separation of every single child" from his or her mother. "To distract attention from this inconvenient fact," the mothers' lawyers wrote, the agency focuses "on the mothers' purported beliefs, rather than on their actions or omissions."

When they exchanged ID bands, and changed their own names and ages and the names of their children and their ages, those mothers by their actions acted as one group, indicated that they agreed with the FLDS rules and they committed a crime by obstructing an official investigation.

 

[mollymalone]

When they exchanged ID bands, and changed their own names and ages and the names of their children and their ages, those mothers by their actions acted as one group, indicated that they agreed with the FLDS rules and they committed a crime by obstructing an official investigation.

Absolutely, and I agree, unless they're proven by dna to be a biological parent of a child, they shouldn't be allowed contact with them.

 

[SewingDeb]

It's about time they identified their kids! But it still leaves the problem of CPS identifying the kids. With the mothers changing the kids names, changing ID bracelets, CPS can't really be sure that one child is named this or that. And I think that FLDS is just waiting for CPS to ID the wrong child in court. But it isn't going to surprise me if it happens.

And I still don't believe that the FLDS should be permitted to speak up for any child if they did not submitt DNA. Also no father should be permitted to speak up for any child that he doesn't have a DNA match with.

I agree. If DNA does not match, no one should be able to claim to be the parent of a particular child. If a parent did not provide DNA, they should forfeit their rights.

 

[SewingDeb]

When they exchanged ID bands, and changed their own names and ages and the names of their children and their ages, those mothers by their actions acted as one group, indicated that they agreed with the FLDS rules and they committed a crime by obstructing an official investigation.

I think they should be charged as a group for obstruction.