Parental rights vs. child safety (Was there any reason Josh was awarded visits?)

[Perodicticus potto]

Dave Cullen, the author of Columbine, was saying on Twitter that many of JP's acts were characteristic of a psychopath - donating his sons' toys before killing them, for example. (Cullen has studied psychopaths in some depth because one of the Columbine killers, Eric Harris, almost certainly was one.) If true, this could explain how he was able to convince the court that it was safe for him to see his kids, while still being capable of their horrendous murder.

 

[Kimster]

State Sen. Pam Roach is asking the state Department of Social and Health Services to provide information sent by Utah police related to the custody of Braden and Charlie Powell.

On Feb. 1, West Valley City, Utah, police issued a news release indicating the agency had sent information to Washington state regarding the placement of Charles and Braden Powell. Four days later, the two boys were killed in a fire set by their father, Josh Powell, who was also killed in the blaze.

http://today.seattletimes.com/2012/02/roach-seeks-info-on-powell-brothers-sent-to-dshs/

 

[BritsKate]

Let me say first, that I am posting this not being privy to any prior postings. I have not been diligently following this case because there were others that I was working on.

When I heard Ann Bremner (sp?) speak on Nancy Grace, that really struck a chord with me. She talked about what defense lawyers for fathers frequently cite as an issue: that there is a supposed "parental alienation" caused by mothers.

I call BS on this in many, many cases.

If anything, most mothers would protect their children with every fibre of their being.

This is what I believe Susan did.

Perhaps Josh was jealous?

Think about what he said in the message. "I can't live without my sons."

Did he say, "I can't live without my wife, and my sons? No. Apparently, he had no remorse or caring for what happened to his wife. That is very suspicious and telling.

So, can anyone tell me what would be his motivation for killing his wife?

And, then, of course, we have his "father"...

The very things that attracted my ex to me were also the things he hated most about me. Abuse is about control. For Susan to die at the hands of her husband signifies he was losing control over her.

It breaks my heart to recall this story but when my son was 5 he became angry with me when I wouldn't let him have a popsicle before dinner. He went into a rage, threatened to kill me and burn the house down. It wasn't until that moment I had any realization that the abuse I was living with was hurting my children as well. I'd done my best to limit their exposure.

I've been wondering if Susan had a similar "a-ha" moment. What I could not or would not do for myself I had to do for my children.

 

[concentric]

State Sen. Pam Roach is asking the state Department of Social and Health Services to provide information sent by Utah police related to the custody of Braden and Charlie Powell.

On Feb. 1, West Valley City, Utah, police issued a news release indicating the agency had sent information to Washington state regarding the placement of Charles and Braden Powell. Four days later, the two boys were killed in a fire set by their father, Josh Powell, who was also killed in the blaze.

http://today.seattletimes.com/2012/02/roach-seeks-info-on-powell-brothers-sent-to-dshs/

------------------
From the article above:

At the hearing, a Pierce County judge said she wouldn’t consider returning the boys to Josh Powell until he underwent a psychosexual evaluation, the News Tribune of Tacoma reported at the time.
------------------

Unfortunately, the visitation ordered was tantamount to:

"returning the boys to Josh Powell"

wasn't it?

 

[concentric]

IMO, the reason why some mothers stay in marriages where they are abused, is because they want to physically be there to protect their children. They know that the court will probably order visitations with the father (who is abusive to them), and at those times, the mothers will have no way to protect their children.

This could be the reason Susan stayed, even though she recognized that she was in imminent danger for her own life.

 

[DLT88]

------------------
From the article above:

At the hearing, a Pierce County judge said she wouldn’t consider returning the boys to Josh Powell until he underwent a psychosexual evaluation, the News Tribune of Tacoma reported at the time.
------------------

Unfortunately, the visitation ordered was tantamount to:

"returning the boys to Josh Powell"

wasn't it?

I remember watching this trial on my PC and hearing all that and then the judge ending with "Visitations with the children and Josh Powell will continue twice a week." I remember being stunned and thinking, "After all that was just said?!" I remember feeling fear.

 

[GrainneDhu]

Should the boys have been visiting Josh Powell?

Where do we draw the line?

SBM

According to this article:

http://www.washingtonpost.com/natio...ore-killings/2012/02/09/gIQA88LF2Q_story.html

Griffin-Hall said Charlie and Braden loved being with their father.

“One of them said what he wanted to do was go home and live with his daddy,” she told ABC, adding that the boys would “light up” during visits with Josh Powell.

Griffin-Hall refers to Elizabeth Griffin-Hall, the social worker who was supervising the visits.

There are plenty of studies that show that children do better with continuing contact with their family of origin, even if they were removed due to proven child abuse. If the well being of the children is worthy of consideration (and I believe it is), then arranging for regular visitation was most likely to be in their own best interests.

Yes, there is a risk that a tragedy like this will happen if there is visitation, even supervised visitation. But the reason why tragedies like this make headlines is because they are so rare. For every Charlie and Braden, there are tens of thousands of children in foster care that benefit from having regular contact with their parents.

I'm not exaggerating, btw. In 2009, there were approximately 423,773 children in foster care:

http://www.childwelfare.gov/pubs/factsheets/foster.pdf#page=3

There is always a trade off in considering acceptable risk. The example I look at is traffic fatalities. In 2009 33,808 people died in traffic accidents. Anyone who is willing to get into a motor vehicle is tacitly saying that this is an acceptable level of risk.

So, yeah, if I had been the judge in this case, I would have ordered supervised visitation as well because it was most likely to be in Charlie and Baden's best interests to visit their father.

 

[nomoresorrow]

SBM

According to this article:

http://www.washingtonpost.com/natio...ore-killings/2012/02/09/gIQA88LF2Q_story.html



Griffin-Hall refers to Elizabeth Griffin-Hall, the social worker who was supervising the visits.

There are plenty of studies that show that children do better with continuing contact with their family of origin, even if they were removed due to proven child abuse. If the well being of the children is worthy of consideration (and I believe it is), then arranging for regular visitation was most likely to be in their own best interests.

Yes, there is a risk that a tragedy like this will happen if there is visitation, even supervised visitation. But the reason why tragedies like this make headlines is because they are so rare. For every Charlie and Braden, there are tens of thousands of children in foster care that benefit from having regular contact with their parents.

I'm not exaggerating, btw. In 2009, there were approximately 423,773 children in foster care:

http://www.childwelfare.gov/pubs/factsheets/foster.pdf#page=3

There is always a trade off in considering acceptable risk. The example I look at is traffic fatalities. In 2009 33,808 people died in traffic accidents. Anyone who is willing to get into a motor vehicle is tacitly saying that this is an acceptable level of risk.

So, yeah, if I had been the judge in this case, I would have ordered supervised visitation as well because it was most likely to be in Charlie and Baden's best interests to visit their father.

I respectfully disagree with you, at least in this case/situation, which is unlike most others. Charlie & Brandon were potential witnesses in the "disappearance" of their mother, their father being the #1 POI. I think that in itself put these boys in an extremely different and dangerous situation. JMO~

 

[shana]

I respectfully disagree with you, at least in this case/situation, which is unlike most others. Charlie & Brandon were potential witnesses in the "disappearance" of their mother, their father being the #1 POI. I think that in itself put these boys in an extremely different and dangerous situation. JMO~

With respect: So what would you think to change in the law and practices that might have prevented the tragic outcome of this case?

Should children of POIs be prevented from any visitation with the suspected parent, or should visits be at the discretion of the judge but always supervised, or should such supervised visits be held in a neutral location, or ???

Would these rules be different if the POI were suspected in a non-familial but violent crime rather than in the murder of the other parent or even of another relative?

Do you think, as some do, that JP would have found a way to commit these murders/suicide even if he had not been granted any visitation rights whatsoever?

I am interested in your answers but certainly not demanding them as much as opening-up the points in your excellent post for ongoing discussion on specific changes that could be instituted.

(Perhaps I am seeing a poll shaping-up as well, to begin to refine ideas...)

 

[GrainneDhu]

yes, I agree CPS does seem to be underfunded and lack proper training. I really hope there's an internal and thorough investigation.
I guess we are all in shock and angry and want answers. I would love to see a law about visitation vs safety in murder investigations.

I have several friends who are social workers (from a previous life when I was a social worker of sorts).

My impression is very strongly that it isn't a matter of lack of training, it's a matter of being overloaded.

In my state, there was a scandal many years ago about "drive through" social worker checks on children in foster care. Yes, that meant they had the foster parents drive into the parking lot outside the office, where the social worker would conduct a 5 to 15 minute verbal check on the child(ren).

Why were they doing that? Because the social workers were being assigned caseloads up to 5 times larger than what is considered the best practices limit. The overall average was over 3 times the recommended limit. The social workers were being pushed not to go into overtime, which meant that they did not have enough time to do in-home checks.

It reminds me of the famous clip from _I Love Lucy_ where Lucy and Ethel get a job in a chocolate factory. They were barely keeping up with the belt at the beginner speed but their supervisor turned up the speed anyway.

It doesn't matter how well trained a person is if their workload is overwhelming.

 

[GrainneDhu]

IMO, the reason why some mothers stay in marriages where they are abused, is because they want to physically be there to protect their children. They know that the court will probably order visitations with the father (who is abusive to them), and at those times, the mothers will have no way to protect their children.

This could be the reason Susan stayed, even though she recognized that she was in imminent danger for her own life.

Statistically, the highest risk period in an abusive relationship is when the victim decides to leave.

Many abused partners (not just women) stay in an abusive relationship because they are more terrified of what the abuser might do if they try to leave.

Also, in most abusive relationships, the incidents of abuse are sporadic rather than constant. The abuser is not acting abusive 80% of the time or even 99% of the time. If they were constantly abusive, it would be much easier for victims of abuse to leave such relationships.

Abusers tend to blame their victims, which can give the victim the illusion that they (the victim) could control the abuse, if they only did this, that or the other thing. The victim gets so focused on trying to control the incidents of abuse that they don't see the larger picture.

In Susan Cox Powell's case, my guess would be that she may have arrived at a point where she was considering leaving or had made a resolution to leave.

Abusers are control freaks, so they are usually very observant of their victims; the victim doesn't have to have verbalised their thoughts of leaving for those thoughts to ever-so-slightly change their normal behaviour. Any change in their normal behaviour is likely to make the abuser suspicious.

 

[CHERIE.T]

Yes, they did!!! So that's who made the decision. I feel he rented that house with the purpose of having a place to do this murder-suicide. I also believe that even if he had been given custody back, he still was planning this murder-suicide because he killed Susan and they were closing in on him. When he was denied custody, I wonder if he thought "oh darn. It's going to be harder now to do my plan." So all his VM's about not being able to live without his sons is garbage! Boo hooo. I was all about JP and them closing in on him.

Gosh, I hate to agree with you but I do. I thought about this last night.....if J planned the 'last ' emails, phone messages, the boy's toy donations and so on, did he rent the house for his final act of inhumanity? Ya, I think he did. :banghead: J was pure evil.

imho

 

[shana]

ITA, GrainneDhu!

Way back in ancient history when I was a social worker for Los Angeles County, my caseload was, in a word, impossible to maintain in the manner I knew it deserved. I spent far more than 40 hrs/week just to keep-up. iirc, we didn't get overtime back then either. Like my work before it as a P.O., also in downtown L.A., by the time I quit after 2 yrs, I was an old-timer. Burn-out on both jobs was extreme.

I can't imagine it would be any better today; in fact, I'd expect the overload to be far greater.

 

[nomoresorrow]

(Red by me)

With respect: So what would you think to change in the law and practices that might have prevented the tragic outcome of this case?

Should children of POIs be prevented from any visitation with the suspected parent, or should visits be at the discretion of the judge but always supervised, or should such supervised visits be held in a neutral location, or ???

IMO, if a parent is a suspect in the murder or disappearance of the other parent, I think there has to be extensive involvement with CPS/the courts in the interim, until the parent is cleared of suspicion. I think a judge should immediately appoint a GAL, order that the child(ren) must see a court-appointed therapist on a regular and ongoing basis, in addition to seeing a professional who specializes in the questioning of children in these type of familial cases. In order to maintain custody of the children during the investigation, the parent must agree to a psych evaluation, a LDT, regular therapy sessions, and the release of all banking and telephone records to authorities, otherwise the children will be removed from their care in the interim. I think the parent should be under the careful supervision of the police during the investigation, including immediate GPS monitoring of all vehicles. There should be a open line of communication between every person/professional involved with the children, including the school/daycare the children attend.

Would these rules be different if the POI were suspected in a non-familial but violent crime rather than in the murder of the other parent or even of another relative?

Hmmm... I don't know. Need to think on that one (Good question).

Do you think, as some do, that JP would have found a way to commit these murders/suicide even if he had not been granted any visitation rights whatsoever?

I think it's very possible and that is the reason why I think there should be extensive involvement by CPS/the court system/therapists from the get-go in these situations in the hope that it may at least provide an opportunity to intercept a tragedy such as this.

I am interested in your answers but certainly not demanding them as much as opening-up the points in your excellent post for ongoing discussion on specific changes that could be instituted.

I too am interested in your thoughts, as well as others thoughts on what changes could be helpful to avert a tragedy like this from ever happening again.

(Perhaps I am seeing a poll shaping-up as well, to begin to refine ideas...)

Sounds great!

 

[shana]

nomoresorrow: A thanks nod just wasn't enough...thank you VERY much for such a well thought-out reply. Personally, I see nothing with which I would be the least bit inclined to disagree.

I'm working on a fuller reply which I shall post soon.

 

[nomoresorrow]

nomoresorrow: A thanks nod just wasn't enough...thank you VERY much for such a well thought-out reply. Personally, I see nothing with which I would be the least bit inclined to disagree.

I'm working on a fuller reply which I shall post soon.

Don't feel rushed by me hun - there are (many) times I'm just to tired to type and can only read along.

 

[Nixie]

http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap...1vj9aw?docId=94a2542fd7d047828c6d3421eada72d2


Still in shock after reading this.....why weren't the right people told??????(the Cox family and their attorney should have seen this before the hearing!) Computer generated images the show incestuous images should be considered *advertiser censored* especially when children are involved. That isn't art or expression and should never be excused!

 

[rotterdam]

http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap...1vj9aw?docId=94a2542fd7d047828c6d3421eada72d2


Still in shock after reading this.....why weren't the right people told??????(the Cox family and their attorney should have seen this before the hearing!) Computer generated images the show incestuous images should be considered *advertiser censored* especially when children are involved. That isn't art or expression and should never be excused!

Oh my, so that is why the Judge ordered the psychosexual evaluation at that time and not earlier.
Snipped form the above article:

"But as the Feb. 1 custody hearing neared, the materials hadn't arrived from Utah, Long said. It wasn't until after the psychologist finalized the report that the materials arrived at the Pierce County Sheriff's Department. When the psychologist saw them, he added an addendum to his report recommending the psychosexual evaluation of Josh Powell — an exam that can include a polygraph as well as more intrusive measures to determine the body's response to child *advertiser censored* or other stimuli."

I am speechless.

 

[ThoughtFox]

With respect: So what would you think to change in the law and practices that might have prevented the tragic outcome of this case?

Should children of POIs be prevented from any visitation with the suspected parent, or should visits be at the discretion of the judge but always supervised, or should such supervised visits be held in a neutral location, or ???

Response to the underlined sentence:

That's what happened in the Kyron Hormon case in Oregon. After the disappearance of the boy, sole custody of Kyron's half-sister was given to Kyron's father. The step-mother was told she would have to undergo psychological testing in order to be able to see her daughter, and she refused because she knew it might be incriminating. And I have no problem with that. She was definitely a person of interest, had issues with alcohol and sexting," and she had tried to hire someone to murder her husband. In her case, they decided her daughter would be healthier away from her mother.

They should never have allowed JP all this visitation without a thorough evaluation. The social worker involved surely didn't know about JP's upbringing and incest *advertiser censored*! I just don't think he was treated seriously enough as a dangerous criminal, and that's why this tragedy occurred.

 

[Donjeta]

I'm not sure if this as been posted on websleuths:

http://www.q13fox.com/news/kcpq-lawmakers-call-for-dshs-supervision-changes-20120207,0,1127948.story

Josh Powell, had twice weekly visits with his kids at a neutral location --a "safe house". Josh complained about a lack of quality time with his sons and that they had to share toys with other children who were also using the facility. Josh Powell rented a house and Department of Social and Health Services (DSHS) determined it was all right for the boys to visit him there instead of the at the "safe house".

JMHO...DSHS made a fatal error in ever allowing the location switch for supervised visits.
DSHS failed those 2 little boys!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I can only hope the exposure on this case prompts some serious changes in protecting children. lease:

I am just so sad... my heart breaks for the Cox family.

Color by me, I removed original highlighting from the quote.

This statement reminds me of JP's farewell message. He couldn't live without his sons etc. He saw them as his toys and he didn't want to share.

Every day that something comes out I get sadder and sadder.

It's one thing to try to make sense of an unthinkable crime that no one could have seen or prevented but what on earth was he doing having anything to do with his sons for two years if he was into incestuous *advertiser censored*?