Beth Maloney, author of Protecting Your Child from the Child Protection System, shows how innocent parents can handle wrongful accusations from the child protection system and reveals how a mere trip to the doctor can start a legal nightmare. In this episode, we discuss the alarming rise of child abuse pediatricians who can accuse parents of child abuse for seeking medical treatment for their children. We tackle how to handle unique parenting situations and provide valuable insights and practical advice for parents in a worst-case scenario.
Resources:
AI tools used to create this episode include Autopod and Cohost AI.
Amazon Affiliate links used.
Subscribe and support the show directly:
https://brendonmarotta.com/show/
Beth Maloney, author of Protecting Your Child from the Child Protection System, shows how innocent parents can handle wrongful accusations from the child protection system and reveals how a mere trip to the doctor can start a legal nightmare. In this episode, we discuss the alarming rise of child abuse pediatricians who can accuse parents of child abuse for seeking medical treatment for their children. We tackle how to handle unique parenting situations and provide valuable insights and practical advice for parents in a worst-case scenario.
Resources:
AI tools used to create this episode include Autopod and Cohost AI.
Amazon Affiliate links used.
Subscribe and support the show directly:
https://brendonmarotta.com/show/
Pediatricians have become board certified as child abuse pediatricians. They don't have any qualifications to make that assessment, but they do.
Speaker 2:So they stop giving the child the care that mom knows that the child needs.
Speaker 1:Right.
Speaker 2:And the child not receiving care dies.
Speaker 1:It's happened.
Speaker 2:You're listening to the Brendan Murata show. In this episode I talked to Beth Maloney, author of the book Protecting your Child from the Child Protection System. Beth is an attorney and parent that helps other parents who are dealing with child protective services or have been wrongfully accused of abusing their children. Reading her book, I was surprised how common it is for parents to find themselves dealing with this system even when they've done nothing wrong. In this episode, we'll talk about what someone should do if they find themselves wrongfully accused of child abuse, how to handle the child protection system and how child abuse pediatricians are building a role for themselves within the medical system where they can accuse parents of abusing their children simply for seeking medical treatment. It's a very interesting industrial complex being built within the medical system around this particular issue that I think you'll want to hear about when you listen to this episode.
Speaker 2:So, without further ado, here is Beth. The question that I wanted to start with that I've had since I first discovered your work is why is it that a good parent, a parent who isn't doing anything wrong, who's treating their children well, might find themselves interacting with child protective services? Because I think everyone knows, you know, if there's a bad situation. If there's abuse going on, we all sort of agree that something should be done. But what are the reasons that that system might go wrong and someone who's doing good might find themselves dealing with it?
Speaker 1:So I think there are a variety of ways that that can happen. First of all, there is certainly an issue where parents are impoverished and don't have the same ability to care for their kids that someone who has more resources does. Unfortunately, those parents are often accused of neglect and, rather than helping, the system perceives some sort of negligence there, even though parents are working as hard as they possibly can. So that's one possibility. Another possibility is when children have accidents and the parents aren't really able to explain exactly what happens, which frankly does happen with kids having accidents. You're not, you don't necessarily have your eyes on them all the time, and particularly if parents, if your child was injured in a park and there falls off a swing, and there are five or six people around and they all see what happens and you saw a kid fall off the swing and nobody pushed him or her off the swing, that's one sort of an accident.
Speaker 1:Another accident is something where there's actually a case that happened in Texas where a child essentially was put on a chair while the mom ran into the house and then ran back out and the toddler fell off the chair. So she wasn't really able to explain exactly what happens, and that then starts an entire child protection exploration. Let's put it that way. And sometimes, as I mentioned in my book, parents inadvertently say things that lead to even bigger investigations. In my experience, once an investigation is opened, the goal of the investigation is not really to clear the parents. It's to figure out how to find something that needs to be addressed. And another way it happens is which is my particular area of expertise is when you have medically complex kids who, and by a medically complex kid and I use kid all the time, so I don't want anyone to think I'm being disrespectful, that's just. You know.
Speaker 2:I call Michael my kids.
Speaker 1:You have a kid out who has maybe a breathing tube or a feeding tube or an autoimmune disorder or some sort of a complex disorder that would not be treated in your typical pediatric, in the office that your pediatrician would probably refer the child out for more expertise. And more and more often I'm seeing those parents of those children being accused of either completely making up the symptoms that the child has or the latest variation is exaggerating the symptoms. Yes, the child really is sick, but not as sick as the parent is claiming. And in those situations the parents get looped into this child protection system. The accusations are being made by doctors who don't agree with the treatment and, in the case of accidents, by doctors. That's where the initial report starts. And then the quote unquote investigation is handled by caseworkers who have no medical expertise and really I think too many times are more interested in supporting the doctors or finding a reason to look more carefully at the situation than they should be.
Speaker 2:So let's say that you're a parent and God forbid you know we're all free from this Something happens that requires bringing the child to the emergency room. How does one go from doing what they need to do to make sure their child is safe and cared for and recovers from whatever accident happened to dealing with the child protective services system? Well, I would not try to explain something that I do not know the circumstance.
Speaker 1:So if your child hurt himself or herself and you don't exactly know what happened in the situation, I would not try and come to the point where I would not know what happened in the situation. I would not try and come up with a theory as to what might have gone wrong. So let's take the example with the child in Texas who essentially fell off the chair. And it doesn't have to be Texas, it can be anywhere. Something happens when you are asked what happened and you say I don't know. I went into the house to. I went quickly into the house because the alarm was going off. I thought maybe there was a fire in the kitchen so I ran in. Everything was under control. I ran out. They were on the ground. Then you're asked how did that happen? I think your answer is I don't know. I only know it happened in less than one minute. That's what happened.
Speaker 1:Rather than saying well, you know, maybe the neighbor's dog came into the yard and pushed him off the chair. Or well, my daughter was also out there and she can sometimes be a little rough, so maybe she pushed him off the chair. Or those, to me, are the mistakes that parents make, if you can call the mistakes. I don't even want to call the mistakes, because parents are really just trying to figure it out and think that the person on the other side of the table who's conducting the investigation is helpful. And they're not really being helpful. They're not trying to figure this out with you. They're trying to justify opening an investigation into you.
Speaker 2:That is what I would say.
Speaker 1:So that's one thing that I would say. The second thing I would say is know your hospital. So there are certain hospitals where these kind of cases are generated all the time, so don't go there.
Speaker 2:So it sounds like a parent might look away for two seconds. Something happens. They rush their child to get some help and someone asks how did this happen? And they say I don't know. I think he might have fallen from something. And then they look at the child and go these injuries don't look like he fell from something. What actually happened? Are you lying to us? And now a case is open and they're trying to build a case against the parent.
Speaker 1:Right, let's say the interrogator or the doctor is not going to say are you lying to us? They might just say well, that explanation doesn't really make sense. So now parents are trying to come up they think that they're in a cooperative relationship trying to figure out what happened. That's not what's going on. So if you were sitting in a police station being questioned everybody who watches television, I think, knows that you don't just like start answering questions and making up ideas and coming up with theories because ultimately all of that can just come back to hurt you. So if you do not know the answer, you say I don't know.
Speaker 2:So it sounds like when you're talking to child protective services, you're talking to someone who's trying to build a case and you have to treat that interaction like you would talking to a police officer or a prosecutor.
Speaker 1:I would. I would do that.
Speaker 2:And are they required to identify themselves? So do you know if you're talking to someone from child protective services all the time?
Speaker 1:A caseworker would identify themselves. But if you are in the hospital and a doctor is coming to talk to you, you may very well have no idea what kind of doctor that is, whether they are a child abuse pediatrician or a hospitalist who are really very anxious, it seems, to find abusive parents. And or is this the emergency room doctor? You just don't know. So I think from the minute you step inside the hospital's doors, you are aware of the fact that you are in a potentially risky situation, and I hate to say that this is a new development. This is not something that 10 years ago I would have said, but I do say it today.
Speaker 2:So why is it that the medical system is interested in building cases like this? Because that seems like a major on ramp or entry point for parents who might otherwise be doing good to find themselves dealing with this.
Speaker 1:Well, I've become very jaded and I think that there is a real interest among this particular group of pediatricians who are known as child abuse pediatricians, who need to justify their positions and if they are not finding a lot of abused children, then what is the point of their job? And I'm sorry to have to say that. And I also want to be clear that there are many children who are abused. But I'm seeing a tremendous number of parents who are really attacked and abused by the system and forced to hire lawyers and engage in extended legal proceedings and lose their children and are only allowed to visit them with supervisors and have to go into counseling and take parenting courses.
Speaker 1:And if there had been a moment of common sense at the beginning of the case, one would recognize that this was either an accident or this is an ill child and that simply because a parent parents differently than someone else might. That's not a basis to take children away. So I might parent my children one way. Another person could parent those same children in a very different way. I might not agree with their parenting, I might not like some of their parenting, there could be many issues that I would have with their parenting, but they're not my kids.
Speaker 1:So while those children cannot be beaten, cannot be starved, cannot be sexually assaulted, cannot be thrown out of the house, cannot be made to sleep in the car in the middle of the winter, as punishment, cannot be held by their ankles outside of a second story window to discipline them, these are all cases that I have seen. That's abuse. That is abuse. But not trying your best in a difficult situation to arrange medical care or not supervising your children the best you can. Every mother and probably father in the world at some point has had to run out and you know, or run into the house or into the apartment because maybe a stoke thing was going to boil over or an animal suddenly ran into the yard and while you're chasing the fox out of the yard, the child gets into some kind of trouble. That stuff happens. It's not abuse.
Speaker 2:So what are some atypical parenting decisions that someone might make that are legitimate, or just different, that the system might look at as abuse, even though they're just different?
Speaker 1:So I've seen a situation where a mom who had some of her own, let's say, academic challenges and had a child who had some pretty severe mental health concerns and that mom was making the decisions that she felt was right for that child, which included that she was not willing to put the child into a live in mental health program. She felt that she could manage that child's behaviors and that was deemed to be abuse.
Speaker 1:Wow so yeah, whereas I felt I at the time was the guardian, I had let him for that child and I fought hard to say but this mom is making reasonable decisions based on the information that she has. Nobody is being hurt here. Nobody wants their child at home.
Speaker 2:It sounds like an incredible possibility in that judgment for medical kidnap or for the doctor to say well, we think the best care is to take your child away from you, and if you don't give your child the best care, which we have defined as taking the child away from you, we'll take the child away from you. So it almost sounds like the medical system gets to be its own judge and authority in that situation.
Speaker 1:Okay, so in that situation, that is a very true example, but in the particular situation I outlined, what was happening was that the case workers were being notified by medical providers that this child need to be in their program full-time, and mom disagreed, and so the case workers were then filing for custody, saying the child has to be removed. There are situations, though, where the doctors are more directly involved, so the emergency room situation that you brought up, where a child goes to the hospital with an injury and the doctor just who looks at it the child abuse pediatrician, for whatever reason decides themselves that child is not going home. So they keep the child admitted in the hospital and they notify child protection services that a petition for custody needs to be filed, and if the child is not removed immediately, then something horrific is probably going to happen, and the case worker goes into court or goes to a judge. There's no notification to the parent and, based solely on what that doctor has told that case worker, who then repeats it to a judge, custody goes to the state.
Speaker 2:And does the parent get the opportunity to tell their side of the story in that situation? After the fact so, the judge makes a ruling and then you get to appeal the ruling.
Speaker 1:It's not an appeal.
Speaker 1:The judge makes the ruling and then you are given notice that there will be a subsequent proceeding.
Speaker 1:Now let me in fairness, because I try to be fair If there is a child who is brought into the emergency room who has cigarette butt burns all over their leg and broken ribs and a black guy and maybe is starving, then certainly in that situation and I don't mean to laugh, it's not funny, I'm just saying in that situation there is a reasonable ground to believe that this child is being abused and should not go home.
Speaker 1:And the same pattern would happen the doctors would not allow the child to leave the hospital and then immediately there would be this emergency custody granted and then the parents would receive notice that the child was in the state custody and that there would be a hearing. So that's how it's supposed to work. The problem is that it's being used in situations where there really is not, in my opinion, that kind of an emergency where parents should not be barred from access to their kids. And there is an expression among lawyers and probably pretty well-known possession is nine tenths of the law. The problem is, once the custody has been delivered to the state, in that emergency proceeding. The parent really is in an uphill battle to get custody back.
Speaker 1:The assumption is, at that point the child belongs in custody.
Speaker 2:It sounds very similar to the political term state of exception. I don't know if you're familiar with that, but state of exception is a political concept that if the government has an exception where they can do something they're normally not allowed to do, they'll just do everything as an exception. So if the government is allowed to spy on you because there's an emergency, well every time they want to spy on you, it's an emergency. Now, and it sounds like that there's a similar dynamic going on with child protective services, where if they're only allowed to take the child in an emergency, well every time they want to take the child, it's an emergency.
Speaker 1:Well, it's not every time, so they only use this emergency procedure in limited circumstances. So here's another example of how an emergency proceeding might work. Suppose that you had and I use this in the book if there were two parents who had overdosed in the car and the police come upon the car and the two parents are overdosed and there's a toddler in the back seat. They get to take that toddler, keep them at the police station, notify the caseworker. Caseworker goes to a judge, says emergency, somebody has to have custody of this child. So it could be used in that kind of a situation also. So I don't really think it's an exception, because there is a specific procedure for this and many times you do have doctors who are actually saying this is what needs to happen. So unless the caseworkers are really explicitly implementing a doctor's agenda, knowing that it's wrong, then there tends to be a lot of deference to medical opinions in general, and so I think that explains part of what's going on.
Speaker 2:So let's say that there's a doctor who's just bad, and they have an agenda and they're willing to do bad things for their agenda. What checks and balances exist in the system to prevent them from engaging in harm against a child.
Speaker 1:In the context of child protection matters. So in other words, the thing okay. So I would say someone like me, I'm the check and balance. There's no internal check and balance on that person. There are only attorneys who fight the cases.
Speaker 2:Got it. So if the parents can't afford and a high quality person like yourself, they're in trouble.
Speaker 1:It's much more difficult because not all attorneys are created equal, just like all doctors and carpenters and car garages who work on car. Some are better than others, and so unless you're able to afford a really good attorney, you're in a tough spot. If you cannot afford any attorney, then an attorney in most states will be appointed for you. It's not a constitutional right to have a lawyer provided in a child protection matter, but most of the states do do that. And I think again, the variation among who gets appointed is pretty great. And so I hear from many, many parents who say their lawyers did really nothing for them, just went along, just went along with whatever was said and didn't really. And let me also just say it's really hard to win these cases. It's not easy, it's hard work. It's hard work. You're up against a machine. The machine is whatever the state system is, excuse me. The machine is the doctor backed by a hospital. It's hard, so ideally you just don't wanna get caught up in it, if it's at all avoidable.
Speaker 2:It sounds like also the people in that machine are probably much more experienced and knowledgeable about how to work the machine than the average parent, who's probably never even thought about this before.
Speaker 1:That's true and that is why I wrote the book, because I saw that the same mistakes. I hate to call them mistakes because I don't I'm not making in any way the parents responsible for this.
Speaker 2:Sure.
Speaker 1:You just don't realize what you're up against and you should really look at this as being a situation. Very much what you said. You're in the police station, you're being interrogated, and so if the if something I'm trying to think of a good example here where something happens, where your daughter wanders down the street to a neighbor's house, let's say, and for some reason there's a report made maybe this is the fifth or sixth time it's happened, I don't know the case worker comes to the door, starts asking questions, and then the mom is saying oh, she's always getting into trouble. There was that fist fight at school two weeks ago. Okay, this is not helpful to your case. Now you've just sort of given out information that will lead to a further investigation.
Speaker 1:The fist fight at school. So now all of a sudden they're wondering about that, and so parents always talk too much, too much in these situations because they feel that they're in a tough spot, and if they can just explain it properly, then everybody will understand. And what they don't realize is that the person you're talking to isn't there to understand. They are not your therapist, they are not your friend, they are an investigator and they're trying to figure out if there's a case.
Speaker 2:One question I wanted to ask you about was if child protective services had any issue with non-standard parenting, so things like homeschooling, home birth, not vaccinating your children. I've heard that in some cases child protective services will not look kindly on those because they believe that the standard is what the sort of dominant institutions want, even though parents who do those things are often very conscientious and care a lot about their children. So is there any issue in those cases? Oh, and co-sleeping was another one that I'd heard there were sometimes issues around.
Speaker 1:Yes, those are all considered red flags. However, I don't think you would be investigated solely for that reason. The problem comes up. Let's use the example where the person comes to the front door and the case worker comes to the front door and says to the mother there's been a report that your child is running wild through the neighborhood. And the mother says at night, at night, okay, she's seen running. And the mother says that's impossible. We co-sleep. She's nine years old but we're still co-sleeping. I know she's okay red flag, but it wasn't the co-sleeping that caused the investigation. It becomes a factor within the investigation.
Speaker 1:So I've seen cases where parents are again a medical case, where the doctors are claiming oh, the child isn't really sick, or the child has this disorder, but the mother it's always the mother, by the way, 95% of the time in the medical cases it's the mother is exaggerating the symptoms. And then, when I'm reading the records, I see homeschooling cited as a concern. Now, why? Because then they're saying well, there aren't enough eyes on this child. That's a phrase you'll hear often there aren't enough eyes on this child. So I always tell clients who and I think I've written it in the book people who want to homeschool. Make sure there are eyes on your child. Take them to public library programs, take them to art lessons. Any child who is homeschooled is still allowed to participate in the sports with the school system, for example. So let them be on the soccer team, let them be on the baseball team. Don't have them be on the football team, because they could get concussions.
Speaker 1:But that's my personal thought, but I'm just saying do things so that there the argument that there aren't enough eyes on this child is defeated.
Speaker 2:Would video or documenting your child's life through photographs and things like that be considered eyes on the child?
Speaker 1:Sometimes, however, then if a child let's say a child's really sick and can't really mobilize around the house and so maybe the mom is with the cell phone taping so that she can show the doctor who's treating this kid, this is what we see after four o'clock in the afternoon. He's really just pulling himself around by his hands because his legs aren't functioning. So the problem with trying to then show that video to case workers who are being told by other doctors that this is all made up, is that then they'll claim well, he or she was just making the child do that, they're making it up. So that might not be compelling. Now, if you have pictures, photographs of the child sitting at story time at the local library, obviously that's a group kind of a shock, right?
Speaker 1:And if there are certain things happening in circle time or whatever it's called. I'm just making all this up, right you?
Speaker 2:got it right though.
Speaker 1:Okay. So if there are things in circle time that demonstrate that there are issues, if the person leading in circle time ends the story and says, okay, everybody can get up to go home and all the other kids stand up, but your child cannot stand up, just is trying but can't get up, then that kind of a video certainly would be helpful, because you're not telling the child to do that.
Speaker 2:So it seems like one of the cases that they might try to build is around the idea that whatever medical issue a child has is made up.
Speaker 1:Correct.
Speaker 2:And that's explain that to me, because that doesn't totally make sense to me. I mean probably because I've never that's never been something that has ever occurred to me to do, and I also don't totally understand what harm is occurring if that actually is happening.
Speaker 1:Well, you and I are on the same page on that one, okay. So I would say that any mom, in particular of a child who is medically complex, has a target on their back because these child abuse pediatricians have decided that most of the care that these children are receiving is unnecessary. So let's use a specific example. Let's say a child has severe breathing issues and, without going into detail, something is wrong inside this child's airway system or and things aren't emptying the way they should empty. So anyway, after many exploratory, different things that are tried, the doctor concludes child needs a tube in order to breathe properly. So, for whatever reason, that child ends up in some kind of a crisis and is turning blue like something's not working, can't get her to the doctor who regularly treats her, and so ends up at a local hospital or a different hospital and the child abuse pediatrician there says oh, nothing wrong with this child, the child doesn't even need the tube. They don't have any qualifications to make that assessment, but they do, and they would then do the whole emergency thing.
Speaker 1:Call CYS or whatever they're called, child Protection Services, say the petition has to be taken and now start yeah, it has to be filed, and now start dictating that the child has to remain in the hospital and the breathing tube has to be removed and the parents are to be separated from the child in the hospital. They're not allowed to see that child because the mother has convinced this child that they don't know how to breathe. So we're gonna reverse the procedure and everything's gonna be fine. So that's called the separation test, where these child abuse pediatricians claim that if they separate the children from the mother and unravel all the treatment, that suddenly the child is going to blossom and be fine and children have died from the separation test.
Speaker 2:Wow, so they stop giving the child the care that mom knows that the child needs and the child not receiving care dies.
Speaker 1:It's happened wow.
Speaker 2:Is there any prosecution of the doctors in that case?
Speaker 1:Well, that's very hard to do because you then have doctors claiming that it was a valid medical opinion and that Because All the actions were taken with the state's approval at the time that the child was in custody, and because the Doctor is then claims quasi immunity through the state, because it just it gets very complicated. Without getting too legally here on you, I'll just say it's complicated and that's why, if you have a child who has any kind of a complex condition, you really need to know where you're taking the child and If you end up in an emergency room. I give a specific example in the book where the mom takes the child to the emergency room and starts explaining all about the medical condition and using all the medical terms, and what she doesn't realize is that Red flags are going off for the doctor that she's talking to, because parents are not supposed to use medical terms, only doctors are supposed to use medical terms. So using medical terms is another red flag. So you have red flag.
Speaker 1:The child's home school, because child has, oh I, osteogenesis imperfecta, which is a brittle bone disease. So the child's home a lot is home schooled. The mother's using medical terms Ah, lots of red flags.
Speaker 2:That's odd to me because it seems to me if someone has a child who has some condition and has been dealing with that condition for years, that they would eventually pick up the terminology.
Speaker 1:Of course they would, and when they're talking to the expert treating physicians there, they will use the medical term because that specifies what is going on, right?
Speaker 1:So desaturation is a term which I'm pretty sure is a low level of oxygen in the blood, so that there may be symptoms where you can tell that's happening. So the mother might say we had several episodes and the mother's needs to be desaturation. Okay, start using the word desaturation in an emergency room, and there's all kinds of problems that come up because you're not supposed to use that word. So you're not supposed to say for example, my child has complex motor ticks. You can say that to the treating physician, because that treating physician, that expert, has told you well, these are complex motor ticks. But what you're supposed to say to a typical doctor is Well, sometimes my child blinks his eyes 25 times a minute, and the reason I know that is because I have one of these clickers and I've clicked to count, or, and then, right after that, she'll roll her neck in one direction and then another. Okay, so that's the language to use, rather than complex motor ticks.
Speaker 2:Would it be legitimate to say that you know, doctor so-and-so told me that this is what the child has, or is even that using that language too much?
Speaker 1:I think that, for example, if you say doctor, so-and-so, told me that she has some kind of a condition where it's really easy for her bones to break, that's okay.
Speaker 2:I see, but even the term in that context is too much for some.
Speaker 1:I'm yeah, I wouldn't use the correct medical term. Medical term osteogenesis imperfecta.
Speaker 2:You know, one of the things I've heard is that Criminals are often very good at navigating the legal system because they know they have to learn how to do that, to do what they do. And it strikes me here that parents who are actually abusers Are probably far better at navigating the system than regular parents, because the parents who are abusers have thought through okay, if we get questioned, you know, what are we going to do about this, whereas a normal parent is like my kid's feeling something. Help me with this right.
Speaker 1:Yeah, that's a good point. I, I don't know, I would have to think about that. I do know that many good parents are. Just, they just Think that everybody is, is on their side, and so therefore they they don't realize that they might be saying things that that are going to get themselves in trouble.
Speaker 2:Yeah, whereas if you're in a police station.
Speaker 1:You know, you would know enough that maybe you've seen enough shows.
Speaker 1:You think I think I should have a lawyer before I'm talking, because otherwise what you might do is say, well, it couldn't be me, because on that Tuesday that you're talking about, I remember I went to a movie because it was pouring rain outside, and then and, and I saw whatever I saw at such and such a theater, and you're 90 percent certain that's right. So you say. But then what happens is when people check out the story, they find out a it wasn't raining that day or that movie wasn't playing at that theater. And then all of a sudden you're explaining yourself, but you recognize that you're you're in a situation where maybe you just shouldn't talk, whereas when you're A parent, typical parent who trusts doctors, who believes that the child protection system is really only interested in Parents who truly abuse their kids, then you go into it more or less like a deer in the headlights. Or you don't even know enough to be a deer in headlights. It's, it's too far along before you even Understand what you're in the middle of.
Speaker 2:So if I'm a parent dealing with this system, how do I tell the difference between a doctor who maybe is there to help me and a doctor who's building a case or or asking a cop like questions? Well or is there a difference? Is it all going into the same system?
Speaker 1:Hmm, that is hard to say. I would be able to tell, um. So I'm trying to think if I bring my child to the hospital and I explain what happened. So I have a friend who was holding her child fell on the ice, landed on the child, child got hurt, she got hurt. She explained what happened. They weren't satisfied with that Explanation. But no matter how many times she explained the story, it was the same story. There were no differences, right? She didn't try to figure out why she tripped on the ice. She didn't think about why she picked him up. She didn't talk about, you know, necessarily, um, how many times before she had fallen on the ice she didn't talk about. Well, two years ago, actually, I fell on the ice with him and he had a concussion and then we had, you know, none, none of that, just. But if somebody keeps asking you to explain it again, I would have red flags go off myself because I would figure well, I already explained it.
Speaker 1:Right If they if they separate. Let's say that there's a mom and a dad and Dad rushes the child to the hospital, calls the mom, says you gotta meet me there. I fell. I was what. Had him in my arms. I fell, tripped on the steps. I want to take him there.
Speaker 1:He brings the child to the emergency room. The mother shows up and they're separated. Somebody says to them you know what? We just we just want to talk to you individually. If that's okay and most parents are like, sure, that's fine because we have an idea Okay, that's a red flag when they start separating you from each other, when, when they Say that they'd like you to step out of the room, you're at your child's bedside, for whatever reason. You're very concerned, you're not leaving that room and somebody says well, we would just like you to step out in the hall. There's probably going to be a guard waiting there or a child protection worker with some sort of an order or something. If you've been in that hospital for several hours with people asking you all kinds of repetitive questions and you don't really seem to be getting the medical care that you came to get, that could be a reason that you'd actually just prefer to Take your child home.
Speaker 2:Got it so. So when the questions start to be about you and what you've been doing, rather than giving your child what they need, that's the red flag.
Speaker 1:That could be a red flag. Yep, or repeating a story, or how's your relationship with your husband or your wife, or you know, is there any physical violence in the home? Or what about alcohol or anything? Those, those questions are definitely going in the direction that Is not consistent with. My child fell off the swing in the park. I'm just here to make sure that they're okay.
Speaker 2:So, when those red flags start going up, what is the way to Gracefully and safely get your child out of that situation?
Speaker 1:Well, until there is an order from a court, they really don't have the ability to prevent you from leaving with your child. They can try, but if your sense is that you're in a situation that's really very unsafe, then you might want to think about just leaving with your child and you could say to the doctors if you needed to um, I think we're good, but you know, he he seems to be coming around was really I wasn't. I was just here out of an abundance of precaution. We've been here for two hours already. We're, we're just going to go home.
Speaker 1:If you get pushed back from that, then I think you really are in trouble. Now Let me mention one thing. Parents think well, I can always just take my child out against medical advice. So that is not true, because Against medical advice is a concept where, with the hospital or doctors permission, you can leave against our advice. That's what, against my advice. I would prefer I'm the doctor. I would prefer that he stay overnight. I think he needs some more observation. You say you know what he seems. I'm going to take him home. If there's a problem, I'll bring him back. Well, our advice is that he stays overnight. All right, I'll sign whatever you. So if you, if you, the doctor says, our advice is if he stays, oh, is that he stays overnight? If you take him home, you're really doing that at your own risk. You say, that's okay, I'll just sign whatever I need to sign, because we're going to go. If you get a lot of pushback from that, there's probably a problem there too.
Speaker 2:And if you go, against medical advice in that situation. Is that something that they would use against you later? They could, but.
Speaker 1:If you've made a reasonable decision. Obviously, if your child is lying on on the bed with broken bones and bloody wounds and so forth, you can't do that, but sure situation where you.
Speaker 1:Something's just too much. Something's just telling you you know something's not right here. I don't understand why they're asking us these questions. What? What does our, the state of our marriage or our relationship have to do with? This child Condition who got hurt in the backyard? And and he's never been hurt before? And I just brought him here because I wanted to make he seemed fine, but I just wanted to make sure he was okay um, I Think that that's the time to think about leaving and, yes, if you leave against medical advice, then it's possible that you're gonna get a phone call from the hospital saying you know, you left a little prematurely and we really think you ought to bring him in and be screened again, and my, so my advice probably would be just don't go back if he's fine. They're trying to.
Speaker 2:I Reading your book and and hearing the stories about child abuse pediatricians. That was a concept that I found Interesting, and it seems like there's sort of an industrial complex around child abuse now, where A system was set up for a legitimate need. Of course, we want to make sure that children who have something happen or safe.
Speaker 2:Right but now the system Can get profit by finding people who they deem is unsafe, and so they want to find more profit. They want to build more cases. Uh, cases against Real abusers are difficult, and cases against parents who are ignorant of the system might be easier. So how is that an accurate assessment that there's a sort of industrial complex going on here? And, and how does Child abuse pediatricians? How does it actually function in the system?
Speaker 1:Okay, so these are.
Speaker 1:These are my theories, having sure and in this area for quite some time and spent a lot of time Writing this book and reading articles and having just won a major victory in allentown, pennsylvania, and seeing what's going on there. So there are about 350 child abuse pediatricians in the country, so let's educate the people listening about medicine. Doctors finish medical school and then they pick an air or during that time, they pick an area, a specialty that they're going into. It might be pediatrics, um, it might be, um, you know, ear, nose and throat might be allergy. It might be a surgeon, and so then doctors get additional training in that particular area and then, once they finish that, they get bored. They take tests to become board certified. So a pediatrician, after they finish the medical school, does two years of residency and in pediatrics. So they go to a hospital and they're part of the pediatric Team at the hospital and they have to do that for two years and then they Pass a test Hopefully they don't fail and they become board certified. Then Other specialties require much more training.
Speaker 1:So, for example, a genetic, uh, uh, metabolicist requires quite a bit more training than a pediatrician, and some doctors Then take trainings in particular areas. So if you want to be A surgeon, then you want to be. Maybe you want to become a pediatric surgeon and maybe you want to be a pediatric heart surgeon. So that requires really a lot of training Beyond just a two-year residency for pediatrics. So um 350 pediatricians have become board certified as child abuse pediatricians. That does not mean that they have any training other than An exposure. Okay. So for example me, I'm a lawyer, right, so I'm not a tax lawyer. I mean, I understand tax law, the basic Tax law, but I'm not a tax lawyer. So, but I've been exposed to tax law through courses and so forth, right? So If you have a child who has an autoimmune condition, for example, you would be taking your child to a rheumatologist. Child abuse pediatrician is not Just doesn't do a residency in rheumatology, they have some brief understanding of rheumatology and as a pediatrician, your typical pediatrician would refer the patient To a rheumatologist. So if your child had an autoimmune condition, you would, your child would be referred to a rheumatologist. Okay, so pediatricians In the hierarchy of medicine are really perceived as being On one of the lower rungs, even though families perceive pediatricians as being really important because those are the doctors who See their children all the time.
Speaker 1:But in the hierarchy of hospital medicine, pediatricians Are not considered to be, uh, one of the more important specialties. Who are the most important? Surgeons? Surgeons are the most important. They generate more income, their training is more significant. And then within surgeons there, there are general surgeons, there are heart surgeons, there are brain surgeons, so so you have this whole hierarchy in medicine.
Speaker 1:Pediatricians are not, they're kind of on the bottom rung. So if these 350 individuals become board certified in pediatrics, suddenly, in terms of their own personal Self-worth or whatever I would describe Suddenly have a great deal of control over other specialists who are far more qualified and well trained than they are, because suddenly those child abuse pediatricians are deciding whether the rheumatologist is making good decisions or not. So there was a recent article written by a group of child abuse pediatricians from radii hospital in San Diego radii children's hospital. And those child abuse pediatricians believe that every hospital should have a, a medical. I forget what they titled it. It's basically a hit squad where they are going to oversee every aspect of a complex Trials, medical care, and they will decide whether that child should be getting the treatment and the medication that the experts prescribed. So there is an ego piece there.
Speaker 1:Secondly, when a medically complex child goes into a hospital system, which then that child abuse pediatrician decides.
Speaker 1:So let me back up and say a lot of times, medically complex kids, who have all these different conditions, they have to go.
Speaker 1:Not every hospital has everything.
Speaker 1:So your child might, depending on where you live, might have to see experts at several different hospitals.
Speaker 1:Because if you're just in a place that has a regional hospital so for example, I'm in Maine and you probably would have to take children with specific conditions to Boston to get certain kinds of care right. So what happens is that if a child were to go into a hospital here and a child abuse pediatrician decided that they didn't like the care that was happening, maybe in Boston, maybe in New York, wherever it is happening then that child abuse pediatrician not only causes the state to gain custody of the child but to cut off all the other medical care the child was receiving and consolidate it within its own hospital system. So this is exactly what I saw happening in Allentown, pennsylvania, where the child abuse pediatrician there, when a child with a medical complex condition ends up at her hospital for one reason or another, she will cut off the care being offered by children's hospital of Philadelphia, by the Cleveland Clinic, and say all the care has to happen within her hospital, which obviously generates income for that, yeah, it sounds like a very vicious way to steal business from another competitor.
Speaker 1:I see it that way and I'm sorry to have had to reach that conclusion, but I do see it that way.
Speaker 2:Well, your mention of the article a discipline writing an article saying that their discipline should have more power, right?
Speaker 1:Yes, yes, that's it.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:That's it. I mean, that is it in a nutshell. The difficulty is that I don't think that the specialists at the hospitals recognize this is happening, because I think they are truly so brilliant and focused on caring for their patients that it's when this happens to one of their patients. They tend to think it's sort of a one patient problem.
Speaker 1:They don't really see the bigger picture, which is what I see, which is that it's happening again and again, or what you've identified, which is an article that is written as if we're really, you know, we're on the child's side, and this is why we need to be involved in these meetings, but actually what they're saying is we want more power and this is how we're going to get it.
Speaker 2:Yeah, it's a classic technique to gain power to take a real problem child abuse and say, well, to fight this serious problem, we need all the power in the world to do it. We need more power, and it's also a problem that can't be solved the way that they're going about it. So I don't know that child abuse can be removed entirely from the world. Even if these people had absolute power and the way that they're going about it, it sounds like they're not even necessarily focused on child abuse as much as expanding their own system.
Speaker 1:So I think that's very true.
Speaker 2:Yeah, this is a very classic problem around power, but it sounds like because it's being viewed through the lens of medicine, people don't see the power dynamics at work.
Speaker 1:I'm protecting children.
Speaker 2:Right yeah.
Speaker 1:And I'm batting my eyes intentionally.
Speaker 2:Yes.
Speaker 1:We're really trying to do this for the kids.
Speaker 1:No, you're not You're trying to do it because you want to be in charge, you want to elevate yourself, you want to be telling all the different specialists what they can and cannot do, and if children end up being hurt as a result of that, too bad. Because what you will never find in any of these articles written by these child abuse pediatricians who talk about separating the children from the parents and the mothers, who exaggerate, and so forth on someone, you will never find the discussion of the trauma that they inflict on those children or the families or the parents. It is not there ever.
Speaker 2:At this point in the podcast we took a short break, but when we came back, Beth had found a piece of research she'd mentioned earlier that she wanted to share with me.
Speaker 1:Must be the American Academy of Pediatrics. So it's a medical journal, right? It's called Pediatrics, Volume 151, number two, February 2023. And the article is Medical Child Welfare Task Force a multidisciplinary approach to identifying medical child abuse. So it's written by these child abuse pediatricians at Rady Children's Hospital and they're saying that every hospital needs to have a medical child welfare task force.
Speaker 2:I'm sure that would be a lot of money for them to hire a task force at every hospital.
Speaker 1:And it's supposed to be made up of child abuse pediatricians and every medically complex child. This medical child abuse task force has to be part of the treatment team and there should be treatment teams, and all of the medicine should be reviewed by the task force to decide whether it's appropriate or not. Well, these pediatricians, they have no training in that they have no training in these complex neuromuscular disorders or lupus or whatever this child has. As far as I can tell, the only people they maybe don't go after are children who have cancer, because maybe that I don't know why Might be a bad look for?
Speaker 1:them.
Speaker 2:Might be a bad look for them to go after the cancer children.
Speaker 1:Yeah, but everybody else they'll go after. Somebody with childhood needs who has a feeding tube? Well, they don't really need that feeding tube. Child who has an autoimmune disease and requires periodic treatments with IVIG? Nah, they don't really need that either. So, anything that's complex, some sort of a metabolic disorder? Mitochondrial disease is a metabolic disorder. Yeah, they don't really have that. That's the mother making it up.
Speaker 2:One thing I wanted to ask about was how the harm of separating a child from their parents is handled or acknowledged by both the medical system and the child protective system, because even a short separation can be a serious trauma. So how is that handled?
Speaker 1:It's not acknowledged.
Speaker 2:That's what I thought. Yeah, I wanted to confirm it.
Speaker 1:It's just not acknowledged. I've never seen it acknowledged.
Speaker 2:Is anyone.
Speaker 1:I'm sorry, go ahead.
Speaker 2:No, you go ahead.
Speaker 1:I've seen a situation where child abuse pediatrician really a child who had very significant neuromuscular disorder which no one was really quite sure what it was, and that child did have a breathing tube and a feeding tube and was getting excellent care, and the child abuse pediatrician that child ended up let's see, is it a trip to the emergency room? Oh, I'm not. It's too complicated to explain. But in any event, child abuse pediatrician decides that that child needs to be pulled out of his home. The police are supposed to go there. Take this kid out he's like three years old drive him in the police car to a local hospital where he is then going to be transferred into an ambulance. The parents are not going to be allowed to see him at all. Now picture a three-year-old being hauled out of the house screaming and crying, who has breathing issues.
Speaker 2:That's pretty scary for a three-year-old.
Speaker 1:Put him in the ambulance and then send that ambulance to a hospital in another city, in another state, to be, quote-unquote, delivered to the child abuse pediatrician at that hospital, who is then going to have all the procedures reversed because these two child abuse pediatricians, who have never even met the parents, have decided that it's all made up Now. Luckily we were able to stop that from happening, but what is wrong with people?
Speaker 2:How did you stop that?
Speaker 1:Well, fortunately we had been. We knew that there was discussion of some stuff going on in the background and fortunately the judge who Child Protection Services went to, felt in that circumstance it didn't add up because there were other children and the judge was saying well, if there are other kids, why are you telling me they're doing this to one child but not the other three? So the emergency removal was prevented. But then we went into whether there would be a court proceeding and by the time we got to the court proceeding the state realized they weren't going to win this case, so they just gave up. Same thing that happened in Allentown. But the amount of work required to get it to that point, so that. So they on their own motion just dismissed their own petition, but with a different family and a different. Suppose there had been no other children, suppose it had been a different judge. So many other things could have gone horribly wrong. And fortunately it didn't. That case was actually.
Speaker 1:The mother took the case to the Portland Press Herald and had it on the front page because it was just unbelievable what they tried to do to that family. But in all those hospital records there was no discussion about the effect on this child. There was no provision made. This child was supposed to, if transported by ambulance, was only supposed to travel in a certain kind of ambulance. So there are ambulances that are essentially like life flights. You've heard of life flights, you know you haven't.
Speaker 2:I haven't, actually, I don't know what that is Okay.
Speaker 1:So a life flight is like a really premature child a child's born at maybe 22 weeks. Something goes wrong and the placenta ruptures or is disrupted whatever the term is and so the baby is born, but in a hospital that really doesn't have the ability to care for that child. So the child goes by life flight. So it's a particular kind of a transport helicopter that is equipped with certain things. So there are also ambulances that are the equivalent of life flight. So it's not your typical.
Speaker 1:It's not like if I had a fell down the stairs had to go by ambulance because my leg was broken. There's a special kind of an ambulance, so this child should only be transported by that kind of an ambulance. No arrangement was ever even made for any of that, and when that was brought to the attention of I'm trying to think how we got it in front of somebody's attention the response from the child of pediatrician was well, that's not my job, so caring for the child is not her job. Her job is to just say child's gotta come out After that. She doesn't. She's trying to say that that's it. So apparently they just think that this whole separation thing, the consequences, are just not their responsibility, other than if for some reason, they think they demonstrate that the child suddenly improves as a result of this really horrific care, if you can even call it that. I guess they would claim credit for that, but I don't know.
Speaker 2:Yeah, it sounds like there's not a lot of cases of this particular aspect of the profession improving things. I mean, is that fair to say? Is there some? If we're trying to be fair, is there something that we could grant them, or is it this bad?
Speaker 1:No, it's that bad, In fact. So I'm an attorney, I don't have any medical training. So the article that I just mentioned to you, I read it and I think, okay, this is just a bunch of bunk. Basically, A doctor reads it and they're actually able to say well, where are the peer-reviewed studies? Well, where are the cohorts? Well, where are this? Well, where are that? There's nothing in there that would meet what would be required for a doctor to write an article about a breakthrough treatment for Alzheimer's or something. You know what I mean. There'd be patients and cohorts and studies and demonstrations that the trial medication was successful, because there would have been one group that you gave placebos to and another group who had the actual medicine and the results would be measured. None of that applies to anything that these child abuse pediatricians write. They just write it.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I guess I'm both so curious what the training for becoming a child abuse pediatrician is, because the claim that any specialist makes is that they have some specialized knowledge that the general public does not. So I can't sequence a genome myself. That's not something I personally know how to do, but what is it that they're claiming that they personally know how to do that the general public cannot understand.
Speaker 1:I do not know they do. There are programs. So one is at Cincinnati Children's. They have a child abuse two year training program. I don't know what their. I know they have training and how to testify in court. I know that's part of the training. What exactly you would have to really get someone. That would be a good thing to explore and try to figure out sort of well, what is that training? Are they what is the training? Because they seem to feel that they can just make all kinds of pronouncements. So, for example, shaken baby syndrome.
Speaker 1:Shaken baby syndrome has been very effectively challenged. So child abuse pediatricians would say this child has shaken baby syndrome. But when cases tried to identify the medical testing that would prove that a baby has been shaken, it requires certain things. I'm gonna explain this as best as I know, because I'm not an expert on baby syndrome. But it's very hard to shake a baby and hurt them. It's hard to do that because as fragile as babies are, within that fragility they're pretty sturdy. So in order to shake a baby hard enough to really kill them, apparently you would have to show some bleeding behind the eyes. And so cases where child abuse pediatricians people were going to jail for shaken baby syndrome, but it turned out that the scientific evidence that would demonstrate that a baby was actually shaken just wasn't there. So those cases started getting overturned and you can find them. So, for example, there was a pretty well-known case in Boston about a nanny who was accused of shaking a baby to death and then defense counsel was able to demonstrate that that was not accurate. And, of course, when it was covered in some program, they made a big deal about the fact that the experts were paid. So experts are always paid to testify. Doesn't mean that there was something wrong with these doctors who said, no, the scientific evidence doesn't back up the claim. I mean that experts are paid. Whatever that's what you do with experts for trials, they get paid. So, anyway, what did they do? So they changed the name child abuse pediatrician. So instead of shaking baby syndrome, now they call it abusive head trauma. Why do they call it abusive head trauma? Because if the word abusive is in there, then it eliminates. The judges need to find any abuse. They've already told you it's abuse. So they're doing the same thing with this medical child abuse where it used to be.
Speaker 1:The parents would be accused of Munchausen by proxy. Munchausen by proxy is incredibly rare. What does it mean? It means? Well, munchausen syndrome means that I am I'm plain English here I really need a lot of attention. So what I do is I pretend something's wrong with me and I go from doctor to doctor, and maybe I've even researched particular diseases, and so I'm able to go to doctors and pretend that I have symptoms that I don't have, because really what I need is I just need a whole bunch of attention from doctors. And so you could imagine now, how many people do you think really have Munchausen? Not a lot, right? Most people don't have a lot of time to pretend that they're sick so that they can go from doctor to doctor to doctor. So they need attention, so anyway.
Speaker 1:So then they accused the child of these pediatricians were accusing mothers 95% of the time it's mothers, they wrote it themselves of Munchausen by proxy, meaning they're pretending the children are sick. So it's Munchausen by proxy. The proxy is the child. So they're pretending the child is sick, and then they're accusing the mother of Munchausen by proxy. Well, attorneys started saying hold on a minute. You, the child of these pediatrician, you don't have credentials to be diagnosing a mother with Munchausen by proxy. That is an adult diagnosis, it's a mental health diagnosis of an adult. A pediatrician does not have the qualifications to diagnose an adult with anything, and certainly not a mental health disorder, when, chances are, they've never even met the parent. I mean you gotta have a doctor-client relationship to have any kind of a diagnosis.
Speaker 1:So then the child of these pediatricians say we'll call it something else. So they went through several name variations and then they stuck on medical child abuse. So now what they're saying is well, the judges really don't have to decide anything because we've decided this child is medically abused. Well, someone like me says well, hold on a second. You're really saying the parent abused the child. So once again you are diagnosing the parent with a mental health disease. There is no diagnosis of medical child abuse. There is no billing code for it, it's just a different name. So the example I like to give is if your kid's name is Charlie and you call him buddy because a lot of people call their kids buddy there's not like a new kid, it's the same kid, you're just calling it by a different name.
Speaker 2:It also strikes me as a legal claim, hiding as a medical claim. In other words, abuse is a legal claim.
Speaker 1:It is so. Their functioning is judge, jury and executioner, these doctors, because they are giving a quote unquote diagnosis that doesn't exist. I'm putting a legal term on there which is abuse.
Speaker 2:Again, I'm curious if there's a defamation case you could make there. Like this person said, I abused my child. I didn't you know.
Speaker 1:Well, defamation generally, you have to have a public, it has to be public.
Speaker 2:If I crime somebody a name.
Speaker 1:that's not really defamation, it's gotta be public. In addition to which, in a court situation in a child protection matter, there are all kinds of protections quasi-immunity, immunity that extend to the people involved. However, there is a limitation in that it has to happen in good faith. So if you can successfully make the argument that there was no good faith behind any of this, then you may have a shot.
Speaker 1:Interesting but good faith is usually a rebuttable presumption. So the presumption is that everybody's acting in good faith and you have to overcome it. So the cards are stacked against you.
Speaker 2:You know, the question always to ask anyone who's asking for power is what checks and balances are gonna be on this power to make sure it's not misused.
Speaker 1:Right.
Speaker 2:And it sounds like that question has not been asked of this profession in any way Correct.
Speaker 1:I think that's an excellent point that I hadn't really articulated. But I think you're exactly right. There just are no checks and balances, and it was really out of frustration that I wrote the book that I wrote because there were no checks and balances. So I figured well, what can I do? I can at least tell parents what they should know. So how do you put those in place? I don't know the answer to that. You need to have physicians really well qualified physicians put their foot down and say no, a child abuse pediatrician is not going to tell me whether I can operate, whether I can administer IVIG, whether this child can or cannot have supplements for metabolic disorders. And until they recognize the seriousness of the problem and how much of a power grab this is, we're reading articles by child abuse pediatricians saying they need to be the check and balance. Right, that's what that article is all about.
Speaker 1:All these other doctors need to be checked and we're supposed to do it. It should be the opposite they need a check.
Speaker 2:Let me ask sort of a strange hypothetical question. Let's say I'm a parent who has some means, so educated, has access to money, has access to resources, maybe even has access to media, and someone comes at me through this system and I want some justice. What could I do to pursue that if I'm willing to dedicate some real resources behind pursuing that justice?
Speaker 1:Well, I think the first thing if someone came after you is I believe in public exposure, so I think the more attention you can bring to this, the less likely it is that it's going to happen. I have also recently realized that, to the extent that these systems are really in place or being used to generating comes for hospitals and doctors, a lot of times the people who are footing the bill for that are the taxpayers. And if you can make an effective case to your county controller or your state controller that those funds are actually being used to generate hospital revenues, so the case workers who are paid, foster care counselors, in-home parenting supervisors, the people giving the parenting courses if these are all being paid for by the state or by the county in order to essentially develop income for the hospitals, then that might be a way to go and someone who had enough influence and enough of a position would probably be able to get a sit-down meeting, which another parent might not be able to do.
Speaker 2:Got it. So if this system gets weaponized against someone who has the capacity to get a real meeting with someone in media or in their state legislature, that case is gonna be dealt with very differently.
Speaker 1:Yes. However, I do think there's kind of an uphill battle because it is such a tough, tough, it's a tough thing to swallow that this really is happening right. It's kind of hard to really. I think it's becoming more and more apparent to more and more parents, but most parents would hear this and they would think, no, that can't be right that this is happening. But it is happening.
Speaker 2:It sounds like the same psychology that people have when they're in emergency situation, where if someone's you know again, god forbid, and I hope everyone is free from this If someone's in a situation where there's an active shooter or something like that, you can see in video of those situations there's a moment where people hear the gunfire and they go OK, is this what I think it is? I was having a normal day two seconds ago and now it might be different and there's that little pause before everyone realizes what's happening and they start running and it sounds like a lot of parents have a similar situation where, if someone from the system shows up and starts trying to harm them or their child, there's that moment of I'm a good parent.
Speaker 1:What's going on, Right? Well, I can tell you that one of the cases I recently had when it started happening to the parents. In that case they thought, oh, they must have the wrong family.
Speaker 2:Hmm.
Speaker 1:They get that first call from Child Protection Services, identify. This is a case worker and the mom is thinking, well, they must have the wrong family right, because that's what your instinct would be that it's this. This doesn't happen to us. Yeah but it does.
Speaker 2:So, if someone finds themselves in that situation, what are the what are the first steps they should take?
Speaker 1:Find a good lawyer.
Speaker 2:Sure.
Speaker 1:I think I honestly think so. This, this medical child abuse, really was my motivation to to write the book, because those are the cases I do right. But once I started writing it, I realized, well, the whole book couldn't just be about medical child abuse. It's got to really cover the system.
Speaker 1:However, if you were a parent of a medically complex kid, I would read it because, because you are at risk, you are a target, somebody who really is just going about their life and they're taking their kids to the park and they're going fishing. You know you don't really have any idea that this could come at you, but certainly if you have a medically complex kid, this could come at you. If you're in San Diego and you're going to Rady Children's Hospital, they are creating this medical child abuse task force. They're looking for you. So I feel like those parents everywhere need to really be proactive and prepared and understand to use plain English in an emergency room so that they at least reduce the risk that they're going to be targeted. And then, if they find themselves in a situation, I think that they need to reach out and find a good lawyer quickly, not wait, not think. Well, I can handle this.
Speaker 2:It sounds like the same advice people get in any emergency situation is like first realize it's happening.
Speaker 1:Yes, yeah, don't be in denial.
Speaker 2:Right.
Speaker 1:Because maybe it isn't happening, but if it is, it's going to get really bad pretty quickly.
Speaker 2:Are there any? We've talked a lot about the medical system excuse me, the medical system. Are there any situations beyond that that a good parent, a parent who's not doing anything wrong, might commonly find themselves interacting with the system? I know the medical system is a big topic for both of us, but I'm just curious beyond that if there's anything people should be aware of.
Speaker 1:I don't think so. I really think that if you, if you're a typical parent and typical things go happen or upstounds and there's no crazies going on in life, I think most likely it's going to be an accident.
Speaker 2:Got it.
Speaker 1:That's. That's going to prompt this.
Speaker 2:It sounds like in other situations to you know someone might investigate a report, but as long as you know that you're being investigated and you should treat it accordingly, that most people will be OK.
Speaker 1:I would think I would hope so. I just I don't know. I mean, you could rub a caseworker the wrong way and that would maybe set them off on a path or an agenda.
Speaker 2:I see.
Speaker 1:OK, caseworkers are very careful if you have a lawyer with you.
Speaker 1:They're just careful because they recognize that you can't make someone do something just because you want to.
Speaker 1:So caseworker typically might come show up at the front door, say, I want to come in and see the kids and hand the parent 25 releases, and the parents just signing away because they figure, well, we don't have anything to hide. So sure, talk to whoever you want, but in the meantime you just don't know what all those people are going to say. So one of the things that that I always recommend that parents do and of course I do it for parents because it's hard to do it yourself is confine the the investigation to what is the problem. So if the problem is that he fell off the swing and nobody saw it other than you, then we really don't have to start answering questions that have nothing to do with that particular incident. So you have to redirect the discussion a little bit. So how does this have to do with when someone then says well, what is your relationship like with your extended family members? Ok, well, what does that have to do with the fall off the swing?
Speaker 2:So let's say there's a knock at the door, there's a caseworker there. How should someone respond?
Speaker 1:Politely. First of all, show me the identification, ask them what it's about. If she, if he or she says, you know I'd like to step inside, maybe say, well, it's, let me, let me step out and let me get the kids settled and I'll be with you in a minute. So maybe you put the TV on or whatever and you step outside. They don't have the right to just come into your house. Number one Got it.
Speaker 2:So is it a good idea in that situation and if they say, oh, I want to have a look around to say I'm not going to do that today?
Speaker 1:That's fine, you can say that. Yeah say that they're not social workers with child protection agency, are not police officers with warrants.
Speaker 2:Got it.
Speaker 1:Police officer with a warrant, you're going to have to let them into the house. Caseworker with a police officer, you're probably going to want to want to let them in, because if they're showing up with a police officer there's some sincere concern about serious abuse.
Speaker 1:I would say However if it's just a basic question. We just want to check and see how someone says doing, because we had a report that he fell on a office swing at the park and you said, ok, let me get him, bring him to the front door. Here he is, here's Tommy.
Speaker 2:Got it.
Speaker 1:Caseworker says how are you doing, Tommy? I don't know how old Tommy is, but Tommy says I'm good, you know? Yeah, that's what. I would limit the interaction.
Speaker 2:In that situation, do you think it's better to show them the child is is fine, or is it better to just say you know? This seems like a situation I should have a lawyer present for and not answer anything or show anything?
Speaker 1:Well, most states do say that when there is a concern for child abuse, that they can see the child. So if you will not show them your child, then they could, for example, turn up at school if the child goes to school or whatever. But ultimately they are entitled to see the child. So I'd probably just let them see the child.
Speaker 2:I see.
Speaker 1:Now, if there's something wrong with the child, then obviously they're going to be additional problems, right, but if there's really just no reason to be concerned, then you bring them. You bring them to the door.
Speaker 2:It's if additional questions start coming. Oh, ok, I see the child's fine, but you know.
Speaker 1:I just like to come in and talk to you for a few minutes and then you can say well, I'm not really comfortable with that. Well, I have some questions. I need to ask you. Well, would you like to set a time when? Why don't we set a time for you to come back? Or maybe you're going to go meet them and then you never meet with them alone. If you can't have a lawyer with you, you have to have someone with you to listen to the entire conversation, and that person should be someone who has no history with job protection services and who is could be a relative, but maybe not you know the most. If you got a pastor and your pastoral comes in with you, that would be great. Right Is someone who maybe has some. I'm trying to come up with different ideas of people who would be that situation, it would be fair to say.
Speaker 2:you know I'd love to answer these questions. Let's schedule a time that would be good for both of us, that that my lawyer can attend as well.
Speaker 1:That'd be fun.
Speaker 1:Yeah, ok, or you could also say if you happen to have a lawyer, let's say you went to the hospital and things just really didn't go well and you just had a feeling. So you talk to some friends and you get the name of an attorney and you call that attorney and you have a little conversation. You say I think everything's OK, but I just just want to. Can I just retain you in some way, have you on board so that if there's a problem and then maybe what happens is you tell the person you really should call my lawyer about that. Here's my lawyer's name and number.
Speaker 1:That would really be good Then the case has to go through the attorney in order to set up an appointment. The case worker has seen the child. So that obligation you have complied with, what is usually a state obligation to show the child to the case worker. So you've done that and now that case worker is on notice that you actually have a lawyer and the appointments have to be scheduled through that attorney. And then what happens?
Speaker 1:If I'm the attorney, then I say, when I get the call, or I call them or whatever is, what is the point of this? What is the point here? What is it that you're trying to explore? And then they might say, well, there was the fall off the swing with the circumstances. And then you say, well, maybe the lawyer says, well, the child was at the hospital for three hours. There were never any problems that were. And then the case worker says, well, we just want to make sure, whatever chances are they're going to back off because you have a lawyer. Yeah, so, but I know everybody can't have a lawyer, I recognize that.
Speaker 1:So in that case then you want to set up a time that's convenient for you, when you know someone can be with you who is going to be a credible third party witness to what happens, because, sadly, case workers do lie and so you need to have someone there who really is is present. Ideally, you'd like to record the whole thing. Some states allow you to record even without notice to the other party, some don't, so you have to be careful about that. Chances are, if you're in a state where you have to get permission and you say to that case worker okay, but I just want to let you know I'm going to be recording this, then they're going to say, well, you can't record it. So you know, get a kind of figure it out.
Speaker 2:Is there anything that we didn't talk about, that that you wish we had, or that you want to make sure that we include that we haven't gotten to so far?
Speaker 1:Well, I would say that when you are at a meeting with child protection services, if it happens, no matter how unfair it is, you cannot become angry, you cannot finger point, because all of that will be written down somewhere. So you really have to be on your best behavior and never call anyone names or all the things that you really want to do because you're being unfairly accused. This is just not the time to do it. You can always, on the way home in your car, call your best friend and go on and on about it, unless your best friend was at the meeting or whatever. But you have to really maintain that composure because if you don't, it will be.
Speaker 1:It will reflect poorly on you and then if you should end up in a court proceeding same thing where you really want to be the person who, when you walk into the courtroom, the judge wonders what is going on. I mean you're well-dressed. That doesn't mean that you're wearing expensive designer clothing. It just means you're. You know you're wearing a collar shirt or whatever, but you're not in ripped up jeans and a dirty t-shirt, so you're respectful.
Speaker 2:Sure.
Speaker 1:So I would say those are important things throughout any case.
Speaker 2:Anything else we should add before finishing?
Speaker 1:I don't think so.
Speaker 2:Is there a? We've mentioned your book, which I've read. I would recommend it to others who are interested in the same subject.
Speaker 1:Thank you.
Speaker 2:Are there any other websites, social media things I should make sure to include in the links for this show.
Speaker 1:Well, you can put my website and my TikToks. You know my TikTok link is at child protection lawyer. Have you seen that?
Speaker 2:I have not. I think my wife saw it which is how I found out about you. She recommended it to me.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I've actually had quite a few people find me through that and and some of those contacts have really turned out to be quite interesting. I mean people who were really interested in uncovering what has been going on and and I had one one mom was so funny who wrote my husband thinks I know so much about this area of law. He just can't believe it. I don't tell him. I learned from TikTok. So I try to actually try to give people you know information about a system that they really don't know anything about in very short segments, because that's what TikTok is like, you know, but um and so I guess that's it. The book is called protecting your child from the child protection system, and parents really seem to like it and I'm really hoping that it saves people money because then they don't necessarily get themselves in as much trouble as they would, or they at least know there's trouble coming and they're able to handle it a little bit better.
Speaker 2:Well, Beth, thank you for the work that you're doing. Thank you for sharing it with with me today. Well, thank you for having me.
Speaker 1:This is really good, and you made me really think about some things I hadn't thought about before, so that's good.
Speaker 2:Well, I'm glad to hear. If there's a way that I can be of service in the future, let me know.
Speaker 1:Thanks again. Okay, we'll do. Thank you.
Speaker 2:Thank you for listening to the Brendan Marata show. If you liked this episode, please leave a positive review on whatever platform you listen to podcasts on. If you really liked this episode, please support the show and become a paying subscriber, giving you access to special bonus material only available to supporters of the show. I want to thank you for listening to this show and I will talk to you all later.