No one told their parents
More than 70 foster children passed through the home of a now convicted child molester. No one bothered to tell their birth parents. Because, why? Right?
To state that the foster system is punitive is an understatement.
“The foster care system is a punative system. Punishment is just more hurt.” – Lanny Wilson, Dasani’s Children’s Law Center Case Manager, in HBO’s documentary “Foster.”
In all cases, this punitive system penalizes both parent and child, over and over.
For most of the public, when they think about the foster system, they think about little babies being neglected or abused and the saviors who become foster parents for those babies. While that does happen quite often, the majority of cases involve older children.
Older children, past the toddler stage, often suffer immeasurable harm in the foster system.
USA Today recently published a story of abuse from 2019. It’s part of a series of investigating foster abuse in Florida.
I want to highlight this passage:
[Rick] Hazel eventually confessed to the crimes, blaming it on the victim, according to arrest records. In November, he pleaded no contest as part of an agreement to serve 25 years in state prison.
“I’m sorry for what happened, but it wasn’t all me, honey,” Hazel said during a recorded phone call to his wife from jail. “It happened at nights when you left … and she came to my room and pushed herself all over me. It just went on from there, and I lost control.”
Records from his foster file show Rick Hazel has a history of arrests and he and his wife faced at least two previous allegations of abusing children. Details of those allegations were not released.
And if you are willing, you can view some of the cases of abuse – just for Florida – and only since 2014, at this link. (https://www.usatoday.com/storytelling/florida-foster-care-abuse-tracker/)
Our work at the NRSBG is designed to keep children out of the foster system through the use of state law where applicable which provides for standby guardianships. Our work is designed to reduce the number of children entering the foster system so that any remaining children can be properly cared for. We cannot call it foster care until that happens.
