A day in court costs a minimum of five hundred dollars and mostly more like a thousand dollars or more. CPS counts on that. CPS counts on most parents of the kids they steal not having any money at all, having to rely on a public defender who even if really interested in the case is so overloaded and overworked that they can’t possibly give it the attention it needs. CPS counts on not being challenged from either side, by the parents or by the court.
It was eight weeks later that we finally made it into court and by this time the damage had been done to my children. I would not know what damage until later because CPS restricted the few visits that we had. Someone was there all the time and they monitored what was said. I wasn’t allowed to ask about the foster homes and what went on there. Our touching, hugging and any sort of parental intimacy was not allowed. I was told to bring them the snacks they liked, which of course I did. But it was clear that my kids were not hungry, were not happy, were dispirited and becoming more and more despondent. I could feel that I was losing them, and this was precisely what CPS wanted.
When my little daughter cried, even though they had someone there watching us, I was not allowed to hold her to comfort her. They stepped in between at every turn, and I know now that this was all by design. It is what they do when they want kids and think they can get them.
My boy was simply bewildered. He sat quietly next to me on one side. My daughter sat on the other side, on the floor. They gave her toys to play with and told me I should have brought their favorite toys. When I told them they didn’t tell me that, that I brought snacks because they said I should, they told me I should know better and any good mother would know to bring things to please their children.
My boy was withdrawing completely. I would later find out that he was in a group home where the unimaginable was occurring on a daily basis. Yes, the unimaginable. More on that later.
So I only had a couple of visits. I was supposed to have them every week, but they didn’t get them started for three more weeks, this despite what the judge had ordered. One week the kids were unavailable, whatever that meant. They notified me about twenty minutes before I was leaving. As it was I had taken the day off work to do the visit. They knew that too. They knew I didn’t have much money, that I made just too much to qualify for a public defender.
They knew the game: keep switching everything up, beating my head up by telling me I was horrible mother, keep costing me days off so maybe I’d lose my job. They pushed every button they could push hoping to make me freak out, act out or crack.
And they were doing a good job of it too.
Every time I called my lawyer to ask a question, I was billed partial hours’ time, so a phone call of 15 minutes would cost me 75 dollars. Imagine that!
No surprise then that by the third time we were in court, now fourteen weeks later, yes, my children had been in CPS custody more that 3 months and I’d only seen them a couple of times, my retainer was almost all used up and my lawyer was asking for more money. They did a quick postponement at 6 weeks—my lawyer and I showed up only to find out that the CPS people had been called on emergency. So in effect that third time in court was the fourth day I was paying for.
I’m sure their emergency was for stealing more kids. But maybe it was just to cost me money.
