Former Foster Parent Speaks Out on Corruption: Falsified Information & Failure To Protect Children from Abuse

Statistics show that children are more likely to be abused in foster care than in troubled homes. Article.

Foster Care System Falsifies Information & Fails To Protect Children

by Nehemiah Flynt
Health Impact News

The foster care system is much more complex than what many people realize. If operated in accordance with its design, “the system” would be for children who had no other options available to them. Potential foster families would be heavily screened, then approved for only certain age groups or for certain types of children, and foster care placements would be supervised both by individual foster care agencies and by the state’s Department of Health and Human Resources office.

If “the system” actually operated the way the government wants its citizens to believe it operates, I would not have a problem with foster care at all.

However, it doesn’t really work that way.

My Experience in a Corrupt Foster Care System – Trafficking Children

When children are taken from their biological families, often based upon false pretenses, most of the time other relatives are not consulted about caring for those children. The government’s ultimate objective, regardless of what they report, is to have as many children in foster care and in state-run group homes as possible.

Foster Parent Qualifications Never Checked

I was originally certified/approved to provide respite foster care. That meant, I was only approved to take children in for weekends and holidays as I was a new foster parent.

However, within a couple of months of providing respite care, the foster care agency I worked for could not find a home for a twelve year old. They contacted me to see if I would take him in and I agreed to do so.

One week after the child moved into my home, I received a new notice of certification stating my home was certified to board children between the ages of eight and thirteen. No one came out to my home or did any further investigations to see if I had met any new qualifications that would enable me to move from being a respite provider to a full time foster parent.

Thirty days later, the same agency was looking for a placement for a fifteen year old. I agreed to take him.

A few days after he moved in, I received another notice in the mail. Now my foster home was approved to board children between the ages of eight and eighteen. Again, I had not completed any additional training criteria or done anything that would have constituted this change.

My certification changed based upon the state’s need for homes – it had nothing to do with my qualifications.

A few months passed and I was asked if I would be willing to provide respite for a four year old. I agreed and lo and behold, I received a letter stating I was certified to board children between the ages of four and eighteen.

It never ceased to amaze me how certifications could be amended based upon the whim of the supervising agency.

Home Inspection Report Falsified

A few years after I began fostering, I received a phone call at work from a case manager who insisted on coming to my home later that afternoon for a re-certification. That meant, she was supposed to go through my entire home and make sure everything was up to par.

For the past two weeks, I had not had any foster children in my home. I was sick, but had gone to work anyway. I told the case manager I had been sick and my house was a mess. I asked her if she could wait a few days before coming out to check my home since there were no kids there anyway.

She said, “Nehemiah, I’m sorry. Your home was up for recertification three months ago. It’s our fault, not yours, but we are getting ready to have our files audited. We have to check your home today. It can’t wait.”

I tried to wiggle my way out of the inspection and the case manager said, “Look. I have to do this. I’ll make it as painless as possible. What if I just come to your house, have you sign a document, and then leave? I won’t even look through your house. I’ll just write down that I did, backdate the inspection report, and I’ll be on my way. I promise. It’ll be as simple as that.”

I agreed to allow her to come as long as she promised to not enter my residence. I was amazed when she kept her word.

She showed up with an inspection report, which had been pre-completed, stating that she had checked everything in my home and it was all up to par. It was dated three months prior than the date she came to the visit and she just asked for my signature. Shame on me, but I signed it.

The State is not Interested in Protecting Children in Foster Care

Again, the state was not protecting the children in its care. The agency I fostered through was more interested in receiving money for their services than they were interested in taking care of the children in the state’s custody.

I would guarantee you that if a social worker was supposed to do a follow-up on a biological family who had recently regained custody of their children, they would not have been this flexible. They would have been looking as hard as they could to find a reason to take those children back away from their parents.

Because I was a foster parent, however, it was an entirely different story.

Foster Parents Have Free Reign on Treatment of Children Biological Parents do not Have

Once, an eight year old boy in my care was sent to a psychiatric hospital. He had a lot of emotional and behavioral problems – more than likely problems he had developed as a result of the trauma of being separated from his biological parents by the hands of the state.

A week or so after the boy was placed in the hospital, I was told he was doing better and that I was to go pick him up. When we got in the car, he seemed fine – at first. However, once we were on the interstate, he unbuckled his seat belt and started hollering, “I want my mommy.”

I told the boy to sit down and he punched me in the back of the head. Repeatedly, I tried to get him to sit down, but he refused. Eventually, I ended up pulling the car off of the side of the road and smacking his behind with my bare hand. I knew according to the state’s guidelines, I was not allowed to use corporal punishment at all. However, I will say that as soon as I smacked his behind, the boy sat back down in his seat and put his seat belt on.

I did not hide the spanking from the foster care agency. I told the boy’s social worker what had taken place and she said, “Nehemiah, I’m not going to record this as a spanking. It sounds to me like you were simply defending yourself. I’m just going to write up an incident report that says when you were bringing him home from the hospital that he got out of control and you had to physically force him back into his seat.”

I do not believe an appropriate spanking of a child is abusive in any way, shape or form. However, had a biological parent done the same thing, more than likely a social worker would have filed the same incident report as “Biological father hit emotionally-disturbed child inappropriately within one hour of removing him from a psychological hospital” and used that incident as an excuse to terminate the parents’ rights.

I was a foster parent, however, so I was protected.

Even Bad References do not Prevent One from Becoming a Foster Parent

Years later, an attorney that I knew told me that she and her husband were interested in becoming foster parents. She wanted me, as another foster parent, to write a character reference for her and to submit it to the state.

I told her I would do it, but throughout the rest of the day I kept thinking that if I wrote a letter for her, I would have to be honest. I would not hold back the things that I knew.

I wrote a letter to the state that told them that the attorney seemed like a very nice lady. However, she and her husband were having marital problems and both were continuously accusing the other of cheating. Both worked long hours and it would appear that any child(ren) they took in would spend the majority of their time in day care centers. Both of them frequently drank alcohol and I knew their refrigerator was full of beer.

I had witnessed the attorney’s husband cursing up a storm when talking to young children. He seemed like an odd man. I would never have felt comfortable leaving my child under his supervision.

I explained every bit of that in my letter and just knew I had stopped her from becoming a foster parent. A few short weeks later, however, they took in their first foster child.

I couldn’t believe it. Even having that kind of a reference letter, these people were approved to take in other people’s children.

Foster Home Never Inspected

I later adopted a child from the foster care system. He had lived in my home as a foster child for nearly two years prior to the adoption. A few months before the adoption hearing, his legal guardian with the Department of Health and Human Resources asked for directions to my home so she could do a home visit.

She had been his legal guardian for two years and had never stepped a single foot in my home to see how he was being cared for.

Children in Foster Homes are Abused and Neglected

Every day children in foster homes are abused and neglected. Many of those children are over-medicated and some even have seizures or fall into bouts of depression as a result of the unnecessary pills they are prescribed.

How does this happen?

CPS is Kidnapping Too Many Children

It happens because there are so many children stolen by Child Protective Services, that there aren’t enough employees to handle supervising the children’s placements.

Just from the few stories I have shared with you about my experience as a foster parent, surely you can see how easily I could have abused or neglected children in my care and no one would have known anything about it.

Thankfully, I was not an abusive foster parent. However, what if I would have been?

Foster Care Corruption is Systemic

The social workers didn’t really inspect my home, legal guardians from the state rarely if ever stepped inside of my residence, inspection and incident reports were falsified, etc.

These are not isolated incidences. They happen all of the time.

Reform of this wicked system is not optional. It must happen in order to protect the children in the state’s custody.

Comment on this article at MedicalKidnap.com

Nehemiah Flynt is the author of Legal Discrimination (www.legaldiscrimination.com).

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