San Jose Mercury - Broken Families, Broken Courts

Last week the San Jose Mercury News highlighted how the court system is failing the parents and children who fall into the system. If you've been reading this blog for any length of time, you'll know that it was not new news to me. It is getting to a point that I am starting to get jealous of myself.

That series was then followed by a story of the legal dependency service run by Gary Proctor resigning, deciding to not apply to renew his contract with the county. Per the SJ Merc, he had established an operating policy to basically 'cooperate' with Social Services and the District Attorney Office (who represent the children) instead of zealously defending the rights of parents. This resulted in numerous injustices over the years - children being wrongfully taken from parents and destroying families instead of doing everything possible to keep them together.

I remember a meeting I went to that included all the court partners in a, "what the heck are you doing?" meeting. Everyone there was cooperative and sincerely wanted to fix the problems but the person representing the legal dependency service was the only one who felt insulted that I would be so presumptuous as to tell them how to do their job. Of course, I was equally insulted that I felt I needed to tell them how to do their job that he/they were being so handsomely recompensed for. He, to his credit, and with a lump in his throat, admitted that there have been grave injustices.

As mentioned a few weeks ago right here in Adventures in Human Rights, in a conversation I had with someone from Social Services, I was told that the contract with Proctor is being reviewed and HOW representation of the parents is being done was also being reviewed, so the problem was known about and something was being done about it, even if it was just thinking about it.

While the investigative story by the San Jose Mercury News was excellent, it really just covered the surface manifestations of the problem. The old, 'follow the money' adage was not completely tracked down, and until that is done, the real solutions will not be allowed to be implemented. How's that for a teaser?!

Preview: My next posting will cover how in Santa Cruz, a 25-year veteran Psychologist with a wall full of Degrees was stripped of all civil rights in defending her husband due to false reports by a Psychiatrist, and its' devastating results. She reports to me, "Psychiatry has sold its soul to the Big Pharma."

Electric Chair Executions Banned - Tasers Still Okay

From the New York Times, "The electric chair is cruel and unusual punishment, the Nebraska Supreme Court ruled Friday. The decision effectively suspended executions there, as Nebraska is the only state that still relies solely on electrocution, which was once the dominant form of execution in the United States. 'The evidence here shows that electrocution inflicts intense pain and agonizing suffering,' Justice William M. Connolly wrote for the majority in a 6-to-1 decision."
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/02/09/us/09penalty.html

I wonder who was the one judge who voted against it and why? So maybe we are slowly moving out of the stone age in how we treat each other? Or just invent new "painless" ways to do each other in? And also, from what I've read, getting Tased by those portable electro-shock machines carried by police inflicts intense pain and agonizing suffering.

Press "Enter" Key At Your Own Risk

Apparently, the San Jose Mercury News will begin their investigative story on the role of the courts and foster care this Sunday. This has been in the works for months so we shall see what direction the article reads the system. About a month ago, talking to someone in Santa Clara's Social Services, they were aware of the article coming out and they were glad that more awareness is being raised on the 'court partners' to Child Protective Services, instead of just pinning all the bad news on CPS. They know CPS is not perfect, don't get them wrong, but with the Judicial system, District Attorneys and Legal Dependency Services (county -contracted representation) it makes for quite an adversarial relationship - usually with the family and child losing out (in my opinion).

Looks like my blog made it in to Santa Clara's Family Court Services records. About a week ago, a father posted his dispute with Family Court on Craiglist which I then put on this site. His posting got flagged and deleted by someone but mine still lives on. I did eventually take out the name of the wife in respect to the privacy of the child involved in the allegations. However, there appears to be some wheels churning on this case - whether good or bad, don't know yet. Rumor has it, a court petition was submitted mentioning how the case is now on the internet, specifically naming this blog, "Adventures in Human Rights."

On the article I blogged re Eli Lilly Drug Cartel possibly settling their federal lawsuit for $1 bazillion dollars, interestingly enough, apparently, the way this got leaked to the press was through an e-mail that was sent to a wrong address and that wrong address just happened to be a newspaper. When you use Outlook, it has an 'automatic complete' address function which means you can type in just a few letters of an address and it will fill in the rest for you. Lesson to be learned here somewhere. Here is the link to the story:
http://www.propeller.com/viewstory/2008/02/05/autocomplete-the-eli-lilly-snafu-and-you/?url=http%3A%2F%2Ftechnologyexpert.blogspot.com%2F2008%2F02%2Fautocomplete-eli-lilly-snafu-and-you.html&frame=true

Probate & Conservatorship Abuses

I received a comment on one of my postings regarding Britney Spears' conservatorship which I feel needs a bit more due justice. It is concisely well written and adequately communicates how this process can be abused:

"Britney Spears is definitely moving into a new arena -- one in which people seriously play "for keeps."

"An industry exists in which lawyers, accountants and other unethical participants, sometimes with complicity from probate courts, can separate any of us from our property when certain (not that unusual) circumstances occur. These circumstances can be orchestrated and lead to an Involuntary Redistribution of Assets (IRA). This often occurs with wills, trusts, guardianships or other probate-related situations.

"To think that property and assets are your own and that you have control over their ultimate distribution is a mistake. Situations such as are described at www.estateofdenial.com occur more often than most people would ever believe. A close study of this issue leads one to recognize that going to court is not a path that necessarily provides reasonable resolution. This course too easily leads to lawyers or administrators becoming the functional beneficiaries while the intended beneficiaries are left with reduced or no assets as well as potentially significant legal expenses.

"With the transfer of wealth that is getting ready to occur in the next 20 or so years, the Involuntary Redistribution of Assets will likely skyrocket. People think proper estate planning will protect them – wrong! People think they don’t have enough assets to be a target – wrong!! There is no inoculation from the threat of IRA. Forewarned, however, is forearmed."

Sex, Lies But No Videotape

Santa Clara -Last week or so I mentioned that article in the San Jose Metro News re the Santa Clara Juvenile Justice system wherein a young african-american teenager looks to have been railroaded. The article also accused the Judge of POSSIBLY making a racially motivated - well, off-color, joke. But, as the article reads, the District Attorney/Prosecutor in the case has decided to take the fall for making that comment. Nonetheless, stay tuned in the short future as this is going to the Appellate Court, our local District Attorney's Office and then some. This case will have far-reaching effects in changing our treatment of people of color here in Santa Clara if in fact our elected and public officials are serious about making the needed changes. There is going to be a follow up story in the press once this comes to a conclusion. A lot of people are watching this case.

Northern California - I also had mentioned, I think, that a few weeks back, I was contacted by someone requesting help in busting a grandfather of molesting his grand-daughter. Apparently, this type of molestation has been ongoing for years with other members of the family and NO one has been doing anything about it. I alerted the authorities about a month ago but since I hadn't heard back yet I called to find out what was happening. The Detective, who was very nice enough, said that a search of the files would have to be done, so I volunteered to resend it since it would be easier. The Detective gave me an email address instead to make it even easier. So, I was both disappointed and glad at the same time.

Santa Clara County - That reminds me of another case where a 'gentleman' decided to come partly out of the closet and profess his sexual orientation AND his affection for younger boys. He did this over the internet for some reason. I was contacted to help address this matter as his profession involved, you guessed it, young boys and teenagers, in a somewhat physical contact intensive activity. I alerted the authorities who called me several weeks later to inform me that they could not do anything as there was no evidence of illegal activity, which was fine with me as I did not want to destroy someone's reputation and livelihood. Yet, that same day, I found out that guy was 'let go for no reason at all'. So, someone apparently outed him to his place of employment. My guess is that the authorities did, as the detective who called me back sounded a bit too nervous to me. Undoubtedly, this would be a good subject for an ethics and moral debate in these times we live in.

Santa Clara - A couple of days ago, I posted the news about the US Court of Appeals handing down a decision stating that Social Workers do not have complete immunity (This was on a case from Santa Clara County, I believe). I asked a local Judicial Officer what impact it would have in a practical sense. The response I got was that it wouldn't be right for a comment to be made on it since it is still in the court system, but that the case had been being followed by everyone and undoubtedly have quite an impact on the child welfare court system. So, I'll keep following how this ruling plays out.

Los Angeles - God help Britney Spears who was held over in the Psych Hospital for another 14 days as a danger to herself or others and her affairs were handed over to her father as the Conservator of her estate, etc. A side note here, there is a group that is fighting the corruption in the Probate/Conservatorship arena (god, the stories one can tell from this arena) were planning to picket in front of the courthouse that Spears' case is being heard in order to raise awareness of how this part of the system can get corrupted. I guess if you are interested in it, you can always google "probate or conservatorship abuse" and dive into it. I have a couple of cases, one in Gilroy that is just jaw-dropping horrendous. Big money to be made here. If you are a Baby Boomer, you'd better have all your papers in good order and know who to trust.

I'll Take Eli Lilly for 1 Billion Dollars, Alex

An article appearing in the San Jose Mercury reports that the Eli Lilly Drug Cartel may be settling with the Federal Courts for 1 billion dollars.

"The drug also has faced thousands of product liability claims from patients, many alleging the company did not adequately warn patients taking the medication of a heightened diabetes risk. Lilly announced earlier this month that it settled 900 claims, including five scheduled for trial next month.

"The company has settled more than 25,000 product liability claims and has more than 1,200 still pending..."

http://www.mercurynews.com//ci_8121053?IADID=Search-www.mercurynews.com-www.mercurynews.com