Transcripts

ELIZABETH STAWICKI: Former juvenile judge Isabel Gomez believes the way the county handles child protection should be leveled and rebuilt. She says the system has hurt as many children as it has helped.

ISABEL GOMEZ: I mean, it would be one thing if historically the system had been removing people from their blighted homes, terminating parental rights, and then placing them with Blondie and Dagwood, where they lived happily ever after. I mean, if we actually did that, well, fine. We've never done that. [LAUGHS] We don't achieve that.

ELIZABETH STAWICKI: Gomez says no one should believe the permanency law will completely remedy situations such as Janet's. The problems are far too complex. Gomez says the courts fail because they try to provide neat and tidy solutions to life's most difficult problems.

ISABEL GOMEZ: Well, I think it is a terrible thing to take a child out of its home in the way that we do that, to essentially arrest the child, take the child away, and banish the parent, which is what happened in case after case that I saw. The kids that I think I saw doing best were kids who maintained a relationship with their mother, through her ups and downs.

ELIZABETH STAWICKI: It's possible the root cause of Janet's problems exists in the years before she ever tried drugs or had her first child. Janet says her father began having sexual intercourse with her when she was 12 and continued for three years, until her brother blurted out the secret during a family argument. Janet was sent to live with her aunt and uncle for the summer but had to return home in the fall for school.

Janet says she told her pastor about the incest when she was 15. The pastor made her father apologize. And then he told the family to move on with their lives.

JANET: My dad recently made a remark to me about things that I wear still turn him on. I was sitting in a church service. And it hit me, as the pastor was talking about the marriage vows and how sacred they are, and when you're married, you're with that person and only that person. And all of a sudden, that remark he made hit me, and I just started bawling.

ELIZABETH STAWICKI: Janet says she blames no one for her current situation. But during the times the county removed her children, she was angry. She says then, she felt the county forced her to choose between her children and the men in her life.

JANET: And how could I choose what was really right when I didn't know how to choose? My mom chose my dad over me after my dad sexually abused me. I got sent away. So it makes sense to me now why I chose my man over my kids. That was what I was shown was the thing to do.

ELIZABETH STAWICKI: Janet faces severe challenges. She must fight her addictions to drugs and abusive men. She can live in a shelter for another year but will eventually have to find affordable housing on a welfare budget. And she must think about whether to confront her parents with a family history of incest, all in hopes of raising two small children alone.

But Janet is optimistic. In the next year, she wants to move past her high school degree with additional education that she hopes will help her find work with disabled children. She says she's compassionate and loves kids. She says above all, she has a new perspective.

JANET: I'm not stuck in my old-- with old tapes going. I mean, there's times when the little man says, well, you don't deserve it. You don't deserve it. Or I can hear my mom say, oh, I told you so. You'll never amount to anything.

But I'm at a point now where I can-- most of the time, I can push that stuff away. And if I can't do it right away, I talk about it. Even though I'm only a month and a half sober again, or I'm just over a month sober again, I know that I can get through whatever is put in front of me, and that God only gives me what I can handle.

[BACKGROUND CONVERSATION]

ELIZABETH STAWICKI: At the Hennepin County Juvenile Court House, parents, lawyers, and others wait for their moment in court. Inside, Judge Jon Stanek approves of Janet's progress in her treatment and in following the court's orders. However, he decides her children will remain in foster care until she returns to court in three months for another progress report.

At the same time, the court sets in motion plans to terminate her parental rights. It's a warning to Janet. If she fails to follow any part of the court's plan, there will be no delay severing all contact between her and the last two children of the seven she has born. I'm Elizabeth Stawicki, Minnesota Public Radio.