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1 Cuban girl in exile, 2 dads....
1 Cuban girl in exile, 2 dads
In the first public hearing on the fate of a 4-year-old girl whose father wants her to return to Cuba, a frustrated judge called for calm. BY CAROL MARBIN MILLER http://www.miamiherald.com/579/story/175091.html The closed-door custody battle over the 4-year-old Cuban girl who ended up in foster care after her mother attempted suicide went on public display Wednesday, baring finger-pointing, raised voices and raw emotion. Crushed into a courtroom in Miami's dingy juvenile courthouse were about a dozen lawyers, four psychologists, social workers, guardians, an interpreter and a judge. They met in public after an appeals court ordered the hearings, which had been held secretly for more than a year, to be opened. At stake is the fate of a 4-year-old girl who confided to a caseworker that she has two fathers, ``one resting on each shoulder.'' The case also is freighted with a half-century's geopolitical conflict. On one side is a Cuban father, hoping to raise his daughter, even in a communist country. On the other is a proud exile community seeking to shield her from the tyranny they fled. ''Everybody is attacking everybody,'' Circuit Judge Jeri B. Cohen, who is presiding over the unusual case, said at the hearing Wednesday. ``I can't control all of you.'' The youngster, whom The Miami Herald is not identifying to protect her privacy, entered the United States legally in March 2005 when her mother won a visa lottery. By the end of that year, however, she had been sheltered by the Department of Children & Families, which had asked Cohen to declare the girl's mother unfit. The girl now lives with a Cuban exile family that is seeking to adopt her. Her birth father, a fisherman and office worker from Guayos, traveled to Miami six weeks ago to press his case. He attended the hearing Wednesday in a crisply pressed crimson dress shirt and slacks, his dark hair cropped short. His lawyer, Ira Kurzban, a prominent immigration attorney, says he thinks the girl's father is being treated unfairly. Kurzban said the custody dispute is ''extraordinarily one-sided'' and hinges largely on the child welfare agency's claims in an updated petition that the girl might be ''endangered'' by any reunification with her father. ''No one has ever accused my client of abusing his child. No one has ever accused my client of being involved with drugs. No one has ever accused my client of in any way harming his child,'' Kurzban said. ``But he's being treated in this process as if all those things were true.'' ''My client has done nothing wrong,'' Kurzban added. ``He has done what any parent would do: try to get his child back.'' Cohen agreed that DCF's petition to declare the father unfit was ''light'' on evidence that he was a poor father. ''You know it, and I know it,'' she added, looking squarely at the state's attorneys. DCF is offering the father a chance to win custody of his daughter by completing a set of tasks, such as the visitations, although an agency attorney, Rebecca Kapotsa, said DCF ultimately would like to see the foster family win permanent custody through a guardianship. Said Alan Mishael, the foster family's attorney: ``What is going on with even limited visitation is injurious to the child.'' Since he arrived, the father has been allowed only videotaped, supervised visits with the girl in two- or three-hour intervals. During a recent visit, a courtappointed psychologist strongly urged the birth father to tell the girl that the nice people she is living with are not her real family and that he is her real dad. The father showed the little girl pictures of her as a baby in Cuba and pointed out the family resemblance and shared surname, said Julio Vigil, the psychologist. ''She had a very strong emotional reaction to that,'' Vigil said. ``She cried and yelled at him, and said she had one father and she loved that father.'' Another therapist who is treating the girl, Miguel Firpi, described the girl's father as emotionally detached and warned that, after 17 visits, he has failed to bond or forge an attachment to the little girl. ''The father is not very expressive,'' Firpi said. ``There seems to be no bond.'' And, Firpi added, it should not be the job of a 4-year-old to establish a relationship with her father. ''I believe this is a great burden for this child,'' he said. ``She has expressed it already.'' A court-appointed therapist for the father called the visitation plan ''a setup for failure'' because the visits aren't long enough or often enough. ''I think the people here are against my patient,'' said psychologist Andrew Lagomasino. ``They use [the visitation schedule] as an attempt to prove my patient is not a fit parent.'' Cohen agreed it would be difficult for the father to win over the girl in such short visits. She ordered that he be allowed an unsupervised, daylong visit with his daughter next week at the home where he's staying, where they could swim together in a pool. ''Oftentimes,'' she said, ``you just have to take a leap of faith.'' The hearings -- it's unclear how many have been held because all child welfare records are confidential -- had been closed to the public until Wednesday, and Cohen has ordered that all courtroom participants be gagged from discussing the case. She has even threatened to jail lawyers who violated the gag order. At the start of Wednesday's hearing, Cohen said she would abide by the appeals court's ruling, which came at the request of The Miami Herald, but she defended her decision to preside over the case privately. Revelations about the dispute, she said, ``are the kind of thing that can wreak havoc for the children.'' Balancing the public's right to know what goes on at the courthouse against the vulnerability of a small child was just one of the case's challenges, Cohen said. ''I am trying to do what is in the best interests of the child without emotionally damaging her,'' the judge said. CURRENTLY CHILD PROTECTIVE SERVICES VIOLATES MORE CIVIL RIGHTS ON A DAILY BASIS THEN ALL OTHER AGENCIES COMBINED INCLUDING THE NSA / CIA WIRETAPPING PROGRAM.... CPS Does not protect children... It is sickening how many children are subject to abuse, neglect and even killed at the hands of Child Protective Services. every parent should read this .pdf from connecticut dcf watch... http://www.connecticutdcfwatch.com/8x11.pdf http://www.connecticutdcfwatch.com Number of Cases per 100,000 children in the US These numbers come from The National Center on Child Abuse and Neglect in Washington. (NCCAN) Recent numbers have increased significantly for CPS *Perpetrators of Maltreatment* Physical Abuse CPS 160, Parents 59 Sexual Abuse CPS 112, Parents 13 Neglect CPS 410, Parents 241 Medical Neglect CPS 14 Parents 12 Fatalities CPS 6.4, Parents 1.5 CHILD PROTECTIVE SERVICES, HAPPILY DESTROYING HUNDREDS OF INNOCENT FAMILIES YEARLY NATIONWIDE AND COMING TO YOU'RE HOME SOON... BE SURE TO FIND OUT WHERE YOUR CANDIDATES STANDS ON THE ISSUE OF REFORMING OR ABOLISHING CHILD PROTECTIVE SERVICES ("MAKE YOUR CANDIDATES TAKE A STAND ON THIS ISSUE.") THEN REMEMBER TO VOTE ACCORDINGLY IF THEY ARE "FAMILY UNFRIENDLY" IN THE NEXT ELECTION... |
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1 Cuban girl in exile, 2 dads....
On Thu, 19 Jul 2007 01:40:37 -0700, fx wrote:
1 Cuban girl in exile, 2 dads In the first public hearing on the fate of a 4-year-old girl whose father wants her to return to Cuba, a frustrated judge called for calm. BY CAROL MARBIN MILLER In terms of rights, whose should be honored in this conflict...the long absent father, or the girl's current relationship with the man she views as her father? Support your argument with something other than opinion please. There is enough hot air already coming from the eternally deflating bag of methane, krp. I can't really type while holding my nose, so I'll no longer respond seriously to the little fat fart. But Michael, you I will debate anytime you care to take off that poorly fitting transparent sock. Or you can continue to run and hide. 0:] http://www.miamiherald.com/579/story/175091.html The closed-door custody battle over the 4-year-old Cuban girl who ended up in foster care after her mother attempted suicide went on public display Wednesday, baring finger-pointing, raised voices and raw emotion. Crushed into a courtroom in Miami's dingy juvenile courthouse were about a dozen lawyers, four psychologists, social workers, guardians, an interpreter and a judge. They met in public after an appeals court ordered the hearings, which had been held secretly for more than a year, to be opened. At stake is the fate of a 4-year-old girl who confided to a caseworker that she has two fathers, ``one resting on each shoulder.'' The case also is freighted with a half-century's geopolitical conflict. On one side is a Cuban father, hoping to raise his daughter, even in a communist country. On the other is a proud exile community seeking to shield her from the tyranny they fled. ''Everybody is attacking everybody,'' Circuit Judge Jeri B. Cohen, who is presiding over the unusual case, said at the hearing Wednesday. ``I can't control all of you.'' The youngster, whom The Miami Herald is not identifying to protect her privacy, entered the United States legally in March 2005 when her mother won a visa lottery. By the end of that year, however, she had been sheltered by the Department of Children & Families, which had asked Cohen to declare the girl's mother unfit. The girl now lives with a Cuban exile family that is seeking to adopt her. Her birth father, a fisherman and office worker from Guayos, traveled to Miami six weeks ago to press his case. He attended the hearing Wednesday in a crisply pressed crimson dress shirt and slacks, his dark hair cropped short. His lawyer, Ira Kurzban, a prominent immigration attorney, says he thinks the girl's father is being treated unfairly. Kurzban said the custody dispute is ''extraordinarily one-sided'' and hinges largely on the child welfare agency's claims in an updated petition that the girl might be ''endangered'' by any reunification with her father. ''No one has ever accused my client of abusing his child. No one has ever accused my client of being involved with drugs. No one has ever accused my client of in any way harming his child,'' Kurzban said. ``But he's being treated in this process as if all those things were true.'' ''My client has done nothing wrong,'' Kurzban added. ``He has done what any parent would do: try to get his child back.'' Cohen agreed that DCF's petition to declare the father unfit was ''light'' on evidence that he was a poor father. ''You know it, and I know it,'' she added, looking squarely at the state's attorneys. DCF is offering the father a chance to win custody of his daughter by completing a set of tasks, such as the visitations, although an agency attorney, Rebecca Kapotsa, said DCF ultimately would like to see the foster family win permanent custody through a guardianship. Said Alan Mishael, the foster family's attorney: ``What is going on with even limited visitation is injurious to the child.'' Since he arrived, the father has been allowed only videotaped, supervised visits with the girl in two- or three-hour intervals. During a recent visit, a courtappointed psychologist strongly urged the birth father to tell the girl that the nice people she is living with are not her real family and that he is her real dad. The father showed the little girl pictures of her as a baby in Cuba and pointed out the family resemblance and shared surname, said Julio Vigil, the psychologist. ''She had a very strong emotional reaction to that,'' Vigil said. ``She cried and yelled at him, and said she had one father and she loved that father.'' Another therapist who is treating the girl, Miguel Firpi, described the girl's father as emotionally detached and warned that, after 17 visits, he has failed to bond or forge an attachment to the little girl. ''The father is not very expressive,'' Firpi said. ``There seems to be no bond.'' And, Firpi added, it should not be the job of a 4-year-old to establish a relationship with her father. ''I believe this is a great burden for this child,'' he said. ``She has expressed it already.'' A court-appointed therapist for the father called the visitation plan ''a setup for failure'' because the visits aren't long enough or often enough. ''I think the people here are against my patient,'' said psychologist Andrew Lagomasino. ``They use [the visitation schedule] as an attempt to prove my patient is not a fit parent.'' Cohen agreed it would be difficult for the father to win over the girl in such short visits. She ordered that he be allowed an unsupervised, daylong visit with his daughter next week at the home where he's staying, where they could swim together in a pool. ''Oftentimes,'' she said, ``you just have to take a leap of faith.'' The hearings -- it's unclear how many have been held because all child welfare records are confidential -- had been closed to the public until Wednesday, and Cohen has ordered that all courtroom participants be gagged from discussing the case. She has even threatened to jail lawyers who violated the gag order. At the start of Wednesday's hearing, Cohen said she would abide by the appeals court's ruling, which came at the request of The Miami Herald, but she defended her decision to preside over the case privately. Revelations about the dispute, she said, ``are the kind of thing that can wreak havoc for the children.'' Balancing the public's right to know what goes on at the courthouse against the vulnerability of a small child was just one of the case's challenges, Cohen said. ''I am trying to do what is in the best interests of the child without emotionally damaging her,'' the judge said. CURRENTLY CHILD PROTECTIVE SERVICES VIOLATES MORE CIVIL RIGHTS ON A DAILY BASIS THEN ALL OTHER AGENCIES COMBINED INCLUDING THE NSA / CIA WIRETAPPING PROGRAM.... CPS Does not protect children... It is sickening how many children are subject to abuse, neglect and even killed at the hands of Child Protective Services. every parent should read this .pdf from connecticut dcf watch... http://www.connecticutdcfwatch.com/8x11.pdf http://www.connecticutdcfwatch.com Number of Cases per 100,000 children in the US These numbers come from The National Center on Child Abuse and Neglect in Washington. (NCCAN) Recent numbers have increased significantly for CPS *Perpetrators of Maltreatment* Physical Abuse CPS 160, Parents 59 Sexual Abuse CPS 112, Parents 13 Neglect CPS 410, Parents 241 Medical Neglect CPS 14 Parents 12 Fatalities CPS 6.4, Parents 1.5 CHILD PROTECTIVE SERVICES, HAPPILY DESTROYING HUNDREDS OF INNOCENT FAMILIES YEARLY NATIONWIDE AND COMING TO YOU'RE HOME SOON... BE SURE TO FIND OUT WHERE YOUR CANDIDATES STANDS ON THE ISSUE OF REFORMING OR ABOLISHING CHILD PROTECTIVE SERVICES ("MAKE YOUR CANDIDATES TAKE A STAND ON THIS ISSUE.") THEN REMEMBER TO VOTE ACCORDINGLY IF THEY ARE "FAMILY UNFRIENDLY" IN THE NEXT ELECTION... |
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