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DCF will stress Cuban father's consent
DCF will stress Cuban father's consent
An international custody dispute over a 4-year-old girl may hinge on a document her father in Cuba signed when he allowed her to travel to the U.S. with her mother. Posted on Mon, Aug. 06, 2007 Digg it del.icio.us reprint or license print email BY CAROL MARBIN MILLER http://www.miamiherald.com/news/amer...ry/193920.html When his girlfriend won the right to move to the United States more than two years ago, a Cuban farmer signed the required form giving permission for their toddler daughter to leave with her. Now, Florida child-welfare administrators, who are embroiled in a bitter custody dispute over the 4-year-old girl, believe they have a powerful weapon against the Cuban national, who is fighting to take her back to Cuba: his own consent. Lawyers with the Department of Children & Families want the little girl, whose mother gave up custody last year, to remain permanently in the home of a wealthy Coral Gables foster family. They are arguing that her birth father essentially abandoned the little girl when he signed the consentimiento in December 2004 allowing her to travel with her mother to the United States. Some immigration attorneys and advocates, however, believe that the state's position has potentially damaging consequences, and could inadvertently strip hundreds, if not thousands, of Cuban fathers of their parental rights. ''This could open up a very dangerous can of worms,'' said Felix Masud-Piloto, director of DePaul University's Center for Latino Research in Chicago. Roger Bernstein, an immigration attorney for 15 years, said that construing such consents as surrenders of a parent's right to raise his or her children might discourage parents from signing them -- which could, in turn, discourage legal migration. ''It could have a chilling effect and would be bad policy,'' he said. The girl's father, who has been in Miami for about two months fighting for custody of his daughter, lives in the central Cuba town of Cabaiguán, where he fishes, raises pigs and works a malanga and plantain farm. He lives in his parent's house along with his wife, another daughter and other family members. The little girl's mother won a visa lottery enabling her to legally emigrate to the United States. On Dec. 23, 2004, the father signed a two-page consent, which allowed the mother to travel with the toddler de forma definitiva -- or definitively -- to the United States. Neither the girl nor any of the participants in the case is being named by The Miami Herald to protect the girl's privacy. In late 2005, the little girl and her older brother -- who has a different birth father -- were sheltered by the DCF after their mother became suicidal and was hospitalized. The DCF agreed to allow the two children to live with the Cuban-American family in Coral Gables, and the couple later adopted the now 12-year-old boy. ABANDONMENT CLAIM Although the DCF is allowing the girl's father to visit her twice weekly, the agency's attorneys have said in court they would like her to remain permanently in the custody of her foster parents. Agency attorneys have said they will argue that the birth father abandoned the little girl, and is therefore unfit to raise her. In a juvenile court hearing last month, DCF chief of staff Jason Dimitris, an attorney who is spearheading the state's effort, announced that the DCF would introduce the father's consent as evidence of abandonment. The girl's mother and father were not married. DCF administrators, faced with some public consternation over their efforts to separate a father and child, defended themselves in court last month, arguing that the state would not have been forced to shelter the little girl if her father had not abandoned her. ''The department did not create the situation with this child,'' Dimitris said. ``The father created the situation, and the department had to respond.'' Consents like the one signed by the girl's father go back decades in Cuba. The document, also known as a patria potestad or poder -- legally, a waiver of parental custody -- is commonly used as power of attorney by custodial parents, and the Cuban government has required that noncustodial parents sign them before their children can leave the island. In the 1960s, the patria potestad was widely used when Cuban children were sent unaccompanied to the United States in what came to be known as Operation Pedro Pan after speculation swirled that Cuban leader Fidel Castro planned to seize children and send them to the Soviet Union to be indoctrinated, said Masud-Piloto. Leo Ochoa, a Coral Gables attorney who has specialized in immigration law for almost 30 years, said most of the parents who sent their children out of Cuba during Pedro Pan executed patria potestad documents. Since then, he said, he has seen such consents ''here and there,'' but he has no firm estimate of how often they are used. ''They were common in the old days,'' said Tammy Fox-Isicoff, a former special assistant U.S. attorney for immigration cases who has practiced immigration law in private practice since 1988. ``If you wanted to take a child from Cuba, you needed a poder.'' Ochoa said he did not believe that a consent-to-travel document, by itself, would be sufficient to show that a Cuban father was surrendering rights to a child. The document, when added to other pieces of evidence, might help support a case that the father abandoned his child when he allowed her to leave, presumably permanently. ''It would weigh against the father's claim,'' Ochoa said. ``If he cared so much for the child, certainly he would not have consented to have the child go to the U.S., where he would not be allowed to travel, at least under the present system. ''Is it a complete renunciation of parental rights? That might be stretching it a little bit,'' he added. Said Bernstein: ``It has to be viewed in the context of where it was signed: a totalitarian state, where you do what you need to do to get families safe and out of harm's way.'' WHAT WAS HIS INTENT? Leon Fresco, an immigration attorney at Holland & Knight who specializes in cases involving the Cuban Adjustment Act and migrant children, said that, ultimately, the dispute over the consent could boil down to the father's intent when he signed it. ''Was this document made under duress? Did the father have to sign it so that his daughter had the choice to live in freedom?'' Fresco asked. ``Did he have the intent to abandon then, and does he intend to abandon now? ''A policy choice needs to be made as to how you want to treat these fathers,'' he said. The state could treat such consents as voluntary surrenders of the right to raise a child, Fresco said, ``or do you want to say you are not going to give full faith and credit to these documents, and a father retains some parental rights?'' 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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DCF will stress Cuban father's consent
fx wrote:
DCF will stress Cuban father's consent An international custody dispute over a 4-year-old girl may hinge on a document her father in Cuba signed when he allowed her to travel to the U.S. with her mother. Posted on Mon, Aug. 06, 2007 Digg it del.icio.us reprint or license print email BY CAROL MARBIN MILLER http://www.miamiherald.com/news/amer...ry/193920.html When his girlfriend won the right to move to the United States more than two years ago, a Cuban farmer signed the required form giving permission for their toddler daughter to leave with her. Now, Florida child-welfare administrators, who are embroiled in a bitter custody dispute over the 4-year-old girl, believe they have a powerful weapon against the Cuban national, who is fighting to take her back to Cuba: his own consent. Lawyers with the Department of Children & Families want the little girl, whose mother gave up custody last year, to remain permanently in the home of a wealthy Coral Gables foster family. They are arguing that her birth father essentially abandoned the little girl when he signed the consentimiento in December 2004 allowing her to travel with her mother to the United States. Some immigration attorneys and advocates, however, believe that the state's position has potentially damaging consequences, and could inadvertently strip hundreds, if not thousands, of Cuban fathers of their parental rights. ''This could open up a very dangerous can of worms,'' said Felix Masud-Piloto, director of DePaul University's Center for Latino Research in Chicago. Roger Bernstein, an immigration attorney for 15 years, said that construing such consents as surrenders of a parent's right to raise his or her children might discourage parents from signing them -- which could, in turn, discourage legal migration. ''It could have a chilling effect and would be bad policy,'' he said. The girl's father, who has been in Miami for about two months fighting for custody of his daughter, lives in the central Cuba town of Cabaiguán, where he fishes, raises pigs and works a malanga and plantain farm. He lives in his parent's house along with his wife, another daughter and other family members. The little girl's mother won a visa lottery enabling her to legally emigrate to the United States. On Dec. 23, 2004, the father signed a two-page consent, which allowed the mother to travel with the toddler de forma definitiva -- or definitively -- to the United States. Neither the girl nor any of the participants in the case is being named by The Miami Herald to protect the girl's privacy. In late 2005, the little girl and her older brother -- who has a different birth father -- were sheltered by the DCF after their mother became suicidal and was hospitalized. The DCF agreed to allow the two children to live with the Cuban-American family in Coral Gables, and the couple later adopted the now 12-year-old boy. ABANDONMENT CLAIM Although the DCF is allowing the girl's father to visit her twice weekly, the agency's attorneys have said in court they would like her to remain permanently in the custody of her foster parents. Agency attorneys have said they will argue that the birth father abandoned the little girl, and is therefore unfit to raise her. In a juvenile court hearing last month, DCF chief of staff Jason Dimitris, an attorney who is spearheading the state's effort, announced that the DCF would introduce the father's consent as evidence of abandonment. The girl's mother and father were not married. DCF administrators, faced with some public consternation over their efforts to separate a father and child, defended themselves in court last month, arguing that the state would not have been forced to shelter the little girl if her father had not abandoned her. ''The department did not create the situation with this child,'' Dimitris said. ``The father created the situation, and the department had to respond.'' Consents like the one signed by the girl's father go back decades in Cuba. The document, also known as a patria potestad or poder -- legally, a waiver of parental custody -- is commonly used as power of attorney by custodial parents, and the Cuban government has required that noncustodial parents sign them before their children can leave the island. In the 1960s, the patria potestad was widely used when Cuban children were sent unaccompanied to the United States in what came to be known as Operation Pedro Pan after speculation swirled that Cuban leader Fidel Castro planned to seize children and send them to the Soviet Union to be indoctrinated, said Masud-Piloto. Leo Ochoa, a Coral Gables attorney who has specialized in immigration law for almost 30 years, said most of the parents who sent their children out of Cuba during Pedro Pan executed patria potestad documents. Since then, he said, he has seen such consents ''here and there,'' but he has no firm estimate of how often they are used. ''They were common in the old days,'' said Tammy Fox-Isicoff, a former special assistant U.S. attorney for immigration cases who has practiced immigration law in private practice since 1988. ``If you wanted to take a child from Cuba, you needed a poder.'' Ochoa said he did not believe that a consent-to-travel document, by itself, would be sufficient to show that a Cuban father was surrendering rights to a child. The document, when added to other pieces of evidence, might help support a case that the father abandoned his child when he allowed her to leave, presumably permanently. ''It would weigh against the father's claim,'' Ochoa said. ``If he cared so much for the child, certainly he would not have consented to have the child go to the U.S., where he would not be allowed to travel, at least under the present system. ''Is it a complete renunciation of parental rights? That might be stretching it a little bit,'' he added. Said Bernstein: ``It has to be viewed in the context of where it was signed: a totalitarian state, where you do what you need to do to get families safe and out of harm's way.'' WHAT WAS HIS INTENT? Leon Fresco, an immigration attorney at Holland & Knight who specializes in cases involving the Cuban Adjustment Act and migrant children, said that, ultimately, the dispute over the consent could boil down to the father's intent when he signed it. ''Was this document made under duress? Did the father have to sign it so that his daughter had the choice to live in freedom?'' Fresco asked. ``Did he have the intent to abandon then, and does he intend to abandon now? ''A policy choice needs to be made as to how you want to treat these fathers,'' he said. The state could treat such consents as voluntary surrenders of the right to raise a child, Fresco said, ``or do you want to say you are not going to give full faith and credit to these documents, and a father retains some parental rights?'' 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... yawn |
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