AUSTIN TX, Foster parent charged with shaking child: 2-year-oldsuffered brain damage, will need long-term nursing care...

Foster parent charged with shaking child

2-year-old suffered brain damage, will need long-term nursing care

12:00 AM CDT on Saturday, June 30, 2007

By ROBERT T. GARRETT / The Dallas Morning News


http://www.dallasnews.com/sharedcont...1.436e22d.html

AUSTIN – Police have arrested a Waco foster parent on accusations he
shook a toddler, causing severe head trauma.

Matthew Lewis Anderson, 51, has been charged with first-degree injury to
a child last spring.

"This is going to be a shaken-baby-syndrome type deal," Waco Police
Department spokesman Steve Anderson, who is not related, said Friday.

Matthew Anderson was arrested Wednesday and released after posting a
$10,000 bond.

According to an arrest warrant affidavit, he told police that when he
tried to wake up a 2-year-old foster girl on April 2, she "rolled over
and had a tear in her eye."

Mr. Anderson said he then "picked up the victim, and started to shake
her telling her she did not need to cry." The affidavit quotes him as
saying the girl's head slumped backward and "her eyes rolled up into her
head."

Police say Mr. Anderson's wife, Cassiopia, 26, was at work at the time
and has not been charged.

The girl's younger sister, then 4 months old, was removed and the foster
home in north Waco has been shut down, said Patrick Crimmins, spokesman
for the Texas Department of Family and Protective Services.

The affidavit says the girl suffered "abusive head trauma," with
bleeding under the brain's protective covering and in the eyes.

Mr. Crimmins said the toddler "suffered significant brain damage" and
after a lengthy hospitalization in Temple is now in a foster home and
will need long-term nursing care.

The sisters had been in the Waco couple's care since December, he said.
It was their first placement. It's unclear where their birth parents
live or why the girls were removed from their original home.

According to court records, the Andersons were married in McLennan
County in September 2004. Mr. Crimmins said they were "verified" as
foster parents in July 2005 by Lutheran Social Services of the South
Inc., an Austin-based child-placing agency that is the state's largest
foster-care contractor, caring for more than 1,500 youngsters.

Last month, the state Child Care Licensing division cited Lutheran for
four violations of state foster care standards. They include abuse and
neglect; failing to treat the girl's vomiting and lethargy for "several
days;" failure by the foster father to exercise "self control" and
"prudent judgment;" and delays that occurred when he took a shower and
tried to give the girl over-the-counter medications before calling EMS.

Court records show Mr. Anderson was convicted of drunken driving in Waco
in 1984. Under state foster care standards, alcohol-related offenses
more than 10 years old do not automatically disqualify a prospective
foster parent.

Mr. Crimmins said the Andersons "cared for three other children in their
home before these two siblings arrived, without incident."

Lutheran Social Services spokeswoman Katherine Kerr said her agency has
cooperated fully with police

"If there had been any indication of a problem, we would not have
verified the family," she said.





CURRENTLY CHILD PROTECTIVE SERVICES VIOLATES MORE CIVIL RIGHTS ON A
DAILY BASIS THEN ALL OTHER AGENCIES COMBINED INCLUDING THE NATIONAL
SECURITY AGENCY/CENTRAL INTELLIGENCE AGENCY 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

Imagine that, 6.4 children die at the hands of the very agencies that
are supposed to protect them and only 1.5 at the hands of parents per
100,000 children. CPS perpetrates more abuse, neglect, and sexual abuse
and kills more children then parents in the United States. If the
citizens of this country hold CPS to the same standards that they hold
parents too. No judge should ever put another child in the hands of ANY
government agency because CPS nationwide is guilty of more harm and
death than any human being combined. CPS nationwide is guilty of more
human rights violations and deaths of children then the homes from which
they were removed. When are the judges going to wake up and see that
they are sending children to their death and a life of abuse when
children are removed from safe homes based on the mere opinion of a
bunch of social workers.

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...