Mom whose kids were slain by their father testifies for child protection bill (Jefferson City, Missouri)

The story of what happened to Tina Porter's children has parallels all over the country. Dad DAN PORTER got visitation despite a history of domestic violence. When the father disappeared with the children and "distressing messages" start emerging from the father, the authorities refuse to issue an Amber Alert. Porter murdered the children, then refused to say what happened to them for three long years.

I can feel for this mother's pain, but I feel that her proposed reforms don't go far enough. There is NO REASON why police data bases should have to have information concerning custody and visitation details in protective orders. Why? Because no mother who has to get a protective order should ever have her children subjected to her abuser. And I mean ever. If Daddy isn't safe around Mom, he's not safe around her children. No joint custody, no visitation. Period.

http://www.kansascity.com/2010/04/24/1900310/tina-porter-whose-kids-were-slain.html

Posted on Sat, Apr. 24, 2010 10:15 PM

Tina Porter, whose kids were slain by their father, testifies for child protection bill
By JASON NOBLE
The Star’s Jefferson City correspondent

JEFFERSON CITY Tina Porter’s voice is too soft for this place where volume so often trumps substance, but when she begins her story, everyone falls silent.

She is in a hearing room in the Missouri House, telling once more the story of how her children were taken from her.

“Hi,” she begins her testimony before the Crime Prevention Committee. “I want to respectfully acknowledge all of you.” But before she gets much further, the chairman reminds her to speak up, to speak into the microphone.

Kansas Citians know her story well — how in 2004, Sam, 7, and Lindsey, 8, disappeared during a weekend with their father, Dan Porter, how he refused for more than three years to tell what happened to them, how he finally led authorities to their bodies, and how he ultimately was tried and sentenced for their murders.

But these state representatives from eastern and southern Missouri don’t know her story. They need to now because Tina Porter has a request for them:

Don’t let it happen again.

In the years since her children were murdered, and the years since that truth was revealed, she has been searching for ways to prevent someone else from experiencing her heartbreak.

She shared ideas with Jim Kanatzar, the Jackson County prosecutor, and Mike Sanders, the county executive, and they pointed her to Rep. Jason Kander, a Kansas City Democrat, who put her ideas into a bill.

In the hearing last week, Kander laid out the mother’s modest requests:

•When a request for an Amber Alert is denied, that denial should be reported to a statewide committee overseeing the alerts.

Tina Porter asked police to issue such an alert that weekend in 2004, after receiving distressing messages from Sam and Lindsey’s father, but authorities declined to do so.

Informing a statewide committee of the denial might spur a review of the decision, and perhaps a reversal, Kander said.

•Details concerning visitation and custody contained in protective orders against parents should be included in police databases so that officers are aware of them in the event of an arrest or a traffic stop. And if an officer finds that a parent does not have a child when the order says the parent should, an investigation should be launched.

Police pulled over Dan Porter two days after he killed Sam and Lindsey, but they let him go, Tina Porter said.

“I think at that time, if they would’ve held him, I wouldn’t have gone through — well it’s not just me, it was the metropolitan area, but me in particular — wouldn’t have gone through as much as what we went through,” she told the committee.

Dan Porter wasn’t picked up by police again for a week, at which time he began his three-year silence on the fate of Sam and Lindsey.

“I do think this is very important and it could benefit so many, so many lives,” Tina Porter said of the bill.

Its prospects this year are uncertain.

Representatives from county sheriff and police chief organizations spoke against the bill, arguing that it would disrupt the Amber Alert system and place onerous requirements on police departments.

It is also late in the legislative session for a bill to receive its first hearing in committee. Kander said he hoped to see the legislation added to a bill already further along in the process.

After the hearing, lawmakers paused to offer support to Tina Porter. The questions from lawmakers may have been tough, Rep. Jeff Roorda, a Barnhart Democrat, told her, and the opposition from law enforcement may have been daunting, but it is part of the process.

And there was still hope.

To reach Jason Noble, call 573-634-3565 or send e-mail to jnoble@kcstar.com.

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