More than 200 children have died with a DFCS history (Atlanta, Georgia)

Why are all these children dying? Here's one reason. Both of the children mentioned in the first paragraph, Eric Forbes and Emani Moss, had custodial fathers with histories of child abuse and domestic violence. Yet somebody gave them custody anyway. In terms of who is being protected in "the system," one good place to start is with all the abusers being coddled and enabled by the pro-father-at-any-cost assumptions that are now the dominant ideology in these agencies.

I wonder if all these didacted records would show a disproportionate number custodial fathers relative to their actual numbers....

http://www.firstcoastnews.com/story/news/crime/2014/02/28/children-died-dfcs-history/5892407/

More than 200 children have died with a DFCS history

WXIA 7:47 a.m. EST February 28, 2014

ATLANTA -- First there was Eric Forbes -- a 12-year-old police say died after being beaten so badly by his father, his body simply gave up. Then, Emani Moss -- a little girl with a heartwarming smile, found stuffed and burned in a trash can. They were deaths that outraged us - and the community.

11Alive's Rebecca Lindstrom has spent the past four months fighting to learn more about the system that was supposed to protect them.

To do that, we wanted to look at why children were dying, how decisions were being made. So Linstrom requested the case summaries of every child that had died since 2012 with a DFCS history. The first request was made November 11, 2013. To this day, there are still 94 case reports missing -- that's 94 children by their own records, that died and we have no explanation for how or why.

What they have given us is in parts. Many of the documents are redacted - covered in black ink.

Most of us would hate to think our life reduced to a few pages, but for the 213 children that we know have died in the past two years with a DFCS history, this is all we have to begin to understand why.

Even attorney Tom Rawlings, former director of the Office of the Child Advocate, the watchdog agency for DFCS, can't make sense of these documents.

"My first reaction is how on earth are you supposed to make any sense of this," said Rawlings.

That's because the reports are broken into bits. Most of these children's lives covered in black ink.

"It really conflicts with the federal rules that the state is required to follow in these cases," Rawlings said.

Even Melissa Carter, an attorney who helped draft the state law that allowed for all this black ink says this goes too far.

"Some of this I can tell you is redacted because there may be criminal investigations that could be jeopardized by the disclosure of this information," Carter said. "At the same time, some of this just goes so far, when you see line after line of complete black out and you have nothing left but pronouns and conjunctions."

A copy of one report given to the Atlanta Journal-Constitution certainly provides more clues as to what happened to 4-year old Jeremiah Tucker. Doctors said his asthma was so severe and his family incapable of caring for him, that he was "at risk of death" if they sent him home. DFCS did it anyway. A hard truth you'd never learn that from the same report - just covered in more black ink - that DFCS gave to us.

In a meeting with DFCS division director Sharon Hill, her communications staff told us this was a legal matter and that they could not comment.

"Our desire is to be as transparent as possible," Hill said. "This may be as transparent as our law allows us to be."

This is a perfect example of how that law is up to interpretation, by whomever holds the black pen. Even with all this ink, we're still missing half the case file. That's 94 children dead, with no explanations as to whether anything could have been done to save them. To get that, DFCS says it needs $21,000 and five more months.

"Access to information is very, very difficult," said Bill Hancock, founder of the non-profit organization Faithbridge.

"Who's being protected by this," asked Lindstrom.

"That is the best question I think I've heard in a while," Hancock replied. "Who would you think is not being protected primarily? Children."

That's why Georgia State Representative Christian Coomer say he's working to change that law. His bill which, passed unanimously in the House on Wednesday, is now in the hands of the Senate. It would certainly allow greater access to those assigned to investigate a child's death, but leaves plenty of loopholes that would allow DFCS to continue giving the general public records that look like this.

"It's at least a step in the right direction," said Coomer. "It's not good enough to say we can't fix everything so we're not going to try anything."

Right now, we're surveying Senators to find out if they support Coomer's bill. As you see, secrecy not only hides what led up to a child's death, but also the people responsible for letting it happen. Even with only half the files, there is still plenty we were able to learn about how the system failed these children.

Custodial dad with history of DV pleads "not guilty" to killing 3-year-old son; non-custodial mom trying to get custody of surviving 5-year-old son (Fresno, California)

Once again, we have a father with a history of domestic violence is granted custody of the two kids DESPITE CONVICTIONS for battery. So, who was the freaking judicial genius who thought it would be okay to give this piece of sh** custody of these little boys? What custody evaluators, GALS, assorted court whores went along with this travesty? Who were the people who basically blew off any subsequent wellness checks? WE NEED NAMES.

The fathers' rights infiltration of the family courts has gone on long enough. Children are dying as babies and toddlers are handed over to abusive men who in many cases have felony convictions. Enough!

http://abclocal.go.com/kfsn/story?section=news/local&id=9385213

Fresno father tearfully says "not guilty" of killing toddler

Tuesday, January 07, 2014

Corin Hoggard

FRESNO, Calif. (KFSN) -- A mother is fighting for custody of her surviving son while the father tearfully said he's not guilty of murdering their younger child.

Donald Nelson and his girlfriend Moneesha Camp are charged with murdering Nelson's three-year-old son last week.

Nelson actually had to make two court appearances Tuesday and he cried at both of them. But these weren't his first trips to the courthouse, leaving many to wonder why he even had two little boys in his care.

Donald Nelson's face betrayed some concern as police found his three-year-old son Zion naked and lifeless in the back seat of his car Thursday.

Five days later, his face looked straight down, his eyes filled with tears, and he openly wept as he pleaded not guilty to murdering the boy.

"I've never had a client who was so upset, who cried so deeply, I was just moved by his reaction to the charges today," said Nelson's public defender, Margarita Martinez-Baly.

A judge wouldn't let Action News record Nelson and Moneesha Camp as they entered their pleas Tuesday.

Minutes after the criminal hearing, Nelson moved to another courtroom where Zion's mother is fighting for custody of their surviving five-year-old son.

"It was emotional," said Tiara Larson. "He was, you know, acting like he was sorry. He told me, you know, to take care of him if he gets placed with me."

Larson won the right to bury her younger son, but she'll have to wait at least one more day before CPS allows her to take the older boy out of foster care.

Larson says she tried to warn the agency about Nelson's propensity to violence -- she even asked for and got a welfare check last April, but agents decided the kids were okay.

Police say Nelson coached the boys to lie about abuse in their home. But Nelson also had a verifiable history of violence, including convictions for battery in 2009 and spousal abuse in 2010. The abuse victim was Larson and even though Zion wasn't born at the time, it may have been the boy's first exposure to violence.

"He beat me up, spent only two weeks in jail even though I was pregnant with bruises all over me and got three years misdemeanor probation," Larson said.

"Were you pregnant with Zion at the time?" an Action News reporter asked.

"Yes," she replied. "And they ordered him then, no contact with me or the child and yet just a year and a half later, they gave him custody of the child."

Camp was also in tears in court Tuesday afternoon, but she was a little more composed and she was obviously avoiding eye contact with Nelson.

They both face life in prison if they're convicted.

Charges dropped against custodial dad in death of toddler son (Shanandoah County, Virginia)

Instead, authorities are blaming the fiancée (not the mother) for the murder of the little boy.

Not one word on how Daddy got custody here, or what happened to this boy's mother.

Notice how mothers are routinely blamed for not "stopping" a violent male bashing their kids--as if they even they necessarily had the power to do so. Since often the same dude is bashing them.

But not this guy. He's gonna walk with no accountability. Typical.

Dad is identified as JEREMY A. VERMILLION.

http://www.nvdaily.com/news/2013/11/charge-dropped-against-father-of-toddler-in-murder-case.php

Posted at 4:06 PM Nov. 15, 2013 | Updated: 4:54 PM Nov. 15, 2013

Charge dropped against boy's father

By Alex Bridges

Shenandoah County prosecutors dropped a child-endangerment charge against a man whose fiancée stands accused of murdering his son.

Authorities had charged Jeremy A. Vermillion with one count of endangerment of a child while in one's custody after his toddler-age son died June 3.

Nicole Dawn Miller, 26, identified as Vermillion's fiancée at the time of child's death, stands charged with capital murder and could face the death penalty if convicted.

Prosecutors also blamed Vermillion, the child's biological father and primary custodian, for not helping the toddler before the incident.

At a hearing in Shenandoah County Juvenile and Domestic Relations Court on Nov. 7, Judge William Sharp Jr. granted a motion by Assistant Commonwealth's Attorney Louis Campola seeking to dismiss the charge against Vermillion. However, under the motion the prosecutor can seek to revive the charge. It is not uncommon for prosecutors to ask to dismiss a charge in a lower court only to seek an indictment by a grand jury in the same case.

Officers with the Woodstock Police Department responded to Vermillion's residence for a report of a toddler not breathing. Officers noticed "several suspicious bruises" on the child's body, according to a criminal complaint filed for an arrest warrant served on Vermillion.

The child later died at the University of Virginia Medical Center as a result of non-accidental trauma, according to the complaint.

Investigators interviewed Vermillion after the incident.

"Vermillion admitted to seeing bruises on the child prior to the incident; however he failed to render necessary medical attention to the child," the complaint states. "Doctors who cared for the child ... said it was impossible for a child of this age to cause such injuries to themself [sic]."

Miller remains held without bond in the Shenandoah County Jail on the charge of capital murder. The maximum punishment for a conviction of capital murder in Virginia is death.

Judge Dennis L. Hupp has scheduled Miller's next appearance in the circuit court for Dec. 4. After her indictment this summer, Hupp appointed Harrisonburg attorneys John C. Holloran and William W. Eldridge IV as Miller's defense counsel. At her most recent court appearance Sept. 18, records note that the defense did not request discovery evidence from the commonwealth at that time. Defense did request a tentative trial date for sometime in November 2014.

Commonwealth's Attorney Amanda Wiseley has filed a notice of intent to seek the death penalty against the defendant in the case. Wiseley states in the notice that "there is a probability that the Defendant had committed criminal acts of violence that would constitute a continuing serious threat to society and/or that her conduct in committing the offense for which she stands charged was outrageously or wantonly vile, horrible or inhuman in that it involved torture, depravity of mind or an aggravated battery to the victim."

Hupp also has granted a request by the defense for a court-appointed, fact and mitigation investigator in the case. The commonwealth attorney's office did not object to the defense request. The court allowed the defense to hire Doris Pye as its fact-and-mitigation investigator at a rate of $75 per hour, with a cap of $3,500. Counsel would need to come back to the court and ask for more funds should the cost for her services reach the cap, the judge's order states.

The defense request indicates that Pye has been appointed to serve as such an investigator in 11 capital cases in state and federal jurisdictions. Pye also has aided defense counsel in 22 capital murder cases after an initial conviction.