When dealing with police investigating you a well spread bit of advice is “don’t talk to the police, refuse all searches, refer them to your lawyer”. This is based on constitutional rights like the 4th amendment.
I don’t really want to debate the wisdom of that advice in this thread, but does the same advice apply to CPS workers(child protective services) and the same constitutional protections apply?
If someone calls in an anonymous tip to police that I’m selling crack and they come to my door I would refuse to speak to them and refuse them entry, they can come back if they can get a warrant. Nothing here would incriminate me and would be well within my rights.
If someone calls in an anonymous tip to CPS that I beat my children, and CPS comes and knocks on my door can I also refuse to speak to them and refuse access to my children and refuse them entry, is my situation identical to dealing with police?
I guess this might differ by state so any response from the USA is welcome.
Short question, do CPS workers have powers above police?
Well, within the paramters of the constitution exactly what CPS can do depends on state law determining their functions and powers. And your constitutional protection against unreasonable searches and seizures is still in place. But generally CPS, if they need to, can get warrants for their investigations, like the police can. Or if their investigations relate to criminal offences, they can just turn them over to the police.
But your basic CPS investigation is not about “Did parent commit any offence?” It’s about “is child at risk?” That’s not a criminal matter, it’s a civil matter. And the rights you would have if the subject of a criminal investigation are not necessarily available to you in a CPS investigation of your children.
You can, of course, refuse to admit without a warrant, take the fifth. etc. But while the fact that you have, e.g., taken the fifth cannot be used as evidence against you in criminal proceedings against you, but I don’t see that it its excluded from consideration in civil proceedings relating to your children.
Briefly, the fact that a parent has uncooperative with a CPS investigation into your children’s welfare cannot be used to convict the parent of child neglect (or worse), but it may, at least in principle, be relevant evidence on the question of whether the children are at risk. And, on a practical level, it’s the opposite of reassuring to the CPS people. If you stonewall them they don’t go away because it’s all too hard; they become more and more concerned that you have something to conceal, and their investigations are likely to be become more intensive rather than less intensive.
But they would still have to produce evidence to a judge to obtain a search warrant or warrant for custody of children beyond parent refuses to speak to them right?
I guess I’m asking for purposes of charging someone with child abuse, or getting emergency custody of children some form of evidence has to be presented to a judge right? Just like with the police you only can make your situation worse by speaking to them, because if they had the evidence needed they would not even ask you anything they would come with the warrant to start with?
The fact that CPS call round to you at all means that they have some reason to fear that your child is at risk. It may be a report from the school, let’s say.
They’re not neccesarily thinking of taking your child into care. They’re trying to see if there is any basis for the school’s concern and, if there is, they have a range of strategies they could employ to address it, most of which involve offering support to the parent/guardian. They much prefer to work with parents/guardians; in most cases it has good outcomes, and it costs a whole bunch less than care orders, etc. So they don’t start out by looking for warrants; they start out by making contact and looking to co-operate.
If the parent/guardian refuses to engage, their concerns are magnified. If they want a warrant of some kind, yes, they need something to put before the judge, but they have the report from the school, plus (now) the stonewalling by the parent. Whether the judge thinks that’s enough is going to depend on the terms of the relevant statute, the precise content of the school’s concerns, the nature of the stonewalling and the judge’s own sense. But the stonewalling is certainly something that could be, in principle, a relevant consideration.
No, CPS will almost never come with the warrant to start with, just like the police often don’t start off with a warrant even when there is enough evidence to get one. I worked for CPS for 7 years and only remember one case where we attempted to get a warrant.Since in most cases parents do cooperate , it’s usually not necessary and obtaining a warrant can make things worse for the family. How, you ask? Because getting a warrant is a guarantee that the parent will spend at least one day in court while if they cooperated there might be enough evidence of non-neglect to tip the scales. Maybe school A called to report your child hasn’t attended for six months. That could be educational neglect-or it could be that you enrolled your child in school B and school A didn’t get that info. Without speaking to you, all the worker and the judge have are the records from school A saying your child hasn’t attended. If CPS gets a warrant first, there will be hearing and you’ll have to go to court- even if you then tell they CPS worker that the kid is in school B and they verify that. If you give the same info to the CPS worker who knocks on your door with no warrant, you may never seen CPS again.
The fact that a parent refuses to open the door or speak to CPS is not enough in itself for a warrant. However, if there is enough evidence to get a warrant and the allegations of abuse/neglect are later sustained, the lack of cooperation is certainly going to be taken into consideration later on when the judge is determining the disposition.
Just to be picky, doesn’t the fourth amendment protect your person and your property from seizure? It says nothing about children and guardianship. Maybe when the constitution was framed, perhaps your children (and your wife?) were considered your property, just like your slaves; but in the context of the last 100 years, your children are persons who are entrusted to your care, not your property to be protected from seizure.
I would view it (how does the law see it?) as a “contract”, i.e. you can have these kids as long as you are taking good care of them. Apprehension of children because of neglect or abuse is a civil matter. I assume like divorce and other such, the “preponderance of evidence” rule applies?
Of course, if during the course of their investigation, they find evidence of a crime (child abuse, child neglect) then the criminal rules apply during the police investigation. So the OP has a very good question - the CPS are agents of the state, if investigating child abuse at some point they must realize this is a criminal matter and have to either stop sticking their noses in or call the police. (My guess is they stick to the non-criminal side for that reason, call the police for anything involving charges.)
I knew I should have been more specific- CPS doesn’t need a warrant to talk to your kids or even remove them from your custody (assuming other conditions are met) if they can do so outside your home. Like at school or in the hospital. They need a warrant to enter your home without your consent- and the 4th amendment protects the right “secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures”.
If a matter is both abuse/neglect and a crime, the CPS agency and the police/prosecutor are both involved- the criminal case is about whether the defendant is guilty and whether or not he or she should be punished while the CPS case is about the welfare of the children. Different courts, differnt rules. It’s entirely possible for a person to be acquitted of a crime, and still lose custody due to a neglect/abuse finding. ( even the vocabulary is likely to be different - respondent instead of defendant , finding instead of verdict, etc)
This is what I’ve heard. Keeping your big mouth shut as to what you might or might not have been doing helps you if they ever drag you to criminal court. If you won’t let the CPS folk talk to Little Suzie, won’t let them see her bedroom, and otherwise act very evasive, they are going to get Very Upset ™. Sure, they can’t use any of that against you in a criminal proceeding for child abuse or neglect, but they sure as hell can file civil proceedings to have your kid taken away based on the fact that they received an allegation from your cousin’s ex-spouse’s bff that you abused her and that this allegation is supported by your lack of candor with CPS.
The prevailing wisdom in the US regarding cops (and, presumably CPS officials by extension) is that they are specially trained in drawing out admissions of minor irregularities and distorting them to make you look like a monster.
E.g. if a CPS worker asks you, “Have you ever let your child leave the house unsupervised other than to go to school?”, and you say,
“Last June, I let Suzie stand on the sidewalk in front of the house for ten minutes around 4:30 PM to wait for Mrs. Jones, the Chair of the First Baptist Church Ladies Sewing Circle, to pick her up and take her to the Morganville Quilting Fair where my mom is presenting some of her work. Mrs. Jones doesn’t like to have to park and knock and was in a hurry so I told Suzie to go out and wait for her. Suzie really wanted to spend some more time with grandma and grandpa so I arranged it in advance that Mrs. Jones would turn Suzie over to my mom after the fair, who would take her home for the weekend, and my parents were looking forward to this too. It was good for me, as I needed a big block of uninterrupted high-speed Internet to gather more experimental data for my thesis in A New Theory of the Development of Competitive Endeavors in Virtual Worlds Environments.”
The CPS worker then writes down,
“Subject admits to a recent lapse in supervision. Subject abandoned their child on the street during rush hour and the child was taken in by a church official. Subject displayed no remorse at their actions. Subject appears to be obsessed with video games.”
About six weeks ago I had jury duty and during the impanelling, the defense lawyer discussed various burdens of proof. “Beyond a reasonable doubt” was necessary to convict someone of a crime, “preponderance of the evidence” was necessary to make them pay money to another party, etc., but there was a standard somewhere in between required to take someone’s kids away, at least in Texas.
All the time…
I would guess the wording is something like “unsafe environment”. You haven’t done anything that actually harmed your kid(s), but the environment or your attitude is not condusive to child safety and good development.
I.e. you don’t seem to supply good nutritious meals, the kid sleeps on a matress on the floor, you are frequently drunk. Unless the kid wandered out into traffic when you were passed out, that’s probably not something you could be charged with. But if it looked bad enough, then they’ll probably take the children away until you can show you’ve cleaned up your act.
Most states probably have a catch-all crime called endangering the welfare of a child or some such thing. But even if nearly every abuse/neglect allegation is technically a crime, the police are not going to investigate every allegation (at least not in a jurisdiction of any size- they might in Mayberry) Sometimes it’s a matter of degree ( keeping a child out of school for two weeks is not the same as having never educated a 12 year old, not providing appropriate meals is not the same as not providing any food ) and sometimes it’s a matter of evidence. In every state a crime has to be proven beyond a reasonable doubt but in my state neglect or abuse needs to be proven by a preponderance of the evidence. Wth a finding of abuse or neglect, the judge can place the child in foster care and require social services to make efforts to reunite the family by providing therapy or parenting education with the return of custody depending on the parent’s progress.If abuse or “permanent neglect” is proven by clear and convincing evidence , the parental rights can be terminated, freeing the child for adoption. It is not at all uncommon for there to be enough evidence to meet the lower standards but not “beyond a reasonable doubt”.
How does CPS avoid being used as an unwitting harassment tool between private parties? For instance, I know of a case where a woman was upset with her daughter, so she called CPS (anonymously? not sure) and reported that her son-in-law pushed one of his kids down the stairs. The CPS investigation was more than cursory, but nothing came of it in the end.
I know a few people who regard local CPS as essentially an American Stasi that can take a kid out of a home at the drop of a hat for specious reasons (e.g. “family pet has an isolated accident in kid’s room” becomes “kids lives in animal feces 24/7”).
This is actually very common in my experience, usually in couples that split up. In fact a situation very much like that made me ask the question, a guy got in an online relationship with a woman and then when he broke it off she called and made an anonymous tip to CPS that he is a drug addict(she helpfully let him know it was her because she had all his contact info).
CPS came out and he talked to them and let them see his house, he admitted to smoking weed when he was younger when questioned on drug use. Then they asked if he drinks and he said sure he enjoys a drink nightly or some beers.
So then they are threatening him that if he doesn’t take drug tests and go to counseling they could try to take his kids, and because he said he would not stop drinking they wanted him to go to AA meetings. On and on about parenting classes too.
In my opinion he could have saved himself the trouble by simply not talking to them at all, but I wasn’t sure where that stood legally.
Animal Control officers can get a warrant to seize an animal in just a few hours if they believe the animal’s life is in immediate danger (i.e. not likely to survive the day in current conditions). I imagine CPS has a similar capability.
On the show i heard about it on (Animal Cops, real life drama), it was a rather uncommon event, so it’s likely a pretty rare occurrence in reality (since those shows are already a sample that includes only the interesting and unusual bits).
A defendant’s cooperation (or lack thereof) can be a relevant consideration at any criminal sentencing, at least in the US. This is not a factor that is unique to child-welfare proceedings.
Alcohol abuse is a big one. It’s not an offence to get quietly drunk every night in your own home, but if you have children, particularly young ones, it certainly raises a question of child neglect.
All these different scenarios depend on the official not being bent.
Daughter going through ’ foster to adopt’ at this time. Plus my only three other personal contacts with three different states DHS people. Every one has been either bent, a liar = writing the worst possible version that contains nothing that was said, stupid, arrogant, and not willing to listen or even keep their own appointments & never giving any notice when they find that they have more important stuff someplace else.
I know many LEO’s, Criminal IRS agents ( from before the blatant times of now. ) & a few people in various forms of, or were in the child protection business. ( DHS, Family Court, Juvie incarceration. Most are good people but my family & friends do not get them. We get all the bad ones.
So be nice to them.
Smile at them.
Lie your ass off about subjective things.