In short, the judge who has been most emphatically overruled twice now has refused to sign the order releasing the children back to their parents until the parents sign an agreement. CNN
How can she do this? The courts have said that the children should not have been removed. Shouldn’t it just be a matter of picking them up? Why should the parents have to sign an agreement when the kids should never have been taken in the first place?
I consider this nonsense, and I hope the higher courts come down on this judge with both feet. But, is it really nonsense?
This probably belongs in GQ, but I suspect a debate’ll break out.
The Judge is being churlish because she got slapped. The appeal ruling left her enough latitude in crafting the return conditions to get away with this legally, so yes she can demand it, but it’s an obvious attempt to subvert the intent of the ruling, so I imagine the attys will be back in court very soon.
This whole raid was started due to a crank call from a woman in Colorado. Texas screwed up big time. And personally, I don’t trust Texas as far as I could throw it or the tabloid media reports about YFZ either.
When the appellate courts reversed the trial court, they noted that the trial court had the power to impose restrictions on the children and their parents while the case was pending – e.g., you can’t leave the state, or certain persons may not have access to the child. In fact, that was one of the rationales for reversing the trial court – you don’t need to take these children away from their parents now, because you have less severe options. I think that’s what is happening now; the trial court is setting the terms of custody.
From the article, it sounds like the hangup is on getting the mothers to sign the order returning the children and imposing the restrictions. I’m not sure why the judge would insist upon this, but my guess is that she wants to ensure there’s proof that the mothers know the terms of the custody order. In other words she might be worried that a mother could pick up her kid, leave the state, and then claim she never got the order, so she didn’t know that was prohibited (and thus she is, arguably, not guilty of contempt of court). That’s speculation on my part, though; there could be some other reason.