How can we protect this little Girl

[katinmaine]

What is the name of your state? Maine

My Husband and I have been fighting to terminate the Guardianship that hubbys mother has on his daughter since January 2006. It has been a long and hard fight. This little girl has been abused and put in danger for a while now, but no one believed us. Finally after months of saying this, The G.A.L (Guardian Ad-Litem) for hubbys daughter came to our house one saturday to talk to her, She had been telling us for months that her "Mammie" was hitting her with sticks in the head and on her back, she showed us bruises, (at the time we didnt know that we should of taken her to the E.R. for it) Well her G.A.L took her alone to talk to her, she confirmed that she was being abused, and that "mammie" had told her what to say to the G.A.L. when he had come to talk to her at mammies house (same thing with DHHS worker) and she also told him that she had lied to him about going alone with her Great Uncle because "mammie" said she would get hurt if she told the truth. (Great Uncle was the same man that Hubbys mother had let molest him as a child) G.A.L. looked in to everything and he has found that Daughter is not safe in that house, he even found out that "Mammie" has been letting daughter go with her alcoholic mother every other weekend, but does not know where she lives, to me that is not protecting her. G.A.L has Stated in his report that the Best Interest for daughter is to be SAFE and that "mammie" cannot do it, so Guardianship should be terminated. Thats Great Right, but "mammies" lawyer keeps getting a continuence so it hasnt gone to court, and that little girl is not safe, how do we get this little girl out of this home before she gets abused anymore or Molested. If anyone has gone through this or knows anything that we can do to get her out of their please post to this. She needs to get out of their.

Thank you

 

[LdiJ]

Does dad have an attorney? What is his attorney doing to address this? If he doesn't have an attorney he needs one.

 

[katinmaine]

dad does have an attorney but same thing, he even filed for an emergency hearing and it didnt go through. Its like they dont care. Also "mammie" has friends that work in the court office, i think that might have something to do with it...but we cant prove it.

 

[goldengirlblue]

Wow that sound's like a big mess
It has been profen that the little girl is in danger and noone has taken her out of this home ?Why?
If mom has people that she knows maybe you should get a laywer out of town or so.
I know I life in a small town, laywers eat dinner and lunch togheter.I had to go out of town to get somone that does not eat dinner or lunch with the rest of them.
Next time the little girl comes home with bruses I would take her to the hospital

 

[BL]

Wow that sound's like a big mess
It has been profen that the little girl is in danger and noone has taken her out of this home ?Why?
If mom has people that she knows maybe you should get a laywer out of town or so.
I know I life in a small town, laywers eat dinner and lunch togheter.I had to go out of town to get somone that does not eat dinner or lunch with the rest of them.
Next time the little girl comes home with bruses I would take her to the hospital

Yes call the police and take her to the Hosp.

If that don't do the trick take pictures of the bruises and call the media in .

 

[GrowUp!]

Next time the little girl comes home with bruses I would take her to the hospital

And what do you expect to come from that?!

 

[BL]

And what do you expect to come from that?!

Persons in profession authorities are mandated to report abuse , or suspected abuse .

Seeing a report would come from such a reporter , the report may get more Attention than just from an every day citizen . , and there would be nothing wrong with a Parent getting that extra professional opinion .

As a matter of Fact it would be beneficial to the Parents in case the system tried something fancy .

 

[stealth2]

And what do you expect to come from that?!

This one deserves little more than "what are you thinking, GU?" a trip to the ER will document exactly what injuries there are, will ensure a report to DHS/CPS/whatever they're called there, ensure that the report will be given more credibility than one from an NCP in a custodial disagreement, and so on and so forth.

Yes, it is possible that OP will also be scrutinized to ensure that the injuries weren't inflicted by her. But the report will be seen as much more credible. You should know that.

 

[katinmaine]

Everything has been reported to the dhhs worker and the DHHS worker has said in court that the abuse in the home is at the moderate level ( they base their cases on different levels, Low, Moderate, high and severe).
We have a video tape of the bruises and we have the little girl on tape (not knowing shes being taped) talking about everything, the abuse, what she wants and going for rides with the pedophile.
We tried to get a Protection from Abuse order, it was thrown out, because the judge couldnt watch the tape, he said it was hearsay, we also had the G.A.L, a police officer and the lady from DHHS at court with us and the judge wouldnt hear anything any of them had to say, he said it was all hearsay and he couldnt listen to them either, she told each one of them the same thing.
We are in the process of working with our local newspaper and our state reps, to get this law changed, it wont help this little girl but it might help another child thats in the same situation.
Our lawyer is an out of town lawyer, and he is working hard for us, but they are putting him off as much as they are piutting us off.

And this is not the childs mother doing this, its her Grandmother, her grandmother has temorary guardianship

 

[LdiJ]

Everything has been reported to the dhhs worker and the DHHS worker has said in court that the abuse in the home is at the moderate level ( they base their cases on different levels, Low, Moderate, high and severe).
We have a video tape of the bruises and we have the little girl on tape (not knowing shes being taped) talking about everything, the abuse, what she wants and going for rides with the pedophile.
We tried to get a Protection from Abuse order, it was thrown out, because the judge couldnt watch the tape, he said it was hearsay, we also had the G.A.L, a police officer and the lady from DHHS at court with us and the judge wouldnt hear anything any of them had to say, he said it was all hearsay and he couldnt listen to them either, she told each one of them the same thing.
We are in the process of working with our local newspaper and our state reps, to get this law changed, it wont help this little girl but it might help another child thats in the same situation.
Our lawyer is an out of town lawyer, and he is working hard for us, but they are putting him off as much as they are piutting us off.

And this is not the childs mother doing this, its her Grandmother, her grandmother has temorary guardianship

The judge wouldn't listen to testimony from the GAL, the police or the DHHS????

There may be something very wrong going on here.

If the judge hasn't made any actual ruling on the termination of guardianship, then your attorney needs to force something through so that the judge has to rule. That way you can take it to appeal.

 

[GrowUp!]

This one deserves little more than "what are you thinking, GU?" a trip to the ER will document exactly what injuries there are, will ensure a report to DHS/CPS/whatever they're called there, ensure that the report will be given more credibility than one from an NCP in a custodial disagreement, and so on and so forth.

Yes, it is possible that OP will also be scrutinized to ensure that the injuries weren't inflicted by her. But the report will be seen as much more credible. You should know that.

I realize all of this, but that wasn't my point with the question to the person who responded.

 

[katinmaine]

The judge wouldn't listen to testimony from the GAL, the police or the DHHS????

There may be something very wrong going on here.

If the judge hasn't made any actual ruling on the termination of guardianship, then your attorney needs to force something through so that the judge has to rule. That way you can take it to appeal.

Our case is being heard in Probate court because it is a Termination of Guardianship. To get a Protection from Abuse order you have to go through District Court. So the Judge from District Court would not listen to a G.A.L. from Probate Court because of some stupid thing, G.A.L. only does Probate Court Hearings. But G.A.L was the one who took us to District Court and showed us how to get the Temporary Protection Order. The Day we got the Temporary Order the Judge Did listen to the G.A.L and to our tape and to the Police Officer who Talked to Daughter and Gave us a Temporary Order, but when it went back for the final hearing a week later everything had to be thrown out because it was all "Hear Say"

We have gotten our next hearing date which is November 1st, but whats going to happen to this little girl in the meantime?



it says in Guardian report "The best interest for "daughter" is to be safe, and I as G.A.L and the eyes and ears of the court have found that "mammie" cannot protect "Daughter" from her Drunken Mother "mothers name" and "daughters" Predetory Uncle "uncles name" therefor Guardianship of "daughter" should be terminated and Parental rights returned to "hubbys Name"

That is word for word (except i left out the names). That right there should already have her back in our custody.
It makes me so mad when we cant protect our children because of law makers stupidity!

 

[katinmaine]

just wanted to give you an update. There was a phone conference with our lawyer, grandmothers lawyer, judge and press yesterday. Going to the press really helped us. The judge has ordered a gag order on all press to do with this case due to a recent article in the newspaper, but for her to do the gag order she also had to do something for us, and that was what we wanted from the beginning, the Judge handed out 4 orders yesterday, one being the Gag on all press to do with this case, the second was Grandmothers Pedophile brother cannot have any contact with Daughter (which is what we wanted to keep her safe) and the third was no alcohol or drug using around child ( which also prevents the child from going with her alcoholic mother, that no one seems to know where lives) and for the 4th we havent found out what it is yet. The D.A. and the Detective we have been working with were pretty upset with the Gag order, but just like i told them, When we initially went to the press it was for no other reason then to Protect this little girl, they wouldnt do anything so we had to, and we got just what we wanted. There was also something else that came out, Not Only did the Grandmother Sell her son (my hubby) to her brother, but my Hubbys Step Sister went to the G.A.L and told him how Hubbys mother used to set it up for her to stay home alone and the pedophile would come over and molest her too, and it happened everytime they left her there alone.

How can they let this woman keep on doing this to children

 

[katinmaine]

If you want to get something done...Go to the Press

http://waldo.villagesoup.com/Government/story.cfm?storyID=79922

Heres the link to my husbands case. I thought that only bad things could happen going to the press but i guess i was wrong. This is Great Reading Material.

 

[katinmaine]

5 days to go. May 2nd is the final hearin date. Grandmothers attorney is throwing a fit, because we have the option to present anything else that might have come up since the nov. 7th hearing. But GAL still says SD should come live with us and that she shouldnt have been in that house for this long. He has Fullfilled his duty for the courts though, so i dont know if he will be at the hearing...I hope he is.

I will let you know what happens.

oh and also SD has not been back to the house with bruises in a while so GR.Mother has physically stopped abusing her...For Now.. But on the Flip side she is mentally doing it. She has had my SD things packed since last november and if my SD asks for one of her toys or stuffed animals that are packed her GR.mother will say NO they are to stay packed if you wanted them so bad u shouldnt have said you wanted to live with your father. She said that in front of us one day. I could not believe it. She even went as far as telling the Doctor who did SD eval. That WE had all worked out an agreement and Hubby and I were going to DROP the case. Doctor even wrote it in her report. Cant wait to comment on that at court because its not true.

Sorry so long. I get worked up over this. I am this childs mother in every sense of the word Except biological and it BREAKS my heart to see her hurt like this