Article from Reason by Lenore Skenazy.
Chandler, Arizona, cops broke through the door of a family’s home in the middle of the night, stormed in, pointed their guns, handcuffed the father, and watched as the state’s Department of Child Safety (DCS) took custody of the parents’ three kids—all because mom had decided her toddler’s fever was not serious enough to merit a trip to the hospital.
It was dinnertime on February 25 when the pregnant mother took her 2-year-old to the doctor with a fever of over 100. The doctor told her to take him to the emergency room, fearing that because the boy was unvaccinated, perhaps he had meningitis—a life-threatening disease.
The doctor called the hospital to alert them. But by the time the mother and child left his office, the boy was “laughing and playing with his siblings,” according to this excellent piece by Dianna M. Nanez in The Arizona Republic. Mom took his temperature again, and it was almost normal. So instead of going to the emergency room, the family went home. The mom called the doctor to say her boy’s fever had broken and she wasn’t going to the emergency room. The doctor told her she should go anyway, so she agreed she would—but then she didn’t.
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In court, DCS tried to convince the judge, Jennifer Green, to bar the press from covering the dispute. A lawyer for the agency even claimed that the parents had gone against the best interests of the children by involving the media. Green rejected this argument, saying, “In Arizona we like our courts to be open.”
Read the entire article at Reason.
wpDiscuz
All of this Anti-Freedom is getting out of hand and we the people need to put a stop to it all.
The city, or whoever ordered that ridiculous raid, needs to cover the replacement of their door, get those children back to their parents’ home NOW, and give them a definite monetary reimbursement for any expenses occurred, as well as a ‘bonus’ for putting the entire family through such a horrendous experience. Use some COMMON SENSE, people!!!
Let’s see, we have had recently children sent home from a hospital just to have the kid die within a couple hours. And this “Mother” because she claims his fever is down doesn’t want to go to the hospital when the doctor told her why and to go to make sure the kid will wake up the next morning. Of course she never got the kid vaccinated so that tells me how much she cares about the kid and that if her kid has some thing serious the kid can give it to her and any other person the kid comes near and the judge is casual about it. My friend’s college age son is lucky to be alive because he was living at home while attending a near by college. He got sick, felt rotten but figured it was the flue. His Mom looking at him and knowing the flue, forced him to go the hospital with her doing the driving where he spent a week barely surviving with meningitis. He still has moments where he has to spend time resting and sleeping and then getting back to his life. He had been vaccinated too, never went anyplace but caught a severe case of meningitis from someone who had been to South America where this particular strain is running rampant. And the judge is all right with the “Mother”. Maybe the doctor’s hospital would have proved her right but we will never know. Don’t fool around with your kids when the doctor says to go to the hospital, go.
It is $600 to walk into the ER and for no reason is silly. Doctors are often narcissistic. They don’t really care about people, but have power trips and want control..can’t be told no.
As a retired LEO, this sound fishy to me. Why the use a swat team to force entry into a home for this reason, who authorized a swat response. Obviously there was a warrant to seize the children, however that is a separate situation as to the use of force used and the reason for it. I think the parents have a good case for a federal charge of “reckless endangerment “. Unless something else was on the request for a warrant, this is excessive force beyond any reasonable review.
Hey, why not use SWAT for trivial issues. It’s a tactic to scare people into knowing the government is in charge. Remember under the Obama regime when SWAT teams raided the farms at 0530 because they were selling raw milk? Or how about under Bush 43, his AG, Alberto R. Gonzales, had the FBI raid Dwayne “Dog” Chapman’s home at 0530 because the Mexican government wanted to squeeze money from him after he became famous for a phony charge in Mexico that was handled Mexican style through a Mexican lawyer? There have been many other incidents of SWAT raids that went very wrong for innocent people. Tucson, AZ sheriff’s SWAT raided the home (wrong address) of a Marine veteran and pumped 67 rounds into him in front of his wife and child because when he heard the commotion he got his rife to protect his home. He never fired a shot and the sheriff lied about it.
As I’m unable to edit, I want to say: NO! Using SWAT anytime against non violent people is wrong. Sometimes it is necessary but obviously this instance and those I cited were wrong.
Whoever called the police, and whoever ordered Swat to respond, WOULD be putting MY children through college!