The two worst ways that CPS skirts due process.

The barbarians are truly inside the gates. When the liberals of the 1970s first started building the foundations for what would later become the monstrous "Child Protective" "Services" ("CPS"--aka Family Destruction System) milieu of today, even they didn't fully envision how their fully anti-American dream (nightmare, for the rest of us) could become fully implemented, given the constraints of the U.S. Constitution and the due process protections built into our legal system.

Over time, they gradually just built their own un-Constitutional legal system, with quasi-courts with new names ("Family Court," "Youth Court," "Juvenile Court," etc.) with their own procedures, their own un-Constitutional processes, and corrupted justices who are on the take and sharing in the profits of family destruction. This was all done very incrementally, and built on the lack of distrust that most Americans of the 70s and 80s still had in their major governmental institutions. Whenever challenges were raised, the "courts" would simply grant themselves immunity and "exceptionalism." Each case that they decided in their own favor against their own manifest corruption of the proper limits of "jurisprudence" became "legal precedent" that could then be built upon in order to risk and undertake further and more serious departures.

(Image courtesy of cartoonstock.com)

These new departures were then, themselves, often challenged, and then decided in CPS/court's favor. They typically prevailed against the challenges (and the people) even on appeal, as the liberals gradually took control of the parts of government (at both the state and federal level)--i.e. the massive static and perpetual bureaucracy-- that were never envisioned by our founders. Liberal control of governments led to more liberal graduates of liberalized (and un-Constitutionalized) law schools being appointed to judgeships, to the point, now, that it is a rare event indeed when governments worst stepchildren (such as CPS) ever lose a procedural challenge in "courts" controlled by these judicial traitors.

Legal precedent has resulted in the worst abuses of parental rights, such as the assumption by CPS staff (though still not strictly legal) that they can enter and search homes without a warrant. There is no "Miranda Rights" equivalent read to traumatized parents whose homes they invade. In fact, CPS reserves the right to never tell parents their rights, counting on their ignorance to run roughshod over them in every possible way.

(Image courtesy of cartoonstock.com.)

As CPS abuses began to be publicized more broadly after 2000, CPS was forced to shift tactics a bit, as some appeals courts had not yet been totally turned, and certain rulings were coming down that forced new ways to skirt the proper legal structures. The most notorious of these changes was to institute an "informal agreement" with parents that was not strictly legal either, but once signed by traumatized parents became a "thing" that CPS would take as a legal contract. These come under various names, but are most commonly known as "safety plans."

Here is an article about those:

https://talkpoverty.org/2018/08/22/trump-administration-says-poverty-barely-exists-measuring-arbitrary/

Here is a key excerpt:

"Truitt, who takes methadone as part of her addiction recovery treatment, admitted to using marijuana daily for anxiety, and cocaine once in the week prior, but denied using illegal drugs in the presence of her child. After that admission, Truitt says, things went downhill fast. 'I saw she wrote I smoke around my son,' Truitt says of the safety plan her caseworker hand-wrote in pencil during their meeting. 'I don’t smoke around my son…[My caseworker] said, ‘it’s the end of the day, we’re not changing it.’'

Safety plans like these are widely used in the realm of child protective services investigations in an attempt to resolve perceived threats to a child’s health and safety without judicial involvement. Though informal, they are signed by both parties and are considered binding within the realm of the department. According to the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, a positive drug test (or other confirmation of a single act of drug use) is not enough to substantiate child maltreatment accusations, or to determine child placement. But because safety plans are not legal documents, local departments have discretion of how they apply those standards, so long as the parent agrees and signs the plan. It’s up to the department what happens if a family violates an agreement, but the possibility includes showing up with a police officer and a court order to remove the child. Truitt says she signed the safety plan because she was told the alternative was foster care. What she didn’t know was that the department would have needed to present the case to a judge before placing her son in foster care."

When the CPS office was challenged in this particular case they hid (so typically) behind the claim that "confidentiality laws" kept them from discussing the issues involved. These informal "safety plans" thankfully, are increasingly being challenged by astute parents, and, depending on location, they are gradually being specifically proscribed by state legislature and other local governments. But, there are many places around the country where they are still in use, and where they are having the very same effect (of tearing families) apart as would a formal court order.

The worst part, of course, is that the families are not being told what their rights are, and often feel exactly like they have a gun to their heads, and so they sign these. And, if the informal "agreement" (which any decent lawyer would get easily thrown out using the coercive nature of "the agreement") has the same impact as a formal court order, why would CPS ever be incentivized to "follow the law" and take the parents to court? Court cases can take time, cost department resources, and, in some jurisdictions, can still be somewhat unpredictable.

(Image courtesy of pikbee.com.)

CPS depends upon fear, intimidation and lack of knowledge. These are the tools of a police state, not a "democracy" (or a Constitutional Republic.) Eventually, all this skirting of the law is going to have to be addressed by the people thought their legislatures. The momentum has shifted. There is hope now, but we must remain vigilant, and parenting classes need to include a major segment on their rights v.v. the CPS monstrosity. No parent in modern Amerika, Inc. can possibly parent, safely, without it.

Knowledge is power, and parents MUST have it.

It's not just for corrupt politicians and their "legal" allies anymore.