Free Republic

Cecil Circuit Court Judge Dexter M. Thompson Jr. decried lawyers' arguments that a child custody hearing should be closed to the public Wednesday, saying such a move would be akin to creating atmospheres similar to historically totalitarian states. The heated exchange came at the start of a hearing in which the county's social services department attempted to retain custody of John Joseph Dougherty's three daughters. Dougherty, 53, faces a second-degree murder charge after police found his brain-damaged wife dead on a mattress, surrounded by moldy food and her own excrement. "Maybe we should be more like Germany or Russia," the...

A grand jury has indicted an Elkton man on a murder charge, six weeks after police found his emaciated wife dead in a bedroom amidst squalid conditions. John Joseph Dougherty, 53, faces a second-degree murder charge in the indictment, handed up last week after the grand jury heard new evidence against him. Dougherty already faced manslaughter and abuse charges in an indictment handed up March 17. The new indictment, unsealed yesterday, included those charges and added the murder charge. Dougherty is accused of causing his wife's death by keeping her locked in a bedroom for six years without access to...

An Elkton man accused of murdering his brain-damaged wife by keeping her locked in a bedroom regained custody of his three daughters Wednesday. Judge Dexter M. Thompson Jr. returned the children to John Joseph Dougherty, 53, after a hearing that lasted all afternoon in circuit court. The county's social services department took custody of the children Feb. 25, after police found their mother dead on a mattress amidst squalid conditions in their Chestnut Drive home.

ELKTON - New evidence against an Elkton man accused of locking up the mother of his children for six years until her death has prompted a Cecil County grand jury to increase the charges against him from manslaughter to second-degree murder. John Joseph Dougherty, 53, told authorities that he started keeping Mary Elizabeth Kilrain, 46, in a bedroom in 1999 after she suffered an aneurysm and became verbally aggressive toward their daughters, according to police. He told authorities that he wanted to keep her from wandering around the house. Kilrain did not have access to food, water and hygiene, prosecutors...

Public sector gets high marksNorwegians are known for complaining, but a new survey indicates they're generally satisifed with the social services they get for their tax money. Subsidized day care centers get the highest marks, while everything from school dentists to centers for the elderly are clearly popular.Public sector services provided through local townships routinely get plenty of bashing, both directly and through the media. A survey of 15,000 Norwegians nationwide by research firm TNS Gallup, however, found that 77 percent of the services offered got positive evaluations.The survey, which asked Norwegians to rank 43 different services from libraries to...

CASEY WIAN: The U.S. Supreme Court has ruled that children of illegal aliens are entitled to an education in this country, some say the Colorado Department of Education has taken that too far. Until this week, its Web site offered a Spanish language brochure called Survival Guide for Recent Arrivals to Colorado. Along with information useful to legal immigrants, it contains tips clearly intended for illegal aliens. The guide advises "The job of the police is not to report you to immigration"; "Always carry the name and phone number of an attorney who will take your calls"; Some lawyers help...

see the original thread for background; ..."...We can start a General Chat on this topic, if you wish and maybe we can get some responses going. This is an interesting topic with more possible solutions than first appear. "A Freeper Guide to Homelessness".?.

HIV positive children and their loved ones have few rights if they choose to battle with social work authorities in New York City. Jacklyn Hoerger's job was to treat children with HIV at a New York children's home. But nobody had told her that the drugs she was administering were experimental and highly toxic. "We were told that if they were vomiting, if they lost their ability to walk, if they were having diarrhoea, if they were dying, then all of this was because of their HIV infection." In fact it was the drugs that were making the children ill...

Study on Juvenile Psychopaths Address:http://www.screwschool.com/term/psy1.htm Study on Juvenile Psychopaths This newest phenomena in the world of crime is perhaps the most dangerous challenge facing society and law enforcement ever. While psychopaths are not new, this breed of super criminal exceeds the scope of psychopathic behavior. They are younger, more brutal, and completely unafraid of the law. While current research on the super predator is scarce, I will attempt to give an indication as to the reasons a child could become just such a monster. Violent teenage criminals are increasingly vicious. John DiIulio, Professor of Politics and Public Affairs at Princeton...

On Tuesday, October 12, 2004, HSLDA Litigation Attorney James Mason argued before the Superior Court of Pennsylvania on behalf of a family whose Fourth Amendment rights were violated in March of 2004. In a situation very similar to HSLDA's North Carolina Stumbo case, Pennsylvania family Rob and Susan Gauthier were forced to allow a social worker from Susquehanna County Services (SCS) into their home without any evidence of either abuse or neglect as the court rubberstamped an order to compel their cooperation. As a matter of protocol, every SCS investigation requires a "home visit," even if the allegations are known...

Netanyahu: Finance social services but don't breach budgetMinister of Finance Benjamin Netanyahu: Don't bring Labor into the government as it will break up Likud. Revenue surplus will be used to cut taxes. Zeev Klein 3 Aug 04 12:13Minister of Finance Benjamin Netanyahu continues to oppose the Labor Party joining the government. He is prepared to allocate money for social services, provided that the ministers agree to make greater cuts in their respective ministries' budgets. Netanyahu said if ministers want more money for social services, they must find the necessary financing without breaching the budget framework. Minister of Industry Trade and...

On the evening of July 9 the H family from Tulsa County was minding their own business at home when there was a knock at the door. The mother answered. It was a social worker who insisted on entering the home and interviewing the children. The mother immediately called HSLDA's emergency number which was answered by Senior Counsel Christopher Klicka. Klicka asked to talk to the social worker but the social worker refused. Due to the refusal of the social worker to communicate he began instructing the mother on her rights and also giving her statements to relay to the...

Maine Pursues Federal Firearms Violators 6/29/2004 In the past three years, the U.S. Attorney's Office in Maine prosecuted more federal firearms violations than nearly any district in the country, the Portland Press Herald reported June 28. According to Paula Silsby, U.S. attorney for Maine, gun prosecutions increased by more than 100 percent since 2001, making the state one of the top five federal court districts in the country for prosecuting certain federal firearms offenses. Silsby attributed the increase in federal firearms prosecutions to Project Safe Neighborhoods, a federal program aimed at curbing urban street crime. "Gun violence isn't really an...

Thursday, July 1, 2004 Could your kids be given to 'gay' parents? Posted: July 1, 2004 1:00 a.m. Eastern By Stephen Baskerville © 2004 WorldNetDaily.com In the debate over gay marriage, strikingly little attention has been paid to the impact on children. Some question the wisdom of having children raised by two homosexuals, but the best they can seem to argue is that serious flaws vitiate the literature defending it. Almost no attention has been devoted to what may be the more serious political question of who will supply the children of gay "parents," since obviously they cannot produce children...

Did anyone else just see Frontline on PBS. The Taking of Logan Marr? I haven't screamed at the television in a long time but that did it. To make a long story short. Maine stole Logan from her mother because a neighbor saw her drop off Logan at her mothers house who they deemed a bad influence. After many months she got Logan back if she agreed to sever ties with her mother. Then she found her father in Florida. Maine again found out and sent a case worker to steal Logan and her new sister. These people are demonic...

HSLDA’s Emergency Appeal Denied By Pennsylvania Supreme Court In a situation very similar to the Stumbo case in North Carolina, an over-zealous social worker in Pennsylvania is causing serious legal problems for the Gauthiers, an HSLDA member family. In mid-February, Mr. and Mrs. Gauthier took their infant daughter Isis to the hospital because she was listless and had a slight fever. Apparently because they did not immediately follow the doctor’s recommendation, the parents were reported to social services for possible medical neglect. While their daughter was lying in ICU, several social workers interrogated both parents at the hospital. After Mr....

What would you think of a tax system that took money from the poor to give to the rich? That’s essentially what’s happening with our Social Security and Medicare tax system, where low-income workers are dunned to pay benefits for high-income seniors.

Group says food stamps underutilized in New York The Associated Press ALBANY - Hundreds of thousands of New Yorkers are annually passing up more than a billion dollars’ worth of food stamps they are entitled to, a new analysis shows. The Nutrition Consortium of New York State, in a report that echoes recent studies by the U.S. Department of Agriculture and other, concluded that only about 56 percent of New Yorkers eligible for the program in September 2003 were receiving food stamps. The other 44 percent who were eligible - nearly 1.2 million people - did not get food stamps,...

A Rutherford County church known for its controversial use of "blasting prayer" has sued the county Department of Social Services, alleging violation of its freedom of religion. The lawsuit, filed Dec. 5 in U.S. District Court by lawyers for Spindale-based Word of Faith Fellowship, accuses Rutherford DSS of unconstitutional harassment of church members. It says that harassment results "from defendants' disapproval of, dislike for and class-based animus towards plaintiffs' lawful religious beliefs and practices." The lawsuit lists as plaintiffs 19 adults who are Word of Faith members and parents of 25 children ranging in age from 2 to 17. At...

<p>WUSA-Channel 9 broke in with the bulletin Thursday morning: An infant was missing after someone stole the mother's car with him in it. The manhunt for both was on. By the time the evening news rolled around, we had learned the truth. It was all a hoax. Why his mother would pull such a believable stunt has authorities scratching their heads. Our question today is this: Is the mother fit to care for that 3-month-old infant?</p>