They Took the Kids Last Night: How the Child Protection System Puts Families at Risk
This account of six families whose children were wrongly seized by child protection services vividly illustrates the constitutional balancing act where medicine, family interests, and child safety can clash.

They Took the Kids Last Night shows a rarely exposed side of America's contemporary struggle to address child abuse, telling the stories of loving families who were almost destroyed by false allegations—readily accepted by caseworkers, doctors, the media, and, too often, the courts.

Each of the six wrongly accused families profiled in this book faced an epic and life-changing battle when child protection caseworkers came to their homes to take their kids. In each case, a child had an injury whose cause was unknown; it could have been due to an accident, a medical condition, or abuse. Each family ultimately exonerated itself and restored its family life, but still bears scars from the experience that will never disappear. The book tells why and how the child protection system failed these families. It also examines the larger flaws in our country's child protection safety net that is supposed to sort out the innocent from the guilty in order to protect children.

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They Took the Kids Last Night: How the Child Protection System Puts Families at Risk
This account of six families whose children were wrongly seized by child protection services vividly illustrates the constitutional balancing act where medicine, family interests, and child safety can clash.

They Took the Kids Last Night shows a rarely exposed side of America's contemporary struggle to address child abuse, telling the stories of loving families who were almost destroyed by false allegations—readily accepted by caseworkers, doctors, the media, and, too often, the courts.

Each of the six wrongly accused families profiled in this book faced an epic and life-changing battle when child protection caseworkers came to their homes to take their kids. In each case, a child had an injury whose cause was unknown; it could have been due to an accident, a medical condition, or abuse. Each family ultimately exonerated itself and restored its family life, but still bears scars from the experience that will never disappear. The book tells why and how the child protection system failed these families. It also examines the larger flaws in our country's child protection safety net that is supposed to sort out the innocent from the guilty in order to protect children.

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They Took the Kids Last Night: How the Child Protection System Puts Families at Risk

They Took the Kids Last Night: How the Child Protection System Puts Families at Risk

by Diane L. Redleaf
They Took the Kids Last Night: How the Child Protection System Puts Families at Risk

They Took the Kids Last Night: How the Child Protection System Puts Families at Risk

by Diane L. Redleaf

Hardcover(New Edition)

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Overview

This account of six families whose children were wrongly seized by child protection services vividly illustrates the constitutional balancing act where medicine, family interests, and child safety can clash.

They Took the Kids Last Night shows a rarely exposed side of America's contemporary struggle to address child abuse, telling the stories of loving families who were almost destroyed by false allegations—readily accepted by caseworkers, doctors, the media, and, too often, the courts.

Each of the six wrongly accused families profiled in this book faced an epic and life-changing battle when child protection caseworkers came to their homes to take their kids. In each case, a child had an injury whose cause was unknown; it could have been due to an accident, a medical condition, or abuse. Each family ultimately exonerated itself and restored its family life, but still bears scars from the experience that will never disappear. The book tells why and how the child protection system failed these families. It also examines the larger flaws in our country's child protection safety net that is supposed to sort out the innocent from the guilty in order to protect children.


Product Details

ISBN-13: 9781440866289
Publisher: Bloomsbury Academic
Publication date: 11/02/2018
Edition description: New Edition
Pages: 304
Product dimensions: 6.14(w) x 9.21(h) x 0.69(d)

About the Author

Diane L. Redleaf has been a leading family defense attorney and policy advocate for over three decades. Since she graduated from Stanford Law School in 1979, she has led dozens of successful class action suits, appeals and policy reform initiatives on behalf of families.

Table of Contents

Preface ix

Introduction xiii

1 Today the Brady Bunch Kids Could Be Taken Too 1

2 A "Multidisciplinary Pediatric Consortium" Means Doctors Help Police and Caseworkers to Take the Kids 12

3 The Investigation Begins in Earnest with "Hurry Up and Wait" 22

4 It's Fine to Take the Kids, Unless the State Is Lying 33

5 A Night to Remember 53

6 Planning for a Court Date to Keep the Kids 63

7 "Without Prejudice" Means You Lose the Kids for Now 75

8 Bringing on the Witnesses 86

9 The State's Star Witness and Someone the Investigation Missed 105

10 The Baby's at Risk If Breastfed in Private 120

11 Attacking the Doctor Who Knows Something About Fractures 136

12 To the Finish Line 151

13 Attempts at Recourse and the End of the Investigation 168

14 Partial Answers and Partial Remedies 181

15 A "Constellation of Injuries" Does Not Equal Child Abuse 196

16 We Believe the Children, Except When They Say the Baby Wasn't Abused 212

17 A Statistical Likelihood Doesn't Make Parents Guilty 222

Epilogue: What Needs to Be Done 231

Notes 239

Index 255

What People are Saying About This

Dorothy Roberts

“Pioneering family defender Diane L. Redleaf tells gripping stories of clients caught up in the nightmare of America’s child welfare system—a system that unjustly tears families apart based on flawed evidence; race, class, and gender biases; and wrongheaded policies. Her spotlight on parents wrongfully accused of harming their children reveals a critical aspect of the trauma caused by an approach to child welfare centered on investigating the parents rather than supporting families. They Took the Kids Last Night is a shocking exposé of the inner workings of a damaging system and an urgent call for change.”

Richard Wexler

“In her gripping, urgently needed book, Diane L. Redleaf presents the child welfare system as it really works—not the Disney version presented by the people who run it. These are frontline dispatches from someone who has devoted her professional life to helping vulnerable children and families. As you read about the enormous harm done to children and families in these cases, remember, as Redleaf often reminds us, that these families actually suffered less than most. And this book reminds us of something else: though the system is most likely to attack those who are poor and nonwhite, it can come after anyone. The people who ‘took the kids last night’ could be back for yours tomorrow.”

Martin Guggenheim

“The United States practices child welfare like no other country in the world. In the name of child protection, it removes children from their families, temporarily and permanently, more than anywhere else on earth. Diane L. Redleaf, a pioneer defender of parents and families, reveals the many flaws in our system and makes important suggestions for change. Those who care about families and children should read this important book and heed her sensible proposals for change.”

Lenore Skenazy

“The idea that you can bring your beloved child to the emergency room for a bump and find yourself accused of child abuse sounds like a bad dream. Terrifyingly, it’s real life for the stunned parents in this book—and the Atticus Finch who goes to bat for them: Diane L. Redleaf.”

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