Texas Scrambles to Prep for Sect Hearing
The state of Texas has dispatched about 300 welfare workers to interview 416 children removed from a polygamous sect in preparation for a hearing Thursday before a Texas judge who will decide whether to place the youths in foster care.
The Texas Bar Association is trying to recruit almost 100 volunteer lawyers for the children, the Wall Street Journal reports. Lawyers and special advocates will be appointed to represent each child removed in the unprecedented raid.
Judge Barbara Walther of San Angelo cannot remove the children unless they are abused, neglected or in imminent danger, the story says. The state will have to battle logistical and evidentiary hurdles to make the case.
Lawyer Tom Vick, who is coordinating the pro bono effort for the Texas bar, told the newspaper the state may be able to make a case without showing each of the 416 children were abused. It could argue that “if it’s a dangerous situation for one child, it’s a dangerous situation for all,” he said.
But the proof could be more difficult in the case of boys at the compound, said Houston child psychiatrist Bruce Perry, who is advising Texas officials. “There are things I know about [what happened to the boys] that border on abusive, but whether they can prove it, I am not sure,” he told the newspaper.
Some children may not be helpful to investigators who are trying to gather information because they are suspicious of outsiders. Darrell Azar, communications director for the Texas Department of Family and Protective Services, said many are not supplying basic information such as their names, ages and the names of their parents. It is possible they do not know their parents, he said.
Azar told the Washington Post the teen who made the phone call that triggered the raid has not been found. She could be among the children in protective custody but “she may be reticent to identify herself,” he said.
