A LITTLE BALANCE PLEASE / Part 392 / For Love and For Justice / Zabeth and Paul Bayne

I know that many readers want me to castigate the Ministry of Children, all of its bureaucrats and all of its social workers and do this all of the time. That's the understandable mood when you feel wronged by an agency funded by your own tax dollars and worse, when you are actually experiencing the disruption of your family, your security, your happiness, your mental and emotional well-being and when your children are being subjected to turbulent changes far beyond your control. I understand that you want me to dedicate this forum to blasting what you perceive as 'the enemy.' So, I have to call for a little balance please.

I know that people embarking upon a career as a social worker do so for reasons other than monetary gain or power acquisition. The motivation is far more honourable than that. People get into social work because they desire to improve other people's lives. They may choose to work with children, youth, geriatric clients, psychiatric patients, families, parents or another one of the many concentrations. We are on this blog site because the subject matter has focused upon child protection social work, child removal, court issues and all of the associated heartaches and stresses. This particular blog has begun with one family's plight as its primary subject. While the Bayne family continues to be the recurring theme, their three year struggle has invited shared stories from countless other parents whose children have been removed from them for brief or extended periods of time. There have been wrenching tales of children removed forever from the biological parents. When many of the writers of comments are anonymous it is impossible to verify the stories. Nevertheless, there is a thread of identifiable veracity and a commonality of experiences that lead a reader to conclude that within the child protection arena, the early genuine, altruistic intention of social workers becomes bent or compromised by something. That's the reality with which we struggle. Why would social workers' reports contain skewed, exaggerated, unsubstantiated, untrue statements about parents or home situations? How could social workers allow themselves to act this way?

What unseen forces exist within the system that compel the worker to compromise the ideals with which the career began?

WHEN CHILD PROTECTION IS WARRANTED / Part 313 / For Love and For Justice / Zabeth and Paul Bayne/

It's the 18th. Then three more days until the last court day of the Bayne case.

A 6 year old boy has been injured many times before. The most recent occasion on September 8th was severe enough that he went to neighbours asking for help. They did the right thing, notified police and child and family services. The boy had a cut on his chin and a broken arm. Further examination has shown numerous other old injuries sustained by this boy, fractures to his ribs, both arms, a foot and the skull. There is speculation that he was beaten with a mop or broom handle. He ran away from home three times in August.

He finally told authorities what was happening to him at home. CFS has since removed the boy from the couple’s care, as well as his 18-month-old half-sister, who did not have any physical injuries. The girl is the daughter of the boy's 24 year old mother and her 32 year old common-law husband. The couple was arrested September 14th. She faces charges of assault causing bodily harm, two counts of aggravated assault, assault with a weapon and assault for earlier incidents between December 2009 and Sept. 8. He is charged with aggravated assault, uttering threats, assault with a weapon, assault and a probation breach for the same period. Each also faces a charge of failing to provide the necessities of life for allegedly not getting the boy medical help.

Now that is why we need both of these agencies, police and child protection in our communities. So as much as we want to and should complain about the abuses resident within systems that have such sweeping powers, let's be real and acknowledge that not all moms and dads or caregivers are responsible or trustworthy.

I don't want to see this mother on my blog site complaining about child services taking her children. Ever!

Video and News Links:
CBC video news report:
Winnipeg Free Press article
Sept 18 Free Press Update

IS THERE ANY SIMILARITY? / Part 208 / For Love and For Justice / Zabeth and Paul Bayne/

Another catalyst for conversation and concern. You see, this bothers me. I watched this. I will allow this video to speak for itself but you will have to take the time to click and watch it. Granted, it speaks to cases and jurisdictions removed from our Pacific turfside home so my question evolves like this. This report begins with a social worker speaking out. She lost her job because she refused to cooperate with a directive from her supervisors to place a child in a high risk care facility.It proceeds to telling stories about retaliatory actions by child welfare against parents who oppose publicly what the welfare agency is doing. Are some of those reported abuses and repugnant motives and conduct cited in this video news clip happening within our own B.C. system of child care and protection? I'm asking. If so, don't you think that some social workers must become whistle blowers. And about what will they blow their whistles? As for our journalists at Global, CBC, and every news organization in the province, we have to trust that will prioritize these whistle blowing stories relentlessly to generate the needed changes.

Zabeth and Paul Bayne – Part 74 – The Bayne Campaign for Justice

I WISH THIS WAS ONLY FICTION

I wouldn't call it a thriller but Paul and Zabeth Bayne have been living a nightmare for two years that could easily pass as a dramatic novel manuscript. The problem is that this is not fiction but real life, and the life of the Bayne family needs a happy ending unless this is a Stephen King product.

I am calling this story, A STATE OF EMERGENCY

WHAT AN INCREDIBLE PLOT
Here is the plot line. Picture two small boys, two and four years of age playing in their family home. Their baby sister is lying quietly and contentedly on a blanket placed in the living room floor. The children's father prepares a family dinner. Their mother leaves the living room momentarily to express milk for her infant daughter. Upon returning to the room fifteen minutes later she sees one of her sons running through a doorway and stumbling and falling upon the infant girl. The initial concern dissipates as the baby stops crying and settles down. Later however, the mother and father become concerned about the baby girl's behaviour. They take their child for examination in several local hospitals and these prove inconclusive. Unsatisfied, they at last take their daughter to a city Children's hospital. There, a physician renders a Shaken Baby diagnosis. The parents are immediately suspected. Child Protection personnel come to the family home and take the children away. The parents are subsequently arrested for aggravated assault on their own child, separately interrogated. The mom is traumatized by these events and is briefly hospitalized until she is stabilized. Then they learn that the police have determined there is insufficient evidence to proceed with charges. The charges are dropped and their case record expunged. In fact the police issue an apology to the parents for wrongfully taking fingerprints and photos and then they wish the Baynes the best of luck. The government's Child Protection agency nonetheless refuses to believe the parents' version of what happened. The agency is convinced that this was non accidental and therefore the parents are under suspicion and considered a potential risk to their children. Months pass as the parents try to assert their character credibility and to retrieve their children but all their efforts are unsuccessful and in the process their legal expenses require them to forfeit their new family home and to sell the mother's grand piano which is her livelihood as a teacher and concert pianist. During all of this time, the young parents are living with the young woman’s parents because it shortens the distance of their weekly visitations to the children and it provides some mutual moral reinforcement. The boys are permitted by Child Protection to live with the parents in the supervised arrangement of their maternal grandparents’ home. They are still without their tiny daughter.

The Bayne’s tortuous story gains public attention and television journalists clamour for their narrative. They agree to a televised interview which is recorded for later showing. Between the day of the recording and the date of the airing of the segment, a mediation arrangement is introduced by the Child Protection agency by which the parents are promised that the two boys may live with the parents wherever they choose to live. This is permanent and it is wonderful news. Then the TV segment airs. Without announcing their arrival, the Ministry people accompanied by police, interrupt the birthday of one of the small boys in the Grandparents’ home. They seize the Bayne boys amid the screams and cries of children and adults and once again have custody of all three. The Ministry justifies this action on the basis that the parents contravened the agreement that curtailed media contact. Little attention is paid to the fact that the interview was agreed to and videoed days before the Baynes learned that they could have full custody of their boys again.

This is a devastating occurrence for the family and for their friends. The parents are known and respected by a vast friendship network that write countless letters of appeal to the Government and for many months scores of people stand in front of elected officials' constituency offices holding placards of protest and appeal. After some time even the Ministry's lawyer says there is no ground for holding the boys and advises the Ministry to return the sons. The Ministry disregards the advice. The Ministry will put these children up for adoption and is moving this case to court, but again slowly, very slowly. The Baynes are unable to afford any more lawyers. Then remarkably the Baynes are met by a high profile Canadian lawyer who expresses willingness to represent them. It is now over two years that the Ministry in the Baynes contend is a violation of the Ministry's own governing ACT and allegedly without an updated court authorization beyond the initial order has held three children from their parents.

That is not the end of the story. It is still being written. You have only finished half of this narrative subtitled, “The Bayne Campaign for Justice.” This tale could go in several different directions. You are going to help to write the conclusion.

Today, please go to the petition page to sign for them, and send this link to your friends.

And if you wish to attend a piano concert this Sunday Jan 3 2010 in Richmond BC., in which Zabeth will be playing, and funds will go into a trust to allay legal expenses, you must reserve you free admission seat by calling 778-228-4717 or sending an email reservation request to sendthechildrenhome@gmail.com

Paul and Zabeth Bayne – Part One - An Alarming Case of BC Government’s Miscarriage of Justice.

Sit down with your coffee cup. This won’t be a pleasant read. An occasional sip of something hot may be needed.

On June 3 2001, I officiated the wedding ceremony of Paul and Zabeth Bayne. Among the words in my concluding prayer was this excerpt. “Now Lord God, would you allocate to them according to Your will, those assignments which will bless them and augment their characters as they walk together. Give them only enough tears to keep them tender, enough wounds to remind them they are human, enough failure to keep their hands tightly clenched in Yours, and enough success to convince them that they are walking by faith with You.”

They could never have anticipated that six years later in 2007 a nightmare of such ferocity would begin that would challenge their sanity not to mention their faith. But the two of them have remained sane and deeply committed to God. The government of British Columbia has taken their children and is not giving them back. Sane yes, but the Baynes are deeply wounded and the agony is not over. As I tell you their story over the next several days, I urge you to engage the question, “What would I do if I were in their shoes?” I believe that they are doing all that they can and they should not have to be doing this at all. Their children should not be enduring this separation from their parents any longer. This should be concluded now.

Because our paths in life diverged several years ago I was not aware of this dilemma until reading about it on Facebook one day recently. Now I have educated myself about it and I believe that something that is terribly wrong needs to be made right.

I urge you as a reader not to dismiss the case prematurely. None other than noted lawyer Doug Christie has involved himself in their cause to have their children returned to them. I am trusting that I can convince you with some information so that you will make the contribution of a letter to the proper authorities. I will direct you.

Here are the essential details of this troublesome case. Zabeth and Paul have three children, two sons ages five (on Oct 18) and four and a two year old daughter. These children were apprehended on October 22, 2007 because the couple was suspected of shaking the small girl causing her a head injury. This was an understandable precaution taken by the Ministry at the time. The Baynes had stated that one of their sons had fallen on the baby but they were not believed. Shaken Baby Syndrome has now become a suspect diagnosis because of wrongful accusations that result from this rush to judgment without a more aggressive medical investigation.

Here are some YouTube posted videos.
This one will break your heart. A CBC reporter interviews and investigates.
This one is disturbing as it discloses the childrens’ experiences while in government childcare.

Look at Zabeth’s Blog site.

I will give you increasingly more information in the next few postings. Then, I will be urging you to write a letter requesting the return of the children to Paul and Zabeth, and I will give you specifics to whom you should direct these communications.