week 5 post 1

March 01, 2020

week 5 post 1

-Juvenile dependency courts are a fascinating place where the fates of children who have been suspected or confirmed victims of abuse are decided. In some states these courts are open to the media; in others they are closed.

Deirdre English Video

narrative journalism
Cultural common knowledge
Great for social justice
Gives a shape you can fill
Get the reader into the scene
The end gives the opportunity to reward the reader for the investment they have made in reading the article by resolving things.
When doing the research be looking for scenes, describe an action or what they are wearing
How do you go back in time and interview, rely mainly on feelings because the human mind is not reliable but maybe focus on things you can verify
Using pov, what was going through your mind
Quotes help capture what happened, dialogue is even better
Significant detail, versus insignificant details
Use details that reveal parts of the character or something about the story
Anecdote

Conduct an interview paint a scene:

Thousands of children entering foster care are processed at the Los Angeles County’s Edelman Courthouse in Montery Park every year. On this occasion is was Heather, a 13 year old school girl who’s teacher had taken her into her own home after Heather’s father threatened her life. The teacher, from Woodland Hills, California was hoping Heather wouldn’t end up in the foster care system.

Heather remembers, “The night before I've gotten taken away it was obviously [a] really bad night, my dad trying to kill me and my mom…” She was safe with her teacher but the ride to the courthouse where she would be processed left her feeling “…a little anxious worried, scared.” Heather was terribly worried about seeing her parents again after the incident. She said, “I guess I knew I'd be safe because there would be so many people around but the thought of seeing him [dad] really ... I was really scared… I was mainly thinking about what would it be like to see my parents, what it would be like to sit in the courtroom, what it would look like.”

In the courthouse Heather was nervous and shy and stayed by herself. She said, “I felt like that was my first time there and all these kids have been through this before.” There were sections for smaller kids and older kids. One section had a representative from the LA zoo who gave a talk on reptiles. The smaller kids loved this but Heather just wanted to leave. The policy was that all kids had to be brought to the foster carers home after the hearing but her teacher wouldn’t be home till after work - after 5pm. The request had been made that Heather be allowed to go to school after the hearing but this had been denied. With a deflated feeling, she realised she would be stuck there till 5pm and looked around for things to keep her busy till then. Finally, she was called to court. She was just so nervous. She noted the judge was a woman with medium brown hair and she noted she was wearing a robe. So this is what happens when a parent threatens your life. Heather’s future was about to be decided. Her wait was finally over.

Judge Trina Thompson Video

Why juvenile dependency courts should or should not be open to the media
Child deserves confidentiality and only people who are genuinely invested in the outcome of the court for this child for a multitude of reasons

Family reunification and access
What is fair and what is ethically sound
Protect the minors confidentiality

The media needs to show a legitimate reason to be there and that they will protect the confidentiality of this child, the media would argue that they are promoting the social values by accessing the courts to drive social change.
At what point do the benefits of a larger social good outweigh the negative effects on children being exposed like that

Think of what it would be like if it were your own child
Best interest of kid always
Behavior and family dynamic, all very private interests

Strangers examining someone's lives
Digital age
Becomes a child permanent record if it is on the media, for example when they are trying to go to college, get a high profile job,
Consent from a minor and a parent is very very very important and you yourself really need to think about how to protect those people with integrity so that these people aren't negatively impacted for the rest of their lives.
Be educated on the ethics
If you are questioning the ethics than it probably isn't ethical, you must understand the parameters
Spend time with social workers, casa workers, talk to the professionals who are working with the kids who are system raised
Make sure you can put their stories in context
You don't want to retraumatize and victimize

Pages 13-30 Fostering media connections 2012

In over half of all states, these hearings are presumptively closed to members of the public and press
Some see this closure as secrecy that prevents journalists from accurately informing the public and legislators about the child welfare system. Others see it as a protective measure for children and families at one of the most sensitive times of their lives
“Presumptively closed” generally means that by default, journalists may not attend a hearing, and journalists who want to attend have the burden of convincing the court to allow them to do so (under standards dictated by statute, usually involving some judicial discretion)

The two most important debates about open courts are 1) whether openness harms the children involved in the open cases, and 2) how openness affects media coverage and social change

Opponents of presumptive openness present the following arguments: Press access to juvenile dependency hearings presents an unacceptable risk of harm to the children involved. If a journalist publishes a story with the details of a child’s case, particularly details that allow a child to be identified, the child may be traumatized. For example, if a child’s classmates find out that he or she is HIV-positive or is the victim of sexual abuse, they may harass the child
Opponents of presumptive openness present the following arguments: The claim that presumptive openness will cause sweeping reform or even an improvement in media coverage is dubious. The reports on pilot programs in Minnesota, Arizona, and Connecticut all found that journalists rarely attend hearings or write about them when the courts are presumptively open. Supporters of openness are too trustful of journalists and their ability and willingness to write responsible stories about the child welfare system rather than the sensationalistic coverage
that dominates the mainstream narrative and has the potential to harm children

Change Impelled by Open Courts

Karen De Sa Video

After her journalism pretty unanimously the governor signed a bill that strengthened kids rights to appear at their own hearings
This requires that the kid is invited
Look for soft spots in public policy
The quality of justice of juveniles courts specifically dealing with foster care
The for profit offices that were helping the parents to cut corners which is not horrible
Example zaron frazier is a great use of storytelling to move people to make social change
Pharmacy benefit claims, children's voices
They gave her a lot of inaccurate information that wasn't substantive
A lot of interviews with current and former foster youth
Over prescription with psychotropic drugs
Almost 1 and 4 of youth had received a psychotropic medication
Hundreds of kids under age 5 were being prescribed and 60% of them were receiving antipsychotic medications they can have super serious side effects
Hearing these children's stories of what it was like to be on those drugs is what really sold the stories
The lack of power they had to refuse medication
Protecting while also empowering
This children needed to be part of the process, it was important to the understanding
It took bravery from the kids
Precautions, let them know they can refuse to answer any questions, they can change their minds, and take things back, they can back out, give them a supportive adult
There can be no surprises, they have to know what is being released
Judges are not equipped to judge the doctors and don't have enough info to make good decisions
The youth voices are not being heard
The children themselves are protesting it, they want their medical records, they want second opinions, doctors don't even know if the kids have an allergy

PART I: How rushed justice fails kids

By karen de sa

https://www.mercurynews.com/2008/02/08/part-i-how-rushed-justice-fails-kids/

Justice is being strangled by the clock.
attorneys spend two minutes on the case of a 3-year-old sent to the children’s shelter after being found in a filthy home. The case of a teenager anxious to reconnect with lost siblings gets three minutes, yet his desperation cannot be felt; he’s absent from his own hearing. Should a mother’s right to her child be terminated? The court date opens and closes in 60 seconds. Parents and children are legally severed for life.
Judges and lawyers representing children and parents juggle caseloads in some counties that at any given time are far higher than even the maximum recommended standards. On a recent weekday, a San Joaquin County judge ruled on 135 families in a single day. Dependency lawyers in San Bernardino County represent 464 children each – almost five times what many experts recommend.
High caseloads mean judges regularly rule without time to probe basic information.
The field of dependency law is a legal outpost often dreaded by judges and undervalued by court authorities.
Children whose interests are supposed to determine dependency case outcomes are regularly excluded from the court process. Judicial officers issue life-altering rulings without ever seeing the children whose futures are being decided. Lawyers fail to bring even teenage clients to court or interview them regularly.
The doctor believed Joseph had intentionally burned the toddler. In dependency court, Monique faced a common allegation: She had failed to protect her child. Even though it never happened, an example of a horrible, false, life altering allegation

PART II: A timid advocate for parents’ rights

Marquita Jackson first met her lawyer minutes before the court battle for her baby began. There was little time to talk before a Santa Clara County Dependency Court commissioner would rule whether her child could come back home.
Marquita Jackson first met her lawyer minutes before the court battle for her baby began. There was little time to talk before a Santa Clara County Dependency Court commissioner would rule whether her child could come back home. NOTE THAT THIS ALSO IS RELATED TO RACE IN SOME CASES AND THESE ASSUMPTIONS LEAVE IMPOVERISHED FAMILIES TORN APART
The quality of Jackson’s legal representation is no fluke; because most parents in dependency court are impoverished, they are given court-appointed lawyers, and many are poorly represented in their fights to keep their children following allegations of abuse or neglect. Juggling too many cases, attorneys for parents often do not meet their clients until just before critical hearings. In many counties, parents’ attorneys routinely fail to fully prepare their cases.
“It felt like fighting with your hands behind your back,” said Emanuella Chrysoglou, who quit in 2004
There needs to be real legal discussion and change over the function of this otherwise this two way abuse is never going to end

PART III: ‘If it was about me, why didn’t they ask me?’

14-year-old Zairon Frazier felt more like a criminal than a survivor of child abuse.
His mother had whacked him with a belt. But inside Juvenile Dependency Court, it seemed like a different sort of punishment. A bank of attorneys argued his fate at a rapid clip
“Obviously, whatever they were saying wasn’t for my benefit,” Zairon said. “I knew they were talking about me, but I didn’t think anything I said or cared about mattered. If it was about me, why didn’t they ask me?”
Judges and commissioners decide who will feed and clothe them – a relative, a stranger or institution staff. They decide where children will attend school, and whether they will ever see their families again after entering California’s foster care system, the nation’s largest, with 75,000 children.
If we deny youth that opportunity to participate, we really have set up a court system that perpetuates injustice,” said lawyer Jennifer Rodriguez, a former foster youth. “Their lives are decided by strangers, in mere minutes.”
Rodriguez, that decision came at age 12, when a San Mateo County court ruled in her absence that she was a poor fit for a foster family. Over six years, Rodriguez shuffled between group homes, she said, “feeling so lonely I wanted to die.”
there was the fifth-grader so doped up on antipsychotic medications he slept through class. Court reports showed the 11-year-old, grieving his father’s death, used “marijuana and ecstasy as well as alcohol to numb his pain.”
Do the people doing this even care about the kids, why havent they made a move to change anything

Vulnerability and free press:

Vulnerability should be taken seriously this may cause a lot of problems and issues if not taken care of, some people and Journalists doesn't give attention to those people who are very vulnerable especially children, as long as they have a story to tell they didn't give focus to what is important that is why most children become afraid and traumatized.

Free press is a good way to share knowledge, ideas, discoveries and true stories but people abused it and used it for sharing anything they want without being considerate of its consequences. This must be taken responsibly and know the limitations