Family Rights and Child Abuse News

A man's tortured words detail woes of foster care

by Mark Di Ionno

Keith Brown has hands that know pain. From hard work. From martial arts. Fingers thick with calluses, scar tissue built up from saw blades and hammers that missed their mark and found flesh.

Brown is one of those guys: a licensed electrician and motorcycle mechanic, a workaday builder who can do carpentry, plumbing and tile. He rides a Harley and drives a '96 Ford Bronco, which he flatly describes as "a piece of (expletive), but it gets me around." But he is also a playwright, and that part of him is seen in his eyes. Brown, 50, has eyes that know pain. From abandonment. From foster care. When he talks about his life, he doesn't cry.

blog.nj.com

December 23, 2012

A mother's battle to be believed

by Patricia Wen

A half-dozen people, seated in a lounge area, announced their conclusions: Bryanna-Rose had no symptoms if her mother was out of the room.

The child would remain in the hospital without Owen present. The baby would be placed into the protective custody of the Massachusetts Department of Social Services. Birk said authorities got an idea about Owen, and refused to let go. "They weren't interested in finding the truth," he said.

The Boston Globe

November 4, 2007

A new city HPV vaccination program flies under the radar

by Jake Blumgart

Powered by millions of dollars in big-pharma marketing in recent years, HPV - the human papillomavirus, most commonly associated with causing cervical cancer - has jumped to the forefront of public-health concerns for young women.

Vaccines are distributed at doctors' offices and at little or no cost at community health centers and Planned Parenthood, and women under 27 are urged to partake. For young men, though, it's a different story. Access to the vaccine has been relatively limited - as I found out the hard way - and its importance has been under-recognized. But the city of Philadelphia is taking steps to change that with "3 for Me," a recently launched city vaccine program for teens. It could be a game-changer, especially for men - if only anyone knew about it.

citypaper.net

October 22, 2012

A north Georgia judge, a gun and a cable TV show

by Political Insider: Jim Galloway

Oh, where, oh, where, to begin. The Judicial Qualifications Commission today lodged a complaint with the state Supreme Court against Judge Anthony Peters, a Catoosa County magistrate.

Among the allegations against the north Georgia judge: - He admitted to smoking marijuana for three months in 2010. - Peters went on the local cable TV show, called "Night Talk," and referred to the chief magistrate as "spineless." - On the same TV show, he displayed a photo of an individual and identified him by name as "a purported confidential informant of the Catoosa County Sheriff's Office."

blogs.ajc.com

February 8, 2011

A Rare First Amendment Victory for a Public School Teacher Complaining About Restrictions on In-School Speech

by Eugene Volokh

Generally a public school has broad authority over what teachers say in class. When they're teaching, or counseling students, they are seen as speaking on behalf of the school, and the school has broad power to control its own speech.

And schoolteachers generally have no constitutional right to put up materials of their own on the walls, since those are the school's walls, for the school to dispose of as the administration pleases. But Johnson v. Poway Unified School Dist., decided yesterday by the federal district court for the Southern District of California, is a rare exception...

The Volokh Conspiracy

February 26, 2010