TX Couple Say CPS Officials Took Infant In Dispute Over Jaundice

[Sugar Cookie]

A Texas couple claim state Child Protective Services took their two-week-old baby, Mila, after a dispute with their doctor about the infant’s jaundice.

Now the child’s mother, Temecia Jackson, 38, of Desoto, said the family is going to court to get her back.

When officials arrived at the Jacksons’ Dallas home on March 28 to take the newborn, the couple claims the paperwork erroneously named the baby’s mother as another woman — and that the person listed has a criminal record, according to reports.

The documents also referred to Rodney Jackson as the baby’s “alleged father.”

“Instantly, I felt like they had stolen my baby as I had had a home birth, and they were trying to say my baby belonged to this other woman,” Temecia Jackson said Thursday during a news conference.

“We’ve been treated like criminals — and that’s far from the truth. This is a nightmare I wouldn’t wish on anyone,” her husband Rodney added.

“They removed my newborn baby from my arms and handed me paperwork,” Jackson told the Fort Worth Star-Telegram in an email. “I went to the police department and filed a police report that my child was

Texas couple say CPS officials took infant in dispute over jaundice

The Jacksons also claim that when officials arrived to their home on March 28 to take their child, the paperwork erroneously named the baby’s mother as another woman.

nypost.com

 

[Sugar Cookie]

This is so damn scary.

I know all the facts are not out but CPS everywhere seems to find no neglect where children are actually being abused. I could see them going the other way and being over zealous here.

 

[BuffettGirl]

Niece #3 was legit school bus yellow, when a pediatric nurse stopped her Mom at morning drop off for niece #2's kindergarten and forced her to take #3 to the pediatric ER at Doernbecher Children's Hospital. She was in the NICU for almost a week. The hospital had sent them home two days earlier from her birth. Scary times! She'll be 21 in May.

 

[GoneWest]

Idk, parents refused to follow medical advice. Her levels were deemed dangerously high and could have led to brain damage. I think medical removal was necessary.

 

[Sugar Cookie]

@

Idk, parents refused to follow medical advice. Her levels were deemed dangerously high and could have led to brain damage. I think medical removal was necessary.

I reread the artcle and agree that the baby's removal was the right way to go. Even if they attempted to provide the child with the light therapy at home anything could have gone wrong.

Mila’s bilirubin level was dangerously high at 21.7, according to the letter from Dr. Anand Bhatt obtained by WFAA that recommended Mila be taken from her parents.

“At a bilirubin over 20, a baby risks brain damage, because the bilirubin can cross the blood-brain barrier,” the doctor wrote.

In the letter, Bhatt said he repeatedly tried to reach the parents and alerted Child Protective Services when he couldn’t get a response from the family.

The Jacksons have since visited their baby in the hospital and are expected in court on April 20.

Texas couple say CPS officials took infant in dispute over jaundice

The Jacksons also claim that when officials arrived to their home on March 28 to take their child, the paperwork erroneously named the baby’s mother as another woman.

nypost.com

 

[Kitsune Faye]

Idk, parents refused to follow medical advice. Her levels were deemed dangerously high and could have led to brain damage. I think medical removal was necessary.

I agree. Jacob had jaundice, and Vitamin D and pooping got it all out.

 

[GoneWest]

@

I reread the artcle and agree that the baby's removal was the right way to go. Even if they attempted to provide the child with the light therapy at home anything could have gone wrong.

Texas couple say CPS officials took infant in dispute over jaundice

The Jacksons also claim that when officials arrived to their home on March 28 to take their child, the paperwork erroneously named the baby’s mother as another woman.

nypost.com

They also refused entrance to local police and CPS for a wellness check. That alone is fishy because it should have been easy enough to show them how they were treating the baby at home and I’m guessing things may not have escalated to the baby’s removal. Now all these people are protesting at CPS office, but I say fuck them. Bet they’d be protesting CPS and not the parents if the baby died or ended up with brain damage.

 

[Sugar Cookie]

Sarita Burrell, director of programs for The Afiya Center, said the Jacksons' midwife reached out to the nonprofit for help in getting Mila back in their custody.

Burrell said this is no isolated case among Black families.

"Families should have the options to birth the way that they want to, seek the type of medical care for their kids that they want, and to simply just raise their kids in the way in which they best see fit," she said. "And any restrictions of that is just simply a violation of our fundamental rights.”

In fact, a 2017 study published in the American Journal of Public Health found that more than half of all Black children experience some form of CPS investigation by age 18.

The affidavit used to support Mila's removal from the home also had the wrong parents' names on it, according to a KERA News review. A spokesperson with DFPS said the mistake has since been corrected.

“It is always our goal to reunite children with their families,” the spokesperson, Tiffani Butler, wrote in an email to KERA News. “It is up to the court to decide when that will happen.”

The criminal and CPS history of a woman incorrectly listed as the child’s mother was also used in the affidavit to argue for Mila’s removal.

Protestors rallied around the Jacksons after they exited the Dallas DFPS building Thursday. Temecia Jackson, holding back tears, did not address the crowd. But her husband Rodney told supporters the journey is far from over.

"It's a lot of other babies that's going through this. Whether they're white, Black or brown, the color don't even matter," Jackson said. "It's too many kids that's going through this system that's just being stripped away from good families."

‘Bring Mila home’: Supporters rally for North Texas parents whose baby was taken after a hospital visit

Temecia and Rodney Jackson say their newborn daughter Mila was wrongfully taken into Child Protective Services custody days after she was born. Local reproductive rights activists are demanding Mila's return.

www.keranews.org

 

[Sugar Cookie]

A Texas couple has been reunited with their newborn nearly a month after child protective services removed the infant from their care.

The situation began with a dispute over treatment for jaundice that quickly turned into a controversy, drawing national attention.

After being removed from her home, baby Mila was in CPS custody for 22 days with her parents allowed to see her once a week.

A court hearing was scheduled for Thursday afternoon, but a CPS spokesperson said a recommendation was made for a dismissal of the case to the assistant district attorney.

And baby Mila has now been returned to her parents.

Emma Roth, a Pregnancy Justice staff attorney, says the team is relieved that the Jackson family is reunited but it doesn’t undo the harm.

Roth alleges that the family’s ordeal shows the trauma of the hospital-to-CPS pipeline and is something that terrorizes Black families and something that should never happen.

A spokesperson for CPS did not immediately respond to such allegations.

As for what’s next?

The family’s legal team says they won’t get justice until everyone involved in removing Mila from her parents is held accountable.

CPS returns baby to parents after nearly a month-long dispute over jaundice treatment

A couple has been reunited with their newborn nearly a month after child protective services removed the infant from their care.

www.wbrc.com