The evil of mandated reporting

Here is a CPS incident in the news:

She and her husband were suspected of child abuse. The daycare center had called CPS to report a bruise on the baby’s chest.

In a sane world, if a daycare attendant wondered about a mark on a child’s chest, she might pick up the phone and call the parent, but that’s not the world we live in. The person at the daycare center really had no option but to call CPS. After all, she didn’t want to lose her job. ...

“The sheriff told us that he thought the birthmark looked like a handprint.” ...

Meanwhile, Skenazy makes the obvious and responsible point that, the mere fact that we have mandatory reporting doesn’t mean the adults in charge of the situation must suspend their adult common sense or their ability to judge the reality of what’s been reported.

These stories illustrate the fact that we must kill off the notion that overreacting to nearly non-existent threats is prudent. Clearly, the daycare provider had been trained, just like the TSA, to treat anything the least bit suspicious as incredibly, overwhelmingly suspicious. Overkill is the government MO. It shouldn’t be. ...

“I would rather see 1 million reports that end up not being an issue than see even one go unreported and lead to serious injury or the death of a child.”

(I mixed up the quotes. Check the source to see who said what.)

The evil of mandatory reporting is understated here.

You may think that the day care worker should have just called the mom for an explanation of the birthmark, and then dropped the matter. Unfortunately, that is illegal.

I once heard of a physician who are was prosecuted for consulting an expert medical professor over whether a symptom was evidence of abuse.

The law requires child professionals to report all suspicions. If he was suspicious enuf to make a phone call, then reporting to CPS is required. The child care worker needs to look the other way and not have any suspicions, or keep calling CPS with accusations that are probably trivial or easily explained.

So these problems are not solved by ppl being reasonable. The only solution is to abolish mandatory reporting of suspicions.

No such fix is likely. The dopey women who work in this field say crazy things like a million false reports being better than some potential real problem going unreported. There is no reasoning with such ppl.

Judicial reformer to be sentenced

I don't know anything about this, but a fellow angry parent sends:

On Tuesday, August 16, 2016 Commission on Judicial Performance reform activist Joe Sweeney will be handcuffed and taken into custody from the courtroom, and on the order of Contra Costa County Judge Bruce Mills.

The place is Department 29 of Contra Costa County Superior Court at 725 Court Street, Martinez CA 94553. The time is 8:30 a.m. This is the Wakefield Taylor Courthouse.

Sweeney will be jailed for publishing a blog documenting institutionalized corruption in the Contra Costa County Family Court system.

This event is to encourage the public to attend the hearing and witness the arrest. The ultimate goal is that the witnesses will later testify at the final CJP prosecution of Judge Bruce Mills.

Judge Mills has been disciplined by the CJP FIVE times, more than any other judge in the state who has not been removed from the bench. It is a virtual certainty that Mills will finally be stripped of his black robe for his misconduct in the Sweeney contempt case.

The circumstances suggest that Sweeney also is being punished for his advocacy to expose judicial corruption and reform the CJP. Even Joe's court-appointed criminal attorney, a veteran criminal and family law lawyer, says he has never seen anything like this.

On Tuesday, August 16, Judge Bruce Mills intends to order that Joe be jailed for 25 days in connection with a trumped up contempt of court proceeding.

Judge Mills is one of the most corrupt judges in California, and, again, has been prosecuted and disciplined by the CJP FIVE times. No other judge in the state has been disciplined as many times and remained on the bench.
Mills has connections at, and has been protected by the CJP for over 10 years. Judge Mills is in effect acting as the hatchet man for the Judicial Branch, and returning a favor to the CJP.

This event is to support, and witness the courtroom arrest of CJP reform advocate Joe Sweeney. We are confident that this extra-judicial act by Judge Bruce Mills will result in the final CJP prosecution and removal of Mills by the CJP.

If you cannot attend, but still want to help, in the next 24 hours we will be posting other ways to participate. This situation is evolving rapidly and we are trying to keep up.

She also sends links to Change.org and Facebook.

Judicial commission holds hearing

A fellow angry parent sends this:

CJE [Center for Judicial Excellence] is working in coalition to audit and reform the California Commission on Judicial Performance (CJP), a powerful state agency that is responsible for disciplining our state’s nearly 2,000 judges.

For 20 years, the Commission admits that less than 2% of all complaints filed by average California litigants or their family and friends have resulted in the discipline of our state’s judges. This is an appalling and concerning statistic that proves the need for reforms of our judicial oversight agency, which was created in 1961 in large part to “protect the public.” We are committed to bringing sunshine into a secretive agency that operates in the dark, and without any meaningful checks or balances.

We are pleased to announce that we expect our audit request to be heard at the JLAC Hearing on August 10, 2016 in Sacramento (the Joint Legislative Audit Committee).

I am surprised that 2% of complaints result in discipline to a judge. That is much higher than I would have expected.

If I were running the commission, I would probably decide that most of the judges need to be displined.

Anyway, I post this in case anywants to attend this hearing, or to send a supporting message.