Disclosure: To protect the identity of the father and children, names and photos have been changed.
A Texas man who lost his wife in 2020 has been dealing with another loss for almost a year now. The Texas Department of Family and Protective Services took custody of his 4 children, and despite false promises, they have repeatedly refused to allow the kids to return home.
Ft. Bend County, TX- John Doe of Ft. Bend County, Texas is a proud father of 4. Like the majority of us, he made a lot of mistakes during his younger years, but he cleaned up his act and turned his life around. Doe became a truck driver, he supported his family, he’s a great father, and he was happily married to his wife of 11 years.
Shortly after the couple’s fourth child was born, Doe’s wife passed away, leaving him to care for his 4 children on his own. It was tough for John to raise his children while grieving the loss of his wife, but he took pride in fatherhood and keeping his wife’s memory alive with his children. Doe was in the process of purchasing a home so that his family could start over fresh, and his children would have their own home with a backyard to play in.
According to Doe, family members were upset that he wanted to raise his children after his wife passed away, so they called CPS on him. Doe says that he cooperated with cps investigators, agreed to drug testing, and the case was closed with no findings of abuse or neglect.
Grief began taking a toll on Doe and he started self-medicating. After a weekend of partying that ended in an occurrence of drug use while his children were visiting family, Doe says that he sought help from a local hospital. According to him, his request for assistance led to the hospital calling child protective services on the father of four. Doe says not long after that another report was made to child protective services by his angry family members. As a result, last May all four of his children were taken away from him. The children have yet to be returned, he added.
One of the allegations against Doe was that his 7-year-old child was walking to school on her own. While it may be questionable in certain situations depending on the maturity level of the child and distance of the school, it’s not illegal. In fact, under the “Every Student Succeeds Act,” parents have the legal right to allow their children to walk to school.
Additionally, sources say that Doe’s daughter was never left alone, she was supposed to have been with her older sibling. However, someone allegedly picked up the older sibling and left the young girl by herself, important information that was never documented in CPS or court records.
Doe admitted to using substances on the occasion to self-medicate when his children were gone. Something that millions of Americans do. He admitted that he was having a hard time dealing with the loss of his wife, and he was more than willing to get help. Doe successfully completed everything that CPS required of him. That didn’t appear to be good enough for the Texas Department of Family and Protective Services.
A few weeks ago Doe’s attorney filed for a review in court so that the children could return home with their father. DFPS put up a set of roadblocks. This time by accusing Doe of somehow tampering with the results of his drug tests.
According to him, he has passed more than 25 drug tests, including drug testing from a provider that works directly with CPS and that still isn’t good enough. He believes that he’s been given a life sentence of being discriminated against because he is a black father that wants to raise his children.
The state of Texas is funneling nearly $3k a month between child support from the father and social security funds from the deceased mother. That doesn’t include the incentives the state may have received for removing the children. They garnished almost all of this man’s paycheck, he can barely afford to eat. I have no doubt that it is intentional. The state wants to help this father fail so that they can keep his kids in the system and add them to the list of statistics. Jenifer Knighton BS, LCDCI, CART
What are your thoughts? Do you think Doe has received a life sentence just because he is a black father trying to raise his four kids? Was it justified for him to lose his children rather than being given help?
Doe’s attorney declined to comment. This is a developing story, check back later for updates.
# child protective services# CPS corruption# DFPS# grieving father# black fathers
This is Jenifer Knighton please let me know how can, I help this black father get his children back so sick of white racist organizations ruining black families and destroying them entirely!
Are you still interested in helping this family?
My children were taken from me for false allegations they said I was homeless but was not now this was in 2015 and my children are grown and I lost my oldest son in October of 2021 he was 21 but we had many conversations about how cps took them just because they could and I never had a chance to fight for them because south Carolina dss had a second hearing without notifying me took my kids out of class to question them without my knowledge and kids are are being snatched by case workers ,that have no knowledge of what being a mother is about dss are kidnappers of any race really and to me God gave us the blessing to have children who are they to think they have a right to take that away