UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT

EASTERN DISTRICT OF MICHIGAN

SOUTHERN DIVISION

DWAYNE B., by his next friend, John

Stempfle, et. al., Case No. 06-13548

Plaintiffs, Honorable Nancy G. Edmunds

v.

Gretchen Whitmer, in her official capacity as

Governor of the State of Michigan, et. al.,

Defendants.
___________________________________/

NOTICE TO THE COURT

My name is Stephanie Jezowski and I am sending this notice in order to notify the court of information
that is relevant to the case and any progress that the Michigan Department of Health and Human
Services (hereon, MDHHS) and Child Protective Services (hereon, CPS) may be able to make. For
several years now, I have been working with families and have been investigating what is going on
within Child Welfare; some of what I have learned has been through contacts that I never thought I
would make.

In more than a decade, the reality of what MDHHS and CPS have been able to claim to accomplish, the
reality is far worse than Judge Edmunds' assessment of disappointing. I have made both parties aware
of some of this information in the past and it would seem that neither see it as important enough to
address in this case; thus the reason for my notice. To be absolutely frank, Child Welfare has been
decimated by this lawsuit and because of laws in place my hands are tied and I am relegated to
describing what I am seeing rather than showing the court. I have done my best to summarize what I
am seeing, but without being able to provide documentation and the extent of the information I have
become aware of, this has become considerably longer than I had planned.

While I understand the reason for the case and the fact that the need for ways to measure improvement,
I can say they are not representing the health of Child Welfare here. Not even close. The fact that
MiSACWIS is being used to generate numbers and reports and is now the center of attention because
of its issues should call everything into question. The true health of systems like Child Welfare and
Education cannot be measured accurately with numbers alone. True health is measured by SEEING
SUCCESS and that is not what is happening here. I would put to the court that there has been no
evidence entered that gives real examples of what the successes have been. In my best assessment, this
is because the reality is that Child Welfare has been decimated and there is little good to show for what
has come from this lawsuit. Numbers showing lower caseloads don't show how effective workers
actually are. MDHHS' own reports on child abuse or neglect while in care can't be trusted as we have
seen and are also no real measure of how well things are going. Examples of HOW workers are

1
bringing successful closure and what percentage of cases end in speedy and successful reunification are
measures of success. Adding more workers and shortchanging training is not a measure of success, it is
a recipe for disaster as we shall see.

ONE RESULT OF LAWSUIT: MORE CHILDREN DYING

Let me take a moment to inform the court of the most recent examples of where Child Welfare in
Michigan stands – the deaths of 6 children within the last year with 5 in the first 6 months of this year
alone along with two parents. The courts are complicit in all of this as ultimately they make some of
the most critical decisions. When I state CPS, in this case I mean from field workers up through
Management. Let us also not forget the over 100 child deaths that MDDHHS failed to turn over to the
Office of Children's Ombudsman (hereon, OCO) for investigation. These factors alone should be
sending up red flags for everyone. However, these do not seem to fit into any category of metrics being
used. Again, current metrics have failed to show the actual health of Child Welfare.

From what can be gathered from the reports on the deaths, most seemed to involve children in
situations where mental health was a concern for at least two of the parents, including the most recent
case where a 5 year old was shot and killed by her mother who subsequently killed herself, the father
states that he had warned CPS and the courts. He also informed them that the mother had lost previous
children because of her Mental Health and this innocent child still died. Michigan CPS and Foster Care
workers seem to have inadequate, if any, training in dealing with mental health issues. I can only
deduct that this comes from the Settlement Agreement section that allows for field workers to receive a
mere 270 hours of training instead of being trained social workers. This has been one of the larger
problems that the Settlement Agreement has caused and no one seems to be looking at this fact.
Instead, the focus continues to be caseload. Caseload doesn't entirely affect a worker's ability to do
their job; I acknowledge that it can but there are likely to be fewer removals and cases when workers
are licensed social workers I would argue. There also appears to be little follow up with placements to
keep an eye on the children in care and in homes where alarms are being sounded.

The Lansing State Journal had an article on child deaths in Michigan in May of 2018 increasing despite
this lawsuit. Workers are being shown in investigations by the OCO to only have done everything right
in 6% of the child death cases they investigated between 2016-2018. It is also mentioned in this report
that workers seem to see that supervisors are more concerned with getting out from under this lawsuit
that giving kids what they really need. As you will see, this was confirmed in a comment by a worker
that I came by independent of this article.

Herman McCall, the most recent executive director of Michigan's Child Welfare Programs to leave, is
quoted as saying, “Since coming under federal court oversight in 2008, MDHHS has taken numerous
measures designed to increase safety and well-being....and deliver effective services to achieve positive
outcomes for children and families.” Well, increased deaths, workers getting it right 6% of the time in
those deaths and add in information that is yet to come doesn't look like success; nor does a 25% rate of
requesting Termination of Parental Rights in the last data set I saw from the State Court Administrator's
Office that was from 2017. I want everyne reading this to think of your own family and three others
that you know. I would love to know how many people believe that one of those families is so awful
that they deserve to lose their children......FOREVER. Now, the answer to that would be that very, very
few may say that even one deserves to lose them forever. Why does that not hold true in Child
Welfare? And how about the fact that between 60-80% of sex trafficking victims come from, or had

2
experience in, Foster Care? One of these groups was the National Center for Missing and Exploited
Children and their estimate was at the higher end of these percentages.

There is now a report that a 6 year old died a year ago and weighed only half of what they should have
after being removed from an abusive father and placed with an aunt. While family placement is ideal,
it absolutely does not negate continued supervision of any child even if there is a guardianship in place.
And did the school fail this child as well not reporting the weight loss or did CPS drop the ball in
supervision or investigation? Why did it take a year for this to come to light and charges filed?

CPS also had contact with a mother and child three days before they went missing about a year ago,
allegedly because of Domestic Violence. The bodies of those two were just recently found in the
backyard of the house next door and the former boyfriend is being looked at with interest. Could CPS
have saved these two? We may never know.

IT AND DATA ISSUES

Apparently it has been decided that MiSACWIS will be replaced and it will take up to 5 years to do so.
Quite frankly, this is not acceptable. Why MDHHS is able to present their plan without anyone from
outside state operations coming to the table to state their recommendations and estimations? The last
implementation was a disaster, allegedly because the state chose not to heed warnings that it was not
going to work. The court doesn't seem to know about that or the fact that on top of between 200-300
cases didn't transfer properly and kids were left without worker assignments for an unknown period of
time. I don't think it knows, either, that there was never an audit to see how many kids were just
dropped in the transfer so for all anyone knows, they may have been lost to the wind. How can upper
management not ask this question when they know of the other issues. Some cases transferred 11
times. Not all data transferred or didn't transfer properly. Security is an issue with MiSACWIS
because rumor has it far too many people have access to it and there was already an issue with workers
having improper access levels. And what about the information that came to me that files are getting
changed on a regular basis and to possibly an alarming degree?

Keeping all of that in mind, how can anyone say for sure that MDHHS hasn't been juggling caseloads
with or without the assistance of supervisors at the local level? Are they looking at reports of the
history of cases that show when things were changed? It is also my understanding that in the
investigation, workers may have been interviewed with their supervisors present; how can anyone
believe this is going to end with honest responses?

The reality of this lawsuit now becomes the fact that NO ONE can possibly know what the real status
of Child Welfare in Michigan is because MDHHS has worked so hard to keep prying eyes out and to
make sure data is appearing as it should. Even the Michigan Auditor General's Office has had trouble
getting access to files for their Audits and MDHHS is coming up with what seems like every argument
in the book to keep them from files. The last Audit, which the Court should request and admit into
evidence, was pretty concerning to put it mildly. The next one is on Adoption and I expect that it will
be as bad, if not worse. Why is the audit not being used as evidence of success within the system to
corroborate what the court is being told? Is the court aware that MDHHS has been sued TWICE for
information they are obligated to release when asked by the parties that were asking?

3
UNINTENDED CONSEQUENCES

At a more recent hearing, there was concern about the number of reports about Maltreatment in Care
and how many calls there have been. It ended up MDHHS grossly understated the number based upon
the findings of Public Catalyst. I can tell you from working with parents for a number of years, I have
yet to come across a single one who has been told that if they have concerns about the treatment of
their children in care to call Central Intake. Based upon the reports I get from parents and see
complaints of online, the number of reports made are likely tiny in comparison to what they actually
would be if workers told parents to call. Parents actually fear calling because they have the rightful
impression that workers can and do retaliate as will foster parents; sadly it is far too often that the
children are the target of this retaliation.

This court MUST mandate that workers inform parents in writing that if they have ANY concerns about
care in a Foster Home that they are to call Central Intake and report it. There should also be a backup
system in place where families can email their complaints and any photos to a select person who may
then gather basic information to share with the court to see how the numbers reported actually match
up with what they are told. It needs to be someone independent of the two parties involved.
Whomever takes over this duty must be independent of the Department and Public Catalyst should also
follow up with their own audit of what MDHHS is reporting vs. what records show.

In addition, the Department is so focused on getting out from under this lawsuit that they are not
concerned with worker qualifications to make the system better. I saw comments from one Foster
Worker who was interviewing for a CPS Investigator position and the only thing that the Supervisors
were concerned with was “what were they going to do to help get them out from under this Lawsuit.”
They had NO interest in what accomplishments they had made in other cases. This is the same thing
that the Lansing State Journal stated that they were hearing in their report on the increase in child
deaths. I have no reason to believe the same person commented for the article and so it would seem we
have two different accounts of this mentality.

Other information I received suggests that someone within MDHHS has seen evidence of records being
altered, seemingly to a large degree, on a regular basis. New evidence is emerging that this is, sadly,
very true. It even includes where children are showing up as being placed in contrast to where they are
ACTUALLY placed. Yes, there is a huge and dangerous discrepancy.

So now we have caseload issues that have been raised, information that the Department is likely
manipulating files to an unknown degree and this includes case files all while they hide behind claims
of privacy for the kids and we have a Department that absolutely cannot be trusted in what they say nor
have any faith that data is correct.

It would appear that while the intentions of those filing the lawsuit may have been good, their goals and
methods are flawed and misguided. More caseworkers isn't the answer, better trained workers are.
More undertrained workers means more removals, especially when they have no proper or formal
training, and thus starts a vicious cycle of needing more workers to spread caseload that leads to more
removals leading to the need for more workers and so it goes on. All that requires more money so
money is not the core issue here. It would seem that adequate acknowledgment of this by Children's
Rights has not been presented and the Court cannot properly address this because they aren't given all
the info necessary to oversee this case and is not being sought or utilized. Perhaps Children's Rights

4
doesn't truly understand the issues at hand and how best to resolve them. No matter what the situation
is, far more children are being harmed and being put at risk because of this lawsuit. As a result, the
Court must consider the possibility of taking this case back to square one with a plan to do things very
differently, more effectively and far more expediently because as the system stands, it is putting
children at far greater risk. I can get the Court the name of someone who would make a wonderful
expert witness in this case to help guide everyone in what truly needs to be done and can also explain
why.

I would have asked both parties to be able to file an Amicus Brief but because of the information I am
sharing, I do not see that either party would want this information in the record.

COMPLICATION IN REFORM

Let me address the issue of Courts in Michigan being complicit in the many problems that now
compose Child Welfare. It seems that Ex Parte Orders for removal are the norm instead of holding
hearings as is compliant with Due Process when there isn't a true emergency. Judges almost always err
on the side of CPS except when they shouldn't. One worker recently commented that there was a
particular case where they recommended the child stay in care and the judge ignored their warning and
the child was placed back in care less than 3 months later. Not only that, but workers are allowed to
say whatever they want on a petition. This same worker also complained that the organization that they
worked for focused far more on adoption and catering to Foster Parents than they were working toward
reunification. They stated that State Workers tended to do a bit more for reunification. Why are these
outside agencies pushing for adoption? Money, plain and simple. They also stated that the goal going
into cases for most of their coworkers was removal.

In other cases, workers recommend children go home and the judge ignores it. There seems to be a
complete lack of consistency and not enough training for judges to make appropriate decisions and they
seem to do whatever they want because there is NO meaningful accountability in this state for them.
They can ignore Federal Requirements for cases and even laws and prior decisions by higher courts up
to, and including, illegal Termination of Parental Rights and no one will correct these situations.

We must also consider the REQUIREMENT that for kids that qualify for Federal Funding, the courts
MUST find that the child needs to be removed with the first petition or they cannot get Federal Funding
for that child with subsequent petitions in that case. So whether a judge believes that a child should be
removed or not, they are pressured to sign the removal order so that the State doesn't lose out on
funding. And why is this funding so important? Very few understand that a large part of the funding
for Departments comes from Federal Funds. They are issued on a per child basis and therefore, if a
consistent number of children aren't in care then budgets will have to be cut and therefore people will
lose their jobs.

On the topic of Kinship Care since it has been mentioned; while State law mandates it be tried, there is
no financial incentive at the Federal level to place kids with families and so workers are making what
may seem like an effort to place kids with family, in reality the placement rarely happens. That is
likely because, as I just mentioned, for the time being there is no money to be had for Kinship
Placement. However, with the Family First Act that was set to become part of Child Welfare this fall
that would have provided for more services to keep kids at home and to pay for Kinship care, Michigan
has instead has asked for a waiver to implement this section of law until October of 2021.

5
EXAMPLES OF MDHHS ACTIONS:

Currently there is a Grandmother fighting for her Grandson and is in a last ditch attempt to stop an
adoption to strangers. Workers were made aware that the parents of the taken child were from out of
state and did little to accommodate this barrier to reunification, to my understanding, and eventually
parental rights were Terminated even though Reasonable Efforts were not necessarily made by the
state. Meanwhile, the Grandmother jumped through every hoop to get placement of the child and even
after being given a date for having the Grandchild placed with her, workers and the Foster Parents
came up with the child was medically fragile and it it would be detrimental to the child. Well, to date
no documentation has been produced to back up these claims and the Grandmother wasn't even given
the chance to prove that she was able to take care of the child. In addition, she is a social worker in
New York. Only a worker's claims, claims of a couple desperate for children and a decision by the
head of the Michigan Children's Institute (hereon, MCI) that almost always backs up what a worker
states which is seemingly not often in the real best interest of the children. What the MCI is allowing
to happen and how many “representatives” they have that can sign off on adoptions is a topic for
another time. Let's summarize it as there are too many “representatives” and far too little oversight
from what I can see.

In another case, a mother was murdered and the Grandmother jumped in her car and drove from West
Virginia and asked for placement immediately. Instead of following Rule 7 and giving them to her in
72 hours if she passed a background check, the children were thrust into Foster Care and separated.
She didn't get them until 7 months later and even then when the Department was responsible for
transportation costs, they refused to reimburse the Grandmother. In addition, when Grandma realized
at least one of the children qualified for a higher level of care, the worker told Grandma without seeing
the situation that if she pursued this that the judge would not allow her to adopt the children. The
outcome? Grandma was forced to become a licensed foster home because of this lawsuit before being
allowed to adopt them a year later. These children already had endured trauma both with the loss of
both parents, but also due to abuse in the foster homes and yet had to wait longer to be free of
MDHHS. This also meant that she was denied some of the benefits and increased payments that would
have gone to getting the kids the help they needed. The Workers promised her some $15,000 in back
pay for childcare and other things and since the adoption has gone through, have refused to pay what
she is owed.

Grandma was forced to quit her job to care for the children because of the trauma and the higher
payments would have meant that she could at least get occasional respite care but as it stands, she is
doing it alone without a break. Therapy has helped two of the children some, but it has been nowhere
near enough and they have a LONG way to go. The West Virgina worker that was doing the home
study and licensing was absolutely appalled at the treatment this Grandmother was receiving.
Michigan could also have been paying for her to be their childcare but has refused to do so because the
adoption is now finalized and they say they don't have to.

Over and over the state denies Kinship placement for the smallest of reasons, even if they have to make
one up. The biggest one is that the child has allegedly bonded with the foster parent already. That is
the doing of the state and is NO EXCUSE for not placing a child with family. Familiar placement has
been shown to be safer for children in almost every case. The recent death of a child in kinship care is

6
one of the exceptions and speaks more to the failure to properly supervise a child in a placement. I also
have to question if there was a school that the child attended that failed to report being so underweight
or not or if there was another mandated reporter who failed to report.

A few brief examples of “Reasonable Efforts” by workers in some other cases:

- Father is incarcerated, not given the chance to participate in a safety plan before he gets out of jail
when it wouldn't be an unreasonable wait for him to get out and rights are terminated. This comes after
a ruling in another case that would favor him in this situation and yet workers and court seemingly
didn't pay attention to the ruling. Courts and Workers seem to regularly ignore higher court decisions
without penalty. This is not the only case that this has happened in and will not be the last.

- A psychological evaluator tells CPS that a parent needs some preparatory therapy so that they can
make the most of more traditional therapy to succeed and CPS forces them straight into therapy without
the prep work and then claims parent failed to make progress because of THEIR failure and terminates
rights.

- Mother is making excellent progress in therapy and CPS singlehandedly decides it isn't good enough
and terminates rights even though reports were favorable and indicated return of the children would be
no issue.

- Teenager removed when a Children's Hospital cannot determine the cause of the symptoms they are
exhibiting. The hospital misses clues in test results, or may even have willfully ignored them, and the
child is sent to a Juvenile Detention center “because nowhere else can handle her medical needs.”
Conditions there are horrifying and she doesn't even get an education while there. Meanwhile, her
mother was forced out of the home and due to finances, mom slept in her vehicle in the driveway all
winter long. After the case was done, they went to see another doctor who almost immediately
diagnosed the problem and the now young woman is working toward a pilot license. However,
because of this case, she has been labeled as having mental health issues because the reporting hospital
claimed that much of what she was experiencing was in her head when in reality it was their utter
failure to see a relatively simple diagnosis in front of them.

- CPS removes children based on allegations of physical abuse even when their expert states that there
is no way to say that the child's injures were caused by abuse considering an auto accident that
occurred prior to the allegations. Judge eventually tells CPS they had no right to bring the case nor
petition to remove the children and tells them that they are in big trouble and hints that they expect the
case to be dismissed. CPS takes the hint and dismisses the case but the damage has been done. The
family is now looking to file a lawsuit.

- Workers have reused efforts from past cases to be the sole efforts to prevent removal in a new case.
Often in subsequent removals, if they become necessary, they don't make any effort and say they did
using the past efforts. They have even been seen to claim they provided a service that they clearly had
no way of providing and will claim they provided a service that was an effort purely of a parent's own
undertaking.

- Workers use homeschooling as one of the reasons to remove kids and because they are uneducated in
the Homeschool laws, state that they don't see evidence of it being done or that the family isn't using an

7
approved/accredited curriculum. There is no state approved or accredited curriculum. They rarely, if
ever, prove that the homeschooling has actually been detrimental to the children and make all sorts of
claims that they are allegedly behind and during trials, there is no proof offered except from those that
have no firsthand knowledge of the situation.

- Workers claim no medical care is being had for a medical condition without investigating anything
and workers are free to state that a parent discontinued care even when it can be proven otherwise.
They just have no requirement of proof and the courts take no issue with this. They also manipulate
through emotion – in one case a worker cried foul because a mother had an accidental homebirth by
herself and the worker claimed that it was a huge deal that the mother didn't have the child seen until 8
hours later. This was the mother's fifth child AND a friend who is a veteran Labor & Delivery nurse
had provided a statement that the mother had contact with her immediately after birth and they went
over some basic observations and measures and the child was fine. The worker also claimed there was
no prenatal care, which even if there hadn't been is not illegal, when there was a file in an office from
prenatal care for all five children through the same provider. Mother was not shown to have ignored
any medical recommendation made to her.

ONE LITTLE COUNTY

Let's take some time to take a look at how one little county in Michigan and just some of what has
happened there over the last decade or so. None of the safeties that are supposed to catch and correct
problems have kicked in and so this county has continued to do as they please. The county is Arenac
and is located across from the thumb in the mitten. It has a population of just under 15,000 people and
has a high rate of people on SSI, SSD, Medicaid and Food Stamps. However, one would not know
unless they lived there as somehow numbers reported doesn't seem to add up when you talk to
residents.

In 2004, a family had their children removed. Caseworkers reported that there had been an extreme
number of complaints on the family that the family seemed unaware of. In short, parental rights were
Terminated and the children were adopted out. Later, one of the children was stabbed by another child
in the home and a subsequent investigation by Midland Police uncovered that there was NO record of
this family ever being a licensed foster home and no clear trail as to how the children got placed with
the family. Even after the Termination, somehow the children were named in the Divorce Decree from
2006 involving the parents when they had not been with them and parental rights had already been
Terminated. There is another somewhat similar occurrence which I will get to shortly.

The court has issued at least two Removal Orders (same judge, different cases) with the names and
birth dates of children to be removed missing; on both; one was also missing the address of the home
granting permission to enter and yet workers and police entered the home without permission of the
parents or the Court. In one of these two filings, this information was added in with a typewriter after
the order had been filed, and in the other at least three versions of the same Removal Petition exist with
only one being the one originally filed. The judge excused one of these two as improbable and not an
issue. Warrants cannot be deemed valid in this state and so it stands to reason that these removal orders
were also invalid and yet nothing came of it.

In another case, children were removed without a proper investigation and an illegal search done of the
home. The worker tried to claim the Removal Order gave them the right to search the home when no

8
search was specifically permitted by the order and when no additional order was produced. The order
only permitted entry to remove the children – they were outside the home and the worker testified to
that and the fact that parents had clothes and related items ready outside the home when they returned
with the order. Therefore, there was NO reason to enter the home. In a Police Report, one of the
Deputies stated that they were told to search when he wasn't even there, to the best of our knowledge,
when the Judge signed the order.

Then the Department asked for Termination in an additional petition 5 days later without having any of
the legal grounds to do so and using a Supplemental Petition rather than a required Amended Petition
as the case had not yet been Adjudicated. Somehow, lawyers did not pick up on this fact and thus did
not argue it. In addition, the police had interrogated one of the children for at least an hour without a
parent present nor an attorney. This is illegal as the child was 9 at the time, had committed no crime,
and had no ability to know how to properly handle the situation and instead, the child told multiple lies
because of a deep rooted distrust and fear of police due to a prior unnecessary removal where the
worker lied on the petition at the behest of his Supervisor.

The mother in this matter ended up in contact with the OCO, Tobin Miller specifically, who agreed that
the Termination request was illegal given some basic info including the fact there had been a prior
removal. He wrote to the Department and they disagreed and went ahead with the Termination.
Meanwhile, the parents were threatened by the judge through a lawyer to take a plea deal or they would
have the book thrown at them, so to speak. The parents were charged criminally, but the evidence that
was going to be used was illegally obtained and so the case would have been dismissed. No lawyer
asked the judge to recuse himself as they should have after the judge threatened the parents into taking
a plea deal through a lawyer and so the Termination went through. The OCO has the ability, and I
would argue the responsibility, to intervene when children's rights are being violated and they did
NOTHING other than ask the Department to answer for it.

The Department made NO efforts to keep the family together nor any to reunify the family. A service
plan was generated late (as evidenced by a licensing audit on the County) and only after one lawyer
remarked about there not being one in court and the family was NEVER given a chance to complete it.
As a matter of fact, the Workers refused to make sure that the second youngest child had or did receive
care after an eye injury that left the whole outside white of the eye red with blood. Mom asked for
follow up and she was told nothing. They were not informed of doctor visits and they were not
informed of Conferences for school. Thus they were denied information that they could have used in
their defense in the case and there was no order prohibiting them from either.
Two of the children told the parents, independently and the parents did not realize until after the trial,
that they were told the night of the removal that they were NEVER going home thus the case had
already been decided before it even saw a courtroom and there was no hope. This is not the first time
either – in another case, a child was told it would be at least a year and a half or longer before they
went home. I will discuss this case after I wrap up the current case being discussed.

The judge for BOTH the Criminal and Probate court cases was Judge Richard Vollbach. He allowed
evidence to be used that was not legally admissible, allowed trial to continue despite one of the lawyers
for the parents not getting ANY discovery. Also of note, the lawyers for the parents provided nothing
for a defense for the parents and Judge Vollbach at one point in the proceedings mentioned that he
didn't see a reason that a hearing had to be more than half a day. Now how can anyone believe that a
Termination hearing could be held in half a day and be worth anything let alone the day and a half that

9
it took? There was clearly a rush to what he deemed justice that was anything but. One must think that
this case had been ongoing for a period of time, I assure you it was not. It was approximately 2.5
months from removal to termination. For what the allegations were, this was an extreme overstepping
of boundaries set up by law.

Months after Parental Rights were Terminated, a stranger contacted the mother and notified her that
they knew they had not neglected or abused their children but that the home they were still in from
foster care WAS abusing and neglecting them. Mother made complaints to management in Lansing
and copied Media on the email and finally after a week and a half she received a text that the two
children had been removed with the assistance of Michigan State Police. However, the mother had
reported that two other children had been in the home that were also being abused and neglected (foster
children) in the home and that there was also a special needs adult that these people were also guardian
for that was being mistreated. Those three were left in the home.

10 months after Termination, the parents received notice they were getting Medicaid when they hadn't
applied for it. Then a month later they received a Redetermination form straight from Lansing and in
preprinted information on the back of the second page, it showed ALL of the children as being in their
household with only one being listed as their son still. This is similar to the first case mentioned and
will be addressed again. In the first case mentioned above, Judge Vollbach was then Assistant
Prosecutor Vollbach, and so we have a common thread now.

In speaking with someone who knows how the computer system works, this raises red flags and should
not be the case even though a delay of a few months is not uncommon. It would also seem that for at
least another year, that same child was showing up as being in their home as they were getting mail
from the state for him for some scholarship program. Since the Termination, the siblings have been
kept apart with three in one home of a childless couple, one being a Sheriff Deputy who was there for
the hearings and knew things weren't right and even told the father he had never seen anything like that
happen in his life and yet did nothing and continues to reap the financial benefits of the alleged
adoption in addition to an “instant family” not to mention evidence that has surfaced as to the
suitability and stability of the home should have been questioned. I say alleged because if the
Termination was illegal then the adoption can neither stand nor be legal. The oldest two have been
separated and it seems the workers aren't even telling families that the children even have siblings.

Workers made claims they knew to be false on the stand and it can be proven with their own
documents. They lied on the removal petition to take the children which can be proven by their own
documents, and they may have falsified records as communication with Lansing has it seeming that
they are looking at an entirely different case when Lansing was contacted by the mother. The
psychological evaluator even stated on the stand that he gave the client the diagnosis they needed.
Clients are the ones who pay for your services – that would be CPS – and so he colluded with them to
get Parental Rights terminated. The testimony of the evaluator was so bad that even the Guardian Ad
Litem asked that it be struck and Judge Vollbach denied the request. That was one of the key elements
he needed to try and justify the Termination since there was no substance abuse, or any other kind of
abuse, or any substantial claim of neglect. The parents also suspect a personal bias by the judge that
one parent had expressed to their lawyer and it was never brought up. Even when a worker testified on
the stand that one of the parents made a comment about the judge being biased and they would get the
removal order based on that alone, the judge never went on the record denying it.

10
The judge had to know the search was illegal and that he was not allowed to admit illegally obtained
evidence and yet he did. And so we have children that are being illegally kept from their parents and
the emotional abuse and trauma continues while the parents continue to fight to get the situation
remedied. How do I know so much about this case? Because it is my own. Since the Termination, it
has gotten back to me that Arenac CPS has told stories about us physically abusing the children and
that was the reason why we homeschooled (abuse was never mentioned in court) or in any document,
ever), that we did drugs (also not an issue raised), that we were planning on kidnapping our children
and running with them, and when we filed complaints on Judge Vollbach, he told people we had done
so and that it was to try and ruffle his feathers. That couldn't be further from the truth and so now we
have been slandered and they have defamed our character in an attempt to keep people from giving us
any reason to consider our plight. As a matter of fact, while we were attempting to pursue a Federal
lawsuit for rights violations, someone higher up saw fit to have the office intensively retrained in an
effort to be able to say that the problem had been addressed. I expect if they are confronted with all of
this, they will deny it all and will show altered records to try and justify what they have done to us.

Legislators and their staffers have been appalled and have given suggestions but their hands are tied
beyond that. Some have ignored it completely even though they acknowledge publicly that they have
known of issues in Child Welfare for years. Former Attorney General Schuette refused to address it.
Complaints to MDHHS staff in Lansing have been dismissed with comments that indicate either they
didn't actually review the case or were seeing different information and didn't even ask for a meeting
with me. I even told them Tobin Miller of the OCO made the determination it was illegal and reminded
them of his credentials which include being some sort of legal counsel for the Department AND being
one of the first to write the Judge's Benchbook for Child Protective Proceedings. No one will address
this injustice because as soon as they do and it is known, their house of privacy cards and wrongdoing
will fall hard and fast and their patterns of bad behavior across the state will come flooding into
Lansing and to legislators.

In yet another case, one of the blank orders I mentioned previously was used to cross county lines to
remove a child that was in no immediate threat of danger. There had been a report by the child to a
step-parent who then took them immediately to the doctor to have them do an exam and speak with the
child because past reports by the child's custodial parent had gotten ignored or were said to be
unfounded. The child named the abuser and it was no one in the home yet this blank order was used in
another county to remove the child when they were in a safe place. After this order was filed and used
to remove the child, as with the last case, a typewriter was used to add missing information. Not only
that, but there appear to be or have been, THREE different versions of the Removal Petition that have
existed at some point from filing to being addressed in court. Arenac had dismissed prior complaints as
efforts to get custody when there was some evidence of sexual abuse.

In this case, CPS was telling people that the parent was planning to take the child and run to Mexico.
They convinced the judge that the first forensic interview at an appropriate facility didn't need to be
seen and so it was not used to make an adjudication hearing so the family had to spend tens of
thousands of dollars to appeal and make Judge Vollbach review it as part of his decision. Meanwhile,
Arenac CPS had another interview done MONTHS later which is out of proper protocol. In this case, it
was also made known to one of the parties that the child was showing up in the custodial parent's home
when the reality was they had been in foster care for some time. The worker that gave them this
information was perplexed when they were told this and didn't want to discuss it further. And so we
have a third situation of the county having children in places that are either unknown to the system or

11
not where they are showing to be.

In this case, Arenac CPS NEVER gave or offered services and stated that the father had anger issues
when his own therapist stated very clearly he did not. They switched to a Guardianship out of the blue
at the last minute for no apparent reason. Then, about two years later out of the blue, the Guardian Ad
Litem states he is petitioning to end the Guardianship and return the child to the full care and custody
of the Father. A month or so later it happens. No rhyme or reason given. The child appears to have
been told that the Guardians adopted them and now that one is deceased, they are asking if their parent
will be adopting them back. To the knowledge of the parent, there was no Termination and Adoption.
In addition, MiSACWIS also appears to have the child as still living with the former guardians.

In another case, a child got acutely sick after parents told the worker at the removal he was going to be
taken to the doctor that evening and the worker never followed through. The child ended up needing a
nebulizer only after a parent DEMANDED the child be seen IMMEDIATELY for clear distress at about
2 months old at a visit a couple days after removal. The Department couldn't figure out how to pay for
the nebulizer, the store was closing and so the parents had to pay out of pocket. They were never
reimbursed by the Department or Medicaid. Then the foster parent was allowed to have said sick and
very vulnerable child out in public at the store they owned exposing them to all the public without any
repercussions from the state for endangering a child. They were also taking them to school functions
when they were this ill and letting others handle the child when they should have been at home. The
foster parent also kept delaying a necessary surgery for the child because of every excuse under the
sun. It wasn't until the children were returned that the surgery was able to happen. MDHHS did
nothing to make sure the child got the surgery or medical care that the child needed.

Abuse in homes licensed by Arenac County seems to not be uncommon. Within the last year, the same
home that had our children removed from them had the other two children removed because enough
people finally got on their case about the abuse. There were allegations of physical and emotional
abuse and inappropriate touching. What happened to them? They only lost their license. It is also said
that the children in that home were both threatened and bribed to keep quiet or rescind reports of abuse.
There still remains a special needs adult in the home in their Guardianship, to the best of my
knowledge, that has been bullied by them into keeping quiet about his treatment. All three of these
individuals were in my emails to Lansing and even after two removals for abuse or neglect, this last
vulnerable man is left. I can only imagine the treatment he is enduring.

Another home was originally licensed by Arenac County that eventually got Guardianship of a child
from Gladwin County. That child was taken primarily because the worker claimed that the ONLY way
Medicaid would pay for an organ transplant was if they were in state care, which was a lie. In this
case, the woman had that Guardianship and licensing terminated for physical abuse. This case was also
one where other children placed with this woman had to be removed because of abuse or neglect, yet
this child was left there. For some reason, even though the Guardian and child were in Bay County at
the time, Arenac County was handling the Guardianship case even though the Guardianship appears to
have been set up in Gladwin County Courts. Guardianship was terminated and child returned to the
Mother rather quickly and charges were actually filed. I can only guess that this was because it
happened in a county other than Arenac.

It has also been reported to me by one mandated reporter that it is not uncommon for Arenac to leave
kids in questionable homes; they repeatedly find nothing wrong until after many complaints and it is

12
almost too late to save children. The mandated reporters refuse to speak up any more than that because
it was hinted that they have been threatened to have their contracts pulled with the County if they cause
any problems. I also do not believe that there is any mechanism in place for such situations to be
addressed and this is a huge concern.

Judge Vollbach has also used Juvenile Detention to punish minors for having a relationship that he, or
maybe one of the workers doesn't like. He seems to have an open door policy for the adoption workers
to go in and decide cases with him. They will even change care providers just because someone thinks
a child needs medication to get them to behave and a doctor won't prescribe them. One adoption
worker was overheard talking to one of our boys and stating that despite their problems with their
placement that they were removed from eventually, that they should be thankful because kids get
worse homes all the time! This should horrify everyone as much as it did me.

Judge Vollbach is also known on several occasions to pay foster parents to have foster kids do yard
work for them and the children don't get the pay. The foster parents do. So it could be said he is
participating in the slave labor trafficking of children. And since they are even illegally terminating
parental rights, in an unknown number of cases, it could also be said that since the county is getting
money for these children and they didn't do their part to make Reasonable Efforts, if any, that they are
working in concert to commit fraud because Judge Vollbach has to check that box saying the removal is
necessary. There also seems to be a strange scenario playing out that after cases are closed, the court is
sending statements to parents that they owe them an exorbitant amount in fees for while the child(ren)
are in care without any hearing or prior notice. I am in the process of reviewing documents to see if
said payment were even ordered during the case or if this is something that is coming about after and
documents may be being changed again.

Let us also consider the fact that at least one worker in this county stated on the record they have less
resources than a lot of other counties to help families and so it stands to reason that in no case has the
reasonable efforts requirement being met and so NO case has met the criteria to receive Federal
funding. One worker stated to multiple witnesses that workers regularly discuss cases with the judge,
know what he thinks about them and where HE wants them to go. This sounds an awful lot like ex
parte conspiracy or collusion to me but no one within the state wants to address any of these problems.
Then we have the violations of the rights of children and parents on a regular basis and we have
violations of the Child Abuse Prevention and Treatment Act (hereon, CAPTA). Another worker stated
to another parent that if they don't meet their goals, apparently hinting at quotas, that staff is fired or
moved to another office. There is at least one post online where a former worker complains about
treatment of workers in the Arenac office.

On another occasion, Judge Vollbach was sitting in on a case for another judge who was out in the
District Court. It was a sentencing hearing. The defense lawyer had to speak up and remind him that
he was not allowed to do the sentencing. His response was along the lines of the fact that the parent
was lucky because he would have given the maximum sentence for what was a first time offense. This
judge was also the Judge for the parent's CPS case that the charges stemmed from. In that case, he took
evidence that showed that the injuries were nothing as CPS was claiming and let the case move
forward. So he is using whatever evidence suits what he wants as an outcome.

It is my understanding that he, and workers in the county and possibly Judge Vollbach, also likely have
knowledge of a foster child that was supposed to have been returned to a parent. It appears they were

13
not because the foster parent threatened the biological parent. The biological parent didn't fight it
fearing losing all contact with the child and the foster parent continued to collect benefits. For all I
know, this child is still in the care of the same person illegally and they are collecting benefits.

Arenac workers were also informed that a foster parent was claiming babysitting reimbursement and
then keeping the money for themselves and nothing was done. This was the same family that had
Guardianship terminated for abuse and neglect.

Some evidence suggests that they may also be monitoring parents phones and are making up cases to
use in court but that never make it into formal reports or records. I am working on getting evidence of
these missing reports but since Lansing has no knowledge of them, we are having to refer to transcripts.
I have personal knowledge that at least one report has falsified information in it. It appears that phone
calls or at least phone records are being monitored because workers know who parents are talking to on
the phone and know the content of some conversations not had on the phone. In none of these cases
have warrants securing these been produced. In addition, a parent in Lansing said this happened in
their case as well and the lawyer was incredibly surprised.

All of this happened in a matter of half a dozen cases or so in one small county and no one is taking
action. No red flags are going up. Not even when records being changed at the courts is reported to
the State Court Administrator's Office. Nothing. If it is like this in just one county, we can only
imagine what is going on in other counties.

NOT THE LONE WOLF

I can share some of what is going on elsewhere – I have seen similar actions to what is going on in
Arenac County, all around the state in different cases. However the issues seem to be a lot less
concentrated.

In one case out of Wayne county, workers asked for Termination when the case in no way met the
criteria. Much like our case. Luckily, with my assistance and her own determination, mom was able to
beat the Termination. Now that she is having trouble with an unruly teen, CPS is involved yet again
and asking her to do things that she is in no position to do and she has documentation from police to
prove it. The County could have offered for her to sign rights away so as to protect the other children
but they have taken no action even though the mother has asked for them to do so and so that they can
do as they feel necessary because the child refuses to stay anywhere and not take off. She even ran
away multiple times from a Juvenile Detention Facility.

The child has been in the care of a family member since March and yet mom has done everything in
her power to find some remedy but without CPS or the family giving her information, she is without
remedy. CPS has made demands of her that she has NO legal ability to comply with and she was
recently dragged back into court because they are “concerned” about the other children when keeping
the teen out of the home is the safest thing for them and they have raised no concerns about the children
until now despite numerous communications. They have been granted a removal order and the mother
is working desperately to get them placed somewhere familiar and to get the judge to rescind the order
because the workers real concern in only one child and yet they tried to remove them ALL. Thankfully,
mom knew what she needed to do and was already documenting everything and the case has been
closed to the best of my knowledge.

14
In another case, a mother was threatened with removal of her children over the condition of the home
when she was having a dispute over repairs with the landlord. No offers of help finding housing or
help getting into a shelter for the time being, just removal. This is not reasonable efforts to prevent a
removal. Not even close. Yet it happens all the time. CPS regularly brings up housing or housing
conditions to take kids without having resources or help available. And then they run families through
hoops that are unreasonable.

In another case, a worker claimed that cutting a female child's hair to a certain length was emotional
abuse. And used it as one of the grounds to remove the children . Now the judge, without any
evidence, is stating that the mother is overwhelmed with the number of children and is stressed
because she happens to run a tight ship and must come up with a plan to deal with it. He also states
that the children aren't being socialized because they are homeschooled even though they are showing
to be doing fine in public school that they were forced into meaning that homeschooling wasn't ever an
issue. Judges regularly judge families based on the number of children and say that parents are
obviously overwhelmed when they have no evidence to support that comment.

When housing is an issue or the demand of services in some way leads to parents losing housing, the
parents then become stuck in an endless loop of, “You need housing to get your kids back” from the
worker and “You must have your children living with you if you want to get into the subsidized
housing program or we can't give you the size housing you need or have applied for” and there is NO
middle ground. Then parents have issues pulling together large sums of money for things like deposit,
first month's rent and other things that may need to be paid up front and oftentimes I see parents asking
for assistance resources online because MDHHS is not helping them. Thus, not making reasonable
efforts. Then workers put in their reports there is no adequate housing while leaving out the efforts
parents have made and the issues that have arisen such as the “return the kids, need the kids” circular
problem.

Psychological Evaluations rarely come up favorable for parents and there is almost always mental
illnesses that are “diagnosed” that have never been diagnosed before. As we saw with our case, there is
collusion between workers and their contracted services. One of their contracted services looked at our
evidence when they came in once in a prior case and said had our case been in any other county, there
never would have been a removal. As a matter of fact, their director wanted me to teach some classes
about how to cut and work within budgets because they were so impressed with our ability to work and
stay within one. In that same case, where they had issues with the size of our home, they stated family
would have to help us as they had nothing to help us with, which is a lie. In our second case, we were
denied assistance that would have shut the Termination down completely. Instead, they chose not to
provide any assistance and kidnapped our children. I have one Appellate Attorney who has helped me
do some of our appeals that has stated that out of all the cases she has seen, ours is one that she would
actually consider a legal kidnapping. Let that sink in.

In other cases, mental health and physical disability are being claimed as reasons that a parent can't
parent their children when no evidence exists to prove these claims and yet they stand in court on a
regular basis.

Another concern is the way MDHHS is treating families that are having life-threatening issues with
adopted children. They are refusing to do anything but try and force families to take the child back
home and threaten the families of the adopted children with neglect or abandonment charges if they

15
refuse. It has been shown that in some cases, the children who make death threats carry them out. Yet
these families are forced to put themselves at risk because the state will not take ownership of these
children that they have placed without having gotten children proper therapy (or any in most cases)
after removal. Add in problems in foster homes that these children have added to their mental health
problems. Workers tend to give vague names to problems the children may have. In essence, they are
directly threatening the lives of other families by not stepping in and taking these children back and
putting them into intensively therapeutic programs. In other cases, in pre-adoption placements, they
will remove children from potential adopters who report issues to them from past foster homes when
there was nothing happening in the pre-adoptive home. A potential parent just reported something like
sexual abuse in a previous placement. It would seem that when looking at these two situations
together, that MDHHS and its workers are trying very hard to cover up how bad things really are after
removing children. I would also make an educated guess that similar things are happening to foster
parents and is possibly part of the problem of “not enough foster homes.”

CPS “Investigators” routinely bully their way into homes when parents are hesitant to let them in but
are willing to show them the children are fine and workers have been known to tell parents that only
CPS has rights and that lawyers don't know what they're talking about. It has been caught in a
recording, the evidence can speak for itself. More and more often, parents are not being told the reason
for the investigation when they ask and when they ask for copies of their case file and documents they
are allowed, the Department and local Departments are routinely giving parents multiple excuses as
reasons not to give them the documents and even FOIA requests are being denied. It is getting harder
and harder for parents to get copies of the documents they are entitled to by law so yet again, MDHHS
can't follow policy or law. We have to ask why they are fighting access to legally allowed files.

A BITTER PILL

This section is going to be very difficult for some to really consider. Why? Because it is going to get
into what may be a very ugly reality of terminology. Child Welfare has such a positive connotation. As
does Adoption. As did the name Child Protective Services. Yes, let's save the children! We can save
them all and we can even predict and prevent it ALL! Such enthusiasm, sadly it has gone completely
wrong and now we have to face the reality that Michigan is failing children more than they are
protecting. Ouch, that reality hurt. It can't possibly get any worse, can it? Sadly, we are about to enter
into a perspective on the situation through the lens that the most prolific horror movie directors could
only dream of for true horror masterpiece. The difference, this is reality.

When talking about CPS and the courts, one lawyer has stated publicly that because of how Child
Welfare is operating, that it is their impression that Michigan is trafficking children. They talked about
how workers can say whatever they want without consequence because of immunity laws in Michigan.
I have to say that this, coming from someone with a legal background, says a lot about the system and I
am hard pressed to disagree. So there we have it, Michigan may be considered to be trafficking
children because of how dysfunctional Child Welfare is. More and more frequently, in the comments
against CPS actions in news about Michigan CPS, the citizens are starting to call out the actions of CPS
as trafficking now as well. Since workers are taking children to secure their jobs and income in far too
many cases, one can argue they are taking the kids for money. Maybe a bit of a stretch but in all reality
it isn't too far off.

The UN defines human trafficking as the recruitment, transportation, transfer, harboring or receipt of

16
persons by improper means (such as force, abduction, fraud, or coercion) for an improper purpose
including forced labor or sexual exploitation.

Since MDHHS is allowing workers to make untrue statements on petitions and even circumvent the
normal need for a hearing before removal, that could be considered fraud and/or abduction. In other
cases, workers bully parents into safety plans where they are forced to place the child or children with
others and the state gets services paid for. And so, they are transporting or transferring children
between homes to keep their paycheck, I would argue that just maybe this would be considered an
improper use of the children when in reality they didn't need to be removed so people may be on to
something here.

The Federal Government defines human trafficking as;

- Sex trafficking in which a commercial sex act is induced by force, fraud, or coercion, or in which the
person induced to perform such act has not attained 18 years of age.
-The recruitment, harboring, transportation, provision or obtaining of a person for labor or services,
through the use of force, fraud, or coercion for the purpose of subjection to involuntary servitude,
peonage, debt bondage, or slavery.

Here again, I can make arguments as to why this applies and they would be similar to above with the
exception that it would possibly fall under slavery in this case because the children are forced into care
unnecessarily and fraudulently to guarantee someone else a paycheck.

Since trafficking is a pretty harsh term, let us look at the UN Definition of Genocide:

“As defined in Article 2 of the Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide
(1948) as “any of the following acts committed with intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national,
ethnical, racial or religious group, as such; killing members of the group; causing serious bodily or
mental harm to members of the group; deliberately inflicting on the group conditions of life calculated
to bring about its physical destruction in whole or in part; imposing measures intended to prevent
births within the group; [and] forcibly transferring children of the group to another group.”

The group here is the family. It is religious, ethnic, racial and the core of our national fabric.
Predictive analytics use socioeconomic factors to determine the likelihood of abuse since some claim
that those that live in poverty are more likely to be abused. That is not necessarily true and it also tends
to target minority groups of race or certain ethnic groups. It also is biased against large families the
way Michigan has it set up. That can be a religious belief. The act of removal is so incredibly harmful
to children that mental health is permanently altered. This issue was most recently raised with the
problems of families being separated at the border. That also applies to American Citizens. Parents
who live through removals have their own, similar issues. PTSD, Anxiety, Depression; the list is long
and is longer for children.

Medical studies are showing PERMANENT brain structure alterations because of separation from
parents. Children are dying in foster care and studies are showing that children are actually at higher
risk of abuse, neglect and death in foster care than when left in a troubled home in most cases. USA
Today did an article about this and the National Coalition for Child Protection Reform has put out a
document with links to some of the studies on their website. Therefore, there must be better evidence-
based determinations happening so as not to continue to attack families unnecessarily.

17
The conditions of life with CPS in Michigan involved in any way is one of terror, fear, distrust,
frustration, heartbreak, physical separation from each other; all of these impose conditions that far too
often bring about its physical destruction in some way. Families are never the same because of the
adversarial tactics and mentality of workers.

The way Child Protection laws are structured, they impose a measure that works to prevent births
within families – one termination of parental rights can, in most cases, lead to immediate request for
Termination without proof that there is any risk to the current child. Rights can even be terminated
without a full hearing depending on how a worker presents their arguments in a petition. How many
parents would have another child knowing they are likely to have all subsequent children stolen from
them? MDHHS is transferring the children from the alleged, yet unproven, “abused” children into the
hands of foster parents who are an elite group that seem to be beyond reproach. Typically they are also
of a higher socioeconomic status that can often be raised by the amount of case and food assistance
they receive for the children. There is the double standard literally advertised that one doesn't have to
be perfect to be a foster parent and yet biological families are expected to be perfect. This all fits the
definition of Genocide. It is a term that will make one shy away from talking about it, but it must be
discussed because I believe I have shown that what is happening in Michigan fits this definition. So if
one is uncomfortable with the term of trafficking, it can be called Genocide instead.

WHERE DO WE GO FROM HERE

So here we sit, a Department with a broken system, legislators that aren't allowed to know what
MDHHS is doing let alone anyone else with the legal right to know, legislators that do know but don't
do anything, except the few that are finally working to change that. Children's Rights that can't seem to
see past their mediocre measures of success (they were told about at least two of the cases above) to see
the true outcome of their demands. MDHHS won't face the fact that they got pressured into an
agreement that has decimated Child Welfare and turned them into an entity that cares only about the
lawsuit and now has the blood of half a dozen children on their hands in the last year alone. So if they
aren't following the laws and don't truly care about the welfare of children and can't get it right, why are
they still allowed to have any say or control over children in Michigan? So here is what I suggest to
the court at this time:

1) That the court issue an order effective immediately that halts any and all Terminations and Adoptions
until such time as a meaningful committee can be created to review all pending cases. I also propose
that MDHHS be ordered to get every child in Foster Care into counseling within the next 90 days.

2) That this court allow myself, and possibly others to intervene and become a part of this case, to
present evidence to support statements so that this lawsuit can finally have a positive impact on the
Child Welfare System in Michigan. This could be in the form of briefs or documents or testimony with
supporting documentation. A court order will be needed to allow anyone wishing to share documents
from cases to do so without penalty. The Court may also wish to appoint counsel to guide those
participating as well.

3) That this court order that some kind of investigation be done into the actions of Arenac County going
back to at least 2009. Until such a time as the investigation can be completed, other counties should

18
handle CPS cases and court proceedings be transferred to courts outside Judge Vollbach's supervision.
There should also be a police investigation or at least one by the Attorney General's office encouraged
into allegations against foster parents in the county and possible criminal conduct of county CPS and
Court Employees. There should also be an order issued immediately locking down the files for Child
Welfare Proceedings so that they can not be tampered with further and possible evidence destroyed.
Until such time as workers are cleared, they should be put on paid leave as I don't believe all the newer
workers neither know what they are participating in nor have they necessarily participated in
questionable actions. Let them have the Due Process they have denied so many families in that county.
I will be sending this to the Judiciary as they have an active role in what is going on. I would also
encourage them to look into Judge Riffle as well as he was a Court Appointed Attorney for a number of
years, including for our Children, before being elected to the Circuit Court.

4) That the court consider hitting a reset button on this lawsuit and consider more independent input
than what the two parties and Public Catalyst have provided. None of them can be relied upon for
accurate data or to accurately portray the health of Child Welfare, especially with all the problems with
MiSACWIS.

5) Since I am committed to this cause, I am willing to also be a part of the solution in any way that this
Court will allow me to be. I would like to be able to do my own investigations and to be able to speak
to whomever I feel it is necessary to speak with be it employees, families or maybe even children.
Having one or two additional trusted people to assist me would also be helpful so we can get a more
accurate picture of Child Welfare health to the court.

6) I would ask that the court get the input of employees who need to be a part of the solutions needed to
improve what is going on. The Court should also consider ordering MDHHS and CPS to comply with
requests for records and to open their files and procedures to legislators without having to be asked. It
is understood that these matters need some careful handling and documents don't need to be redacted to
the extent that they often are.

7) It would be prudent for the court to ask MDHHS to disclose the factors used in their “Predictive
Analytics,” and what evidence that is based on. This is because there is strong and bountiful evidence
showing that removals are generally contrary to the well being of children. One estimate states that
only 30% of children need to be removed. Newer studies also show that removals cause permanent
brain damage and rewiring that is detrimental to the children and other studies show that foster care
actually costs a state more and is also detrimental to most foster children when it comes to health and
safety in foster care and after. What is the evidence they are using to justify removals and are they
considering contrary evidence at all? Currently what is in place is no different than what was used in
the movie “The Minority Report” and most know how that ended.......not well for the Agency.

8) I would suggest that the court take into consideration media reports on Child Welfare from at least
the last few years and Auditor General reports as they come out. These will also give a better overall
picture of what is going on. Children's Rights has ignored the alarms sounded by parents such as
myself and so we must look elsewhere for information.

9) It would seem that the legislature should be more involved in this process and needs to be
represented in this matter as they will be the ones that need to create and implement laws and decide
budgets moving forward. Perhaps the head of each body can attend hearings and receive copies of

19
filings so that they can be better informed so they can help speed up the necessary changes. They
already have some plans in place to start the process of finding out what the problems are, but I suspect
they will be met with great resistance and lobbying by MDHHS to thwart these efforts. Let the court
assist them and let them hear and have a say in these matters.

10) Finally, I humbly request that this court ask that both sides prepare answers for the shortcomings
and the real reasons for the lack of progress in 10 years and why the system appears worse overall than
when this lawsuit was initiated. The well being and safety of the children of Michigan is in serious
jeopardy. Stricter timelines must be made and met or the state should be put into Federal Receivership.

In closing, Michigan Child Welfare has been destroyed by this lawsuit and how this moves forward
needs to change, fast. I expect both parties to object to the contents of this document. I want to make
everyone aware that I will be sending a copy of this to all state and federal Michigan legislators, Media,
the Governor, law enforcement, the Attorney General and several Federal agencies in the hope that
someone will take this seriously. I also want to make it known that in presenting this information, I am
extremely concerned about retaliation, particularly by Arenac County. To the best of my knowledge, I
do not have any Whistleblower type of protections and ask that the Court grant me some kind of
protections so I can continue to assist in this matter in the ways I find to be effective.

I, Stephanie Jezowski, swear that all of the information contained within this document is true to the
best of my knowledge.

I also certify that a copy of this document was served up on the parties and/or counsel of record by
electronic and/or First Class Mail.

_______________________________________ ____________________
Stephanie Jezowski Date

Contact Information:
Email: thejezowskis@gmail.com
Phone: upon request

20