Justice

For my own reasons, I like to maintain a degree of anonymity here so I rarely get into specific details of my personal or professional life. Generally speaking, I write about things that I want to write about and the topic is rarely me for one good reason; I am just not that interesting. I consider that a good thing. One need only to remember the old Chinese curse, that one live in interesting times, to see why. Unfortunately, this has been a very interesting year for my family. Suffice it to say, I have had more dealings this year with insurance companies and the criminal justice system than I would have liked. Yesterday, thankfully, some of that was resolved. And before I proceed any further, please understand that I write this as cautionary rather than an effort to garner sympathy or throw myself some sort of pity party. This is the story of how our former day care provider endangered my child, as well as several others, and landed herself in the state pen.

When J. was just 12 weeks old, we put him in the care of what we thought was a licensed, reputable, and hence sane, day care provider. She had oodles of references, twenty-five plus years experience and a lovely home-based environment that just what we were looking for. We thought that, after much research, we had found the perfect setting for our child. It turns out that we, like several other parents, were hoodwinked by a greedy charlatan with money troubles, piss-poor judgment, and few qualms about imperiling children for financial gain.

You see, instead of providing the love and attention we had expected and indeed, paid for, this horrid woman was placing our children, a half dozen at a time, in a hidden, unventilated, sound-proofed room built into the garage. This room, the entrance to which was secreted behind a carefully placed sheet of plywood, was chock-a-block full of Pack and Plays, a hot water heater, and nothing else. It was used to hide children during inspections by the state licensing agencies because our provider was “caring” for eleven kids BY HERSELF, far beyond the legal ratio of 5 kids per person. As many as seven children were locked into this stifling ten by ten box, unattended and ignored. To add insult to this injury, the proceeds from this deception were used to remodel our provider’s kitchen and master bathroom. Miserable bitch…

No one outside of that house really knows how long this lasted but in April, someone notified Child Protective Services. That tip led to the discovery of the room, our provider’s arrest and subsequent plea to seven misdemeanor counts of contributing to the delinquency of a minor. Yesterday, she was sentenced to seven years in the state penitentiary, with three years suspended. In all likelihood, she will do two years time, in addition to losing her house, her livelihood, and her reputation. Even with those punishments, I consider her (and us) lucky for what could have but did not happen. There was never a fire. A child never suffocated while unattended in that room. There are a million dreadful situations one can conjure up in that circumstance. I try not to dwell on it for obvious reasons.

Thankfully, none of these nightmare scenario occurred. If any had, some poor parents, perhaps my wife and I would be mourning a loss so profound that I can hardly bring myself to think about it and our provider, at the very least, would have faced manslaughter charges. That fact, however, does nothing to dissolve the guilt we feel for putting our child in that situation. Neither does the realization that we were duped into believing that everything was in good order and above board. As one of the other mothers in court said, you only get one shot at raising a child. Putting it my way, it breaks my heart to think that we were one accident away from completely fucking it up.

So my sage and experienced words of advice on this matter are be ye not so gullible as I. If you have questions about your provider, ask. Most states have licensing boards and every jurisdiction has something equivalent to Child Protective Services. They were invaluable resources in our case. Next, make sure that when your provider says that they have an open door policy, it really is an open door policy. Our provider hid the true number of children in her care by enforcing a rather elaborate pick-up and drop-off protocol. If you are made to wait for more than a couple of minutes on a regular basis, demand to know why. We failed to question the routine and in doing so, perpetuated the ruse. And last but not least, if you harbor any suspicions about your provider, follow your gut. In retrospect, so many of the oddities that should have raised reds flags to me, I conveniently explained away. This was exactly the wrong thing to do. I should have known to trust my instincts rather than my rationalizations; so should you.

In the end, everything has worked out, in a fashion, at least. J. is in a wonderful new pre-school where I know he is safe and happy. He does not appear to have suffered any long term effects from the neglect, though we will never really have an answer to that. The parents that I have talked to said much the same thing. They also share the same guilt and desire for retribution that Lo and I feel. Thanks to the fine work of Virginia CPS and the Office of Commonwealth’s Attorneys, I believe justice was done. As for the guilt, well only time will tell. I know that I failed my child. The knowledge that I did so inadvertently, deceived by someone I trusted, does little to alleviate the sting of that failure. This is now water under the bridge. The only thing that I can do now is learn from this ugly episode and maybe warn others that when it comes to those that would care for your children, one cannot rely on a sterling resume and a solid reputation as I did. I was led down the primrose path, but my complacency fueled my willingness to follow. Or to borrow a phrase from Ronald Reagan, trust but verify. Your kids are too important not to.