The Hello America! Lady
I met Maggie Jessop, author of the op-ed piece titled ''Hello America,'' for the first time Tuesday at the Tom Green County Courthouse.
She is one lively lady, which you know if you read her commentary a few weeks ago in The Salt Lake Tribune.
Like most mother who have trekked to the courthouse this week, Maggie looked a little weary -- no offense, Maggie! But the stress of the process and of traveling all over the state of Texas to see their children is obviously taking a toll on the mothers.
Most have dark circles under their eyes. No wonder: many of the women have spent the past weeks finding new homes closer to where their children have been moved, getting jobs, meeting with attorneys and traveling hundreds of miles to see their children. Still, they keep their composure.
In court earlier this week, a CPS caseworker said she had met only briefly with one mother on Monday before a Tuesday court hearing.
The mother's attorney then got the caseworker to explain why: The mother was in a hurry because she had a four-hour drive ahead of her to make it to a one-hour a week visit with a child. Then she had to drive back to San Angelo in time to appear in court at 8:30 a.m. Tuesday.
Maggie told me she travels 500 miles each week to visit her children -- two boys in Amarillo, a daughter in Converse and another in Gonzalez.
How are the children doing, I asked Maggie.
''Good and bad,'' she said, and then explained what she meant.
''Good meaning they're strong, independent and determined in their faith.''
And bad: ''They look different, they smell different. There is a depth of hurt in their eyes I've never seen before. They have a look of betrayal like they don't trust adults. They have never been lied to by anyone in our faith.''
But mostly, Maggie said, she was ''really grateful to see the spunk'' her children are showing.
''I'd be way more worried if I saw withdrawal and stupor,'' she said.
She is one lively lady, which you know if you read her commentary a few weeks ago in The Salt Lake Tribune.
Like most mother who have trekked to the courthouse this week, Maggie looked a little weary -- no offense, Maggie! But the stress of the process and of traveling all over the state of Texas to see their children is obviously taking a toll on the mothers.
Most have dark circles under their eyes. No wonder: many of the women have spent the past weeks finding new homes closer to where their children have been moved, getting jobs, meeting with attorneys and traveling hundreds of miles to see their children. Still, they keep their composure.
In court earlier this week, a CPS caseworker said she had met only briefly with one mother on Monday before a Tuesday court hearing.
The mother's attorney then got the caseworker to explain why: The mother was in a hurry because she had a four-hour drive ahead of her to make it to a one-hour a week visit with a child. Then she had to drive back to San Angelo in time to appear in court at 8:30 a.m. Tuesday.
Maggie told me she travels 500 miles each week to visit her children -- two boys in Amarillo, a daughter in Converse and another in Gonzalez.
How are the children doing, I asked Maggie.
''Good and bad,'' she said, and then explained what she meant.
''Good meaning they're strong, independent and determined in their faith.''
And bad: ''They look different, they smell different. There is a depth of hurt in their eyes I've never seen before. They have a look of betrayal like they don't trust adults. They have never been lied to by anyone in our faith.''
But mostly, Maggie said, she was ''really grateful to see the spunk'' her children are showing.
''I'd be way more worried if I saw withdrawal and stupor,'' she said.
6 Comments:
Thanks Brooke
Bets of luck to Maggie.
Maggie, tell your kids that a lot of good people outside the FLDS are also praying for them.
They need to know this.
http://www.boycott-texas.org/
The unbelievable and almost impossible to meet requirements of the CPS restructuring plans are designed for failure.
Mothers have to drive hundreds of miles to see each child once a week while at the same time have sustainable employment, counseling by a licensed therapist, etc., etc., etc,...
When they fail to meet these impossible requirements they lose all hope of reunification and their precious children become lost souls in the horrific Texas CPS gulag.
All this because of an unsubstantiated crank call with conspiratory connections to Flora Jessop. Who's investigating Rozita Swinton? Who posted her $20,000 bail? Why aren't the Texas Rangers bringing charges against her?
The answer to these questions is obvious--Texas Baptists don't want polygamists in their state and will stop at nothing to get rid of them. Any contrived excuse to use the color of law to persecute the FLDS religion is and will be used.
Is America going to look the other way while the Constitution burns in Texas? This is a question that will haunt all of us, as well, this poor lady Maggie.
This is not happening in Tibet, China, or Communist Cuba, this is happening in the good ol' USA . . .
Socrates: This is a whole lot bigger than Texas Baptists. Since when do the courts, the FBI, the governor, legislators, the Southern Poverty Law Center, the majority leader of the U.S. senate, the attorneys General for the States of Utah and Arizona, law enforcement and the CPS bureaucracy work for Texas Baptists? It wasn't the Texas Baptists who incinerated the Branch Davidians fifteen years ago.
And the target, then as now, is not a small religious group but our Constitution and the protections to our rights it used to provide.
The message is for all of us, not just those who wear "prairie- style, pastel dresses": Our government from the oval office to the CPS has become a criminal organization and the thing most precious to you - your children - can be taken from you without cause. There is no legal remedy, no appeal to the constitution, no public resistance. There is but chaos and we are paralyzed.
There is pleanty of evidence to show that these children are being abused. They need help and protection from this community they have been living in.
Their so called prophet Warren Jeffs has already admitted that he is not a prophet and that he decieved these people but because they are so cut off from the rest of the world most of them will never know that.
If you are going to pray, pray for the truth to be revealed to the victims living inside these communities.
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