How Could You? Hall of Shame-Sophia Grace Hope Merrill case

This will be an archive of heinous actions by those involved in child welfare, foster care and adoption. We forewarn you that these are deeply disturbing stories that may involve sex abuse, murder, kidnapping and other horrendous actions.

From San Mateo County, California, foster child Sophia Grace Hope Merrill was beaten  “three times with a belt” by her aunt Ka’misha Crittendon. Her father is Barry White.

Ka’Misha ” was court-ordered to supervise father-daughter visits and to comply with regular telephone calls between the two. Except, Ka’misha has worked to alienate him from his daughter Sophia Grace. Before long, Barry found himself totally absent from his daughter’s life: Ka’misha refused to schedule visits, cut visits short and selected inappropriate locations for visits, even restricting telephone contact.

Feeling a loss of control, feeling his daughter Sophia slipping permanently away, feeling betrayed by someone he had loved and trusted, Barry reached his breaking point and did something he will forever regret. Without thinking, he threatened his sister.

“It all happened so fast. One minute I was texting and calling my sister to set up visits, and before I knew it, I was blowing up inside from being ignored,” said Barry. “First I begged her; then I was texting things like ‘You better let me see my daughter or else,’ but then I started telling Ka’misha that if she continued to ignore me that I’d hurt her. I even threatened to kill her once. But I didn’t mean any of it. I know it was wrong and I didn’t mean it and I’d do anything to take it back,” said Barry.

“But everyone has a limit and she pushed me past that limit. I love my daughter and my daughter loves me. Why would my own sister keep her from me?”

Ka’misha pressed criminal charges and filed for a restraining order. Barry did 17 months in the state prison, California Institution for Men, and is now a convicted felon.

In April 2016, while Barry was behind bars, his little girl Sophia called her mother, Donna Merrill, crying hysterically. Ka’misha had beat her three times with a belt, she said. Please help, she begged.

Donna Merrill immediately called the police, who referred her to the child abuse hotline. However, when Donna called the child abuse hotline, they informed her to go through the regular social worker because Sophia was already in the child protection system. Except, when Donna called the social worker who handled the case, the social worker told her that the case was closed and that there was nothing she could do.

Striking a child with a belt is considered child abuse and is a criminal offense if it is excessive and/or if it leaves a mark. Moreover, severe emotional abuse is characterized by symptoms that Sophia exhibited in her secret phone call to her mother, and isolating behavior by a caretaker is also a sign that a child may be abused.”

“When Sophia was removed from her mother, Barry fought to have his little girl placed with him. San Mateo County CPS treated him as an outsider and misconstrued and fabricated evidence against him. “They used my previous history of alcohol abuse against me, except the only reason they know this is because I voluntarily attended an alcohol treatment program and because I am actively participating in long-term recovery programs.

“A social worker, Michael Bonner, who was also a participant in these programs used things I shared during this confidential program against me, except his reports weren’t accurate,” said Barry.

What is equally disturbing is that there are laws protecting the safety and confidentiality of those seeking substance abuse treatment. Laws dealing with the confidentiality of drug and alcohol addiction patients trace their origins back to two statutes: the Comprehensive Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism Prevention, Treatment, and Rehabilitation Act (1970) and the Drug Abuse Prevention, Treatment, and Rehabilitation Act (1972).

In 1975, the Department of Health, Education, and Welfare issued federal regulations in accordance with these two laws, and the Department of Health and Human Services revised them in 1987. Congress recently reaffirmed these statues and reorganized them under the Public Health Service Act.

The laws are based on the idea that an individual suffering from a substance abuse problem is more likely to seek and succeed at treatment if he or she is confident that information about that treatment will not be disclosed to other people unnecessarily. This makes sense, given the stigma that often accompanies drug and alcohol addiction.

Moreover, having previously suffered from alcoholism should not have negated Barry’s right to parent his own child, since he is a model recovery client. He can provide evidence that he has not had a sip of alcohol since he sought treatment three years ago. One of the fundamental principles of our child welfare system, in fact, is the idea that people can be rehabilitated – which is one of the aspects of the Family First Prevention Services Act that was just passed into federal law increasing funding for services such as substance abuse treatment for families with children in the foster care system and with children at risk for removal.

How is it that a father who beat the odds and turned his life around, a father who served this country in the United States Army, a father who has demonstrated the desire and ability to care for and provide for his daughter, how is it that San Mateo county CPS hardly even considered this man for placement of his daughter? The American child welfare system was developed with the purpose for the state to take custody and control over children who have nowhere else to go – not to squander taxpayer money and to deprive a child of her constitutional right to be raised by her own loving father.”

San Mateo CPS ignores father and covers up child abuse

[San Francisco Bay View 1/8/19 by Michelle Chan]
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