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| Arizona Republic
A state legislator said late Tuesday that a judge’s ruling stating she violated court confidentiality laws contains “an egregious misrepresentation of the facts,” raising questions about whether the state Department of Child Safety and justice system treat families fairly.
Maricopa County Juvenile Court Presiding Judge Timothy J. Ryan ruled Tuesday that Townsend and an Arizona Republic reporter at a March 7 hearing violated confidentiality rules “by holding a press conference outside of the court room that same day.”
Rep. Kelly Townsend, R-Mesa, told The Republic she expects the court to correct the record and clear her name.
“He (Ryan) must have concluded that based off of hearsay because he obviously didn’t see a press conference because there was no press conference,” Townsend said. “For them to portray, to announce everything that happened in the (court) record as fact, when that’s not what happened, is an egregious misrepresentation of the facts.”
The ruling is related to a child-welfare case that drew national attention after police with guns drawn raided a Chandler family’s house to check on a feverish toddler and the Department of Child Safety took custody of the family’s children.
When Townsend and The Republic reporter were in court observing the family’s April 10 proceeding, Ryan first had them removed from the open court hearing. In a later hearing, he barred another reporter from publishing news about the case. Ryan lifted some of those restrictions after attorneys for The Republic intervened.
Advocates for parental rights have argued that broad privacy laws in child-welfare proceedings largely serve to protect government agencies with the power to sever parental rights, arguably one of the most important rights any person holds.
Townsend said she’s long been concerned about how DCS treats parents but hoped the justice system acted as a counterbalance to protect the rights of children and parents. Now, she said, she’s not sure.
“I have no confidence in DCS,” she said. “And if the courts aren’t going to give proper justice, then we have no hope.”
In response to questions about the case, DCS officials have said the department doesn’t comment on individual cases because of privacy laws.
Rep. Kelly Townsend on child-welfare warrant law, removal of Chandler toddler
Rep. Kelly Townsend, R-Mesa, talks about Chandler police breaking down the door of a home to take a toddler with a spiking fever from parents.
Sean Logan, The Republic | azcentral.com
Townsend wonders if she’s being targeted after questioning how the system has treated the Chandler family. Townsend, who helped craft legislation requiring DCS to obtain a warrant before removing children from their parents, attended the family’s March 7 hearing to monitor the parents’ rights and the the child-welfare system.
Judge Jennifer Green at those proceedings denied the state’s request to close the hearing. She told the courtroom that Arizona favors court hearings to be open to the public. But Green also issued a warning: Anyone who remains in the courtroom could be held in contempt if they revealed personally identifiable information about the children or any others in the hearing.
According to court rules, that information is considered to be “name, address, date of birth, Social Security number, tribal enrollment number, telephone or telefacsimile number, driver’s license number, places of employment, school identification or military identification number or any other distinguishing characteristic that tends to identify a particular person.”
The Republic knows the names of the parents and children in the Chandler case, but does not typically identify children in the child-welfare system.
In the days that followed the hearing, Townsend participated in news interviews and posted on social media about the case. She said her public observations never offered information that would run afoul of privacy requirements governing child-welfare hearings.
She questioned whether the parents were unfairly targeted because they had not vaccinated their children, called on DCS to “immediately return the children who are also being traumatized” and said the case was “a complete miscarriage of justice and a shame to the state of Arizona.”
Townsend said Tuesday that as an elected official she has heard from aggrieved parents asking her to intervene on their behalf. She said she could do little to uncover the truth of their cases because she was limited by a system cloaked in secrecy, she said.
“I have experienced people begging me to do something because no one will help, because no one knows what’s going on,” she said. “They beg me to believe them, and now I’m being treated like that, and I have no choice but to believe them now.”
The Legislature has worked for years to fix Arizona’s child-welfare system, she said, but the Chandler case and Ryan’s ruling Tuesday call for renewed legislative action to enforce greater accountability and oversight that would ensure privacy laws aren’t misused to protect the system over families.
“I have an expectation of accuracy of statements being put out by the court, accuracy of what happened. I expect that for myself and I expect that for the many families,” she said. “I’m concerned about misinformation being presented as facts and that deepens my concern for how parents have been treated in the court and it demands transparency.”
Townsend said she’s considering her options for addressing Ryan’s ruling. For now, she said, she’s focused on what the case means for Arizona families.
“For them to portray me as in contempt of court is astonishing and maddening and I will not stand for it,” she said. “If they are willing to treat a lawmaker like this, how are they treating parents?”
Ryan did not find Townsend and The Republic reporter in contempt but ruled that they had previously violated court rules protecting the children’s privacy by publishing a March 28 story in The Republic — though he did not cite what information had violated the rules.
At Tuesday’s hearing, though, after Republic attorneys intervened, he ordered that transcripts of previous hearings be released to The Republic. The state objected to the release of unredacted transcripts. The release is under temporary stay, awaiting word on whether the state will turn to an appeals court in an attempt to continue blocking media access to the proceedings.
Townsend said she’s stunned that the presiding judge of the Juvenile Court would issue a ruling against anyone, and in particular, a lawmaker and member of the news media, without specifying what information had violated court confidentiality rules.
“It concerns me that if they are willing to do this to me and the press, then parents don’t have a chance, especially if everybody’s gagged,” she said, referring to court orders that restrict parents from speaking publicly about their child-dependency cases. “How are they supposed to begin to get help if they can’t talk about their case?”
About this report
A three-year grant from the Arizona Community Foundation supports in-depth research on child welfare and Arizona’s foster-care system at The Arizona Republic and azcentral.com.
Are you part of the child-welfare system? We want to understand your story. Visit this site to share your story.
Reach the reporter at [email protected] and follow her on Twitter @diannananez.
Do you want to learn more about Arizona’s child-welfare system? Subscribe to The Arizona Republic/azcentral.com to keep up with our child-welfare coverage.
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