Florida

In It to Win It

(9,620 posts) Sun Oct 23, 2022, 12:47 PM Oct 2022

He's 9 months old and a U.S. citizen. Why does Florida DCF want to send him to Haiti?

He was born in Broward County to a troubled mother who lost permanent custody due to mental health struggles. His mother’s parental rights to three of her older children had already been terminated. His father, back in Haiti, was not in the picture.

Urged on by the Florida Department of Children & Families, a circuit court judge has ruled that 9-months old Ector — by birthright an American citizen — should be sent to Haiti to be with his maternal grandmother, who lives in a mountainous region and has no steady income. The Florida foster family that has raised him since he was a week old fears for his safety in a country torn by kidnapping gangs and catastrophic hunger and wants to adopt him. They are suing to keep him here in their care.

Haiti is a country on the verge of collapse. Armed gangs regularly block roads and close down hospitals and schools and an ongoing gang blockade is making fuel and drinking water scarce, leading to a deadly cholera outbreak and food shortages. The State Department has warned U.S. citizens not to go, and said those living there should depart Haiti now in light of the current security and health situation and infrastructure challenges.

He could be sent to Haiti any day despite the concerns of his foster parents, who have struggled in their legal effort to keep him here.

“He was born here. This is his birthright,” Simmons said, adding that the child is formula fed. “He has the right to clean water, and he has the right to not starve.”

In August, Broward Circuit Judge Jose Izquierdo sided with state welfare authorities and ruled that Ector should be placed with his maternal grandmother because he found that she is the closest responsible relative. That move, the judge said, would reunite Ector with still another sibling in the grandmother’s care and place Ector “in proximity” to his legal father — to whom Ector’s mother was married at the time of his birth — though court records do not show him expressing any interest in the child. The couple is now estranged. Separately, there is a biological father, who also is not involved with the child. Both men are in Haiti.