Reply #2: His not sending money FROM Cuba indicates he abandonded the child, says Fl DCF [View All]

[Mika]

Its Florida. The rules are different here.

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-DCF lays out case against Cuban father-
http://www.miamiherald.com/news/florida/story/199881.html

DCF attorneys say in the petition that the father essentially abandoned his daughter by not sending her money, birthday cards, presents or letters after she left the island. Under Florida law, a father may be declared unfit if he abandons his child.

The DCF petition also says the little girl would be harmed if forced to leave her older brother, now 12, who protected and cared for her when their mother was neglectful. A lawyer for the girl's foster parents, who have adopted her brother, is asking Circuit Judge Jeri B. Cohen to allow the sibling to participate in the court case.

DCF lawyers have said the biological father, a malanga and plantain farmer from Cabaiguan in central Cuba, should be stripped of custody because he failed to take responsibility for his child.

''The department did not create the situation with this child,'' said Jason Dimitris, DCF's chief of staff and the state's chief litigator in the case. ``The father created the situation, and the department had to respond.''

FATHER'S LAWYER

In court Friday, Ira Kurzban, a prominent immigration attorney who represents the birth father, described the course of the case as ``Alice in Wonderland.''

Kurzban dismissed the state's claim that his client should have financially supported his daughter as unrealistic: ''I have never heard of a case where a person sends money from Cuba to Florida,'' he said.

Felix Masud-Piloto, a Cuba scholar who is director of DePaul University's Center for Latino Research in Chicago, told The Miami Herald that it would be nearly impossible for the father to have sent money.

''No one sends money from Cuba to Miami. That's insane,'' he said ``And you have a hell of a problem trying to get money from here to Cuba. Any money transaction involving Cuba is problematic.''

Kurzban took his biggest shot at the state's claim that the father would cause ''permanent psychological damage'' by separating his daughter from her half-brother. He said the allegation that the girl's right to be with her half-brother trumps her father's right to raise her is unprecedented.

''Now they have added a totally new theory of dependency,'' Kurzban told the judge.

''I've wondered about that,'' replied Cohen, who in an earlier hearing called the state's case ``light''.

EXPERT OPINIONS

Some experts in child-welfare law say they, too, fear the state's case against the birth father could blaze new legal ground if accepted.

Paul DeMuro, the former commissioner for Children & Youth in Pennsylvania, and a 35-year child-welfare administrator and consultant, said the claim the state is making on behalf of the girl's brother is extraordinary: ``I've never heard of anything like that.''

Richard Gelles, dean of the University of Pennsylvania's School of Social Work and a 40-year veteran of child welfare who has written 25 books and consulted for Florida child-welfare administrators, told The Miami Herald in a phone interview that the state's position does not square with long-standing state and federal child-welfare law. He predicted the judge would be reversed on appeal if she decides in favor of the state.

''They are trumping up a perfectly absurd mechanism to trample on rights,'' he said. ``It's a deliberate attempt to ignore what would normally be parental rights.''

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Interesting, because the fact that Elain had a sibling in Cuba didn't seem to deter the FL DCF from making a case against returning Elian to his real family in Cuba.

F-ing hypocrites.