Couple Who Took in 18 Children Forced Some to Dig Their Own Graves

[Sequoia]

TRENTON, Tenn. July 9, 2004 — A couple facing criminal abuse charges forced some of their 18 foster and adopted children many of them disabled to dig their own graves, warning the youngsters they could be killed and nobody would care, according to investigative documents.
A search warrant affidavit released in the case against Thomas and Debra Schmitz also alleges that the children were beaten, locked in a cage and punished by having their eyeglasses, leg braces or crutches taken away.

A home care nurse told authorities the "children were forced to dig their own graves" and told by the couple "they could be killed and buried in the back yard and no one will care," according to the affidavit.

The nurse said she saw two children, ages 8 and 10, forced to sleep in a locked metal cage without a mattress or blankets. The youngsters were "curled in a fetal position in the cage," the affidavit said.

<snip>

http://abcnews.go.com/wire/US/ap20040709_222.html

http://abcnews.go.com/wire/US/ap20040709_222.html

[Dookus]

1. how the hell

does the state give so many children to one couple without inspecting the conditions? This shit makes my blood boil.

[oneighty]

2. Screaming into the void

Does anyone really care? Sigh.

180

[clydefrand]

4. I care

My heart aches to even think about hurting anyone in such a manner.

[oneighty]

23. You betcha

We have two adopted children...There are willing parents out there. Many people DO CARE. The powers that be should make adoption easy, religion free.

180

[lostnfound]

30. What do you mean by "religion free"? nt

[oneighty]

38. I mean.

My wife and I are not religious. Yet the judge sent investigator to our home to check us out see if we are good Christians. Religion often interferes with adoption so I have been told and so I believe.

180

[RowWellandLive]

40. I know what you mean

My husband and I are in the process of adoption. We are not even looking for an infant like most couples want. Our preference is the 3-6 age range. The fact that we are not religious or Christians has severly limited the agencies, and therefore, the children we can pursue. Better for them to remain in the state foster care system then to be adopted by a loving "non-religious, non-Christian" couple. What a farce!

[oneighty]

43. Yes.

It is stories like yours I have heard. It is sad that one must somehow be judged on/by beliefs in sky god/gods, and meanwhile wanted children fall by the wayside.

IMHO

180

[lostnfound]

41. That's sad. I wonder if it's the biological parents' choice, or..

if it's an arbitrary state policy.

[Cerridwen]

45. Social workers . . .

frequently impose their own religious beliefs on the process.

I have first hand knowledge of this having worked with many social workers over the past decade. I am not a social worker, btw.

[tnlefty]

13. How the hell was their history in Wisconsin not detected. Was it because

they weren't formally charged there or something? It does seem that somehow this would've been discovered somewhere along the line.

And how the hell does this happen -
The nurse was told "she could get a child through this Web site within three weeks and would not have to go through (Tennessee's) Dept. of Children's Services".

The article doesn't mention the website anywhere else. What in the hell is this?

[Solly Mack]

3. ..

:(

this hurts my heart

[quaoar]

5. They should be hanged

or at least sent to Abu Ghraib.

[lostnfound]

31. Not in favor of death penalty..

but for these types of cases..I wouldn't spend any time opposing it.

Damn. Damn. Damn.

[qb]

6. All of these child welfare atrocities lead to Bush & his budget cuts.

I'm sure there is mismanagement at the state & local level as well, but if they can't afford enough caseworkers, a lot of kids are going to fall through the cracks.

[90-percent]

7. response

Seems like the archetypal Bush supporters to me......

[Cerridwen]

46. ... actually, this began way before this particular bush was in

social welfare programs have been mandated then stripped bare of funding for decades.

[shadu]

8. I recommend torture

These people deserve to be tortured.

[SoCalDem]

9. I don't know how much they were paid per child, but in CA it's a lot

I know of a woman who had 3 or 4 teen foster kids, and she received a check for almost 5K a month..and they had free medical so all she had to provide was shelter, food & clothes..

[LeighAnn]

20. Welfare Queens of the 21st Century

There's a book called something like, "Confessions of a Child Stealer" written by a foster mother, who says that foster mothers are the welfare queens of the 21st century.

We give a mother with two children something like $400 a month for welfare for two to five years, but a foster parent caring for the same children would get more than that apiece for the kids, plus food stamps. Adopting a foster child also brings a monthly subsidy.

The author maintained that the majority of the parents she came in contact with were good people and parents, just too poor to live up to child welfare's standards and unable to afford the legal representation that would have allowed them to get their kids back.

She also maintained that child protective services is corrupt to the core.

[SoCalDem]

28. And you can bet your last dollar, that having a "good Christian home"

helps GET those children into your foster care home..:eyes:

A gay couple with a stable home, or an older retired person probably would never be approved as a foster parent..and they could actually care for the kids..and would..

[RobinA]

34. Nonsense

In my county there are gay couple foster parents and retired couple foster parents. Religion has nothing to do with it.

And as far as another comment about the majority of parents with kids in foster care just being too poor to meet child welfare's standard of living.... This is utter nonsense as well.

[nothingshocksmeanymore]

35. In your opinion how does a case with this many kids fall through

the cracks?

[RobinA]

49. I Don't Know Enough Facts

to really comment, and I don't work in Kentucky so I don't know how they do things there, but I can take a swing.

First, it's very difficult to do police checks in other jurisdictions let alone other states. We check with our state police, but not with the other 49. Generally other police jurisdictions will give you a hard time and simply ignore requests, depends on the jurisdictions. There's no central database of arrests, and we don't have a police-type system like where they check auto information. Hell, even police don't know what other police are doing half the time.

Second, it is very difficult to find foster homes for disabled and neglected kids. Very, very difficult. Neglected kids can have some pretty nasty habits that wreak havoc in your average home. Lots of new foster parents have good intentions, but a neglected 9-year-old can turn the family upside down in about two days.

So when there are parents that take problem kids, they tend to be overutilized. Clearly these people were and clearly they put on a good front for caseworkers. I'm a caseworker. Biological parents or foster parents, I don't live with these people. Even if I do my job above and beyond, I can't live with these people and I have no idea what they are doing when I'm not in the house. If I only kept or sent children to homes I was 100% sure of, there would be very few foster homes and even fewer kids home with their parents. We're walking a thin line here.

I would hope that I'd never put a kid in a home with 18 children. I have deep suspicions of anyone who takes in this many kids. Frankly, I don't like to use homes that have more than two foster kids, but that can be unrealistic. 18 is clearly out of bounds, but I have seen it in the old days.

[Cerridwen]

48. Then yours is an unusual county . . .

I have seen social workers impose their particular brand of religion on the people whose lives they are deciding.

The social worker's standards of financial well begin are also applied to the families.

[Cerridwen]

47. Thanks for perpetuating the Reagan myth used to demonize

the social welfare system by the then militant anti-woman, anti-child, anti-worker Reaganites, Pat Robertson, Pat Buchanan, Newt Gingrich, Strom Thurmond, et. al.

That particular myth was used to push forward welfare reform which would eventually ensure the division in wealth currently apparent in the U.S.

[Judi Lynn]

10. More info. on this fine couple.......

Schmitzes, named among Families of Distinction in 2000, arrested in Tennessee

The Jackson (Tenn.) Sun, The Associated Press and Press-Gazette

What’s next
A preliminary hearing for Thomas J. and Debra Schmitz is set for 1 p.m. Aug. 17 in Gibson County General Sessions Court, Trenton, Tenn.


A former Howard couple face child abuse and neglect charges in Trenton, Tenn., after they were arrested last week and the 18 children they cared for were placed in foster homes.

Thomas J. and Debra Schmitz made their first court appearance Tuesday in a Gibson County, Tenn., courtroom. Debra, 44, is charged with three counts of aggravated child abuse and one count of child abuse and neglect. Thomas, 45, is charged with one count of aggravated child abuse and one count of child abuse and neglect.

The charges include allegations from two 14-year-old girls that Debra Schmitz threw a knife at one girl, striking her in the shoulder and that both Schmitzes held down a girl in a bathroom and lanced a boil beneath her arm with a rusty box cutter.

The Schmitzes were the subjects of heartwarming profiles both in Green Bay and Tennessee for their role in adopting and caring for children with special needs.

Thomas and Debra Schmitz were honored by the Green Bay-De Pere YWCA as one of 10 Families of Distinction in Northeastern Wisconsin in 2000. At the time they were reported as having eight children — four biological and four adopted with special needs. The Green Bay city directory lists the couple as owning a home on Windover Road in Howard in 2000 and 2001.
(snip/...)

http://www.greenbaypressgazette.com/news/archive/local_16721846.shtml

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Another story:

The Brown County Human Services Department would not release the number of local complaints lodged against the Schmitzes because they said they could not reveal information regarding a particular family.

Another relative, SanDee Markiewicz of Suamico, said more than a dozen complaints — in the form of letters, phone calls and personal visits — were made to Human Services.

Debra Schmitz’s mother, Shirley Hogan, said one complaint involved a three-hour visit to Human Services, in which one of the children cried and begged not to be sent back to the Schmitz home.

“I contacted lawyers. I tried everything I knew of to do, and the only solution was for (the child) to run away and hide until (the child) turned 18,” Hogan said.
(snip/...)

http://www.greenbaypressgazette.com/news/archive/local_16734414.shtml

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

On edit, adding another story:

The allegations in Wisconsin were similar to the new ones, including that Debbie Schmitz drank heavily and most of the care for the younger children was provided by the older ones.

Shepard said the new allegations came from several of the children as well as two nurses who worked at the home.

Sheriff's Detective Don Curry said the children were required to clean the house and take care of two horses and other animals on the farm. He said one young teenager who needs a leg brace to walk told him she was beaten for not working fast enough and forced to sleep naked on the floor after breaking a ceramic vase.

Debbie Schmitz forcefully cut off a 14-year-old girl's hair when she refused to name a boy who had written her a note in school, Curry said he was told.
(snip/...)

http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2004/06/30/national/main626789.shtml

Sorry, I forgot to arrange the last story to include this:

Last year, several news organizations, including The Associated Press, produced feature stories about the couple. Debbie Schmitz stayed in the home with the children, while Tom Schmitz was a salesman for a company that rents portable toilets.

Debbie Schmitz told the AP then that she felt a religious calling to care for youngsters. Those in her care at the time included a 4-year-old girl with Down syndrome, a 2-year-old boy with deformities and medical problems, and older children from China and Vietnam.
(snip)

[gatlingforme]

11. Sad, very sad. n/t

[hrhdeb]

12. let down

The system in this country has failed children on all levels, in the home and at school.

deb

http://www.votewhileyoustillcan.com

[tom_paine]

14. Wow, these people are REALLY Busheviks, aren't they

"...warning the youngsters they could be killed and nobody would care, according to investigative documents."

Sounds like Bushevik Policy towards members of the Imperial Senate.

[JitterbugPerfume]

15. I would prefer to say

I do not believe this could happen in Amerika

but I know it did happen , and will continue to happen if caring and decent people continue to do nothing

[tom_paine]

16. Agreed. But what will happen is the caring people will wind up

in the Gulags.

[Maeve]

17. And if we continue to destroy our social service programs

Social workers, child-advocates...given massive case loads because their programs are easy to cut and there is a foolish belief that all adoptive/foster parents are good people who would NEVER do anything bad. :grr:

I seem to remember something about "as you treat these little ones, so you treat Me" back in Sunday school...

[NorthernSpy]

22. I'm for abolishing the Dept. of (in)Human (dis)Services

Children don't need "programs". They need their true, blood-related families. As it stands now, social workers and other oppressive busybodies are free to break up working class families merely for being poor, without anything in the parent's treament of the child that could be prosecuted as a crime.

Fire the social workers, and abolish the child welfare system. Vigorously prosecute maltreatment of a child as the crime that it is. In the absence of any actual crime, we might as well leave the family alone, as we have NO reason to believe that meddling by the state will improve the situation.


Mary

[eridani]

33. The state is just one more power center, and the more, the better

Kids don't have power. Parents do, and the state does. Having more than one power center gives the powerless another option--playing one against the other. Like Thailand, which was never colonized because the King of Siam managed to play the French against the British, and vice versa.

[DiverDave]

18. Jesus loves the little children

all the children of the world.

If I EVER get in the same room as these monsters, or any like them, they are going to be hurt.
I'd go to jail for it.
Nobody knew, right? This just started, Right??
The people that knew and did nothing share the blame.

[AlexanderBarca]

19. This is sickening

I guess Tennessee was too busy keeping gay couples from adopting. :grr:

After all, we all know they are harming the children, right? :grr::grr::grr:

[elehhhhna]

21. It'sa work at home program

in Chicago's south suburbs. There are foster families with several children who are not ashamed to tell you it's the easiest way to get money.

[RowWellandLive]

42. BS!!!

the money provided for a foster child here in SC averages in the low $300's a month. These kids often come to you with not much more then the clothes on their back. As someone in the process of adopting through foster care I can assure you that the paperwork and scrutiny involved is intensive and daunting and that we will end up spending way more then what is provided.

Of course there are some that do it for the money and short change the kids. Please understand that they are the tiny minority and that it is not that easy to be approved. I am amazed at the amount of time and effort we must go through. Those that slip through the cracks are truly evil and diabolical. It takes a lot of effort.

[NorthernSpy]

24. the Khristian Kiddie Kollectors strike again!

Count on this: for every one of these churchy scam artists and the artificial megafamilies they assemble, there's a paper trail of gooey puff-pieces in the human interest section of the local rag. This case is no different:

http://www.oakridger.com/stories/051403/stt_20030514011.html


Adds Debbie, "They think there's something called s-u-c-k-e-r written in the phone book."


At the time, of course, saintly Debbie was busy torturing other people's kids and enjoying gobs of adulation and tax dollars, coutesy of all those s-u-c-k-e-r-s -- including the gullible little nitwit who interviewed her.


Mary






(fixed typo)

[Judi Lynn]

26. It's a shame to see that story now, isn't it?

Good grief. The reporter they sent to do the story must have been a real goober, swallowing their spiel hook, line, and sinker.

Golllly, gee. Ain't they just the best sorts?

Almost makes you ill reading about their astonishing piety:

The family worships at the nearby Hickory Grove Baptist Church, where they comprise about a quarter of the congregation most Sundays.

Not long after they moved to Trenton, Hickory Grove members knocked on their door and invited them to worship.

When Mitchell, 16, was hurt in a farm accident and required hospitalization, women from the church delivered meals to the house for a week.

"Every time we go to church, they're kissing the kids and just loving everybody up," Debbie says. "I don't know if it's the religion or the church, but I feel like there's something missing if we miss a Sunday."

The Rev. Jeremy Barrett, the church's 26-year-old pastor, says the order and discipline of the Schmitz household amaze him.

"From everything I've known about them, they just seem to be very down to earth, just very open people, who have a lot of love to give," Barrett says.

~~ snip ~~

[section321]

27. Thanks for the story.

I was wondering if these weren't the "good, God fearin" type of people. I am not religious and the problem I have with many religious people is that many see their belief in Jesus as an excuse for any bad actions they take. If they do something crappy they just ask Jesus for forgiveness and are instantly absolved of their sins. This is a lazy way to redemption and from my observation a common interpretation of Christianity.

[Sequoia]

32. You are SO right on this!

I grew up in a very religous children's home and after all these years those who were kids then have come up with horror stories of their own abuse. One of the "Christian" adult men who's a preacher was taking nude photos of a young teen. In 2nd grade our teacher taped kids mouths shut (for talking out of turn), and tied kids to their desk (for jumping up without raising their hand). Christians...a group of God fearing people. Hey, even the Native Americans in the 1800s were horrified and commented on the way the kids were beaten by their Christian parents, and wanted nothing to do with white man's god. And this couple here...I hope they're sent to jail.

[KayLaw]

25. We live in Florida

Out of curiosity, I checked our small local paper for a few weeks, looking for actual jobs ( not phony sales stuff ) and the highest paying job was from DCF - taking care of foster children.

[hightime]

29. What the hell is Phil Bredesen doing about this shit?

[Renew Deal]

36. They obviously learned this from Bush.

[dsc]

37. It is nothing short of nuts to permit

one couple to take care of 18 children, especially ones with special needs. This smacks of laziness on the part of the child welfare department where these people lived. I don't have a problem with providing reasonable stipends for people to take in foster children. But given that we do so, there should be measures taken to make sure people aren't taking in too many kids to get those stipends.

I do have to comment on the delusion that most children in foster care are there due to the parents being poor. That is an utter crock. It is very difficult to get children removed. As a teacher I have seen kids in hell holes that are close to as bad as that described above and no action is taken. It is nothing short of a crock to say that children are being taken willy nilly.

[shrike]

39. You're right

My folks served as foster parents for a few years. Those poor kids --Mom and Dad took in older children and most of them were so screwed up, by their biological families and by the system. One foster committed suicide, another ended up in prison and I have no idea what became of the other two.

As for foster parenting being an "income" opportunity, then why is there such a shortage of homes? There are simply not enough homes available for kids who need them. I also know a few social workers, and keeping the original family intact is their top priority.

[Gyre]

44. 4 felony counts is crapola

The law allows you to charge a singe felony count for every single time this happened. If it happened on a regular basis the prosecutor could theoretically send them to prison for the rest of their lives. Evidently, the facts are not as the article made them out to be, or the prosecutor thinks psychological or physical abuse of adopted/foster children is business as usual in Tennessee and hence "no big deal".

If it is as it appears from the article and this happened in Northern Calif. we'd probably be pushing for life sentences.

Gyre