Still Missing CA - Orson & Orrin West (3&4), California City, 21 Dec 2020 #4

[sunsetbeach]

Sorry if this has already been posted but just in case it hasn’t Good Morning America is going to talk about the boys. I have no idea what they are going to say. Just thought some would be interested. I don’t recall seeing their story on GMA before.

 

[sunsetbeach]

Unfortunately nothing new was gleaned from GMA’s news piece.

 

[Bbybluz]

would neighbors have had full visibility of that yard though? I know the guy with the CCTV did but did other neighbors?

The neighbors CCTV would not have seen the boys playing only on the patio like the AP’s stated. It would have only caught sight of them if they came off the patio onto the dirt. The house with the pool directly behind the West had visual & hearing access to the full back yard but states they have never seen children in the backyard.

 

[Bbybluz]

Trezell West is how it's spelled, I've seen it all different ways too, unique name. Since he spelled it on camera the articles should not be getting it wrong! Lazy.

when the chief says "they were picked up" I think he means they did not walk away- they were lifted (either alive or deceased) and put in a vehicle to transport them somewhere, and that could include the AP. moo

I wish the Chief would elaborate on how many car seats were seen both in the van & in the house. If 2 for the appropriate age/weight/height of the boys were missing how can that be explained?

 

[Seattle1]

https://www.facebook.com/video.php?v=118860716782815

 

[Bbybluz]

It'll be an interesting interview for sure.

I agree with you & just MIGHT add a few more puzzle pieces ️‍ for us?

 

[AmandaReckonwith]

I was hoping the GMA piece would be actually "something".
Just Ryan Dean saying she is not a bad mother. I believe her. CPS is often vindictive. IMO.

2 young brothers went missing from their adoptive parents' home more than a month ag

 

[imstilla.grandma]

In an interview with ABC's "Good Morning America" airing Saturday, the boys' birth mother, Ryan Dean, said she found out about the boys' disappearance from a news article.

"I looked more into it and I read everything and I just started going a little crazy," said Dean.

Dean, who is still involved in the boys' lives, said she's frustrated by the way the Wests have been handling the investigation.

"[The Wests] barely want to speak to me," she said.

Adoptive mother Jacqueline West said that the situation has been hard for everyone.

"It's difficult I mean, everyone's making their own, you know, their own conclusions," West told KERO in December. "They don't know anything."

Walker remains optimistic the CCPD can find the boys alive.

"I'm still optimistic and I'm very hopeful they're still alive, my department, we're a small department, we're a small town, and we're all truly invested in this thing because we want to bring our kids home," Walker told ABC News, "So I want to believe that they're alive."
2 toddlers still missing after disappearance from California home nearly 6 weeks ago

 

[MsBetsy]

I was hoping the GMA piece would be actually "something".
Just Ryan Dean saying she is not a bad mother. I believe her. CPS is often vindictive. IMO.

2 young brothers went missing from their adoptive parents' home more than a month ag

I think it would have been up to the court to make the final decision as to whether a parent's rights should be terminated. I've never known of a case where a parents rights were terminated as a result of CPS being vindictive. In my experience parents are given many opportunities to better themselves as well as a substantial amount of time to meet any requirements made by the court, such as mental health treatment, counselling, substance abuse treatment or any services they think will help the parent. Imo

 

[Knox]

https://www.facebook.com/video.php?v=118860716782815

As you say, any national media attention is good.

Maybe RD's portion of the story was cut for brevity in the video? All I heard was RD talking about how all this impacted RD. What about Orrin & Orson? The written part of the story attributed to her was outright misleading. According to her interviews right after they went missing, she had not seen them in nearly two years

Let's find the boys before we begin focusing on who is going to have custody in the future. It's day 40, I'm hoping we won't be here discussing Orrin & Orson whereabouts much longer.

 

[Bbybluz]

https://www.facebook.com/video.php?v=118860716782815

Awwwww I LOVE seeing his smile!!!

 

[MsBetsy]

Wait a minute, I thought she hadn't seen them in two years and had nothing to with them?

Yes, she said she had not seen them since 2018 and she doesn't know the Wests. It's not a surprise they won't talk to her. They are only obligated to speak to LE about the investigation. Imo

 

[imstilla.grandma]

As you say, any national media attention is good.

Maybe RD's portion of the story was cut for brevity in the video? All I heard was RD talking about how all this impacted RD. What about Orrin & Orson? The written part of the story attributed to her was outright misleading. According to her interviews right after they went missing, she had not seen them in nearly two years

Let's find the boys before we begin focusing on who is going to have custody in the future. It's day 40, I'm hoping we won't be here discussing Orrin & Orson whereabouts much longer.

Thank you. I was about to say the same dang thing. I have little faith in media anymore. The stuff that’s going on here happens in most threads. Misreporting is inexcusable. What can we do? She didn’t know squat about those boys before they went missing. I know she’s upset and I do believe she’s hurting. However...

 

[MoeInVA]

I think it would have been up to the court to make the final decision as to whether a parent's rights should be terminated. I've never known of a case where a parents rights were terminated as a result of CPS being vindictive. In my experience parents are given many opportunities to better themselves as well as a substantial amount of time to meet any requirements made by the court, such as mental health treatment, counselling, substance abuse treatment or any services they think will help the parent. Imo

I agree with you @MsBetsy that in my experience the courts give the parents every opportunity. However, the extended family in this case may well have been steamrolled and I have seen that before.

If the parents are not on top of it, the courts and CPS can act in ways that seem very unfair and sneaky to the extended family. In my experience, the extended family gets no right to hear about hearings so they are easily steamrolled in my opinion. They are not party to the case so even if they are somehow able to find out about a hearing and show up, they may or may not be allowed in the room and they cannot speak. If they are not the CPS selected foster family (because they didn’t know what was going on, hadn’t had home study yet or whatnot) their only chance is to secure a lawyer well liked in the system to advocate for them through motions and try to get hearing dates, which is expensive.

Anyway, don’t want to derail the thread. JMO based on my experiences.

 

[imstilla.grandma]

Awwwww I LOVE seeing his smile!!!

He does look happy.

 

[MsBetsy]

I agree with you @MsBetsy that in my experience the courts give the parents every opportunity. However, the extended family in this case may well have been steamrolled and I have seen that before.

If the parents are not on top of it, the courts and CPS can act in ways that seem very unfair and sneaky to the extended family. In my experience, the extended family gets no right to hear about hearings so they are easily steamrolled in my opinion. They are not party to the case so even if they are somehow able to find out about a hearing and show up, they may or may not be allowed in the room and they cannot speak. If they are not the CPS selected foster family (because they didn’t know what was going on, hadn’t had home study yet or whatnot) their only chance is to secure a lawyer well liked in the system to advocate for them through motions and try to get hearing dates, which is expensive.

Anyway, don’t want to derail the thread. JMO based on my experiences.

Well, I was referring to the biological parents but if you are referring to the grandparents or other relatives, they can always file for custody themselves.
The courts will normally try to keep children with their family rather than putting them in foster care with strangers. Imo

 

[Bbybluz]

I think it would have been up to the court to make the final decision as to whether a parent's rights should be terminated. I've never known of a case where a parents rights were terminated as a result of CPS being vindictive. In my experience parents are given many opportunities to better themselves as well as a substantial amount of time to meet any requirements made by the court, such as mental health treatment, counselling, substance abuse treatment or any services they think will help the parent. Imo

@MsBetsy I sure wish I could agree with you on this but unfortunately I lived through it & watched each tearful heart wrenching time the vindictive case worker weaved her lies & adjusted her paperwork to match her lies. I have remained quiet about this because I know this is rare probably. I would like to think if you were in the position of such a sensitive line of work, you also obtained people skills & compassion. My situation was many years ago so I would hope new screening in employment & new training was implemented.

 

[imstilla.grandma]

There are many issues arising in this thread deserving of a separate discussion thread of their own. I’ll mention this as it’s both topical and current. This PBS/NPR audio virtual lecture is available at this site as of yesterday.
The Importance of Investigative Journalism in Our Current Environment

 

[musemoon]

I think it would have been up to the court to make the final decision as to whether a parent's rights should be terminated. I've never known of a case where a parents rights were terminated as a result of CPS being vindictive. In my experience parents are given many opportunities to better themselves as well as a substantial amount of time to meet any requirements made by the court, such as mental health treatment, counselling, substance abuse treatment or any services they think will help the parent. Imo

It takes A LOT to terminate someone's parental rights. If she showed up to every visit on time, sober, and was willing to work her case plan, she'd have her kids. No judge would take children away from a compliant mother. Many birth parents have lots of reasons why they can't be compliant, but a judge doesn't care about excuses. If she did the work, she'd have her kids...period. No one is going to say that they made a BIG mistake to a blame hungry group of strangers in the media. It's better for her to look like the victim. It's okay to admit to small mistakes (like not being home when a child was injured, or using medical marijuana) but if the court says stop using marijuana to get your kids back, you stop. Period. They say jump...you jump! For a mom who has lost her children for the first time they give them at least two years to get their kids back, so she's not telling the whole truth either...none of them are. You can't be as innocent as she claims to be and lose your parental rights...they give parents a lot of chances to reunify with their children and there are therapists, lawyers, cps workers, and supervisors involved as well as an appeal process which every parent has the right to use...so...

AND....IF the Wests had a set of foster children in the California City home...they SHOULD have had a new homestudy in September. If the children were fostered and not adopted, (not O and O but the other kids) they should have a new homestudy done, because they can't move foster kids without an updated homestudy. A homestudy is not only a search of the home for adequate housing but also an interview with ALL of the children and an identification of their beds and sleeping arrangements. They would have to have eyeballs on all of the kids in order to approve the move...that's just procedure. So... if two of the children were foster children CPS should have seen O and O around September. Perhaps there were excuses for reasons they were not seen in other months, but if foster kids moved with them, then they should have had an updated homestudy after they moved in. Now if they didn't see the kids CPS made a huge mistake, which makes me tend to think this isn't an ongoing abuse issue as too many people in the system SHOULD have seen the boys.

 

[nannymo]

I agree with you @MsBetsy that in my experience the courts give the parents every opportunity. However, the extended family in this case may well have been steamrolled and I have seen that before.

If the parents are not on top of it, the courts and CPS can act in ways that seem very unfair and sneaky to the extended family. In my experience, the extended family gets no right to hear about hearings so they are easily steamrolled in my opinion. They are not party to the case so even if they are somehow able to find out about a hearing and show up, they may or may not be allowed in the room and they cannot speak. If they are not the CPS selected foster family (because they didn’t know what was going on, hadn’t had home study yet or whatnot) their only chance is to secure a lawyer well liked in the system to advocate for them through motions and try to get hearing dates, which is expensive.

Anyway, don’t want to derail the thread. JMO based on my experiences.

I have some personal knowledge about this process. A young woman I work with has 3 children of her own. Her older sister has had her 4 children ranging in ages from 4-16 removed because the CHILDREN tested positive for meth. She claims she was only smoking from her bedroom, but apparently the smoke and residue is absorbed through the kids skin/clothes so they test positive. This was the 2nd or 3rd time this had happened. My friend asked CPS to please let her take the kids. She worked closely with them and now she has all 4 children. That gives her 7 kids in one household! The kids have supervised visits with their Mom. They love her but realize she has a drug problem. (At least the older 2 do). But they love being in a drug-free stable environment.

CPS/courts have given Mom at least a year to conform to "their plan" for return of the kids. This includes a job, a home and drug screenings from hair follicles. (Which can tell when she was using). Up front she was told she must follow all the rules or CPS will terminate her parental rights and the kids will be adoptable. She has now failed 2 hair follicle tests and it appears she only has one more chance to right her wrongs or she loses her kids. Her sister will probably adopt all 4 kids.

So my point is, she loves her kids but cannot get off the meth.....really hard I am sure. If my friend did not intervene and ask to have the kids, they would be with strangers and they would not be able to see them. I feel this is a similar fate that happened to the biological Mom, but she just couldn't get it together, so the courts took them. Very sad. Why can't people "JUST SAY NO?" Drugs are ruining our young people and our family units!! JMO