Jugendamt horror stories

[john99 16]

By chance I did a Jugendamt google search, and a ton of truly horrifying results came up.

 

They mostly belonged to three categories:

 

- Jugendamt taking away children from parents almost without reason, given that a child makes 8K euro/month to the Jugendamt (giving work to all parties involved)

 

- Foreign parents being routinely ignored and abused by courts, which make their decisions exclusively upon hearing Jugendsamt and not parents

 

- Foreign parents being stripped of their parental rights and/or arrested when trying to work out divorce agreements with the German ex-spouse.

 

Since the reports are horrific beyond imagination, I am starting to doubt starting a family in Germany...

[Keydeck 9,244]

Based on this and some of your previous posts I'd be tempted to advise you to reconsider starting a family anywhere.

[sarabyrd 18,763]

You seem to scare easily. Remember that you only hear of failed marriages; hardly anyone hits the news by remaining happily married. Considering that these cases outnumber the unhappy ones 2:1 (30% divorce rate) you may assume that marriage is a good institution.

 

The same applies to foreign or mixed-nationality families. Not to mention that the last few horrific child neglect/killing stories (Kevin, Sarah, Jessica) were all in German families and the Jugendamt couldn't prevent them.

[janjan 741]

I think that in custody cases in the UK the court routinely asks for and gives great weight to a social worker's report, too.

 

A Scottish friend of mine here, who I later decided was a bit of a manipulating bitch, got custody of her kids when she left her husband and later blocked access. The courts didn't enforce access. I've a feeling that the problem can be a bias towards the parent who has most to do with the children, normally the mother.

[Guest]

 

Since the reports are horrific beyond imagination, I am starting to doubt starting a family in Germany...

 

Might I suggest not making that step anywhere, mate?

[Noel Furlong 3,306]

People complain far more about things that (in their opinion) go wrong than give praise for things that go right. The internet is full of horror stories about perfectly good services like Deutsche Post and the Finanzamt, even though the vast majority of their customers are very satisfied with these institutions. Add the highly emotional aspect of custody battles and taking children out of families, and you are going to get a very negative press no matter what you do. The problem, as I remember well from my public service days, is that the general public understand little or nothing about the need for proper procedure or why certain actions are taken. In the absence of any knowledge, I think it's better to let the professionals do their job (under appropriate supervision) and stop resorting to trial by google.

[poppet 4,006]

 

By chance I did a Jugendamt google search,

 

I often search for such things 'by chance'. Intrigued as to why you would 'by chance' search for problems with the Jugendamt before you have children? Expecting trouble? Vorbeugen? Anyway prevention is better than cure. See especially posts #2 and #5.

[john99 16]

Sara & Noel:

 

I basically think the cases on the internet are probably misrepresented and exaggerated.

 

It's comforting to know that other people think that too.

[Keydeck 9,244]

I didn't read that in what they wrote.

[sarabyrd 18,763]

 

Sara & Noel:

 

I basically think the cases on the internet are probably misrepresented and exaggerated.

 

It's comforting to know that other people think that too.

 

How you can read any kind of agreement to your representations into my post is beyond me. I suppose I'll just have to stick to facts and reality and leave you to interpret them in your own manner.

[onemark 784]

As a non-parent I'm not going to offer any opinion as to whether you should have a family or not. (But it seems common sense to me to wait a few years and see how well you get on with your partner just to see what sort of a person he/she is.)

 

On a more general note, one factor seems is the lack of transparence in both the UK and the German systems and the (at least apparent) lack of oversight, where they do not appear to be subject to any kind of meaningful controls and appear to be able to act on their own initiative without being answerable to anybody. (That's how it looks from the outside, anyway.)

[olivierkarrer 0]

never marry a German Part1

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J1JEQihrosk

 

never marry a German Part2

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7QzOZwtXDxE&feature=related

 

never marry a German

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qSisH5_V_F0

 

never go to germany, they will take your child away

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y8ypR2sxkq8

 

never got to germany, the Jugendamt is a state parent

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0Usp2gdlMsU

 

never go to germany, they will take your child away

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SfL9wfp17Aw

 

never go to germany, they will take your child away

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QjRxBXSUF5Y

 

never go to germany, they will take your child away

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U2d2L_6dhso

 

never go to germany, they will take your child away

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5DEwWfK0-NE&feature=related

 

never go to germany, they will take your child away

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DuurM4P3Vbk&feature=related

 

Never buy a German product anymore

http://www.Jugendamt-Wesel/JUGENDAMT_LEBENSBORN_Think_twice_before_buying_a_german_car.htm

 

CEED Paris

[onemark 784]

This phenomenon is by no means restricted to Germany.

 

There's a custody case going on in the UK right now where a child welfare department has pursued a mother to the Irish Republic to get her 14 year-old boy back.

 

Unfortunately the Irish child welfare authorities seem to have weakened & given in to the UK authorities.

[roland 1]

The CEED is quite outspoken about this subject and, as you see, they have been censored. The ZDF, a respected public TV station is not candid about the failure of the Jugendamt and the German Family Court system. Take a look:

 

 

 

Also...you will note that the U.S. State Department only recently endorsed Germany as helpful with Hague issues. Also of note on the U.S. State Department website, when looking for lawyers to deal with these family matters in Germany, Bavaria seems to keep a lot of lawyers busy.

 

I am glad to see that there are lots of German patriots speaking here - I would suggest caution. Inform yourself before acting.

[fraugenau 82]

 

 

Also...you will note that the U.S. State Department only recently endorsed Germany as helpful with Hague issues. Also of note on the U.S. State Department website, when looking for lawyers to deal with these family matters in Germany, Bavaria seems to keep a lot of lawyers busy.

 

I am glad to see that there are lots of German patriots speaking here - I would suggest caution. Inform yourself before acting.

 

Family law matters keep the courts and lawyers busy in every jurisdiction.

 

Ahhh "caution." If someone's going to hold off on having a family due to the possibility that something will go wrong later down the line, perhaps it's best not to start one to begin with. Just to be cautious, of course.

 

And to me it's fascinating that when things do go wrong, the question always becomes (again, in any jurisdiction) why weren't the authorities more involved? You can't have it both ways though.

[kato 3,551]

The CEED may have had the right idea at some point in the past, but they've since evolved into a racist anti-German organisation being influenced by US organization P.A.R.E.N.T. who basically sound like they've made The Trumpet their bible.

 

Due to this evolution most more serious critics of current practices in Germany have turned their back on CEED and Olivier Karrer. The fact that CEED has also turned into an organization kidnapping children and bringing them across international borders in multiple cases hasn't helped in that regard either.

[chris999 1,202]

Social services throughout the world are dammed! They are dammed if they do and dammed if they don't.

 

When the mother of our foster children died we offered them a home 'cos we thought it would be better for them than going to foster parents. Since then we have met lots of other foster parents and, well to put it blunty, we sometimes wonder if it would have been better for the kids if we'd kept our nose out!!!

 

The judentamt are a great team (and we have had dealings with two different offices). They are however simply over worked humans.

 

If you look at the range of cases they have to deal with someone will always think they are wrong.

Just consider - Someone reports someone for child cruelty. They investigate. They decide it's Ok. The person that reported them says "I told them and they did nothing". They take the kid away - "They took my kid away for no reason"

 

There is unfortunately no computer program in which you can put all the info and it comes out with the right answer for a given set of circumstances, and of course everyone will lie.

 

They will use facts, but must also use intuition when those facts don't add up. At the same time keep out personal prejudice. They get this as right as anyone could in the 100's of cases they have on their books in any one year (that's each worker).

 

We don't hear about those, we hear stories that claim they have made a mistake (more often than not with the benefit of hindsight). We have all made mistakes, bad errors of judgement, believed the wrong person and acted on it.

 

NO one will say they are perfect, but who or which organisation involving human decision making is? On the whole they do an extreamly difficult and thankless task very well.

[Joanie 1,127]

heh, i did a random search for Jugendamt too today, as i was looking for english resources for a friend (found it!). I, too, got distracted by the horror stories and the CEED links that popped up. But the cases it mentioned were from 2011, and I wondered if there was ever any resolution, particularly the Kimberly Hines case.

[pheenmachine 4]

I don't know about the validity or non-validity of the horror stories posted online. However, I will say from experience (current) that our family is going through a 100% absolute horror story with the Jugendamt. And the assertions that they seem to have no oversight and endless power appears true from our experience as well. As a former foster parent in the US, and having seen the system intimately there, I'm actually appalled at what the JA has been doing to us here. I saw problems in the US, too, of course. But really, it makes me sick what we are going through.

[forteetoo 1]

I was shocked too.

The situation, which might not be limited to Germany, is caused by a very loose interpretation of the Best Interest of the Child. Google it up, and you'll find that a lot of ink has been wasted about this subject in the past 40 years.  It is a principle abused in almost all countries.  Although the name may sound reassuring and should imply sound application of common sense in the interest of the child (the weakest party in a separation dispute), it is too often abused and its meaning is stretched to the point of giving boundless discretionary powers to those who are supposed of evaluate what is good for the child.

In reality it is more complicated than that.  The Jugendamt and court experts are only half of the picture.  The other half are the judges themselves, who silently approve of such behaviours, guaranteeing no one will be held accountable of malfeasance.  No matter how outrageously the Jugendamt might behave.

The truth is, if you exclude obvious cases of child abuse, alcoholism, or drug abuse, 95% of the cases (those, where the parents are equally capable of taking care of the child) are adjudicated by how the judge gets to like you.  If he likes you, Jugendamt and various "experts" will simply voice his liking.  If he doesn't, they'll look for reasons why you should be stripped of your rights to the child. 

That means, if you are a foreigner married to a national, you don't stand much chances to have your rights recognised by a local court.

But, on the other hand, if you give them any material they can work on, for instance, if they are given any reason to as much as suspect you may mistreat your child (which is the ruse tried by 50% of ex-spouses, the other 50% opting to fake domestic violence), you can forget about your child for ever.  And I can't blame them for that.

 

Given the lack of regulation in family law, (it basically says that the judge decides, end of the story) I wouldn't be surprised if most if not all family law litigation was escalated to the appellate court or even supreme court.  On top, all this acrimony is a huge money machine, and I'm not sure the judges don't get their benefit.

 

My advice: escalate.  Your child is too important to be left in the hands of charlatans.