We had our story published in the Sunday Guardian (click here)

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Our story aired on October 24th, 2016 on Bay News 9; exactly one year and one day away from the date our lives were forever changed.  We entered into a nightmare we could not wake up from and never knew a family could go through with these allegations from one doctor who was not even a treating doctor to our son. On October 25, 2015, Tristan turned 4 months old and presented with seizures; we rushed him to All Children's Hospital, only to have my husband accused of aggravated child abuse.  He was arrested two days after my son got discharged and our family was separated for 7 long months. We thought we were alone in this situation occurring to our family and found out this happens to a lot of families across the country and globally with SBS accusations.  The road to hell they put families through is emotionally and financially traumatic to families and does not hold anyone in CPI, DCF, or criminal court accountable when it's found to be a medical diagnosis.  

 

Child Protective Investigator Jennie L. Davis, Child Abuse Pediatrician Dr. Sally Smith, and Pinellas Park Police Department Detective Hurt were over zealous in our case and didn't do a full investigation of Tristan's medical condition before arresting my husband on aggravated child abuse.  On November 9th, 2015 with  the intimidation of five Pinellas Park Police officers, CPI showed up at our door and stated we had broken the "safety plan" but would not tell us what we did wrong.  Little did we know that we didn't have hand over Tristan to them that day, but they used the police to intimidate us with their presence and we didn't know anything on how family court works.  After spending all day at All Childrens Hospital for several doctor appointments, CPI Davis gave me a phamplet with a hand written time of 8 A.M. for family court the next day and took custody of Tristan.  I was hysterical that evening crying and it's a day I will never ever forget   Even though I wasn't the accused, Tristan was taken out of my custody because CPI said I didn't have "protective capacities", since I never accused my husband of hurting Tristan. Tristan was the baby I had to have two founds of IVF for, so it was a living nightmare to have a court say that!  

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  We found out that this is very common in these types of cases, because they want parents to turn on one another and if a mother doesn't accuse the father; custody is lost by both or mom is usually pressured to separate from father.  Many think that telling the police that one partner did it will get their babies back, but this has also proven to be untrue in the cases we have heard about, as they just want someone to admit to hurting the baby when they have no proof.  A win is a win for the prosecution; family and criminal court do influence each other in these cases so don't be fooled.  

 

Our family court case closed on December 2016, and the criminal side file a "no information" in May 2016 due to our medical reports that proved that Tristan was never abused and had a medical condition.  Unfortunately, I have been contacted by so many other families accused by the same CAP Sally Smith since our cased closed who are still fighting these abuse accusations. 

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