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Many people who have followed the Justina Pelletier case—largely ignored by the mainstream media, by the way—have thought that there has
to be more to it, or that it’s an outrageous out-of-the-ordinary
affair. This is the case where the Massachusetts Department of Children
and Families forcibly took custody from her parents over a year ago of a
teenager who had been treated for years for mitochondrial disease (a
genetic disorder), when they brought her to Boston Children’s Hospital
for consultation about a related gastrointestinal problem and resisted a
quickly-made diagnosis by a medical resident and a psychologist there
that she instead had a mental problem. Justina has been confined to
Children’s Hospital for over a year and then DCF assigned her to a group
home and then foster care and a juvenile judge awarded the agency
custody of her until she turns eighteen. Justina has written that she
feels like a prisoner and she has been denied both schooling and the
opportunity to attend Mass or receive Holy Communion—all this, while the
hospital and DCF claim they’re “helping” her. Her parents’ have engaged
in a protracted legal battle with DCF and now their attorneys have
filed a habeas corpus action.
continue reading at http://www.crisismagazine.com
Stephen M. Krason's "Neither Left nor Right, but
Catholic" column appears monthly (sometimes bi-monthly) in Crisis
Magazine. He is Professor of Political Science and Legal Studies and associate
director of the Veritas Center for Ethics in Public Life at Franciscan
University of Steubenville and co-founder and president of the Society of
Catholic Social Scientists. His is the author of several books including The
Transformation of the American Democratic Republic (Transaction Publishers,
2012), and most recently an edited volume entitled, Child Abuse, Family Rights,
and the Child Protective System (Scarecrow Press, 2013).
