主题：【原创-评论】谈谈关于贺梅一案 “公正的审判” -- 梦里依稀

Anna Mae decision botched by judge

By Wendi C. Thomas, Commercial Appeal

May 20, 2004

http://www.commercialappeal.com/mca/news_columnists/article/0,1426,MCA_646_2898787,00.html

If you let Circuit Court Judge Robert Childers tell it, Jack and Casey He are horrible parents.

Because of that, they don't deserve to get their 5-year-old daughter, Anna Mae He, back from her foster parents, Jerry and Louise Baker.

If you believe Childers (and I don't), the Hes are deceptive illegal immigrants motivated solely by their desire to stay in America.

If the Hes are bad as Childers claims, why hasn't the Department of Children's Services taken the Hes' other children away from them?

I'll tell you why. Because no American family is fighting to keep those children. And there's no proof the Hes are unfit parents.

Matters as complex as child custody cases are never as clear cut as Childers would have you believe.

His ruling to terminate the Hes' parental rights can be summed up in four words: Bakers good, Hes bad.

The Bakers, Childers says, are so wonderful that they missed church a few times so Anna Mae could see her biological parents.

On the other hand, the Hes had to lure Anna Mae to them with food during visits to the Bakers' home. Childers points this out as if to say, see, I told you they were bad.

The judge allows for no good will in the Hes' actions.

The Hes sent checks to the Bakers for Anna Mae's care, but the Bakers didn't cash them. The judge goes on to say the Hes didn't financially support their child.

The Hes brought Anna Mae gifts, but the fruit, clothing, toys and diapers were of "insubstantial economic value."

Hmm. I didn't know gifts had to have a high trade-in value to have worth.

Childers reluctantly acknowledges the risks of a "transcultural placement;" legalese for saying Anna is Chinese and they're white.

Then he pooh-poohs those risks, since they'll be erased by the Bakers' sensitivity.

The Bakers, I'm sure, are loving and caring parents.

But their best efforts to raise Anna Mae as a Chinese girl are destined to fall short.

No number of trips to Chinese festivals or Chinese churches, no number of visits from Chinese friends can replace waking up each morning to look into a face that looks like yours.

I can't shake the feeling that an anti-immigrant sentiment clouded Childers's judgment.

It's as if life in America is preferable to life anywhere else. But Childers can't come out and say that. Instead, he catalogs the Hes' every misstep (and granted, there are some) to make his case.

Mrs. He, Childers wrote, is "an impetuous person not subject to being intimidated. . . in achieving whatever she sets as her goal."

Mrs. He's goal? To reclaim her daughter, to which Childers assigns nefarious intent.

By the time I made it through the 73-page ruling I fully expected Childers to blame the Hes for global warm ing and rising gas prices.

Childers never proved the Hes are unfit parents. What he did prove is his version of justice is biased.

I hope it gets overturned.