10:24 a.m. - The attorney for a woman whose last name is Barlow objects to: lack of notice, the hearing’s format, and failure to meet requirements of the Texas code that entitles each child to a full adversarial hearing.
More attorneys make objections, and Judge Walther asks them to allow the court to get started. She says no perfect solution exists, and the state is required to get started after 14 days.
The judge tells the attorneys their objections are premature.
Maybe I'm missing something, but I can't imagine how those particular objections are premature in the context of the hearing that took place.
If 400 some children are not entitled to individual hearings, then why is that? Because it is hard to do? Let me put it this way: when the warrant was served on the compound, they didn't go with one law enforcement office and one social worker. They went with an armored personnel carrier, SWAT team, etc. They did that because they believed the scope of the situation requires that level of resources.
Likewise, fellow Americans, the scope of the fundamental interests at stake and the diversity of situations between each set of parents and each child involved, requires more than one hearing for everyone. If the State seeks to pursue this matter, it has to devote the resources to do it correctly, in the same manner that they approached the serving of the warrant with a cast of (dozens?hundreds?).
What we've got going on yesterday and continuing into today is specific testimony about some of the parents in the sect, which presumably is to be extrapolated out in order to make decisions for each and every one of the hundreds of children. Is it just me, or is that not right? Exactly when would it be "timely" to object that a particular child is entitled to a separate hearing, if it cannot be heard at the hearing that will remove him from (both of) his or her parents?
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