Children & Youth Poster Child
The picture below is Donna when about ten years old, circa 1974. It is a school picture. Please take a close look at her face and notice the black eye, cuts and scrapes. She was in a fight, again, more or less, the day before it was taken. From her own account, with much protest, her hair was "chopped". In my opinion already lost at that age thanks to Children & Youth. At present my daughter is in foster care as her mother (Donna) was in foster care as Donna's mother was before her. What a legacy. My daughter has two sisters and two brothers. They are all in foster care. One girl, Tasha, was already adopted.
This woman is the mother of my daughter. What happened to Donna, this little girl for her life to turn out as it did? I wanted to know. (Remember, we had a child together. One motto states the acorn does not fall far from the tree. Medical theories abound as to nature verses nurture. Is "deviant behavior", for example, passed on genetically? And so on. As a father I wanted to know what to expect, if need be.)
Donna was sexually molested while in one foster home. (She wrote about the incident in her own words.) How could this happen? Where was Children & Youth? Much was able to be gleaned from her criminal history that has spanned over 15 years. One incident, when she just turned 18, tried to kill a man with a shotgun in Schuylkill County, Pa. (Her history of violence has been non stop.) She was a victim that became a victimizer.
A surprising turn last year was obtaining a copy of her parent's divorce file. Back in circa 1968 the laws pertaining to divorce were different. Her father filed for divorce that was conducted in absentia. Donna's mother did not attend the proceedings. As a result, a large amount of testimony was taken, in part, giving the history not only of the marriage but of the three children. (Donna was the second of three, having a sister and brother. As for a tragic life, legacy of violence and drug addiction, Donna's brother was, in a way, her twin disaster.)
From the record, Donna's father tried to keep the children together as they went in and out of foster care. He was most worried about Donna.
Where is this leading? The system did not want to help a father. Then as now, where is the shelter for single fathers? Instead, a child becomes trapped in the system for the sake of profit and employment opportunity. Children & Youth has the nerve to say "best interest of the child"? That is a joke.
Year after year, having a parade of social workers come and go, one foster family after another, filling out forms, countless examinations, observing the techniques, fain hearings, manner of language used on forms, then inspiration took hold. What does this mean?
My allegation against Children & Youth, she became like them: transformed herself into one of them. How to manipulate. Forge documents. Invent "evidence" when non exists. And on and on. How could a little girl, living within the foster care system, have any respect for a man when the systems treats men as a commodity, something to be exploited?
Moral of the story? Take a good look, Children & Youth. This is your masterpiece. Your accomplishment. What can you say? "Yes, maybe your right Mr. Stanziola, maybe if all effort was made to help Rocco keep his children things would be better but we needed a job. We needed to make money. Can't you understand how exhilarating it is to have all this power, to invent stories, seize opportunity, take children and hand them out to our friends. Yes, we create the very chaos we want the glory of controlling for benefit of reward."
By her own choice of words, Donna has a nickname: Jungle, The Wild Beast. Signed many of her letters in that fashion. Despite all the grief this woman has caused me, I can't help but feel pity. From accounts I've obtained, she was bright, intelligent, once had beauty and potential for a promising and rewarding life. Instead, she was molded and fashioned into a shining star for the conquest of bureaucratic greed.
Updated: 11-24-2001