The accusation

Here is the story of how Andrew came to be taken away the first time. It was after the second time that we lost touch with him.

Andrew's sister was born on May 30, 2010. She weighed 4 lbs 9 oz and was a month premature. Her lungs were not fully developed. Her big brothers had different reactions to their new sister. Cody, who was almost four, thought she was pretty. Andrew, still a baby himself, was not impressed. 

Cody is my sister's son from a previous relationship. I was bed-bound, and he was always bringing in toys for us to play with. One time, I was watching a 1940s movie, Caesar and Cleopatra, starring Claude Raines and Vivien Leigh. Cody loved it. When Caesar was getting decked out in his armor, he said, "It's a knight!" He kept yelling for his grandma to come see. The next time he came over, he wanted to see it again. When he talked, he would say t instead of hard c or k. He could not have had a worse name for that.   

His parents shared custody. In April, the father of his other siblings had poked him in the chest and accidentally caused him to fall backwards into a glass coffee table, which gave him a bump on the head and a cut. The other father and my sister put ice on the bump and washed and examined the cut. They kept Cody up playing video games to make sure the bump wasn't a problem. Eventually, it went away and the cut healed. Cody's paternal grandmother, who often looked after him, reported this to CPS two months later, in June. CPS did not think her concern was warranted. Neither did the police. Cody's father had taken him there to report the bump, and they didn't think it was serious.

The baby girl died on July 12, of what Desert Valley Hospital diagnosed as SIDS. A CPS social worker looked them up and found the complaint. While they were still at the hospital, CPS told them that they had to go to their offices just to sign something. When they got there, they were questioned, and then Cody and Andrew were taken. This was despite the fact that when they called 911, police automatically investigated their home and found no signs of foul play. Cody's father got custody of him, and Andrew was put into foster care.