Episode 1: Moms Wrestle Goliath
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BRITTANY WHITWORTH: It’s kind of hard to grieve somebody that’s still alive. I used to sit outside the school and watch my son on the school bus. He wouldn’t know I was there, but at least I get to see him.
MELOS AMBAYE, HOST: Welcome to “Virginia’s Foster Care: Crawling Through Broken Glass.” I’m Melos Ambaye. In our first episode, “Moms Wrestle Goliath,” we follow four women caught in a relentless battle. They will tell us about the challenges they face as they confront Virginia’s Department of Social Services, the courts, and some of society’s most difficult issues, from substance abuse to poverty.
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AMBAYE: Brittany Whitworth remembers the day in early December 2021 when social workers from the Child Protective Services agency came to her house to check on her children. They came back again more than a week later. And she’ll never forget when they came back yet again the next day, with police officers, to take her children away.
WHITWORTH: There were four police officers there, and we were told that we had a limited amount of time to either find somebody in our family or friend circle that could pass a background check or a CPS check and could take the children.
AMBAYE: Court records show that Hampton DSS was investigating anonymous reports that accused Whitworth and her husband of substance abuse and neglecting their children. Whitworth scrambled to call friends and family, but no one could take in her 9-year-old son and 21-month-old daughter. That left one option: a short-term foster placement.
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AMBAYE: Police body camera footage captured the moment her children were taken away. An officer tried to reassure her.
OFFICER: I know it sounds cliche and probably doesn’t feel that way, but it’s going to get better for you, alright?
WHITWORTH: It’s not.
OFFICER: You’ve just got to work with these guys. I’ve seen people in worse situations and where they’ve gotten, it gets better.
AMBAYE: Three weeks after the removal, social workers in the local DSS office gave temporary custody to a relative with whom Whitworth has a strained relationship. Her kids are still there today, three years later, even though the state Children’s Ombudsman criticized the way social workers had treated Whitworth. He said social workers had failed to provide her with services that she needed to get her children back.
WHITWORTH: I wrote to the department, and I asked them, “What was going to be the case plan? What was going to be the reunification plan? What services needed to be done, and what was going to be the visitation schedule?” And they wrote me back and told me that because they transferred custody, they did not have to offer me any services. They did not have to offer me any reunification and visitation would be held, respectively, between me and a custodian that had the children.
AMBAYE: Ombudsman Eric Reynolds investigated Whitworth’s case and found that she was given no clear plan for her children’s return home. He says she was also offered no services to help address the safety issues that led to the removal of her kids.
Reynolds’ office can investigate and make recommendations to local DSS offices. But the local agencies can ignore him—and the Hampton office did.
WHITWORTH: Everybody keeps telling me that the Ombudsman did a good job showing that this department did not do my family right. How does that help me get my children home or make the situation better when apparently, it doesn’t matter to anybody?
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AMBAYE: Whitworth isn’t the only mother who says the system is stacked against her.
In August 2022, CPS social workers took Katie Baker’s three children from her after they received reports of drug use in the home. Her son was 8, and her daughters were 9 and 11.
KATIE BAKER: When they took our kids, we had a Section 8 voucher. So, after they take our kids, they took our voucher because we had lost our kids, they said. But then we need housing to get our kids back. We were just screwed all the way around. They made it literally impossible for us to get our kids back.
AMBAYE: Today, Baker and her husband’s parental rights have been fully terminated. But Baker says they followed a safety plan that required her and her husband to remain drug-free.
BAKER: We signed it.
AMBAYE: But Baker says they never got any services that had been promised.
In 2022, social workers alleged Baker and her husband had abused and neglected their children. But the Harrisonburg Rockingham Social Services District office later ruled that the allegations were unfounded. In Whitworth’s case, the DSS Appeals and Fair Hearings Unit decided more than a year and a half after her children were removed that the social worker’s finding of abuse and neglect was, in fact, unfounded. But neither decision brought either of the moms closer to reunification.
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AMBAYE: Mom of three Amanda Lasley-Dollarhyde of Lebanon, Virginia, had nearly 30 items to complete on her safety plan to get her kids back. She got involved with DSS in October 2023 after CPS received reports that she was using drugs.
AMANDA LASLEY-DOLLARHYDE: I had actually voluntarily started personal counseling myself before they ever put a safety plan into effect to help me deal with the whole situation.
AMBAYE: Lasley-Dollarhyde says a caseworker wanted her to participate in Moral Reconation Therapy, a program designed to improve decision-making and moral reasoning. But there was a problem—there weren’t any MRT classes in Lebanon, Virginia. She had to go to Big Stone Gap, 50 miles away.
LASLEY-DOLLARHYDE: The classes were an hour and a half drive each way. And my first attempt, I was five minutes late. She wouldn’t let me in the class. So, I tried again the same week. I wasn’t even quite five minutes late, and I was even in line for those five minutes that I was late to register because it’s at a health clinic setting. They denied letting me in again, and I didn’t know what to do at that point, because it was such a far drive for me. I was getting frustrated, going out of my way, spending gas money I really couldn’t afford, and putting all that effort in for nothing.
AMBAYE: She decided to enroll in a different program—one that helped her with her substance abuse and covered behavioral therapy.
LASLEY-DOLLARHYDE: DSS never asked me once if I wanted to go into the drug program. I wanted to do it so that, you know, I would have that under my belt. I wanted to do everything I could to show that I wanted my kids home.
AMBAYE: Within four months, she completed the rehab program: 144 hours of cognitive therapy and training designed to address the role of addiction in the family. Her rehab counselor said she had completed the program and described her progress as excellent, according to a letter Lasley-Dollarhyde shared with the Rockbridge Report.
But she says DSS wanted more. Her social worker still insisted that she complete the Moral Reconation Therapy program. But without support for gas or transportation, she says she could only attend a few classes.
Reynolds, the Children’s Ombudsman, says lengthy safety plans create barriers for parents.
ERIC REYNOLDS: Unfortunately, what we see are the boilerplate foster care service plans like okay, parenting classes, substance abuse treatment, drug screens, you know, just going through, and you need to do a psychological evaluation, and probably a detachment assessment too. All this stuff that really is meaningless in the long run.
AMBAYE: State lawmakers created the Office of the Children’s Ombudsman in 2020. Reynolds was appointed in June 2021 to handle complaints about Virginia’s child welfare system. Whitworth says she turned to the office because she wanted someone to investigate how her case was being handled.
WHITWORTH: So, I ended up finding a way to get in contact with Mr. Reynolds’ office, and he actually gave me a complaint form, and I filled it out, and my case was one of either the first 25 or first 50 cases that was taken by the office.
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AMBAYE: Whitworth says the removal of her kids was made worse by the way she was treated by social workers and police.
WHITWORTH: But for in the process of the children being removed, to have people standing around laughing, joking, carrying on. I’ve had bad teeth most of my life, like really bad teeth at the time of the removal of my children. The officers assumed I was a drug addict. I am not a drug addict. I am not a recovering addict. I have never been on any hard drugs.
AMBAYE: Whitworth obtained the body camera footage from the Hampton Police Department of the day her kids were removed. She shared it with the Rockbridge Report. The footage captured audio of police officers’ making jokes about her.
OFFICER: If anyone wants to know what a dope fiend looks like, it’s right there.
AMBAYE: Whitworth took a drug test less than a week after the removal and tested negative for meth, cocaine and opioids. She only tested positive for a legal dose of marijuana.
Police body camera footage also showed the social worker laughing and joking with police while Whitworth and her husband were comforting each other nearby. The Rockbridge Report reached out to the Hampton Police Department for comment. In a statement, the department said, “The Hampton Police Division expects all officers to treat individuals with respect regardless of their circumstances.”
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AMBAYE: Mom of four Alexis Toran says the system is biased against her because she was in foster care herself as a teen.
ALEXIS TORAN: I’ve heard stories about, okay, you have kids, foster care, and the system automatically puts their eye on you. And I knew that I wasn’t going to have my kids in Maryland, so I moved back to Virginia to try to distance myself from the system, you know, interjecting themselves in my life, with me and my kids.
AMBAYE: So, she moved to Norfolk. But in 2017, she lost custody of three of her sons. They were placed in what’s known as kinship care, which occurs when relatives or close friends take custody of children.
TORAN: My grandmother Miss Sue, Lou Sue, we call her Sweet Lou, she went down there to the courts. She filed that paper that morning of court, and she walked in that courtroom, and she told that judge, “She is not alone. She has family. That document that you have is incorrect. She has family, and we are right here, and those kids can come with me.”
AMBAYE: A judge subsequently approved the placement of the children with Toran’s grandparents. Toran’s three kids are still there today.
In 2023, Toran gave birth to her fourth son, Jahsiah. She says a dispute with her landlord led to Jahsiah’s removal when he was just one.
AMBAYE: But Toran says she had a better understanding of the system by then.
TORAN: I had gone through college again. I obtained my pre-law degree. I got a paralegal certification and license with an associate. I did all of this because now I had to get on my p’s and q’s because I needed to understand what, why? What was going on with the system? How can I defeat them? How can I be ahead of them so that way they’re not on top of me. And from that point, I beat them at their own game using their own policies, procedures, documents, laws against them.
AMBAYE: Toran says she knew she had to fight to get her kids back.
TORAN: I placed signs outside of the courthouse on the opposite side of the street that would say, “Bring Jahsiah home! Justice for Jahsiah!” And it was an annoying situation to stand out there on the corner with that sign as they’re all coming in for work early in the morning. Because I want you to see me. I want you to know that I’m not sleeping until you give me my kid and that I’m not going nowhere.
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AMBAYE: Other moms like Baker have no choice but to rely heavily on court-appointed attorneys. Baker emailed her lawyer with instructions to subpoena her daughters to testify during an appeal of the termination of parental rights.
BAKER: I asked her, “Hey, did you subpoena the girls?” She said, “No, I didn’t, because CPS doesn’t want them here.” And I said, “I know—that’s why I asked you to subpoena them. Because CPS has been doing everything they can to stop my kids from coming to court.” You know, so I couldn’t believe it. She did not subpoena my kids, all because CPS didn’t want them there.
AMBAYE: When the hearing started, the lawyer tried to request the girls’ attendance in court. But the court records showed that the judge denied the request, saying it was too late.
Attorney John Koehler, who represents parents in Virginia, says most people can’t afford to hire a lawyer.
JOHN KOEHLER: Regrettably, that means that they will be appointed an attorney who, no matter their level of dedication, is probably not capable of giving the case the maximal amount of attention that they can.
AMBAYE: Baker says the judge limited her to yes or no answers to questions when she testified.
BAKER: Now, our trial in circuit court was nine hours long. We didn’t get out of court that night until eight o’clock at night, I think. And, um, that entire day, me and my husband were made to sit in the gallery instead of at the tables with our, with our attorney.
AMBAYE: She says she wasn’t allowed to respond, even when the judge characterized her Christmas gifts to her kids as bribes.
BAKER: Every Christmas, we would always get them one big gift, and then the rest were little gifts. So, my daughter wanted a MacBook—we got her a MacBook. My son, he got a PlayStation 5. And then my other daughter got—I think she also got a MacBook. And then my oldest daughter, for her 13th birthday, I got her an iPad. So it wasn’t like, oh, I was getting gifts all the time. No, that’s what we usually did at home.
AMBAYE: Baker says she worries about the impact on her kids.
BAKER: It even says in the court papers that my kids are extremely bonded to me, and that they are unable to bond outside of their immediate family, and that it would eventually cause them issues in their placements.
AMBAYE: Court records show a volunteer court-appointed advocate found that Baker’s children had behavioral issues because they couldn’t bond with anyone else. They lost an opportunity to be adopted.
BAKER: The girls, they’re in a group home, they are not, they’re never going to get adopted, and I know that, because they have to get the girls consent to even get adopted, and the girls are never going to give their consent. They’ve already told them they do not want to be adopted.
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AMBAYE: Whitworth says she hasn’t seen her kids in over a year. She says she just wants to be part of their lives.
WHITWORTH: It’s like living in a nightmare that you just don’t wake up from.
AMBAYE: The moms say that DSS’s rules on visitations with their kids are too restrictive. Reynolds, the ombudsman, says parents often are required to visit their children in DSS offices during regular office hours, with a social worker present.
REYNOLDS: This is what drives me crazy is that the default is one hour a week supervised at the agency office. Now how can you possibly visit a 2-year-old in an office?
AMBAYE: Lasley-Dollarhyde, the Lebanon, Virginia, mom, says DSS limits her in-person visits with her kids to two hours a month.
LASLEY-DOLLARHYDE: Every other week, I get to see them at the DSS building being supervised by a social worker for one hour. And then on the alternate weeks, I get a virtual visit by video call that is also supervised by a social worker for an hour. I do not get to have any phone calls, text messages. They’re not allowed to have me on social media. Nothing outside of that.
AMBAYE: The same thing happened to Baker.
BAKER: Every single one of our visits were supervised, one hour. That’s all we got, the entire time.
AMBAYE: Baker’s parental rights were terminated in December 2023. Lasley-Dollarhyde has a hearing coming up in May to appeal the temporary termination of her parental rights. Whitworth is still fighting in court to regain custody of her two kids from relatives.
Toran, the mom from Norfolk, won. She got Jahsiah back.
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TORAN: I went into that courtroom. I was, I’m not even gonna lie. I was, I was scared. I was unsure. I was so confident the day before, but the day of, I did not feel very confident in the actions that I took. It was a very unsure day. It was cold, and it was raining, a very wet day, and I walked into the courtroom. We was in there. My case was supposed to have been heard at 11 that morning. My case did not get heard until three o’clock. I was the last person. And my mom, she always made this comment, like, if you’re the last one, if your case is at a certain time and you’re the last one, that is not good, and it normally doesn’t turn out good, is what they say.
AMBAYE: Toran says the case eventually started to turn her way.
TORAN: And when I heard that judge scold the CPS workers and tell them how much they were wrong, “You weren’t supposed to be attacking this parent. You were supposed to be assisting her. She had a serious matter that she need assistance with pertaining to housing.” And he was just breaking them down piece by piece, and every time he would scold them, I got a little bit more happier. I got a little bit more confident, a little bit more hopeful. Until my lawyer came, and she said, “Well in that case Your Honor, I’d like to file a motion to strike.” And he said, “Motion granted. Ms. Toran, your son will be released today, and he said to CPS, you are ordered to return her son to her today.”
AMBAYE: She says she’ll never forget what the judge did next.
TORAN: And for him to get off the bench and to shake my hand and apologize. It wasn’t his place to apologize, but he apologized on behalf of his city, and that was that was important to me to know that you can recognize when you’re wrong. And that was a powerful day for me that day.
AMBAYE: Toran says Jahsiah didn’t seem to know what was happening at first.
TORAN: And he would not let me go. I tried to put him in his car seat, in the car, and he would not let me go. He would not let me go. But I didn’t mind it, because I could breathe him in all day, because I had missed that little hug, those little hands, his curly hair against my face.
AMBAYE: Toran says she resents what the system did to her and her son.
TORAN: It took 42 days for me to get my son back out of their care. It took 42 days for a judge to recognize that they were completely wrong. It took 42 days for me to be quiet to them and focus on the matter at hand. 42 days that my son was in the care of someone he didn’t even know. 42 days of lost time spent, and 42 days of damage.
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AMBAYE: Up next, Claire Hamlet will follow the daily challenges that social workers face in the foster care system. To read the full story, visit our investigative reporting page on the Rockbridge Report’s website at rockbridgereport.wlu.edu.
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Music credit: “Mystery Box” by Amir Marcus