Tonight’s Without a Trace episode was a repeat, but one I had not seen before. In case you haven’t watched that series before, it is about a person who disappears and the Missing Persons caseworkers who solve the disappearance.


Tonight’s disappearing person was a social worker. He “went missing” a few days before he was due to quit his job. They find him alive, and he had “disappeared” because he was helping a pregnant mom evade the authorities—other state social workers like him—so that her newborn baby would not be removed from her at birth, for “predictive neglect.” Her two year old son had been removed from her and placed in a foster home, where he was killed by a twelve year old foster child also residing in the home. (According to the story, the older boy “cracked open” the younger child’s skull with a baseball bat.) The AWOL social worker was the same social worker who had physically removed the boy from his mom, so he felt personally responsible. He was also the one responsible for telling the pregnant mom that her son was now dead. She blamed him and said her son had been safe with her. (I honestly can’t remember why they said they had removed the child in the first place, but it was pretty light stuff, all things considered. “Suspected drug use” or something like that.)


The missing social worker had a younger trainee in tow when they visited the pregnant mom’s home at the time of removing the toddler boy. The trainee explained to the Missing Persons caseworkers how the system worked … if they (the social workers) left a child in a dangerous family of origin, and the kid was harmed, the social workers were held accountable. If they pulled the kid and something happened in a foster home, the state of New York was accountable. So it doesn't take Einstein to figure out whose butts they cover.


This series is told in flashbacks, as the Missing Persons caseworkers piece the puzzle together by interviewing folks who had recently seen the missing person. There was one scene that we later learn occurred at the time of the toddler’s death, where the AWOL social worker comes home early and drowns his sorrows in booze. He “reminisces” to his wife about listening to an old ABBA song with his sister, cranking the volume up very loud, while his dad beats his mom in the adjacent room …


There was also a scene with a baby seller … she was a piece of work, with no concern for the child at all—only the $30,000 she could get for the baby. (She was buying from the worthless bio dad … but the deal fell though because she refused to take the child until she talked to the mom first … so at least that part was good. The mom didn’t want to surrender the child.)


After watching this episode, I am sure many Americans turned off their TV and went to bed, hardly thinking much past the really crazy 12 year old and the burned-out social worker. Many folks have gotten very good at dividing life into “us” and “them”. Trouble is, you and I are the “thems”. We have those crazy 12 year olds—we deal with the burned out social workers—we see the mentality of parents who wouldn’t think twice about selling their babies for a profit. I couldn't just turn off my TV and put this story out of my mind.


I Googled "Predictive Neglect", a term used in tonight's show to justify removing the baby, and I found very little, but here is one document from Connecticut that mentions it.


Next up I’m going to tell you what Foster Cline wrote about the four categories of therapists/social workers … in his book Hope for High Risk and Rage-filled Children—still one of my favorite early references, even though it is 15 years old. (You can't get it anymore!)

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