L-Eugene Martensen, R-Emily Gibson (father/daughter) staffing NOW/CALLAC table at County Federation of Labor, Labor Day Rally
Two years ago, Emily Gibson, then ten years old, was in the custody of her mother and step-father in the Antelope Valley, when she was prosecuted in juvenile court for assaulting a school police officer. At the time, she was placed on juvenile probation, but nobody bothered to inform her father, in spite of the fact that he had joint legal custody of Emily. Neither the County District Attorney, the County Probation Department, and certainly not her mother/step-father (who once physically attacked the father in public) said word one about the child’s legal problems to him.
Fast forward: April 19, 2013, there was some sort of violence between Emily and her mother, so abruptly, without any explanation or notice offered, the Probation Department informs Emily’s father that he will be taking actual physical custody of her. This letter was the first time anybody bothered to let her father know that she had been on juvenile probation for a couple of years.
Her father, who lives in the San Pedro area, immediately got Emily, now 12 years old, enrolled in a local school. He got her involved in extracurricular activities, such as a trip to Catalina Island. He immediately began requesting that she receive “Wrap Around” services from the County – designed to assist families to keep their children on the straight and narrow path. Not even Emily’s public defender requested these services for her and had Emily’s father not demanded them, the court would not have granted them to be provided.
Just because a court orders services to be provided to a juvenile (or an adult or anybody else) doesn’t mean that they will actually receive them. Emily’s father kept asking and asking and asking for the services to start….for three months. Finally in desperation, he requested similar services from the Los Angeles Unified School District but when the Masada Homes, a Gardena Community Mental Health Center was ready to enroll Emily for virtually identical services to Los Angeles County “WrapAround,” Emily’s probation officer put a halt to the process and directed the family to wait until WrapAround began.
What turns “WrapAround” into what seems like “Warped Around” is that by the time the process was ready to begin, Emily was already out of control again. She told her probation officer that she was using drugs and without bothering to verify with a drug test as to whether or not it was true, the probation officer violated Emily’s probation and abruptly had her taken into custody on August 7, 2013.
There is this concept in America that nobody should be held incommunicado. There should be no prisoners without names nor cells without numbers…..but as Guantanamo has proven to us it is entirely possible when somebody is in United States custody. While that process might be arguable when it comes to dealing with alleged “unlawful combatants” in war or out and out terrorists, that’s one thing. When it comes to dealing with a 12 year old girl, one might think that her father would be able to ascertain what’s going on with her and where she is, but nobody in the County has seen fit to answer his basic questions about what sentence she has received for her supposed probation violation, where she’s being held, and when if ever she’s going to be released or even available for visitation. Nothing. Nada.
