Current Events · Fostering the Future Podcast

More Sorry Than Safe in Foster Care Part 3

·42 min·2 clips

Melissa finds her daughter with a giant black eye after 72 hours in foster care.

1. Current Events covers part three of the "More Sorry Than Safe" foster care story with Melissa on Fostering the Future. 2. Hosts Jack and Kat frame the show as a child welfare, dependency, adoption, and foster care podcast, and Melissa matters because she lived the removal case. 3. The episode asks what happens when "better safe than sorry becomes more sorry than safe" in a CPS case. 4. Melissa says she did not sleep the night her children were removed and switched into "fight" mode because thinking about it made her nauseated. 5. A friend who had been through a child abuse pediatrician case called at 5:30 in the morning and pushed her toward attorney Dennis Slate. 6. Dennis Slate's wife fit them in at 6:30 or 7 PM, and Melissa says they retained him with help from her in-laws. 7. Melissa describes paying nearly $1,000 for a daughter’s x-ray, repeated copays, and about $25 a night for parking at Texas Children's. 8. She says the family was small-business owners with ordinary insurance, not a large employer plan. 9. The children were in foster care for 48 hours before the family learned they were not even in the same foster home. 10. Melissa says a two-year-old and a baby had viable kinship options, including her aunt and uncle, that CPS did not choose at first. 11. When the children were returned, Melissa says her daughter looked despondent, yellowed, and sleep deprived. 12. Melissa says her daughter also had a giant black eye that the caseworker explained as a fall out of a bed. 13. She says her son was hoarse because he had cried so much that his voice disappeared. 14. Melissa says CPS let the family see the children for about 30 minutes before telling Dylan and Melissa they had to leave. 15. She says they saw their kids for about one hour over the next 14 days. 16. Melissa argues that CPS ignored its own 60-day and 90-day investigation rules and filed an emergency removal exactly 60 days after removal. 17. She says the show cause hearing lasted three days, her mother typed up recordings, and the judge found the agency had not met its burden of proof. 18. Melissa says the court removed the agency as managing conservator, returned the children, and later entered the sanctions phase over bad faith. 19. The episode sounds like a legal and emotional debrief, with Melissa, Jack, and Kat trading courtroom details, timeline checks, and reaction questions. 20. People following CPS, foster care, and Texas family court will get the most from it, while listeners wanting a light or self-contained story may skip it.

As heard by us

A hard, careful listen about child welfare, removal, deadlines, and how procedure can blur responsibility.

More Sorry Than Safe in Foster Care Part 3 stays on child welfare, removal, and the legal steps around a show cause hearing. Melissa's account gives the episode its weight, while Jack and Kat keep translating court language into plain speech without flattening the stakes.

Read the full review in PlayNext →

Why you'd press play

Want a hard, detailed look at a child-welfare case under pressure?

Read the full recommendation in PlayNext →

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