Davis N Smith

He flat refused to give any guidance as my child was being kidnapped by the state. My child had marks from Martial Arts as did half a dozen other kids in the same class but the state refused to accept the truth. This man Left the state while my child was being Sexually assaulted in the foster home. D...espite evidence and the states knowledge of the high risk of danger present in foster home! He gave no actual advice and told us to agree to the charges against us despite us being entirely innocent! We lost over a year with our children and neither of my kids were the same happy children upon returning! It took years of therapy and showing them they weren’t going to be stolen again for them to be able to play like other kids without me standing within reach and one of my kids still won’t tolerate being away from me for longer than his school day and even that is an immense daily struggle! That is the consequences of this man’s inadequate legal counsel my children suffer the PTSD from the trauma instilled upon them by the state! If you get assigned this man do everything in your power to get different counsel that would be my advice he doesn’t care!

If you find yourself in the frightening, confusing position of having CPS open a case against you, and take jurisdiction of you child(ten), and there is ANY way you can get the money to hire a private attorney, do so! Even if you think you want the same things as CPS, and so you can just cooperate an...d everything will turn out ok, it’s not that simple. I didn’t want to believe the cynical, paranoid sounding advice I read online over and over when my case began. If there’s one thing that will make all the difference, it will be hiring your own attorney. A private attorney will fight for you, your rights and your position. A court appointment attorney will simply guide you through the process of allowing CPS to do whatever they want to do to your family. At least, this one will. He never put an ounce of effort into talking about potential strategies, but put plenty of brain power into defending and excusing anything and everything CPS did and said. His overall mantra seemed to be “That’s just what they do.”, and assured me that it was useless to stand up to them. I was told it didn’t matter that they lied on court documents, and that I could prove they did so. He said that bringing witnesses and evidence of their dishonesty to court wouldn’t matter. He failed to follow through on my request for a hearing on my founded disposition, after he told me his office would handle that request, resulting in my missing the 30 day window to request the hearing. I was told I would receive a signed plan after the family engagement meeting, and that was never provided. I was talked out of going to trial, even though I could not honestly make a statement of settlement, but he scared me into making a statement I did not mean, telling me if I lost my case CPS would punish me by not lifting their harsh restrictions, and trying to take my rights permanently in the end. He assured me if I just settled they would loosen restrictions right away, and then if I just cooperated everything would work out. They never lifted restrictions, and still tried to cut me out of my daughters life in the end. At that point, Davis told me he’s said all along that that’s what CPS does in situations like mine. Basically, every conversation, he’s tell me something completely different that what he’s told me the last time, and then act as if I were crazy for saying he’s ever said otherwise. He was disrespectful and without compassion, and couldn’t have made it more obvious that he works WITH CPS and not FOR me. I finally got together money to hire an attorney, but I honestly would have sold my every possession to have done so from the beginning, rather than having allowed myself to be kept confused and helpless by this court appointment advocate for the Agency.