(Newswire.net — August 14, 2016) — Too much homework and short haircuts was enough evidence for Mississippi officials to take away custody of five children, the Charlotte Observer cited the Sun Herald who broke the story.
It took the parents months of legal battles with the state to get their children back.
Jennifer and Scott Berry’s family is still struggling to get their life back to normal after officials ruled that maybe it wasn’t really child abuse if parents pressure them to finish their homework.
Allegedly, the social services horror story started after the Mississippi Department of Human Services came for their five children.
“All I could do was replay their leaving in my mind and see their crying faces and hear their voices, confused and afraid,” Jennifer Berry said.
One mutual son and four kids from their previous relationships were taken away to seperate foster families after an anonymous report of “isolation or mental maltreatment.” The DHS sent two investigators who questioned the children, one by one behind closed doors and without the presence of their parents.
After reviewing evidence, DHS took the children away claiming they have been neglected and abused, however, according to the parents, they never provided the details of the evidence of neglect and abuse in the case.
“They never actually said what the actual accusation was,” Scott Berry told the newspaper. The Berry’s later learned that someone complained that the family had no food at home and made their minor children cook their own meals. It was discovered later that their 8-year-old child was allowed to operate a microwave oven.
In addition, the Berry’s were accused of treating a girl differently than than boys, and one of the charges against the parents was that they gave the girl a shorter haircut than her sisters, which was called a “punishment haircut.”
Jennifer Berry managed to prove that the shorter haircut is not a punishment but the style that the little girl preferred. The DHS dropped the “punishment haircut” accusations and focused on the older children.
After months of proving that the DHS overreacted, the Berry family reunited. The trauma, however, remains, leaving a nasty scar on the souls of the children and their parents while they were apart.