When I saw the cringey-sweet ad about a gay couple adopting a little boy with the help of Delaware County (NY) Department of Social Services (and saving $100,000 on the adoption - one of the adoptive parents, Dan Endress, had to mention that detail), I knew I need to dig the adoptive parents' backgrounds.
Because I have lived in Delaware County for 16 years, and during those entire 16 years either my husband, or we together, or I alone represented parents against that same Department of Social Services - I know Delaware County DSS, their mafia and their mafia tricks VERY WELL.
Delaware County as a whole is (some call it "a land of kissing cousins") - tribal, clannish, and its DSS is even more so.
Moreoever, I know for a fact that Delaware County DSS never act as good Samaritans to anybody outside of their circle.
Moreover, as an attorney, I know how gay-averse local public figures are, so, when I saw this particular joyous piece, I started to dig for answers - and boy what I, of course, found.
First of all, for some interesting reason, DSS in its ad changed the name of one of the adoptive parents.
It showed him as a "Sean Kaufmann".
In fact, in his mother's obituary and in homeowner's records he is shown under a different name, Shawn Kauffman.
I wonder why Delaware County had to change his name - but not the name of his partner, Dan Endress, in this ad. Possibly, so that his adoption would not show up in Internet searches. But - he is already in a public ad by the government, so in for a penny, in for a pound.
What is also interesting - I didn't find anything, but will be grateful for tips from local readers, what kind of position does Shawn Kauffman have in Delaware County. Very, very interesting.
As to Daniel Endress, it turned out that, while - I KNOW FOR A FACT as an attorney who consulted gays in the area - that SUNY Delhi discriminated against and squeezed out gays from its employment (out-of-the area gays, mind, not rooted deeply through partnership with a local large tribe, like Endress is), Daniel Endress is "our kind of gay" in Delaware County, part of the local tribe and thus entitled to gifts.
Of children.
I also know from my representation of parents against local DSS that Delaware County DSS routinely takes young children from their families and adopts them out into families of local government officials - with local judges obliging such gift-giving.
Because, as I wrote before in another blog article, according to the skewed incentives provided by the New York State Legislature in the Family Court Act, New York Family Court judges are paid out of the budget of Delaware County, and get (or don't get) perks from the Delaware County government.
So - local judges have to "pay to play" with DSS. In children gifts/ trafficking, too.
When I represented some parents against DSS in Family Court, I have found strangest "coincidences" in how local government officials gathered and adopted into one family (through the same "foster-to-adopt" scheme) children taken/stolen/ripped from the entire large extended clans/tribes in the county.
People associated with Village of Delhi's government got such gifts, for example.
And, the "foster-to-adoption" scheme is an illegal scheme, too, and the County knows about it.
Because, as the New York State Court of Appeals (the highest court in the State of New York) has stated 51 freaking years ago, foster parents must deliver the child back to social services or to the parent (whichever may be the case) on demand.
And that a "the temporary parent substitute must keep his proper distance at all costs to himself" and not plan to keep the child put into their temporary - and paid - care by DSS.
And that is, again, NOT what is happening in foster care in Delaware County, where, I KNOW as an attorney representing parents against DSS for years in that County, that DSS, at the same time, routinely denies bio parents their rightful visitation of children in foster care, especially with very young children, thus destroying their bond with their parents, while allowing and encouraging foster-to-adopt parents to have children call THEM, and not their own parents, Mom and Dad.
And, DSS routinely denies extended biological family's requests to adopt the child, by threats to take their own children away, by dragged out, botched and fabricated "home study" of bio families.
That is done on purpose, to get to the point of the child reaching 11 out of the last 15 months in foster care, where "by law" mandated by federal grant-giving legislation, DSS may move to terminate parental rights of children in foster care, WHETHER DSS HAVE PROVEN THAT THE PARENT DID SOMETHING WRONG BY THAT TIME OR NOT.
This law is arrogantly, openly unconstitutional - but who cares when a valuable asset (a child, worth $100,000 to the adoptive parent and thousands of dollars in federal grant money to DSS) is to be harvested from the local poor.
While dragging time with the bio family to reach the 11 out of 15 months' mark, once the goal is achieved, and the child is "freed" for adoption (parents' parental rights terminated through various fabrications of DSS and local judges) - DSS "home finder" sweetly admits in the gay adoption ad, that it then moves with a lightning speed.
It takes her from a month to a month and a half to approve of adopting a child (even to a RELUCTANT parent - one of the two adoptive gay parents admitted to not wanting the child at first!), less than some animal shelters take to verify the adoptive pet owners' backgrounds.
And, as one of the adoptive gay parents happily and tearfully claimed, it took him just 3 minutes in the courtroom to get adoption approved by the judge.
The same judge (usually) who, being paid by Delaware County, for himself and for the pet jobs he creates for friends and connections, helped DSS drag the case until termination of parental rights, accepted all kinds of fabrications from DSS and did not make it a 3-minute deal for the bio parents. An unwed mother in this case (I will appreciate if the bio family of this child will contact me with their story. I will keep it confidential if they don't want to publicize it, but will publish it if they want to do it).
It is a POLICY in this county to behave like that - fabricate a child neglect case where a marketable child is born to an unwed poor mother, drag it in court until 11 out of 15 months, terminate mother's rights or force her to accept termination by various means, adopt the child out to one of "their own", and gather funds from the feds the entire time the child was in foster care and a special gift for the efforts to adopt the child out of foster care.
It is an illegal policy, a policy dictated by money the county gets from stealing children from the local poor and adopting them out of foster care to biological strangers (friends of DSS).
It is a child trafficking operation authorized by the federal government - while not allowed by the state Court of Appeals based on State Constitutional rights of parents, BUT WHO CARES in the rural neck of woods, right? RIGHT?
The New York State Court of Appeals I quoted in this article has also pointed out in the same case that foster care "parents" have NO right to custody of the child.
Bio parents who have been through this particular heartache know that at the time a child is placed into foster care, the case in Family Court is usually JUST STARTING, DSS did not prove that the parent did anything wrong yet (while the burden of proof IS on DSS and not on the parent).
Bio parents at that time KEEP their CONSTITUTIONAL parental rights - and may be OPPOSED to their child being placed, let's say, with a gay foster couple.
Does Delaware County CARE about parents' wishes in such cases?
Because parents may choose to SUE the county for violating their cultural, moral and religious beliefs by disregarding their preferences for the child and having the child groomed from early on according to the LGBT agenda, contrary to the child's bio parents wishes.
Moreover, at the very minimum, at the time the child is placed with foster parents, the child SHOULD NOT BE placed with people whose interest is to SAVE MONEY ($100,000) on "starting a family" with the help of somebody else's kid.
A foster parent like that will put their efforts, contrary to the initial goals of court proceedings to reunify the child with his bio parent, to, instead, WEAN the child from their bio parents and instill into the child that foster parents are their permanent parents and that adoption is inevitable and desirable.
Which is EXACTLY what is happening in Delaware County.
In fact, now Delaware County DSS went to the point of arrogantly making public advertisements trying to earn money from the feds by luring gay couples with the $100,000 savings on surrogacy through a "foster-to-adopt" schemes.
Even advertised application of "foster-to-adopt" parents is not for fostering SEPARATELY and for adoption SEPARATELY, but it is the same application for "FOSTER/ADOPTION". They don't even try to conceal their illegal policies.
After all, single mothers in Delaware County are a captive breeding herd for the friends and public officials in the local government.
It is NO JOKE.
After I have moved away from Delaware County I have received PLENTY of reports from my former clients and people who knew from my former clients about my representation of parents against DSS in the area.
Reports from mothers about to give birth who were FRANTIC that DSS is threatening to take their child right after birth (newborn children are the most marketable in the adoption business, mind).
Delaware County DSS DOES take children right after birth from their nursing mothers. Routinely.
I represented parents in such cases.
And Delaware County DSS DOES harass pregnant women, having NO REGARD for the health of the mother or the child. I know examples of that, too.
And I know that mothers threatened by DSS sometimes prefer a home birth, with all its attendant dangers, rather than to risk having the child grabbed from them from the hospital - because DSS have a cordial relationship with hospitals, and hospitals, by a convenient law, are "mandatory reporters" of "child maltreatment", so DSS strikes an agreement with local hospitals to flag a certain future mother after she gives birth, withhold her child from her and call DSS.
Since at that time the mother (usually an indigent/poor person) has no funds to hire a private attorney, and is not entitled yet to an assigned attorney, the theft of the child from the hospital goes smoothly.
Contrary to, again, the decision of the New York State Court of Appeals that said that a child of a single unwed poor mother is "not a waif up for grabs", and the government may not redistribute children from the poor to the rich-er adoptive parents based on determinations whether it will be "better" for the child to be raised in a rich-er adoptive home than by the child's own biological parents and extended family.
NOW GUESS WHAT.
You know WHO Dan Engress is, the sweet gay adoptive parent of the child Mason who was grabbed from his mother as a newborn or a toddler by DSS
and placed with Dan Engress and his gay partner by Delaware County DSS on a pre-agreed illegal foster-to-adopt scheme that was meant to save the gay couple $100,000 in surrogacy costs?
Here is Dan Engress's self-description from his LinkedIn account.
He IS the local hospital's mandatory reporter of child abuse and maltreatment - in Delhi, NY, I am told by the locals, where DSS has its office - so he HAS to have a long-time bosom relationship with the local DSS.
He is "one of their own".
So DSS gave him and his - reluctant! Kauffman did not want that child at first, and admitted that in the ad - gay partner a $100,000 gift of a child likely stolen from a local unwed mother.
Watch how Engress recalled how the child Mason was "temporarily returned to the mother" and then ripped out of her arms again and placed with Engress again.
Obviously, Engress got attached to the child, he wanted the child - and DSS obliged and delivered the child. What a friend of Delaware County DSS wants, he gets. Law or no law.
That's what a "good tribal relationship" with DSS is worth in Delaware County, New York.
Engress is not only a director of nursing in the local hospital.
He was also a school "educator" in Walton Central School - and an Assistant (some years) and Adjunct (some other years) professor in the local state college, SUNY Delhi Tech College, data from watchdog Seethroughny.net.
SUNY Delhi lists a Daniel L. Endress as an Assistant Professor, School of Nursing even now.
Would the child Mason fare better in life with his well-paid and - locally - powerful new adoptive father Daniel Endress than with his unwed birth mother?
I do not know.
What I do know though is what the New York State Court of Appeals has said 51 years ago - which the local tribal DSS mafia wouldn't get through their braindead heads:
"the issue is not, as the Polks would have it, whether one choice of custody or another is better for the child, or, put another way, whether the Polks would raise the child better than would the unwed mother, or which cultural or family background would be best for the child.
Least of all is the issue that of comparing the quality and depth of love and affection between the child and those who would compete for its custody.
Nor is the issue whether natural parents or adoptive parents make "better" parents, whatever that may mean.
The power of the State, let alone its courts, is much narrower.
Child and parent are entitled to be together, unless compelling reason stemming from dire circumstances or gross misconduct forbid it in the paramount interest of the child, or there is abandonment or surrender by the parent.
A baby born out-of-wedlock, even of a troubled mother, is not no-one's child.
In the inimitable vernacular, it is not "up for grabs".
It is not a waif claimable by the first finder, however highly qualified."
- Knowing how Delaware County DSS made a child trafficking conveyer from the poor to the local high-and-mighty of infant children, without any legal grounds for it,
- knowing how local judges fold over under DSS pressure, and knowing which financial incentives exist for the local judges and for DSS to do so;
- getting hints from this cringey-"sweet" story that the mother DID get her son for a month and a half back, so she did not want to let him go - before DSS, with the help of one of the local Family Court judges who DSS financially supports - ripped the child out of the mother's arms because Dan Engress got a liking of him and wanted to save $100,000 on surrogacy, and because DSS thought they will look properly woke and good and "modern" in giving an infant to a gay couple, even if one of the adoptive parents was UNWILLING
I smell a rat here.
This case STINKS.
As many, if not all adoption-out-of-foster care cases stink to high heaven.
Note also how the sweet happy-faced Cruella - oh, sorry, Allison Hamm of Delaware County DSS,
the "home finder" - she has supposedly "FOUND" Dan Engress, the mandatory reporter she works in lockstep for years!
And look how well child trafficking pays in Delaware County - after all, this woman provides inventory so that the county can claim grants from the feds to fund those same salaries (see how it happens, for example, in the annual report of such funding published by the neighboring Otsego County DSS).
The annual report from Otsego County DSS (and federal financing by DSS work the same way everywhere) shows that THE BULK of financing of salaries of DSS workers come from federal grants - received for stealing children from their bio families and adopting them out to strangers.
As to the moral story about how well this child trafficking pays, I have gathered data about Allison Hamm's salary from public salary watchdog Seethroughny.net and sorted it by the year.
Here we go:
Note that in 2008 Hamm was humbly penny-pinching in the Schenectady City School district.
Then in 2009 she moved up into the rural snow belt into the Jefferson Central School district, and her salary was already in the double digits - while continuing to get paid in Schenectady City School District, too.
In the same 2009 Hamm put her toes into the South Kortright Central Schools and into Stamford Central Schools (Judge Becker's seat where his wife worked - and Judge Becker was, remember, Delaware County's DSS attorney for 27 years before coming to the bench in 2002).
Then, in 2010, Hamm switched into South Kortright Central School for a modest double-digit salary (13K) while continuing to penny-pinch in Jefferson Central School - see the relocation trend?
In 2011 and 2012 Hamm toiled singularly in the South Kortright Central Schools, somehow earning in 2012 less than in the previous year, 2011.
In 2013 Hamm continued to toil in South Kortright Central Schools, while adding local BOCES (children-dumbing haven of the local DSS) to her career.
In 2014 Hamm already proudly commanded over $26K in salary from the South Kortright Central Schools.
In 2015, Hamm suddenly "suffered" a great big loss in income, only getting $2K from the South Kortright Central Schools (a loss of $24,000 in comparison with the previous year) - but she has hit gold by footing the door with Delaware County DSS!
And from then on, Hamms' salary with Delaware County DSS was steadily growing from the 30s to the 40s (with an unexplained dip into 20s in 2020).
Child trafficking pays, see?
The redistribution of children from the poor to friends of the local government should stop.
And financial incentives corrupting public officials, including judges, to go along with this child trafficking, should be abolished.
And, as I said, policies revealed in this happily woke, but brainless ad by Delaware County DSS can garner the County a good old class action by bio families of stolen children.
I am looking forward to it.
