January 14, 2019 • 35 mins
The Hart kids are "crack babies." Developmentally-delayed. The victims of racist attacks. There are so many family stories, but each one has the same theme: Jen and Sarah are saviors.
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:01):
One quick thing. A week ago, on Tuesday, January two
thousand nineteen, the Mendocino County Sheriff's Office received word from
the Department of Justice that the foot discovered near the
crash site in May was positively identified as belonging to
Hannah Hart. It is now believed by officials that she
died in the crash with her family. The notice reads,
(00:25):
Davante Hart is still listed as a missing person with
the Mendocino County Sheriff's Office. The case remains open and active.
Stay tuned for the latest installment of Broken Hearts. Before
we begin today's episode, Liz and I feel compelled to
address something we think is vitally important to the story.
(00:48):
We're white, Loses of Irish Catholic descent. She has freckles,
and I. She thinks are green, but I'd say are
blue with a swirl of cinnamon. I am of Jewish descent,
of blonde hair and hazel eze. We were both raised
on the East Coast. We both attended private colleges in
the Northeast. We are both mothers to white children. For
(01:12):
many reasons, we are not the ideal people to delve
into the tricky and very problematic race issues that this
case presents. We'd also be remiss not to talk about
these issues, as they're crucial to the larger socio cultural
context of the story. In this episode, you'll hear from
Nathaniel Davis, who helped raise three of the Hart kids
before they were adopted, and April Dinwoodie, who was a
(01:35):
transracial adoption expert here in New York, and more from
Shaunda Jones, the lawyer who fought to keep Jeremiah, Davante
and Sierra with their biological aunt. Each of these people
has a different perspective on how race and bias may
have played a role in the deaths of Marcus, Hannah Davante, Abigail, Jeremiah,
(01:55):
and Sierra Hart. From Glamour and How Stuff Works, This
is Broken Hearts, I'm Justine Harmon and I'm Liz Egan.
Before Jane and Sarah Hart adopted their second set of
siblings in two thousand nine, Davante, Jeremiah, and Sierra had
(02:16):
been Davanta d E v O n t A Jeremiah
j E R m I A h and Sierra c
I E r A Davis. They had lived in Houston, Texas,
with their older brother Dante, their mother, Sherry Hurd, and
her boyfriend Nathaniel Davis, whose last name the children had
(02:40):
taken even before Sherry and Nathaniel got married in two
thousand ten. Here's Nathaniel, Oh, no, tell me that I
was They chuckles from me and sell it to my
room and he removed them for less to the audio
quality here isn't great, but Nathaniel saying that he was
(03:00):
the only dad those kids ever had, and that CPS
removed the siblings from his and Sherry's care when Sierra
was born in two thousand five. The children lived briefly
with his brother, he says, before all three entered the
Texas foster care system. Nathaniel remembers the three younger siblings
personalities well, even though he hasn't seen them in over
(03:21):
a decade. La Sierra all the time, always tried to
protective and laugh. Remember, Nathaniel wasn't the only family these
kids had. Before jenn and Sarah Hart adopted Davante, Jeremiah,
and Sierra in two thousand nine, their aunt Priscilla fought
(03:44):
hard to get them out of foster care. Priscilla hired
Houston attorney Shawanda Jones to help her plead her case
and was successful in having them returned to her care.
She even moved to a new house to accommodate the children,
but a decision to let their mom, Sherry, watch the
kids while Priscilla went to work, resulted in the kids
(04:05):
being removed from the home. Sherry had a well documented
substance abuse problem. According to court records, she was a
crack cocaine abuser and was forbidden contact with the kids
and CPS exercised a no tolerance policy. The children had
only lived with their aunt for five and a half months.
Priscilla's decision to let the kids mom babysit was a
(04:27):
bad judgment call, yes, but Shaunda says the tenor of
the court proceedings stands out in her twenty two years
as an attorney. The father's rights were being terminated because
I think she had alcohol problems and the mother had
drug problems, and so that's why their rights are terminated,
which I don't take issue with that. I think you
(04:48):
know in that instant that was the prudent thing to do.
But I always have taken issue within this case is
the harsh manner the way that they dealt with Miss Celestine.
The presiding judge for that court was Patrick Shelton, who
is now retired. In response to questions about how the
Hearts were allowed to adopt Davonte, Jeremiah, and Sierra after
(05:10):
an allegation of child abuse had already been made against them,
he pointed to the lack of criminal charges in the
state of Minnesota. Shelton told Criminal Justice site the appeal
Unless there's a criminal charge, what can you do, Believe
it or not. Kids get bruises that do not get beat.
Shelton also denies reports that he or his associate judge
(05:31):
favored non relative adoptions over placement with family members. The
agency that facilitated Jen and Sarah's adoption of the Davis
siblings closed in two thousand eleven. It was called the
Permanent Family Resource Center. The offices were located on a
commercial gride of land in Fergus Falls, Minnesota, which is
(05:53):
about a fifteen minute drive from Alexandria, where the women
lived until two thousand thirteen, and our chived version of
the now defunct website says it was started in two
thousand by three families who had adopted eight children out
of the child welfare system. According to a page report
filed by the Minnesota Department of Human Services in September
(06:15):
two thousand nine, only months after Jen and Sarah officially
adopted their second set of siblings through the agency, the
Permanent Family Resource Center was placed on conditional status after
accruing seventeen licensing violations. The violations ranged from failing to
submit paperwork to failure to complete proper background checks on families.
(06:36):
In the past ten years, the Minnesota DHS has only
issued three conditional licenses for child placement agencies. Back when
the Hearts were clients, the Permanent Family Resource Center ran
the Waiting Children Program, a service that provided families in
Minnesota and North Dakota with access to foster kids living
in Texas, Washington, Ohio, Idaho, Oregon, California, and Florida. The
(07:01):
website reads children in this program are living in foster
homes or residential facilities and a termination of parental rights
has occurred, they are legally available for adoption. The average
weight for a child after approval of the home assessment
is between six months and three years. It took Jen
and Sarah Heart less than a year to legally adopt Davonte, Jeremiah,
(07:25):
and Sierra. Our Field reporter Laurence Smiley reached out to
three former Permanent Family Resource Center employees about how these
children were matched with the Hearts as we record this episode,
those emails have not yet been returned. Davantae, Jeremiah, and
sarah stepdad, Nathaniel Davis, still has a hard time understanding
why Jen and Sarah were able to adopt the children
(07:47):
while also being under investigation on allegations of child abuse.
He goes on to say, I'm going to tell you
why they figured we were poor, didn't have nothing to
fight them with. They should have given other people an
opportunity to adopt them kids. After DeVante, Jeremiah, and Sierra
(08:11):
were removed from Priscilla Celestine's care, Shanda says she barely
had a chance to say goodbye to the children she
had cared for for the past several months. I think
maybe saw them one last time. Both Nathaniel and Shonda
believe the institutionalized bias may have informed the court's decision.
You just got the complete feeling that they already had
(08:33):
made up their mind. It's almost like you're just wasting
their time. You're in the way, and it's like, this
is supposed to be a judicial system where you weigh evidence.
Why would you be so emotional and so angry over
somebody during their job. Because this lady wanted to make
sure that she kept her niece and nephews and not
allowed them to go off as she never seen them
(08:53):
again in life. Despite trying to find out more details
regarding the siblings adoption, Shaunda says she was never given
more information about their placement family. I saw some communication
with Brian Fisher, who was a children's attorney, and he
said he would have to fly to Minneapolis, so they
sent the kids out of state. And that didn't even
make sense anyway. I was like, as Hughes, Texas, is
(09:15):
you mean to tell me that there's no one? Why
is there this effort to harry up and get these
kids out of Texas. When Lauren reached Brian Fisher over
the phone in August to ask about the case, he said,
only no, ma'am, no ma'am, no ma'am. Adoptions are sealed
in Texas. Goodbye. It wasn't until March of this year,
when Shanta saw reports of the crash on TV, that
(09:37):
she realized what had happened to DeVante, Jeremiah and Sierra
and who got custody of them? So many years ago,
I was sitting here in my office and I was
looking at the news and I heard them say Minneapolis,
and then they said Devant, and then that's when I said,
oh my god, those are the kids. Shanna called Priscilla
to break the news. When I finally make the connection,
(09:57):
I was just horrified, and I had admit, because she's
somebody who can't listen to a lot of bad things
that happened. But I called her around like eleven o'clock
at and I asked her, have you heard about that kids?
Where the those kids were driven off the cliff? And
she said no, So she said she couldn't hear what
I was about to tell her. So I called it
(10:18):
back the next day and that's when I revealed to
her they were driven off the cliff. And you know,
she she she says, she just can't. She didn't want
to accept that. She always thought that the kids were
in a better place. But she was, you know, she
was devastated. She was devastated, like so many people who
(10:38):
learned the fate of Marcus. Hannah Tavante, Abigail Jeremiah, and
Sierra Hart. Shanda takes issue with the disconnect between the
facts and emerged on paper and the fiction Jen Hart
presented on Facebook. She recalls reading about a particular post
in which jen called out the racism her children experienced
(10:59):
on a regular or basis. These kids are being used
as a prop I read this article where I think
one of the adopted monks has said she was in
a store. She was checking out in an older white
gentleman and this patch here who was also Caucasian. We're
having this discussion about Davonte asking him something about whether
he was going to play sports. And I won't believe
(11:20):
for one moment that that conversation took place. That never happened.
We scoured Jen Hart's Facebook feed, and sure enough, a
post from November two thousand fourteen refers to this interaction.
The post reads, quote, we were standing in the grocery checkoutline.
An elderly man was standing at the end of the
bagging area, conversing with the woman checking us out. He
(11:41):
spots our son looks him up and down. Man Colon,
I can tell you were going to be a baseball
player when you grow up. Son pauses, tilts his head
and gives a closed mouth grin. Actually, no, baseball isn't
really my thing. The post was on like this a
little bit, with the woman bagging groceries in what Jen
(12:03):
describes as a befuddled, nearly astonished voice, saying, quote, what
I have never met a kaid that looks like you
that doesn't play sports, and the man agreeing with a chuckle, Right,
never they all do. Gentleman's having to watch her child
be subjected to ongoing racial stereotyping, but doesn't step in. Instead,
(12:25):
she says, her son responds, well, of course you've never
met a kid like me. I'm one of a kind.
I'm going to be myself no matter how much people
try to make me something I am not. She adds
at the end, I think this kid will be all
right no matter what is tossed at him. This kind
of storytelling from Jen may seem benign at first, but
(12:48):
when it factors into an ongoing pattern of isolation and
chronic abuse, the narrative takes on a sinister undertone. Jen
and Sarah Hart had taken six black kids from Houston,
one of the most diverse cities in America and moved
them from one rural town to the next. For context,
a two thousand seventeen census report found that Woodland, Washington,
(13:12):
the last place the Hearts lived, is at least ninety
two percent white. Only point three percent of Woodland's population
is black. Friends of the Hearts often recount the stories
(13:33):
Jan and Sarah told about how unwelcoming their neighbors were,
how much abuse this unconventional family faced, and how I'm
safe it was for them at times. Bill Groner lived
next door to them in West Lynn, Oregon, where the
population is white. Bill believes that maintaining a sense of
fear might have helped Jen and Sarah keep the ongoing
abuse under wraps. He spent the past four years playing
(13:57):
keyboard at Mount Olive Baptist Church in Portland. The website
from Mount all of It claims the church was built
in seven from lumber provided by the Ku Klux Klan
to keep the African American organization on what they deemed
the proper side of town. For the record, Bill is white.
I've always played music in church. I play at an
(14:19):
African American church, so I'm aware about, you know, racism.
It maybe covert rather than over, even if it's kind
of almost subliminal, I could see parents wanting to protect
their kids always. Maybe that's part of why they told
the kids to kind of not be overly conversational or
(14:39):
friendly with neighbors because people could secretly harbor prejudice against you.
But when you read more about what's what actually happened,
I don't think they want the kids to tell what
was going on. I think that's really part of the deal,
because all would have taken as one kid to come
(15:00):
over and say, you know, I'm hungry, could have some
food for me to call Children's Services. Groner isn't the
only one who noted the way the Heart women, especially Jen,
would cut their family off from outsiders, but their festival
friend Ian Spurling only came to that realization after they died.
It's like, okay, so we have some dates set up
(15:21):
they canceled, like, hey, let's plan a play date at
the park list Tuesday. Oh yeah, that'd be great. And
then the day comes, Hey, we're not going to be around.
You know, a few little things here and there that
you know, we never found anything more about. Now looking back,
it's like she was shielding them from being close to people.
I felt like we were really close with them. But
at the same time, are they like our family that
(15:42):
just stops by all the time? You know, not at all?
Now looking back, there were some dumb moments there. In particular,
like Marcus, Marcus and Jeremiah, they were very reserved and
almost stoic in nature. And then when you talk to him, boom,
snap into a smile, snap into some personality, and and boom,
right when you stopped talking, go right back to a
stoic face. And Ian got closer than most. Back in
(16:05):
June two, eighteen, our Field reporter Lauren talked to Ken Noatake,
an activist who started the Free Hugs project. Ken first
reached out to the family when he saw that viral
image of Davante hugging a police officer at the Black
Lives Matter rally. He thought perhaps he could mentor the boy.
Here's Lauren. Ken first held a free Hug sign at
(16:28):
the Boston Marathon in He soon extended his campaign for
peace and racial understanding to Black Lives Matter rallies in
college campuses across the country. When Davante's photo went viral
six months later, Ken social media lit up. Ken read
about how Davante had white moms. He also noticed the
(16:49):
boy's curious outfit fedora hat, leather, pea coat, and why
is looking face, the age of which was hard to peg.
He sent a direct message to Jen's acco out on
Facebook when his photo of him holding that free Hug
sign and crying in front of the officer. When that
went viral, my social media went crazy because it was
(17:14):
the second time an African American was shown like that
in regards to law enforcement. And that's what my work
of the Free Hugs project really begin as. And so
shortly after DeVante hearts photo comes out with him holding
that free Hug sign in front of a police officer,
I'm getting all of these emails from people saying, Ken,
(17:35):
your work is spreading and look at the impact that
you're having, even on young people. And so right away
I felt like I need to meet this kid, and
so I started searching online and then made contact with
their family the Facebook thought might benefit from having a
blackmail figure in his life. In fact, it was something
(17:56):
he himself had craved growing up. I was raised by
a single mother, and I appreciate my mother and all
of the strength that she had to raise four boys
and my sister, but my entire life I longed for
a father. Originally Ken thought he was messaging with Davante,
but then it became clear he was chatting with an
adult Jen over Facebook. She said she preferred her children
(18:20):
lived what she called a private lifestyle. Understandable really, how
many parents out there willingly connect their young children with
strangers over the internet. And after the amount of attention
that photos list died, all the more reason to be protective. Still,
the two remained friends on Facebook, a choice Ken now
believes was intentional on Jen's part. She kind of intercepted
(18:43):
that potential friendship or connection that we could have had.
It wasn't until after that I was like, oh, now
it all makes sense. You wanted them to live a
private lifestyle because if he would have started sharing with
me that food was being with Hell. She kept a
very close circle of people that she can kind of
(19:04):
play this role with that everything is okay, and so
then the truth wouldn't get out or they wouldn't believe it.
Back when we started looking into this story, we wanted
to better understand what it takes to make a blended
family like the hearts work in the real world. Lauren
spoke with April Dinwoody, a transracial adoption expert and the
(19:25):
former executive director of the Donaldson Adoption Institute. April Dinwoody's
expertise and transracial adoption starts close to home. She was
adopted out of foster care as a toddler by a
white family and Rhode Island. The way her family dealt
with their racial differences was to not talk about race
at all. As an adult, hungry to connect with black culture,
(19:48):
April moved to Harlem. She became CEO of the Donaldson
Adoption Institute and mentors kids of color who are adopted
by white families. She used to host a workshop called
what my White parents did it Know? And Why I
turned out Okay Anyway. April is vocal about the flaws
and the adoption system. More often than not, professionals are underpaid,
(20:10):
Black children are overrepresented. Not enough attention is paid to
bias training. Sometimes adoptions are rushed if you look at
what tends to happen when it comes to data. States
can have a sense of not leaving young people in
foster care for a long time, so things get rushed.
(20:31):
So sometimes the termination of prontal rights happens too quickly.
Sometimes an adoption happens too quickly. She also believes that
the American perception of adoption is binary. Adopted parents are
good parents who can't take care of their children bad.
She says, not enough attention is paid to the gray
areas that exist. What kind of words come up when
(20:52):
you think of parents who have their rights terminated? Poor,
drug abusers, addicts, You know, all these really loaded terms,
and then you say, what comes up for you with
parents who adopt? Family? Love, safety? You so, and then
even when you look at, you know, families and parents
who relinquished voluntarily, there is a much warmer feeling about
(21:13):
that versus parents who have their rights terminated. It's just
something that we have embedded in our perceptions. Like Shanda Jones,
April believes that the system may have favored the hearts
and the family. Like the hearts, I could see how
they would be very appealing within the foscare system, very appealing.
She says, there is no way to discuss this case
without taking a hard look at what she calls the
(21:34):
deep layers of racism within the child welfare system. There's
so many issues of just racism and raising class differences.
It's just hard not to have that just be so
front and center. You know, you have an aunt who
is ready willing and able, and you've got families that
are struggling for whatever reason and doing what they can
to rehabilitate, and there are people of color, and then
(21:57):
you've got white family resources available Bowle, and you can
see it coming so clearly. You know that that this
is how this would play out. Institutional racism within chow
Wilfare is this there. There's no question. As a woman
of color who was taken in by white parents, April
is uniquely aware of the challenges of transracial adoption, how
(22:17):
important questions about identity can get glossed over, or how
a child may grow to feel ambivalent towards their birth culture,
or as if they're stuck between two worlds. First and foremost,
they should be living in diverse areas with examples and
teachers and community members and friends close friends of the
family that are people of color. Like you just can't
raise a brown or black kid in a situation where
(22:39):
they're one of a few people of color. Is just
not safe anymore. It's not emotionally safe. It's not physically safe.
Um So I think first and foremost they should be
living in diverse areas and parents need to be uncomfortable,
right Like white parents need to make it their business
to go and be in places where they're in a
minority so they can get a little bit of a
sense of what their kid feels. Ultimately, she believes that
(23:00):
multiple pleas for racial understanding and tolerance on Facebook not
to mention the family's presence at protests was self congratulatory.
I just remember looking at Davante's face, went back into
the two thousand and fourteen right, it was like it
just struck me. I mean I had no idea honestly,
and no idea that he was a young person that
was involved in the foster system. But but something didn't
(23:21):
sit right, and just so much pain in that and
it just felt like it felt uncomfortable to me, honestly,
It just it just did. And and then to find
out his backstory and this tragic end to his life,
it's just sort of reinforces this idea that some parents
do operate this way, which is, you know, look what
we did, we're symbols of you know, racial harmony, and
(23:45):
our kids are evidence of that, and it's just really
really uncomfortable and exploitive and um, it's sort of heartbreaking,
and it's really calculated. Right Was it calculated or was
it ignorant? If you reads heartfelt words on the topic
of systemic racism, you might find yourself impressed by her conviction.
(24:07):
On July seven, two thousand sixteen, she took to Facebook
to air her frustrations. My beautiful black boys, she wrote,
alongside a picture of Jeremiah and Davante smiling in hoodies
and beanies. We talk endlessly about the realities of this world.
So much beauty, so much pain and suffering. These boys
(24:31):
live and lead with love, but I will never deny
them their human right to be frustrated, sad, and angry
about the perpetual violence and murder of people of color.
My feed is filled with people white and POC that
want to help make a difference but are completely at
a loss of what to do. Opening up and breaking
(24:53):
the silence is a start, because white silence is black death.
If that statement makes you uncomfortable, I'm not sorry. Black
pain matters, Black anger matters, Black lives matter. Back in
(25:16):
two thousand seven, after jan and Sarah adopted Marcus, Hannah,
and Abigail. A case worker visited the women's home in Minnesota.
Her findings were positive. She recommended that Jan and Sarah
be allowed to adopt a sibling group of up to
five more children. Her report, filed on July eleven, two
thousand seven, read the Hearts are open to any race
(25:37):
and gender, although they would prefer to have at least
one boy in the sibling group. Jen and Sarah have
adopted by racial children, and they have the tools and
knowledge to adopt more children from the African American heritage.
They are prepared to advocate for their children and to
secure the necessary services to support their family. Over the
course of our reporting, Lauren has reviewed over eight hundred
(26:00):
pages of material from the Clark County Sheriff's Office in Washington.
Among the documents are official caseworker reports and personal emails
from the Heart women, and it appears they did try,
at least at first, to create a nurturing and culturally
aware home for their children before they even received the
first set of kids. Gen wrote an email in January
(26:23):
two thousand and six to her adoption agency caseworker talking
about having set up an appointment with a child psychologist
who she calls simply the best of the best. Gen wrote,
we registered him a SAP because there's a waiting list.
About three or four months out, they talked about enrolling
Marcus in special education. Jen calls the school the most
(26:45):
diverse in the district. A case worker wrote up a
conversation she had with Jen reflecting on the transracial adoption
homework Jen had completed about places and people African American
kids could identify with. It said that Jen had identified
the Black student Union at a local university. The case
(27:06):
worker writes about Jen just purchase a couple more children's
books about African American heritage. One book is called Martin's
Big Words about Martin Luther King. In pictures that were
released of the inside of the Heart's home in Washington,
their home library showed what looked like African masks hung
on the wall. The book collection included books like Mandela
(27:28):
and The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks. Another thing that
really stood out was back in March two thousand nine
email to some friends. This is after the adoption of
the second set of kids. Jen says how well the
kids are doing and mentions the maternal aunt trying to
get the kids back. Gen wrote, the kids are all
(27:50):
doing swell. I don't know why they insist on growing
up on me. Sierra will be four next month. Abby
and Jeremia are five now, Davante six, Hannah's Evan and
Marcus ten. Davante, Jeremiah, and Sierra are doing incredibly well.
You wouldn't know they are the same kids that came
to our home nine months ago. I'm so proud of
(28:11):
them for all they have accomplished in such a short time.
We finalize their adoption last month, Thank goodness. I have
been a ball of anxiety just waiting for that day
to come. Until a couple of months ago, a maternal
aunt was still trying to get them back. Long story,
happy ending or beginning. A two fifteen evaluation of data
(28:40):
on six children adopted in Minnesota examine whether being raised
by someone of a different race is inherently damaging, and
the conclusion was no. Emma Hamilton's, the lead author and
a doctoral candidate in counseling psychology at the University of
Texas at Austin, put it this way, beings by someone
of a different race is not inherently damaging to the
(29:03):
development of the adoptees. But much depends on how white
parents talk about race with their children of color and
help them identify with people of their own race. This
mirrors what April Dinwoody has found in her personal and
professional life. You almost have to become an activist, and
I think a true activists one that goes into the
school and says black and brown kids are disciplined and
(29:24):
higher rates, and you've got to make yourself known to say, hey,
not my kid. You've really got to become, you know,
a champion of your child safety physically and emotionally. I
think the Hearts tried to sort of like put that
idea out there of like racial kind of coming together,
but it was like very very superficial and uncomfortable quite frankly,
(29:48):
and how they sort of paraded the children around it.
Just that's not what that looks like. What it really
looks like when you embrace bringing a child of color
to your family and you're a white family, there better
be people that look like your kid in that community.
And the better, you know, really be authentic. And the
way it becomes authentic is learning about birth family. Like
you know, there are a lot of ethnicities and cultures
(30:08):
within black and white people and brown people, So it's
kind of like you gotta have some information so that
you actually know what your kid may have been experiencing
in their birth family. In so many ways, the mythologies
Jen and Sarah Hart told about their children had their
intended effect. They told people the kids were crack babies
(30:29):
in eighties term now widely debunked. People believed them for
April Dinwoodie. These stories are evidence of white saviorism, the
idea that white people can swoop in and fix non
white people. It's one of those things that really just
makes me so angry because at the end of the day,
it may well be true that these young people come
(30:50):
with those traumatic experiences that manifest and behavior and health issues.
That just means that family needs more support, and those
those parents who are going to parents as children need
not use that as any form of excuse or even
be talking about private things about their children unless it's
with a licensed therapist. That dressed so much suspicion and
(31:14):
so much just emotion around the fact that that would
be utilized as a way to mask some of the
abuse and neglect that was happening within the home. It's
just just disturbing the and Sparreling now sees how the
use of loaded terms like crack babies may have helped
reinforce a certain narrative. Everyone was very envious of them
(31:36):
because of how they could pull this off, how they
can raise the six quote unquote developmentally the late children.
Good for you, nice work, you saved him. You know,
that was the narrative always. You know, we talked extensively
about it. So it was just like, you know, she
had a very detailed story about how they were adopted
and what they went through prior. There's a lot of
(31:57):
white saviorism symbolic in this right now that I never
understood or knew about, trying to build this portrait of
a you know, idealistic situation or these white ladies came
in and saved these six black children. Um, which just man,
(32:23):
it's tough. We loved those kids so much. Okay, so sorry, okay.
Jen and Sarah's artfully spun stories were alarmingly effective. They
neatly explained away some of the kid's strange behavior while
(32:44):
also reinforcing a cocoon of silence around what happened behind
closed doors. They kept the kids from being able to
connect with people who had similar backgrounds. They kept the
neighbors from interfering. These stories even prevented the children from
being in touch with their own flesh and blood. And
most importantly, these stories ensured that the voices of the
(33:05):
hard children were never ever heard. If you suspect a
child as being abused, call one eight hundred for a
child that's one eight hundred numeral four a C H
I l D. Or visit child help dot org to
(33:29):
find out how to report your concerns next time on
Broken Hearts, when I realized that she was on school, mama, like,
there's no way in hell those kids are learning. I mean, really,
those third parties came here and scoured the bluffs with
fancy helicopters and airplanes and boats. I can't even imagine
(33:53):
how many miles he walked on those beaches and bluffs
and drove around and sat on the cliff with his
binoculars day after day after day after day. I remember
making this comment, like you're like an abused wife, and
she just kind of gave me this look like no kidding.
For access to exclusive photos and videos and documents about
(34:14):
the case. Visit Glamour dot com slash Broken Hearts. Have
questions for us about this podcast, reach us on Twitter
at Glamour mag or at Broken Hearts Pod. If you
like what you heard, leave us a review. Broken Hearts
is a joint production between Glamour and How Stuff Works,
with new episodes dropping every Tuesday. Broken Hearts is co
(34:36):
hosted and co written by Justine Harman and Elizabeth Egan
and edited by Wendy Nogal. Lauren Smiley is our field reporter.
Samantha Barry is Glamour's editor in chief. Julie Sheen and
Diana Buckman head up the business side of this partnership.
Joyce Pandola, Pat Singer and Luke Zeleski are our research team.
(34:58):
Jason Hope is executive for Doucer On behalf of How
Stuff Works, along with producers Julian Weller, ben Kie Brick
and Josh Thaine. Special thanks to Jen Lance h
One quick thing. A week ago, on Tuesday, January two
thousand nineteen, the Mendocino County Sheriff's Office received word from
the Department of Justice that the foot discovered near the
crash site in May was positively identified as belonging to
Hannah Hart. It is now believed by officials that she
died in the crash with her family. The notice reads,
(00:25):
Davante Hart is still listed as a missing person with
the Mendocino County Sheriff's Office. The case remains open and active.
Stay tuned for the latest installment of Broken Hearts. Before
we begin today's episode, Liz and I feel compelled to
address something we think is vitally important to the story.
(00:48):
We're white, Loses of Irish Catholic descent. She has freckles,
and I. She thinks are green, but I'd say are
blue with a swirl of cinnamon. I am of Jewish descent,
of blonde hair and hazel eze. We were both raised
on the East Coast. We both attended private colleges in
the Northeast. We are both mothers to white children. For
(01:12):
many reasons, we are not the ideal people to delve
into the tricky and very problematic race issues that this
case presents. We'd also be remiss not to talk about
these issues, as they're crucial to the larger socio cultural
context of the story. In this episode, you'll hear from
Nathaniel Davis, who helped raise three of the Hart kids
before they were adopted, and April Dinwoodie, who was a
(01:35):
transracial adoption expert here in New York, and more from
Shaunda Jones, the lawyer who fought to keep Jeremiah, Davante
and Sierra with their biological aunt. Each of these people
has a different perspective on how race and bias may
have played a role in the deaths of Marcus, Hannah Davante, Abigail, Jeremiah,
(01:55):
and Sierra Hart. From Glamour and How Stuff Works, This
is Broken Hearts, I'm Justine Harmon and I'm Liz Egan.
Before Jane and Sarah Hart adopted their second set of
siblings in two thousand nine, Davante, Jeremiah, and Sierra had
(02:16):
been Davanta d E v O n t A Jeremiah
j E R m I A h and Sierra c
I E r A Davis. They had lived in Houston, Texas,
with their older brother Dante, their mother, Sherry Hurd, and
her boyfriend Nathaniel Davis, whose last name the children had
(02:40):
taken even before Sherry and Nathaniel got married in two
thousand ten. Here's Nathaniel, Oh, no, tell me that I
was They chuckles from me and sell it to my
room and he removed them for less to the audio
quality here isn't great, but Nathaniel saying that he was
(03:00):
the only dad those kids ever had, and that CPS
removed the siblings from his and Sherry's care when Sierra
was born in two thousand five. The children lived briefly
with his brother, he says, before all three entered the
Texas foster care system. Nathaniel remembers the three younger siblings
personalities well, even though he hasn't seen them in over
(03:21):
a decade. La Sierra all the time, always tried to
protective and laugh. Remember, Nathaniel wasn't the only family these
kids had. Before jenn and Sarah Hart adopted Davante, Jeremiah,
and Sierra in two thousand nine, their aunt Priscilla fought
(03:44):
hard to get them out of foster care. Priscilla hired
Houston attorney Shawanda Jones to help her plead her case
and was successful in having them returned to her care.
She even moved to a new house to accommodate the children,
but a decision to let their mom, Sherry, watch the
kids while Priscilla went to work, resulted in the kids
(04:05):
being removed from the home. Sherry had a well documented
substance abuse problem. According to court records, she was a
crack cocaine abuser and was forbidden contact with the kids
and CPS exercised a no tolerance policy. The children had
only lived with their aunt for five and a half months.
Priscilla's decision to let the kids mom babysit was a
(04:27):
bad judgment call, yes, but Shaunda says the tenor of
the court proceedings stands out in her twenty two years
as an attorney. The father's rights were being terminated because
I think she had alcohol problems and the mother had
drug problems, and so that's why their rights are terminated,
which I don't take issue with that. I think you
(04:48):
know in that instant that was the prudent thing to do.
But I always have taken issue within this case is
the harsh manner the way that they dealt with Miss Celestine.
The presiding judge for that court was Patrick Shelton, who
is now retired. In response to questions about how the
Hearts were allowed to adopt Davonte, Jeremiah, and Sierra after
(05:10):
an allegation of child abuse had already been made against them,
he pointed to the lack of criminal charges in the
state of Minnesota. Shelton told Criminal Justice site the appeal
Unless there's a criminal charge, what can you do, Believe
it or not. Kids get bruises that do not get beat.
Shelton also denies reports that he or his associate judge
(05:31):
favored non relative adoptions over placement with family members. The
agency that facilitated Jen and Sarah's adoption of the Davis
siblings closed in two thousand eleven. It was called the
Permanent Family Resource Center. The offices were located on a
commercial gride of land in Fergus Falls, Minnesota, which is
(05:53):
about a fifteen minute drive from Alexandria, where the women
lived until two thousand thirteen, and our chived version of
the now defunct website says it was started in two
thousand by three families who had adopted eight children out
of the child welfare system. According to a page report
filed by the Minnesota Department of Human Services in September
(06:15):
two thousand nine, only months after Jen and Sarah officially
adopted their second set of siblings through the agency, the
Permanent Family Resource Center was placed on conditional status after
accruing seventeen licensing violations. The violations ranged from failing to
submit paperwork to failure to complete proper background checks on families.
(06:36):
In the past ten years, the Minnesota DHS has only
issued three conditional licenses for child placement agencies. Back when
the Hearts were clients, the Permanent Family Resource Center ran
the Waiting Children Program, a service that provided families in
Minnesota and North Dakota with access to foster kids living
in Texas, Washington, Ohio, Idaho, Oregon, California, and Florida. The
(07:01):
website reads children in this program are living in foster
homes or residential facilities and a termination of parental rights
has occurred, they are legally available for adoption. The average
weight for a child after approval of the home assessment
is between six months and three years. It took Jen
and Sarah Heart less than a year to legally adopt Davonte, Jeremiah,
(07:25):
and Sierra. Our Field reporter Laurence Smiley reached out to
three former Permanent Family Resource Center employees about how these
children were matched with the Hearts as we record this episode,
those emails have not yet been returned. Davantae, Jeremiah, and
sarah stepdad, Nathaniel Davis, still has a hard time understanding
why Jen and Sarah were able to adopt the children
(07:47):
while also being under investigation on allegations of child abuse.
He goes on to say, I'm going to tell you
why they figured we were poor, didn't have nothing to
fight them with. They should have given other people an
opportunity to adopt them kids. After DeVante, Jeremiah, and Sierra
(08:11):
were removed from Priscilla Celestine's care, Shanda says she barely
had a chance to say goodbye to the children she
had cared for for the past several months. I think
maybe saw them one last time. Both Nathaniel and Shonda
believe the institutionalized bias may have informed the court's decision.
You just got the complete feeling that they already had
(08:33):
made up their mind. It's almost like you're just wasting
their time. You're in the way, and it's like, this
is supposed to be a judicial system where you weigh evidence.
Why would you be so emotional and so angry over
somebody during their job. Because this lady wanted to make
sure that she kept her niece and nephews and not
allowed them to go off as she never seen them
(08:53):
again in life. Despite trying to find out more details
regarding the siblings adoption, Shaunda says she was never given
more information about their placement family. I saw some communication
with Brian Fisher, who was a children's attorney, and he
said he would have to fly to Minneapolis, so they
sent the kids out of state. And that didn't even
make sense anyway. I was like, as Hughes, Texas, is
(09:15):
you mean to tell me that there's no one? Why
is there this effort to harry up and get these
kids out of Texas. When Lauren reached Brian Fisher over
the phone in August to ask about the case, he said,
only no, ma'am, no ma'am, no ma'am. Adoptions are sealed
in Texas. Goodbye. It wasn't until March of this year,
when Shanta saw reports of the crash on TV, that
(09:37):
she realized what had happened to DeVante, Jeremiah and Sierra
and who got custody of them? So many years ago,
I was sitting here in my office and I was
looking at the news and I heard them say Minneapolis,
and then they said Devant, and then that's when I said,
oh my god, those are the kids. Shanna called Priscilla
to break the news. When I finally make the connection,
(09:57):
I was just horrified, and I had admit, because she's
somebody who can't listen to a lot of bad things
that happened. But I called her around like eleven o'clock
at and I asked her, have you heard about that kids?
Where the those kids were driven off the cliff? And
she said no, So she said she couldn't hear what
I was about to tell her. So I called it
(10:18):
back the next day and that's when I revealed to
her they were driven off the cliff. And you know,
she she she says, she just can't. She didn't want
to accept that. She always thought that the kids were
in a better place. But she was, you know, she
was devastated. She was devastated, like so many people who
(10:38):
learned the fate of Marcus. Hannah Tavante, Abigail Jeremiah, and
Sierra Hart. Shanda takes issue with the disconnect between the
facts and emerged on paper and the fiction Jen Hart
presented on Facebook. She recalls reading about a particular post
in which jen called out the racism her children experienced
(10:59):
on a regular or basis. These kids are being used
as a prop I read this article where I think
one of the adopted monks has said she was in
a store. She was checking out in an older white
gentleman and this patch here who was also Caucasian. We're
having this discussion about Davonte asking him something about whether
he was going to play sports. And I won't believe
(11:20):
for one moment that that conversation took place. That never happened.
We scoured Jen Hart's Facebook feed, and sure enough, a
post from November two thousand fourteen refers to this interaction.
The post reads, quote, we were standing in the grocery checkoutline.
An elderly man was standing at the end of the
bagging area, conversing with the woman checking us out. He
(11:41):
spots our son looks him up and down. Man Colon,
I can tell you were going to be a baseball
player when you grow up. Son pauses, tilts his head
and gives a closed mouth grin. Actually, no, baseball isn't
really my thing. The post was on like this a
little bit, with the woman bagging groceries in what Jen
(12:03):
describes as a befuddled, nearly astonished voice, saying, quote, what
I have never met a kaid that looks like you
that doesn't play sports, and the man agreeing with a chuckle, Right,
never they all do. Gentleman's having to watch her child
be subjected to ongoing racial stereotyping, but doesn't step in. Instead,
(12:25):
she says, her son responds, well, of course you've never
met a kid like me. I'm one of a kind.
I'm going to be myself no matter how much people
try to make me something I am not. She adds
at the end, I think this kid will be all
right no matter what is tossed at him. This kind
of storytelling from Jen may seem benign at first, but
(12:48):
when it factors into an ongoing pattern of isolation and
chronic abuse, the narrative takes on a sinister undertone. Jen
and Sarah Hart had taken six black kids from Houston,
one of the most diverse cities in America and moved
them from one rural town to the next. For context,
a two thousand seventeen census report found that Woodland, Washington,
(13:12):
the last place the Hearts lived, is at least ninety
two percent white. Only point three percent of Woodland's population
is black. Friends of the Hearts often recount the stories
(13:33):
Jan and Sarah told about how unwelcoming their neighbors were,
how much abuse this unconventional family faced, and how I'm
safe it was for them at times. Bill Groner lived
next door to them in West Lynn, Oregon, where the
population is white. Bill believes that maintaining a sense of
fear might have helped Jen and Sarah keep the ongoing
abuse under wraps. He spent the past four years playing
(13:57):
keyboard at Mount Olive Baptist Church in Portland. The website
from Mount all of It claims the church was built
in seven from lumber provided by the Ku Klux Klan
to keep the African American organization on what they deemed
the proper side of town. For the record, Bill is white.
I've always played music in church. I play at an
(14:19):
African American church, so I'm aware about, you know, racism.
It maybe covert rather than over, even if it's kind
of almost subliminal, I could see parents wanting to protect
their kids always. Maybe that's part of why they told
the kids to kind of not be overly conversational or
(14:39):
friendly with neighbors because people could secretly harbor prejudice against you.
But when you read more about what's what actually happened,
I don't think they want the kids to tell what
was going on. I think that's really part of the deal,
because all would have taken as one kid to come
(15:00):
over and say, you know, I'm hungry, could have some
food for me to call Children's Services. Groner isn't the
only one who noted the way the Heart women, especially Jen,
would cut their family off from outsiders, but their festival
friend Ian Spurling only came to that realization after they died.
It's like, okay, so we have some dates set up
(15:21):
they canceled, like, hey, let's plan a play date at
the park list Tuesday. Oh yeah, that'd be great. And
then the day comes, Hey, we're not going to be around.
You know, a few little things here and there that
you know, we never found anything more about. Now looking back,
it's like she was shielding them from being close to people.
I felt like we were really close with them. But
at the same time, are they like our family that
(15:42):
just stops by all the time? You know, not at all?
Now looking back, there were some dumb moments there. In particular,
like Marcus, Marcus and Jeremiah, they were very reserved and
almost stoic in nature. And then when you talk to him, boom,
snap into a smile, snap into some personality, and and boom,
right when you stopped talking, go right back to a
stoic face. And Ian got closer than most. Back in
(16:05):
June two, eighteen, our Field reporter Lauren talked to Ken Noatake,
an activist who started the Free Hugs project. Ken first
reached out to the family when he saw that viral
image of Davante hugging a police officer at the Black
Lives Matter rally. He thought perhaps he could mentor the boy.
Here's Lauren. Ken first held a free Hug sign at
(16:28):
the Boston Marathon in He soon extended his campaign for
peace and racial understanding to Black Lives Matter rallies in
college campuses across the country. When Davante's photo went viral
six months later, Ken social media lit up. Ken read
about how Davante had white moms. He also noticed the
(16:49):
boy's curious outfit fedora hat, leather, pea coat, and why
is looking face, the age of which was hard to peg.
He sent a direct message to Jen's acco out on
Facebook when his photo of him holding that free Hug
sign and crying in front of the officer. When that
went viral, my social media went crazy because it was
(17:14):
the second time an African American was shown like that
in regards to law enforcement. And that's what my work
of the Free Hugs project really begin as. And so
shortly after DeVante hearts photo comes out with him holding
that free Hug sign in front of a police officer,
I'm getting all of these emails from people saying, Ken,
(17:35):
your work is spreading and look at the impact that
you're having, even on young people. And so right away
I felt like I need to meet this kid, and
so I started searching online and then made contact with
their family the Facebook thought might benefit from having a
blackmail figure in his life. In fact, it was something
(17:56):
he himself had craved growing up. I was raised by
a single mother, and I appreciate my mother and all
of the strength that she had to raise four boys
and my sister, but my entire life I longed for
a father. Originally Ken thought he was messaging with Davante,
but then it became clear he was chatting with an
adult Jen over Facebook. She said she preferred her children
(18:20):
lived what she called a private lifestyle. Understandable really, how
many parents out there willingly connect their young children with
strangers over the internet. And after the amount of attention
that photos list died, all the more reason to be protective. Still,
the two remained friends on Facebook, a choice Ken now
believes was intentional on Jen's part. She kind of intercepted
(18:43):
that potential friendship or connection that we could have had.
It wasn't until after that I was like, oh, now
it all makes sense. You wanted them to live a
private lifestyle because if he would have started sharing with
me that food was being with Hell. She kept a
very close circle of people that she can kind of
(19:04):
play this role with that everything is okay, and so
then the truth wouldn't get out or they wouldn't believe it.
Back when we started looking into this story, we wanted
to better understand what it takes to make a blended
family like the hearts work in the real world. Lauren
spoke with April Dinwoody, a transracial adoption expert and the
(19:25):
former executive director of the Donaldson Adoption Institute. April Dinwoody's
expertise and transracial adoption starts close to home. She was
adopted out of foster care as a toddler by a
white family and Rhode Island. The way her family dealt
with their racial differences was to not talk about race
at all. As an adult, hungry to connect with black culture,
(19:48):
April moved to Harlem. She became CEO of the Donaldson
Adoption Institute and mentors kids of color who are adopted
by white families. She used to host a workshop called
what my White parents did it Know? And Why I
turned out Okay Anyway. April is vocal about the flaws
and the adoption system. More often than not, professionals are underpaid,
(20:10):
Black children are overrepresented. Not enough attention is paid to
bias training. Sometimes adoptions are rushed if you look at
what tends to happen when it comes to data. States
can have a sense of not leaving young people in
foster care for a long time, so things get rushed.
(20:31):
So sometimes the termination of prontal rights happens too quickly.
Sometimes an adoption happens too quickly. She also believes that
the American perception of adoption is binary. Adopted parents are
good parents who can't take care of their children bad.
She says, not enough attention is paid to the gray
areas that exist. What kind of words come up when
(20:52):
you think of parents who have their rights terminated? Poor,
drug abusers, addicts, You know, all these really loaded terms,
and then you say, what comes up for you with
parents who adopt? Family? Love, safety? You so, and then
even when you look at, you know, families and parents
who relinquished voluntarily, there is a much warmer feeling about
(21:13):
that versus parents who have their rights terminated. It's just
something that we have embedded in our perceptions. Like Shanda Jones,
April believes that the system may have favored the hearts
and the family. Like the hearts, I could see how
they would be very appealing within the foscare system, very appealing.
She says, there is no way to discuss this case
without taking a hard look at what she calls the
(21:34):
deep layers of racism within the child welfare system. There's
so many issues of just racism and raising class differences.
It's just hard not to have that just be so
front and center. You know, you have an aunt who
is ready willing and able, and you've got families that
are struggling for whatever reason and doing what they can
to rehabilitate, and there are people of color, and then
(21:57):
you've got white family resources available Bowle, and you can
see it coming so clearly. You know that that this
is how this would play out. Institutional racism within chow
Wilfare is this there. There's no question. As a woman
of color who was taken in by white parents, April
is uniquely aware of the challenges of transracial adoption, how
(22:17):
important questions about identity can get glossed over, or how
a child may grow to feel ambivalent towards their birth culture,
or as if they're stuck between two worlds. First and foremost,
they should be living in diverse areas with examples and
teachers and community members and friends close friends of the
family that are people of color. Like you just can't
raise a brown or black kid in a situation where
(22:39):
they're one of a few people of color. Is just
not safe anymore. It's not emotionally safe. It's not physically safe.
Um So I think first and foremost they should be
living in diverse areas and parents need to be uncomfortable,
right Like white parents need to make it their business
to go and be in places where they're in a
minority so they can get a little bit of a
sense of what their kid feels. Ultimately, she believes that
(23:00):
multiple pleas for racial understanding and tolerance on Facebook not
to mention the family's presence at protests was self congratulatory.
I just remember looking at Davante's face, went back into
the two thousand and fourteen right, it was like it
just struck me. I mean I had no idea honestly,
and no idea that he was a young person that
was involved in the foster system. But but something didn't
(23:21):
sit right, and just so much pain in that and
it just felt like it felt uncomfortable to me, honestly,
It just it just did. And and then to find
out his backstory and this tragic end to his life,
it's just sort of reinforces this idea that some parents
do operate this way, which is, you know, look what
we did, we're symbols of you know, racial harmony, and
(23:45):
our kids are evidence of that, and it's just really
really uncomfortable and exploitive and um, it's sort of heartbreaking,
and it's really calculated. Right Was it calculated or was
it ignorant? If you reads heartfelt words on the topic
of systemic racism, you might find yourself impressed by her conviction.
(24:07):
On July seven, two thousand sixteen, she took to Facebook
to air her frustrations. My beautiful black boys, she wrote,
alongside a picture of Jeremiah and Davante smiling in hoodies
and beanies. We talk endlessly about the realities of this world.
So much beauty, so much pain and suffering. These boys
(24:31):
live and lead with love, but I will never deny
them their human right to be frustrated, sad, and angry
about the perpetual violence and murder of people of color.
My feed is filled with people white and POC that
want to help make a difference but are completely at
a loss of what to do. Opening up and breaking
(24:53):
the silence is a start, because white silence is black death.
If that statement makes you uncomfortable, I'm not sorry. Black
pain matters, Black anger matters, Black lives matter. Back in
(25:16):
two thousand seven, after jan and Sarah adopted Marcus, Hannah,
and Abigail. A case worker visited the women's home in Minnesota.
Her findings were positive. She recommended that Jan and Sarah
be allowed to adopt a sibling group of up to
five more children. Her report, filed on July eleven, two
thousand seven, read the Hearts are open to any race
(25:37):
and gender, although they would prefer to have at least
one boy in the sibling group. Jen and Sarah have
adopted by racial children, and they have the tools and
knowledge to adopt more children from the African American heritage.
They are prepared to advocate for their children and to
secure the necessary services to support their family. Over the
course of our reporting, Lauren has reviewed over eight hundred
(26:00):
pages of material from the Clark County Sheriff's Office in Washington.
Among the documents are official caseworker reports and personal emails
from the Heart women, and it appears they did try,
at least at first, to create a nurturing and culturally
aware home for their children before they even received the
first set of kids. Gen wrote an email in January
(26:23):
two thousand and six to her adoption agency caseworker talking
about having set up an appointment with a child psychologist
who she calls simply the best of the best. Gen wrote,
we registered him a SAP because there's a waiting list.
About three or four months out, they talked about enrolling
Marcus in special education. Jen calls the school the most
(26:45):
diverse in the district. A case worker wrote up a
conversation she had with Jen reflecting on the transracial adoption
homework Jen had completed about places and people African American
kids could identify with. It said that Jen had identified
the Black student Union at a local university. The case
(27:06):
worker writes about Jen just purchase a couple more children's
books about African American heritage. One book is called Martin's
Big Words about Martin Luther King. In pictures that were
released of the inside of the Heart's home in Washington,
their home library showed what looked like African masks hung
on the wall. The book collection included books like Mandela
(27:28):
and The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks. Another thing that
really stood out was back in March two thousand nine
email to some friends. This is after the adoption of
the second set of kids. Jen says how well the
kids are doing and mentions the maternal aunt trying to
get the kids back. Gen wrote, the kids are all
(27:50):
doing swell. I don't know why they insist on growing
up on me. Sierra will be four next month. Abby
and Jeremia are five now, Davante six, Hannah's Evan and
Marcus ten. Davante, Jeremiah, and Sierra are doing incredibly well.
You wouldn't know they are the same kids that came
to our home nine months ago. I'm so proud of
(28:11):
them for all they have accomplished in such a short time.
We finalize their adoption last month, Thank goodness. I have
been a ball of anxiety just waiting for that day
to come. Until a couple of months ago, a maternal
aunt was still trying to get them back. Long story,
happy ending or beginning. A two fifteen evaluation of data
(28:40):
on six children adopted in Minnesota examine whether being raised
by someone of a different race is inherently damaging, and
the conclusion was no. Emma Hamilton's, the lead author and
a doctoral candidate in counseling psychology at the University of
Texas at Austin, put it this way, beings by someone
of a different race is not inherently damaging to the
(29:03):
development of the adoptees. But much depends on how white
parents talk about race with their children of color and
help them identify with people of their own race. This
mirrors what April Dinwoody has found in her personal and
professional life. You almost have to become an activist, and
I think a true activists one that goes into the
school and says black and brown kids are disciplined and
(29:24):
higher rates, and you've got to make yourself known to say, hey,
not my kid. You've really got to become, you know,
a champion of your child safety physically and emotionally. I
think the Hearts tried to sort of like put that
idea out there of like racial kind of coming together,
but it was like very very superficial and uncomfortable quite frankly,
(29:48):
and how they sort of paraded the children around it.
Just that's not what that looks like. What it really
looks like when you embrace bringing a child of color
to your family and you're a white family, there better
be people that look like your kid in that community.
And the better, you know, really be authentic. And the
way it becomes authentic is learning about birth family. Like
you know, there are a lot of ethnicities and cultures
(30:08):
within black and white people and brown people, So it's
kind of like you gotta have some information so that
you actually know what your kid may have been experiencing
in their birth family. In so many ways, the mythologies
Jen and Sarah Hart told about their children had their
intended effect. They told people the kids were crack babies
(30:29):
in eighties term now widely debunked. People believed them for
April Dinwoodie. These stories are evidence of white saviorism, the
idea that white people can swoop in and fix non
white people. It's one of those things that really just
makes me so angry because at the end of the day,
it may well be true that these young people come
(30:50):
with those traumatic experiences that manifest and behavior and health issues.
That just means that family needs more support, and those
those parents who are going to parents as children need
not use that as any form of excuse or even
be talking about private things about their children unless it's
with a licensed therapist. That dressed so much suspicion and
(31:14):
so much just emotion around the fact that that would
be utilized as a way to mask some of the
abuse and neglect that was happening within the home. It's
just just disturbing the and Sparreling now sees how the
use of loaded terms like crack babies may have helped
reinforce a certain narrative. Everyone was very envious of them
(31:36):
because of how they could pull this off, how they
can raise the six quote unquote developmentally the late children.
Good for you, nice work, you saved him. You know,
that was the narrative always. You know, we talked extensively
about it. So it was just like, you know, she
had a very detailed story about how they were adopted
and what they went through prior. There's a lot of
(31:57):
white saviorism symbolic in this right now that I never
understood or knew about, trying to build this portrait of
a you know, idealistic situation or these white ladies came
in and saved these six black children. Um, which just man,
(32:23):
it's tough. We loved those kids so much. Okay, so sorry, okay.
Jen and Sarah's artfully spun stories were alarmingly effective. They
neatly explained away some of the kid's strange behavior while
(32:44):
also reinforcing a cocoon of silence around what happened behind
closed doors. They kept the kids from being able to
connect with people who had similar backgrounds. They kept the
neighbors from interfering. These stories even prevented the children from
being in touch with their own flesh and blood. And
most importantly, these stories ensured that the voices of the
(33:05):
hard children were never ever heard. If you suspect a
child as being abused, call one eight hundred for a
child that's one eight hundred numeral four a C H
I l D. Or visit child help dot org to
(33:29):
find out how to report your concerns next time on
Broken Hearts, when I realized that she was on school, mama, like,
there's no way in hell those kids are learning. I mean, really,
those third parties came here and scoured the bluffs with
fancy helicopters and airplanes and boats. I can't even imagine
(33:53):
how many miles he walked on those beaches and bluffs
and drove around and sat on the cliff with his
binoculars day after day after day after day. I remember
making this comment, like you're like an abused wife, and
she just kind of gave me this look like no kidding.
For access to exclusive photos and videos and documents about
(34:14):
the case. Visit Glamour dot com slash Broken Hearts. Have
questions for us about this podcast, reach us on Twitter
at Glamour mag or at Broken Hearts Pod. If you
like what you heard, leave us a review. Broken Hearts
is a joint production between Glamour and How Stuff Works,
with new episodes dropping every Tuesday. Broken Hearts is co
(34:36):
hosted and co written by Justine Harman and Elizabeth Egan
and edited by Wendy Nogal. Lauren Smiley is our field reporter.
Samantha Barry is Glamour's editor in chief. Julie Sheen and
Diana Buckman head up the business side of this partnership.
Joyce Pandola, Pat Singer and Luke Zeleski are our research team.
(34:58):
Jason Hope is executive for Doucer On behalf of How
Stuff Works, along with producers Julian Weller, ben Kie Brick
and Josh Thaine. Special thanks to Jen Lance h
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