December 11, 2018 • 26 mins
Jennifer and Sarah Hart adopt two sets of siblings in three years. Chaos ensues—with an undercurrent of something else. Something sinister.
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
As Fridayful Meet the Heart Kids as they appeared online.
This is a family sing along Jen posted to YouTube
back in two thousand thirteen. Davante is on the bongo drum,
Abigail is holding a guitar but not playing, and Jeremiah
(00:23):
is shaking a morocco while Hannah dances off to the side.
They're in a sunny room with a gleaming wood floor,
and the shelves behind them are packed with neatly stacked
picture books. Happy times, right, It certainly looks that way,
especially when Davante pauses to give Hannah a hug. Is
it spontaneous or is the person behind the camera prompting
(00:46):
him with a stern glance. We'll never know, yes, Zula,
we don't know when Jen and Sarah Hart decided they
(01:06):
wanted children. Maybe they always wanted to be moms, or
maybe they just felt like kids were the next logical step.
Years after they adopted six children, Sarah would tell a
colleague that she wished she'd known it wasn't mandatory to
have a big family. She was the oldest of four kids.
Jen was the oldest of three. We're piecing together the
events that led Jen and Sarah from their early days
(01:27):
together all the way to the edge of that one
d foot cliff in California. How did they go from
being just the two of them living in Minnesota working
at a department store to a family of eight in
less than three years. From glamour and how Stuff Works,
this is Broken Hearts. I'm Justine Harmon and I'm Liz Egan.
(01:50):
We've been looking into the story of the Heart family
for the past six months. In public and on Facebook.
They looked like the perfect family, fun loving, joyful, and
acky in the best way. But as we've learned, sometimes
perfect is the perfect cover up. In two thousand four,
(02:24):
when Jen and Sarah were in their mid twenties, still
living in Alexandria, still working at Herburger's, they took in
a fifteen year old foster daughter. Just to give some context,
This was the same year Minnesota State Senator Michelle Bachman
laid the groundwork for presidential run on an anti gay platform,
calling homosexuality personal bondage, personal despair, and personal enslavement. When
(02:49):
thousands gathered on the steps of the Capitol to rally
for same sex marriage, she spoke out to a Christian
television network, there's something that's happening in our schools. And
one of the reasons why I felt like I was
called to take up this issue is because of the
profound impact that this would have on every man, every woman,
every child in the state of Minnesota. Because everyone thought
(03:11):
this would only impact the one point three percent of
our population that is the same sex individual. And again,
don't misunderstand, I am not here bashing people who are homosexuals,
who are lesbians, who are bisexual, who are transgender. We
need to have profound compassion for people who are dealing
with a very real issue of sexual dysfunction in their life.
(03:34):
It's not funny, it's sad. It's part of satan. I
think to say this is gay, it's anything but gay.
So this is the backdrop for the world in which
the Hearts started to build their family. You already met
Jordan Smith. She was only nineteen when she worked with
Jen and Sarah at her burgers our Field. Reporter Lawrence
Smiley talked to Smith about Jen and Sarah's first foray
(03:57):
into parenthood. They are one of my early role models
for what like a non traditional family could look like.
I was nineteen at the time. The foster child she
was probably I remember one of them sharing with me
a lot of like this girl is so difficult, she's awful,
(04:21):
and that she was eating out of the garbage. It
felt like mean girl gossip, you know, like she's the worst.
It didn't feel like they really had interests in developing
her as a person and giving her the tools she
needed to be a successful adult. And I just felt
(04:44):
so sorry for the girl. I wasn't really old enough
to realize that, like these are shitty parents, But even
at the time, I just kind of was like, this
was a child, she's struggling, Like something's not right about this,
Like isn't it your job to make her feel more
confident and encourage her to have healthy habits. But you know,
(05:08):
I also grew up in the Midwest where I didn't
see a lot of like great parental models happening. I
grew up where people still hit their kids in the nineties,
Like in the Midwest and Minnesota, you became parents are
like one and let's be honest, you're you're immature, Like, okay,
(05:33):
my brain is still developing until I and now I
have to develop this other human instead of focusing my
energy on you know, becoming the adults I need to become.
Her burgers would have just like friends and family sale
and all the makeup counters were filling the books with
a lot of makeovers to like drama more business, and
(05:55):
so Sarah and Jen signed their foster daughter up for
one of the makeovers as kind of a let's bring
you into our world a little bit, you know, like
maybe this is something she would want to learn about.
I was the only teenager working at the counters. They
thought it would be fun to have her go with
another teenage girl. So I did her makeover, and you know,
(06:17):
i'd say things like she had really pretty skin, which
she did, I remember that for some reason. And she
was hunched over, like holding herself in. I could tell
she did not want to be there. I remember Jen
and Sarah, mostly Jen interrupting and answering questions or being
(06:41):
like she doesn't talk much. I remember them being both
very annoyed with the situation, like we came into work
on a day we're not working and we're doing this
nice thing and our boughter daughters being difficult and annoying it.
I don't remember her being difficult are annoying. I remember
(07:04):
her being very insecure and unsure of herself, and Jen
being very intimidating. I didn't see a lot of empathy
coming through, Like I remember that very clearly and being like, huh,
do you feel sorry for this girl. After Jen and
(07:26):
Sarah died in March, their former foster daughter told the
Seattle Times that she never ate out of the garbage
she remembered the makeover. She said she was a tomboy
back then and never wore makeup, which would explain her
slouched posture that day with Jordan's. The former foster daughter,
now in her twenties and preferring to remain anonymous, also
told the Seattle Times how she remembers Jen and Sarah
(07:48):
showing her pictures of the three young children they were
planning to adopt. She was thrilled. Jen and Sarah had
told her she was going to stay with them until
she turned eighteen, and now she was going to be
a big sister. But that's not what happened. They were
applying for the children, the first three. They had gone
and visited them, and I remember them being really excited.
(08:11):
I didn't apply like a lot of critical thinking to
the situation at the time. I mean, like if I
had my experience, now I'd be like, you don't seem
very excited with the child you have, why do you
want three more? But mostly I remember hearing it like
after I left her Berger, I'd hear that, like Sara Engin,
they got their three kids, like they're so happy. I
(08:34):
remember vaguely hearing that they dropped the foster daughter off
and like just abandoned her. And I remember being like,
what the fuck? Cold blooded? Like, oh Jesus, there is
their excitement about getting adopted kids. Did you get the
sense they really wanted to be moms or I got
(08:56):
the sense that they wanted the validation be a foster parent,
didn't have the cloud of having children like they want
to be like, we have children that are ours versus
a child? Were watching and do you mean validation as
in we're a real couple, We're a real you know,
we're a real family. Jenet Sarah dropped their foster daughter
(09:27):
at a therapist office and never returned. She never heard
from them again. She was moved to a different foster home.
Her belongings were already there. She would not become a
big sister after all, She told the Seattle Times. She
remembers feeling abandoned devastated. Two years later, in two thousand six,
(09:52):
Jen and Sarah officially adopted those three siblings from the
Texas foster system, Marcus then seven, Hannah four, and Abigail too.
On December, in a Facebook post celebrating Abigail or Abby's
twelfth birthday, Jen wrote, she was the first of my
children I ever held in my arms. Not only is
(10:13):
today her birthday, but it also marks the day Sarah
and I became mothers. We flew to Houston, Texas ten
years ago on Christmas Day to meet our first trio
of children. Due to a plethora of issues that came
up with our flight and then finding the hotel had
burned down, we wouldn't meet the children until the next day, December.
(10:34):
We walked into the foster home a bundle of nerves
and excitement. The foster mother called Abby from the upper level.
This dainty little peanut walked out, grabbed the railing, walked
down the stairs, stood right at my feet, and held
out her arms as a gesture to be picked up.
I lifted her and she immediately nestled her head right
(10:55):
into my chest, with her tiny arms gripped around me,
genuine love oozed out of every pore of my body.
I will never know what it's like to birtha child,
or the feeling of holding your newborn for the first time,
but I imagine the feeling is much like what I
experienced with Abby. We'll get more into the adoption process, Leader,
(11:21):
but just to give you some quick background, Marcus, Hannah,
and Abigail fell into several categories that might have made
them hard to place with adoptive families. They were black.
Black children are overrepresented in foster care and less likely
to be adopted out of it, and it can be
more difficult to find families willing to take on multiple siblings.
(11:41):
Jen and Sarah had their work cut out for them.
They were young, they had no family in the area,
and overnight they became mothers of three. Ten years later,
on the anniversary of the day Jen and Sarah brought Marcus, Hannah,
and Abigail home to Minnesota, Jen would revisit their first
night as moms in a Facebook post. The post is
(12:04):
accompanied by Jen's profile picture. Jen and Sarah hart cheeked
to cheek, their faces mostly hidden behind big sunglasses. Here's
what she writes, and bear with us. This is long,
but we want to give you a sense of how
much Jen really shared on Facebook. A different kind of
Mother's Day, March third, two th six, with temperatures in
(12:27):
the teens and an abundance of snow on the ground.
I wondered what their reaction would be as we paced
back and forth, peering out the front windows while clenching
our phones in anticipation of their arrival. The three hour
flight from Houston seemed like days. Nearly two years of
our lives had been dedicated to making this moment a reality,
(12:47):
and then bab parenthood times three. Jen continues the lengthy
post with rumination on their first day as parents. All
the challenges of a lesbian couple trying to break through
barriers in a rural community in Minnesota just transformed into
a story of hope and triumph. The social worker pulled
(13:09):
up in a silver sedan and out came three little
humans that gifted us with motherhood. My heart pounded with
pure love and the strength of a million drums as
we embraced and welcomed them to their home for the
first time. To say this was an unforgettable day would
be an enormous understatement. It was unforgettable in all the
ways we weren't expecting. We had no idea what challenges
(13:33):
we would be facing in the coming months years. I
can't even begin to imagine what it would be like
for a child that had lived their entire life with inconsistency, abuse,
and neglect to be swooped twelve hundred miles away to
a new place with the promise of this time it
will be different. This is how the first twelve hours
(13:54):
of motherhood was for us. The youngest urinated anywhere but
the bathroom several times and fell down a flight of stairs,
resulting in a bloody gash on her chin. The middle
child pulled out chunks of hair and smeared feces on
the wall and gorged herself with food until she started
choking and needed the Heimlich, resulting in episodes of projectile vomiting.
(14:17):
The oldest banged his head repetitively on a rock wall
until we were able to safely restrain him. Blood was involved.
This was a result of not giving him a king
sized tutsie roll that he requested at nine pm. It
took hours to calm him and get him to a
place where we could leave him in his room to sleep.
We were physically and mentally obliterated by this time. We
(14:39):
went to be absolutely terrified as a million thoughts ran
through our minds. As we drifted off to sleep, we
were abruptly reminded that our day was far from over.
Loud crashes, banging, and strange sounds slash voices from above
us resulted in us sprinting upstairs to find the eldest
in a closet. He told us he was possessed by
(15:01):
demons as he growled, clawed, and spoke in multiple voices
while continuing to thrash, bite, and bang his head on
the wall. My heart was breaking and I was terrified.
I was terrified for him, and it would be disingenuous
if I didn't admit I was afraid of what he
could do to others as well. Hours passed before we
(15:21):
were able to get him to sleep. That night, just
when it seemed like we could breathe again, the youngest
had an asthma attack and stopped breathing. A one am
e er visit followed. I didn't sleep at all for
the first forty eight plus hours of parenthood. I cried
a lot. What had we done? We had no experience
(15:44):
with these kinds of things. We questioned everything. When the
social worker called to check in after the first night,
we related everything, the good, the bad, and the ugly.
Her response, just give them whatever they want. We were dumbfounded.
That's it, that's the golden advice. In that moment, I
(16:05):
knew what to do. We could not give up on
these kids. Before we were matched with these children, they
were going to be separated and adopted into two different families,
with the oldest place in a residential treatment facility. How
can a child even know what they want when they
haven't ever been gifted with what they need? If not us,
(16:26):
who at twenty five years old. We didn't have any
parenting experience under our belts, but we had boatloads of love, compassion, intelligence,
and the natural instincts to navigate these wild and uncharted waters.
There was no way on earth we were going to
toss these children back into an incredibly broken and abysmal
(16:46):
foster care system. Here we are, one decade and three
more kids later, ten years ago to day, we became
mothers and began the grandest adventure of our lives. Through
the spectrum of despair and utter joy, I give thanks
to all of us who have joined this journey of
(17:07):
the Hearts. Look what love can do. Come assist in
writing the next chapter with us, Love, Love, Love. The
(17:30):
adoption records for Marcus, Hannah, and Abigail are sealed, so
it's hard to fact check Jen's claims of health or
behavioral issues, but there is no evidence that Abigail, the youngest,
had asthma. We also can't verify whether Marcus was going
to be placed in residential treatment. The sibling Gen was
referring to here may have been the older brother of
(17:50):
the Davis Is the second set of siblings adopted by
the Hearts kids Sarah and Jen hadn't even heard of
back in two thousand six. Maybe Jenn, ten years later,
was just getting the kids mixed up. There were six
of them, after all. Every mom calls her kids by
another kid's name at some point. But the night was
so momentous for her. One can't help but wonder if
(18:11):
she was going for drama over truth. Can you imagine
if your mom posted something like this about you on Facebook? Remember,
at this point, the Hard kids were teenagers. Marcus was seventeen,
Hannah was fourteen, and Abigail was thirteen. Maybe they never
saw their mom's Facebook posts, but if they did, they
would have been old enough to be completely mortified. Janet
(18:36):
Sarah must have gotten into the groove, because not long
after they welcomed their first three kids, a picture of
their new family of five appeared on an adoption agency website.
They were smiling, everyone looked happy. This time, Jen and
Sarah were seeking up to three more kids of any
ethnicity up to eight years old. Two years later, in
(18:58):
the spring of two thousand eight, they took in three
more foster kids, five year old Davante and his younger siblings,
Jeremiah four and Sierra three. The Davis siblings were also
from Texas, and they'd been removed from their mother's home
in Houston. According to court records, she was a crack
cocaine abuser and was forbidden contact with the kids. The
(19:19):
records showed that Jeremiah had tested positive for cocaine at birth,
and the kid's mom had tested positive for cocaine after
Sierra was born. They'd been living with their paternal aunt,
Priscilla Celestine for five months. She'd moved from a three
bedroom apartment to a five bedroom place to make room
for them, but then one day, a CPS worker made
a spontaneous visit to their aunt's home and found their
(19:41):
mom babysitting. The consequences were swift. Davante, Jeremiah, and Sierra
were removed from their aunt's home and put into foster care.
Shaunda Jones, Celestine's attorney, says Celestine had been called into
work for an extra shift a needed childcare in a pinch,
She's trying to keep her job, so she scrambled for
(20:02):
childcare and called their mom, who she says was clean
at the time. Jones met the family ten years ago,
but she still remembers their case. Here's how she described
it to Lauren. The father's rights were being terminated because
I think he had alcohol problems and the mother had
drug problems, and so that's why their rights were terminated.
(20:23):
Which I don't take issue with that in that instance,
that was the prudent thing to do. But I always
have taken issue within this case is the harsh manner
in the way that they dealt with Miss Celestin. There
was nothing in her background whatsoever, probably never even had
as much as a driving ticket um And to this day,
(20:43):
it just seems so strange, like I don't understand what
is the rush. I do think that race is a
part of thing. Absolutely. I think race is playing a part.
You know, when people are sitting in the audience thinking that, okay, well,
why did the judge just rule that way? Would think
If I was trying to adopt a kid and you
had a family member that wanted to adopt them, I
(21:05):
personally would think that's great. Why should I try to
interfere with the family member's adoption of their own family? Right?
That should kind of like be a clue right there
and there that this is a person you don't think
can operate in the child's best interest. Let's pause here
for a second on that point. Davante, Jeremiah, and Sierra
hen and aunt who wanted them, She really wanted them,
(21:27):
but instead they were sent to live with Jen and
Sarah Hart, who were soon to be under investigation for
child abuse. Yes, you heard that right. We'll get into
more on that later, but first we want you to
know a little more about the heart children, who they
really were, as best as we can piece it together
from Jim's Facebook posts and our conversations with people who
(21:49):
knew them. First. There was Marcus, the one with the big,
floppy hair. He loved to read and devoured Twilight in
one sitting. He wanted to change the world one Christmas.
According to his mom, he asked for a world without cancer.
Hannah was the spunky one with a closed mouthed smile.
(22:11):
Her front teeth were missing. Jen's Facebook post described her
as dancing and singing. Once. She told her mom she
couldn't concentrate on subtraction because she had a song stuck
in her head. She must have been a courageous kid, too,
because she would later jump out of her bedroom window
and run to the neighbor's house task for help. Next
(22:32):
up DeVante, whose face you might remember from a photo
that went viral in two thousand fourteen. Davante was the
boy hugging a cop tears streaming down his face. He
was known for wearing a free hug sign wherever he went.
He loved animals and hated Donald Trump. He appeared to
have a special bond with Jen. He may have gotten
(22:54):
special treatment as a result. Abigail known as Abby, had
big brown eyes and glasses. She loved lime, green, yoga,
and exploring the wilderness. She had a homemade strawberry shortcake
on her birthday. All the Hard kids were arrestingly beautiful,
but when you look at pictures of Abigail's face, you
feel like you can see the elegant woman she might
(23:15):
have grown up to be. Jeremiah wore glasses too. They
called him the J Man. He was stoic. A survivor,
Jen said he wasn't expected to live more than a
few days when he was born, what with all the
drugs coursing through his system. Instead, he made it to
fourteen and last, but not least, there was Sierra. She
(23:38):
was another animal lover. She adored her kitten, Sebastian and
pulled him around the house in a cardboard box. In
one of Jen's final Facebook pictures, we see her holding
one of her brother's hands backs to the camera. She's
wearing a bathing suit and her shoulder blades are so
pronounced they look like little wings. In the past several months,
(23:59):
Justine and I have seen hundreds of pictures of the
Heart kids, but we only have a handful of recordings
of their voices. Here's one from two thousand twelve. You
can hear the kids giggling in the background, and Jen's
voice as she hands Jeremiah and Earthworm. You're ready, Yes, Yes,
(24:20):
what are you doing? I was excited? Try again? Can
you try not to throw him this time like he's
turning kids? Oh, maybe he loves you up next time?
(24:48):
On Broken Hearts, Yeah, I see them. They're right over
his head. I know it doesn't look like it, but
that bird is really a dove asking us for world peace,
no wars. When I say that Jen was good, she
was good at the time, we're thinking, Wow, phenomenal parenting.
(25:08):
You're not exploiting your children. We learned now that there
was some abuse charges in Minnesota there fleeing to Oregon,
so there's probably more of a reason why she didn't
want to go on national TV. Have you seen John's Facebook?
Jen loves Sarah to an insane degree. Broken Hearts is
(25:32):
a joint production between Glamour and How Stuff Works, with
new episodes dropping every Tuesday. Broken Hearts is co hosted
and co written by Justine Harman and Elizabeth Egan and
edited by Wendy Knockle. Lauren Smiley is our field reporter,
Samantha Barry is Glamour's editor in chief, Julie Shen and
(25:52):
Dianna Buckman head up the business side of this partnership.
Joyce Pandola, Pat Singer and Luke Zeleski are a research team.
Jason Hoke is executive producer on behalf of How Stuff Works,
along with producers Julian Weller, ben Kiebrick, and Josh Thaine.
Special thanks to Jen Lance. Have questions for us about
(26:13):
this podcast, reach us on Twitter at Glamour mag for
access to exclusive photos and videos and documents about the case.
Visit glamour dot com slash Broken Hearts. If you like
what you heard, leave us a review.
As Fridayful Meet the Heart Kids as they appeared online.
This is a family sing along Jen posted to YouTube
back in two thousand thirteen. Davante is on the bongo drum,
Abigail is holding a guitar but not playing, and Jeremiah
(00:23):
is shaking a morocco while Hannah dances off to the side.
They're in a sunny room with a gleaming wood floor,
and the shelves behind them are packed with neatly stacked
picture books. Happy times, right, It certainly looks that way,
especially when Davante pauses to give Hannah a hug. Is
it spontaneous or is the person behind the camera prompting
(00:46):
him with a stern glance. We'll never know, yes, Zula,
we don't know when Jen and Sarah Hart decided they
(01:06):
wanted children. Maybe they always wanted to be moms, or
maybe they just felt like kids were the next logical step.
Years after they adopted six children, Sarah would tell a
colleague that she wished she'd known it wasn't mandatory to
have a big family. She was the oldest of four kids.
Jen was the oldest of three. We're piecing together the
events that led Jen and Sarah from their early days
(01:27):
together all the way to the edge of that one
d foot cliff in California. How did they go from
being just the two of them living in Minnesota working
at a department store to a family of eight in
less than three years. From glamour and how Stuff Works,
this is Broken Hearts. I'm Justine Harmon and I'm Liz Egan.
(01:50):
We've been looking into the story of the Heart family
for the past six months. In public and on Facebook.
They looked like the perfect family, fun loving, joyful, and
acky in the best way. But as we've learned, sometimes
perfect is the perfect cover up. In two thousand four,
(02:24):
when Jen and Sarah were in their mid twenties, still
living in Alexandria, still working at Herburger's, they took in
a fifteen year old foster daughter. Just to give some context,
This was the same year Minnesota State Senator Michelle Bachman
laid the groundwork for presidential run on an anti gay platform,
calling homosexuality personal bondage, personal despair, and personal enslavement. When
(02:49):
thousands gathered on the steps of the Capitol to rally
for same sex marriage, she spoke out to a Christian
television network, there's something that's happening in our schools. And
one of the reasons why I felt like I was
called to take up this issue is because of the
profound impact that this would have on every man, every woman,
every child in the state of Minnesota. Because everyone thought
(03:11):
this would only impact the one point three percent of
our population that is the same sex individual. And again,
don't misunderstand, I am not here bashing people who are homosexuals,
who are lesbians, who are bisexual, who are transgender. We
need to have profound compassion for people who are dealing
with a very real issue of sexual dysfunction in their life.
(03:34):
It's not funny, it's sad. It's part of satan. I
think to say this is gay, it's anything but gay.
So this is the backdrop for the world in which
the Hearts started to build their family. You already met
Jordan Smith. She was only nineteen when she worked with
Jen and Sarah at her burgers our Field. Reporter Lawrence
Smiley talked to Smith about Jen and Sarah's first foray
(03:57):
into parenthood. They are one of my early role models
for what like a non traditional family could look like.
I was nineteen at the time. The foster child she
was probably I remember one of them sharing with me
a lot of like this girl is so difficult, she's awful,
(04:21):
and that she was eating out of the garbage. It
felt like mean girl gossip, you know, like she's the worst.
It didn't feel like they really had interests in developing
her as a person and giving her the tools she
needed to be a successful adult. And I just felt
(04:44):
so sorry for the girl. I wasn't really old enough
to realize that, like these are shitty parents, But even
at the time, I just kind of was like, this
was a child, she's struggling, Like something's not right about this,
Like isn't it your job to make her feel more
confident and encourage her to have healthy habits. But you know,
(05:08):
I also grew up in the Midwest where I didn't
see a lot of like great parental models happening. I
grew up where people still hit their kids in the nineties,
Like in the Midwest and Minnesota, you became parents are
like one and let's be honest, you're you're immature, Like, okay,
(05:33):
my brain is still developing until I and now I
have to develop this other human instead of focusing my
energy on you know, becoming the adults I need to become.
Her burgers would have just like friends and family sale
and all the makeup counters were filling the books with
a lot of makeovers to like drama more business, and
(05:55):
so Sarah and Jen signed their foster daughter up for
one of the makeovers as kind of a let's bring
you into our world a little bit, you know, like
maybe this is something she would want to learn about.
I was the only teenager working at the counters. They
thought it would be fun to have her go with
another teenage girl. So I did her makeover, and you know,
(06:17):
i'd say things like she had really pretty skin, which
she did, I remember that for some reason. And she
was hunched over, like holding herself in. I could tell
she did not want to be there. I remember Jen
and Sarah, mostly Jen interrupting and answering questions or being
(06:41):
like she doesn't talk much. I remember them being both
very annoyed with the situation, like we came into work
on a day we're not working and we're doing this
nice thing and our boughter daughters being difficult and annoying it.
I don't remember her being difficult are annoying. I remember
(07:04):
her being very insecure and unsure of herself, and Jen
being very intimidating. I didn't see a lot of empathy
coming through, Like I remember that very clearly and being like, huh,
do you feel sorry for this girl. After Jen and
(07:26):
Sarah died in March, their former foster daughter told the
Seattle Times that she never ate out of the garbage
she remembered the makeover. She said she was a tomboy
back then and never wore makeup, which would explain her
slouched posture that day with Jordan's. The former foster daughter,
now in her twenties and preferring to remain anonymous, also
told the Seattle Times how she remembers Jen and Sarah
(07:48):
showing her pictures of the three young children they were
planning to adopt. She was thrilled. Jen and Sarah had
told her she was going to stay with them until
she turned eighteen, and now she was going to be
a big sister. But that's not what happened. They were
applying for the children, the first three. They had gone
and visited them, and I remember them being really excited.
(08:11):
I didn't apply like a lot of critical thinking to
the situation at the time. I mean, like if I
had my experience, now I'd be like, you don't seem
very excited with the child you have, why do you
want three more? But mostly I remember hearing it like
after I left her Berger, I'd hear that, like Sara Engin,
they got their three kids, like they're so happy. I
(08:34):
remember vaguely hearing that they dropped the foster daughter off
and like just abandoned her. And I remember being like,
what the fuck? Cold blooded? Like, oh Jesus, there is
their excitement about getting adopted kids. Did you get the
sense they really wanted to be moms or I got
(08:56):
the sense that they wanted the validation be a foster parent,
didn't have the cloud of having children like they want
to be like, we have children that are ours versus
a child? Were watching and do you mean validation as
in we're a real couple, We're a real you know,
we're a real family. Jenet Sarah dropped their foster daughter
(09:27):
at a therapist office and never returned. She never heard
from them again. She was moved to a different foster home.
Her belongings were already there. She would not become a
big sister after all, She told the Seattle Times. She
remembers feeling abandoned devastated. Two years later, in two thousand six,
(09:52):
Jen and Sarah officially adopted those three siblings from the
Texas foster system, Marcus then seven, Hannah four, and Abigail too.
On December, in a Facebook post celebrating Abigail or Abby's
twelfth birthday, Jen wrote, she was the first of my
children I ever held in my arms. Not only is
(10:13):
today her birthday, but it also marks the day Sarah
and I became mothers. We flew to Houston, Texas ten
years ago on Christmas Day to meet our first trio
of children. Due to a plethora of issues that came
up with our flight and then finding the hotel had
burned down, we wouldn't meet the children until the next day, December.
(10:34):
We walked into the foster home a bundle of nerves
and excitement. The foster mother called Abby from the upper level.
This dainty little peanut walked out, grabbed the railing, walked
down the stairs, stood right at my feet, and held
out her arms as a gesture to be picked up.
I lifted her and she immediately nestled her head right
(10:55):
into my chest, with her tiny arms gripped around me,
genuine love oozed out of every pore of my body.
I will never know what it's like to birtha child,
or the feeling of holding your newborn for the first time,
but I imagine the feeling is much like what I
experienced with Abby. We'll get more into the adoption process, Leader,
(11:21):
but just to give you some quick background, Marcus, Hannah,
and Abigail fell into several categories that might have made
them hard to place with adoptive families. They were black.
Black children are overrepresented in foster care and less likely
to be adopted out of it, and it can be
more difficult to find families willing to take on multiple siblings.
(11:41):
Jen and Sarah had their work cut out for them.
They were young, they had no family in the area,
and overnight they became mothers of three. Ten years later,
on the anniversary of the day Jen and Sarah brought Marcus, Hannah,
and Abigail home to Minnesota, Jen would revisit their first
night as moms in a Facebook post. The post is
(12:04):
accompanied by Jen's profile picture. Jen and Sarah hart cheeked
to cheek, their faces mostly hidden behind big sunglasses. Here's
what she writes, and bear with us. This is long,
but we want to give you a sense of how
much Jen really shared on Facebook. A different kind of
Mother's Day, March third, two th six, with temperatures in
(12:27):
the teens and an abundance of snow on the ground.
I wondered what their reaction would be as we paced
back and forth, peering out the front windows while clenching
our phones in anticipation of their arrival. The three hour
flight from Houston seemed like days. Nearly two years of
our lives had been dedicated to making this moment a reality,
(12:47):
and then bab parenthood times three. Jen continues the lengthy
post with rumination on their first day as parents. All
the challenges of a lesbian couple trying to break through
barriers in a rural community in Minnesota just transformed into
a story of hope and triumph. The social worker pulled
(13:09):
up in a silver sedan and out came three little
humans that gifted us with motherhood. My heart pounded with
pure love and the strength of a million drums as
we embraced and welcomed them to their home for the
first time. To say this was an unforgettable day would
be an enormous understatement. It was unforgettable in all the
ways we weren't expecting. We had no idea what challenges
(13:33):
we would be facing in the coming months years. I
can't even begin to imagine what it would be like
for a child that had lived their entire life with inconsistency, abuse,
and neglect to be swooped twelve hundred miles away to
a new place with the promise of this time it
will be different. This is how the first twelve hours
(13:54):
of motherhood was for us. The youngest urinated anywhere but
the bathroom several times and fell down a flight of stairs,
resulting in a bloody gash on her chin. The middle
child pulled out chunks of hair and smeared feces on
the wall and gorged herself with food until she started
choking and needed the Heimlich, resulting in episodes of projectile vomiting.
(14:17):
The oldest banged his head repetitively on a rock wall
until we were able to safely restrain him. Blood was involved.
This was a result of not giving him a king
sized tutsie roll that he requested at nine pm. It
took hours to calm him and get him to a
place where we could leave him in his room to sleep.
We were physically and mentally obliterated by this time. We
(14:39):
went to be absolutely terrified as a million thoughts ran
through our minds. As we drifted off to sleep, we
were abruptly reminded that our day was far from over.
Loud crashes, banging, and strange sounds slash voices from above
us resulted in us sprinting upstairs to find the eldest
in a closet. He told us he was possessed by
(15:01):
demons as he growled, clawed, and spoke in multiple voices
while continuing to thrash, bite, and bang his head on
the wall. My heart was breaking and I was terrified.
I was terrified for him, and it would be disingenuous
if I didn't admit I was afraid of what he
could do to others as well. Hours passed before we
(15:21):
were able to get him to sleep. That night, just
when it seemed like we could breathe again, the youngest
had an asthma attack and stopped breathing. A one am
e er visit followed. I didn't sleep at all for
the first forty eight plus hours of parenthood. I cried
a lot. What had we done? We had no experience
(15:44):
with these kinds of things. We questioned everything. When the
social worker called to check in after the first night,
we related everything, the good, the bad, and the ugly.
Her response, just give them whatever they want. We were dumbfounded.
That's it, that's the golden advice. In that moment, I
(16:05):
knew what to do. We could not give up on
these kids. Before we were matched with these children, they
were going to be separated and adopted into two different families,
with the oldest place in a residential treatment facility. How
can a child even know what they want when they
haven't ever been gifted with what they need? If not us,
(16:26):
who at twenty five years old. We didn't have any
parenting experience under our belts, but we had boatloads of love, compassion, intelligence,
and the natural instincts to navigate these wild and uncharted waters.
There was no way on earth we were going to
toss these children back into an incredibly broken and abysmal
(16:46):
foster care system. Here we are, one decade and three
more kids later, ten years ago to day, we became
mothers and began the grandest adventure of our lives. Through
the spectrum of despair and utter joy, I give thanks
to all of us who have joined this journey of
(17:07):
the Hearts. Look what love can do. Come assist in
writing the next chapter with us, Love, Love, Love. The
(17:30):
adoption records for Marcus, Hannah, and Abigail are sealed, so
it's hard to fact check Jen's claims of health or
behavioral issues, but there is no evidence that Abigail, the youngest,
had asthma. We also can't verify whether Marcus was going
to be placed in residential treatment. The sibling Gen was
referring to here may have been the older brother of
(17:50):
the Davis Is the second set of siblings adopted by
the Hearts kids Sarah and Jen hadn't even heard of
back in two thousand six. Maybe Jenn, ten years later,
was just getting the kids mixed up. There were six
of them, after all. Every mom calls her kids by
another kid's name at some point. But the night was
so momentous for her. One can't help but wonder if
(18:11):
she was going for drama over truth. Can you imagine
if your mom posted something like this about you on Facebook? Remember,
at this point, the Hard kids were teenagers. Marcus was seventeen,
Hannah was fourteen, and Abigail was thirteen. Maybe they never
saw their mom's Facebook posts, but if they did, they
would have been old enough to be completely mortified. Janet
(18:36):
Sarah must have gotten into the groove, because not long
after they welcomed their first three kids, a picture of
their new family of five appeared on an adoption agency website.
They were smiling, everyone looked happy. This time, Jen and
Sarah were seeking up to three more kids of any
ethnicity up to eight years old. Two years later, in
(18:58):
the spring of two thousand eight, they took in three
more foster kids, five year old Davante and his younger siblings,
Jeremiah four and Sierra three. The Davis siblings were also
from Texas, and they'd been removed from their mother's home
in Houston. According to court records, she was a crack
cocaine abuser and was forbidden contact with the kids. The
(19:19):
records showed that Jeremiah had tested positive for cocaine at birth,
and the kid's mom had tested positive for cocaine after
Sierra was born. They'd been living with their paternal aunt,
Priscilla Celestine for five months. She'd moved from a three
bedroom apartment to a five bedroom place to make room
for them, but then one day, a CPS worker made
a spontaneous visit to their aunt's home and found their
(19:41):
mom babysitting. The consequences were swift. Davante, Jeremiah, and Sierra
were removed from their aunt's home and put into foster care.
Shaunda Jones, Celestine's attorney, says Celestine had been called into
work for an extra shift a needed childcare in a pinch,
She's trying to keep her job, so she scrambled for
(20:02):
childcare and called their mom, who she says was clean
at the time. Jones met the family ten years ago,
but she still remembers their case. Here's how she described
it to Lauren. The father's rights were being terminated because
I think he had alcohol problems and the mother had
drug problems, and so that's why their rights were terminated.
(20:23):
Which I don't take issue with that in that instance,
that was the prudent thing to do. But I always
have taken issue within this case is the harsh manner
in the way that they dealt with Miss Celestin. There
was nothing in her background whatsoever, probably never even had
as much as a driving ticket um And to this day,
(20:43):
it just seems so strange, like I don't understand what
is the rush. I do think that race is a
part of thing. Absolutely. I think race is playing a part.
You know, when people are sitting in the audience thinking that, okay, well,
why did the judge just rule that way? Would think
If I was trying to adopt a kid and you
had a family member that wanted to adopt them, I
(21:05):
personally would think that's great. Why should I try to
interfere with the family member's adoption of their own family? Right?
That should kind of like be a clue right there
and there that this is a person you don't think
can operate in the child's best interest. Let's pause here
for a second on that point. Davante, Jeremiah, and Sierra
hen and aunt who wanted them, She really wanted them,
(21:27):
but instead they were sent to live with Jen and
Sarah Hart, who were soon to be under investigation for
child abuse. Yes, you heard that right. We'll get into
more on that later, but first we want you to
know a little more about the heart children, who they
really were, as best as we can piece it together
from Jim's Facebook posts and our conversations with people who
(21:49):
knew them. First. There was Marcus, the one with the big,
floppy hair. He loved to read and devoured Twilight in
one sitting. He wanted to change the world one Christmas.
According to his mom, he asked for a world without cancer.
Hannah was the spunky one with a closed mouthed smile.
(22:11):
Her front teeth were missing. Jen's Facebook post described her
as dancing and singing. Once. She told her mom she
couldn't concentrate on subtraction because she had a song stuck
in her head. She must have been a courageous kid, too,
because she would later jump out of her bedroom window
and run to the neighbor's house task for help. Next
(22:32):
up DeVante, whose face you might remember from a photo
that went viral in two thousand fourteen. Davante was the
boy hugging a cop tears streaming down his face. He
was known for wearing a free hug sign wherever he went.
He loved animals and hated Donald Trump. He appeared to
have a special bond with Jen. He may have gotten
(22:54):
special treatment as a result. Abigail known as Abby, had
big brown eyes and glasses. She loved lime, green, yoga,
and exploring the wilderness. She had a homemade strawberry shortcake
on her birthday. All the Hard kids were arrestingly beautiful,
but when you look at pictures of Abigail's face, you
feel like you can see the elegant woman she might
(23:15):
have grown up to be. Jeremiah wore glasses too. They
called him the J Man. He was stoic. A survivor,
Jen said he wasn't expected to live more than a
few days when he was born, what with all the
drugs coursing through his system. Instead, he made it to
fourteen and last, but not least, there was Sierra. She
(23:38):
was another animal lover. She adored her kitten, Sebastian and
pulled him around the house in a cardboard box. In
one of Jen's final Facebook pictures, we see her holding
one of her brother's hands backs to the camera. She's
wearing a bathing suit and her shoulder blades are so
pronounced they look like little wings. In the past several months,
(23:59):
Justine and I have seen hundreds of pictures of the
Heart kids, but we only have a handful of recordings
of their voices. Here's one from two thousand twelve. You
can hear the kids giggling in the background, and Jen's
voice as she hands Jeremiah and Earthworm. You're ready, Yes, Yes,
(24:20):
what are you doing? I was excited? Try again? Can
you try not to throw him this time like he's
turning kids? Oh, maybe he loves you up next time?
(24:48):
On Broken Hearts, Yeah, I see them. They're right over
his head. I know it doesn't look like it, but
that bird is really a dove asking us for world peace,
no wars. When I say that Jen was good, she
was good at the time, we're thinking, Wow, phenomenal parenting.
(25:08):
You're not exploiting your children. We learned now that there
was some abuse charges in Minnesota there fleeing to Oregon,
so there's probably more of a reason why she didn't
want to go on national TV. Have you seen John's Facebook?
Jen loves Sarah to an insane degree. Broken Hearts is
(25:32):
a joint production between Glamour and How Stuff Works, with
new episodes dropping every Tuesday. Broken Hearts is co hosted
and co written by Justine Harman and Elizabeth Egan and
edited by Wendy Knockle. Lauren Smiley is our field reporter,
Samantha Barry is Glamour's editor in chief, Julie Shen and
(25:52):
Dianna Buckman head up the business side of this partnership.
Joyce Pandola, Pat Singer and Luke Zeleski are a research team.
Jason Hoke is executive producer on behalf of How Stuff Works,
along with producers Julian Weller, ben Kiebrick, and Josh Thaine.
Special thanks to Jen Lance. Have questions for us about
(26:13):
this podcast, reach us on Twitter at Glamour mag for
access to exclusive photos and videos and documents about the case.
Visit glamour dot com slash Broken Hearts. If you like
what you heard, leave us a review.
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