Jennifer and Sarah Hart

Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
Hi, I'm Tina and I'm Rich. Welcome to Love Mary Kill.

Speaker 2 (00:04):
Just the facts, all right.

Speaker 1 (00:20):
So today's episode is a hard one. It involves children
and abuse, and while it's not particularly graphic, I do
want to give a content warning. Please listen with care.
The drive along Highway One in northern California is breathtaking.
The road tightly hugs the coastline, creating a myriad of
twists and turns. The road curves along the terrain, with

(00:43):
the Pacific Ocean lapping the rocky beaches below. The air
is crisp and clean, with a vista that will never
cease to captivate you. Guardrails line much of the highway,
but there are stretches where the view is unencumbered. The
drop to the ocean and cliffs below is steep. On
March six, eighteen, a German woman who was visiting northern
California noticed an unusual sight when she stopped at a

(01:05):
scenic turnout along the highway about two hundred miles north
of San Francisco in Mendocino County, at the bottom of
a one hundred and forty foot cliff along the Pacific Ocean,
she spotted a crumpled and overturned two thousand and three
GMC Yukon Excel on the Rocky beach below. She called
nine one one. Emergency responders arrived minutes later at four

(01:27):
forty five PM, then repelled to the bottom of the
cliffs and found five bodies among the ruckete Oh my gosh.
Jennifer and Sarah Hart, both thirty eight, were found in
the partially submerged, overturned vehicle. Jen was in the driver's
seat and her wife, Sarah was in the back of
the vehicle, pinned between the collapsed roof and the seats.

Speaker 3 (01:46):
Three of their.

Speaker 1 (01:47):
Six children, Marcus nineteen, Abigail and Jeremiah, both fourteen, were
thrown from the vehicle and found nearby. The three other
Hart children were missing, Hannah sixteen, Devon fifteen, and Sierra twelve.
No one was wearing a seatbelt. When the vehicle's computer
was later analyzed, it indicated the yukon pulled off of

(02:09):
Highway one into the scenic turnout, which lacked a guard rail.
Jen stopped for a moment before she floored the gas pedal.
The yukon only traveled seventy feet and reached the speed
of twenty miles per hour before it floated off into
the Abyss and crashed at the bottom of the cliffs
over one hundred feet below. Was this a terrible accident

(02:29):
or a planned murder?

Speaker 4 (02:31):
Gosh, I don't know. Whatever it is, it's horrible.

Speaker 5 (02:33):
I know.

Speaker 3 (02:34):
I'm sorry. It's a sad story.

Speaker 1 (02:36):
Jennifer Hart and Sarah Gengler were both born in nineteen
seventy nine in South Dakota, about one hundred and fifty
miles from each other. Jen was the oldest of three
children and Sarah was the oldest of four. They both
grew up in small, nearly all white towns. They met
and fell in love in nineteen eighty nine at age twenty,
while studying at Northern State University in Aberdeen, South Dakota,

(02:58):
where they both were education majors, Sarah specializing in special education.
She graduated in two thousand and two with a four
point zero GPA, but Jen dropped out after Sarah's graduation
a semester. Shy from graduation. They shared a love of
the outdoors, spending their free time hiking, camping, kayaking, and
attending bohemian music festivals. Sarah was engaged for a time

(03:22):
after high school but broke it off before college. Jen
and Sarah introduced each other as friends or roommates. They
were a couple, but very discreet. However, later when they
moved to Minnesota, they lived openly as a couple. They
were both estranged from their families after their deaths. The
family said their estrangement had nothing to do with Jen
and Sarah's sexual orientation, but after they'd voiced concerns over

(03:46):
the heart's parenting style, they severed ties. A relative of
Jen said she often erupted at the children. Quote, the
kids couldn't do anything without getting into trouble. If the
kids did anything she thought was wrong, she would snap
her finger and say get in the corner.

Speaker 3 (04:01):
No food for you.

Speaker 1 (04:02):
Jen wouldn't have anything to do with you if you
disagreed with her end quote. Sarah and her mother had
once been very close, but after Sarah and Jen became
a couple, she felt that Jen made Sarah choose between
her and her family. In two thousand and five, Sarah
legally changed her last name to Heart. They married in
two thousand and nine in Connecticut. Same sex marriage wasn't

(04:24):
yet legal in Minnesota, where they lived with all six
of their adopted children present. I know, I'm kind of
getting ahead of myself with the kids. We're going to
circle back to the adoption. Jen was outgoing and friendly,
but also assertive and controlling, especially with Sarah and the children.

Speaker 3 (04:40):
She was the rebel of the two. In college. She'd
been arrested for shoplifting.

Speaker 1 (04:44):
Sarah was more reserved, passive, and introverted. In two thousand
and four, Jen and Sarah moved to Alexandria, Minnesota, where
they both worked at a store.

Speaker 3 (04:54):
Called her Burgers.

Speaker 1 (04:57):
Say that her Burgers, which I was like researching it
just really quick.

Speaker 3 (05:03):
And Burgners where.

Speaker 1 (05:06):
I grew up, that was an offshoot of her Burgers,
and my mom actually worked at Burgners.

Speaker 4 (05:11):
So interesting.

Speaker 1 (05:13):
Yeah, I think they are a lot of business. It's
weird how many department store chains have gone out of business.
Sarah was a manager and Jen worked in the junior's department.
They were in their mid twenties when they applied to
become foster parents. A fifteen year old girl came to
live with them. Friends recalled the couple being challenged by
parenting an older child. I mean, of course they were.

(05:35):
Jen complained to a friend that the girl ate out
of the garbage, wasn't very smart, wouldn't do a homework,
and was hard to discipline. Jen and Sarah started the
process of adoption shortly after. They told their foster daughter
that she was going to be a big sister, and
she was very excited. It's unclear how long she lived
with Sarah and Jen.

Speaker 3 (05:53):
I think about a year and a half.

Speaker 1 (05:55):
But one day they dropped her off at her therapist's
office and never returned. She was reassigned to a new
foster home with no explanation from Jen and Sarah. They
never said goodbye.

Speaker 4 (06:06):
Wow, she felt pardon, that's kind of cold.

Speaker 3 (06:10):
It was horrible.

Speaker 1 (06:12):
She felt abandoned and devastated. She never had contact with
them again. Gratefully, her next foster family, a youth pastor
and his wife, welcomed her with open arms. Jen and
Sarah told their foster daughter's caseworker that they had found
a suicide note and a noose under her bed and
they couldn't have someone mentally unstable around their newly adopted children,

(06:32):
so they needed to sever ties with her. And that
wasn't true, the foster daughter, said, Jen and Sarah lied.
She'd never been suicidal and definitely never ate food from
the trash.

Speaker 4 (06:43):
And if it was true, it's no reason to abandon
your foster child without even saying goodbye or you know well,
and I.

Speaker 3 (06:50):
Think you know.

Speaker 1 (06:50):
Jen and Sarah at this time were about twenty five,
and they were a little immature. Yeah, weren't ready to
be parents, especially to a fifteen year old. In an
interview with The Seattle Times, the heart's former foster daughter,
who was chosen to remain anonymous, said the first six
months were good with Jen and Sarah. There was no
abuse or withholding of food. They exposed her to new adventures,
such as camping and the music festivals they loved. As

(07:13):
time passed, Jen became moodier and often withdrew, choosing to
spend time alone. They began arguing more typical parent teenager issues.
The foster daughter worked at Subway during high school and
was required to turn her paychecks over to.

Speaker 3 (07:28):
Gen and given only a small allowance.

Speaker 1 (07:31):
Today, though she's doing well and she has a child
of her own. She has a relationship with both her
birth mother as well as her former foster parents. She
forgives the hearts, and she doesn't believe that they were
capable of killing their children. So a week after abandoning
their foster daughter, in September two thousand and six, Jen
and Sarah welcomed Marcus seven, Hannah four, and Abigail two

(07:54):
from Texas. The children's birth mother had several mental health
issues and little outsides. So after several difficult interactions with CPS.

Speaker 4 (08:04):
Child Protective Services exactly.

Speaker 1 (08:06):
So, there's several states in this story, and I refer
to I know that some states it's DCFS, but I'm
going to just refer to it as CPS Child Protective Services.
So she relinquished her parental rights, hoping her children.

Speaker 3 (08:19):
Would have a better life.

Speaker 1 (08:21):
She had hoped for an open adoption and to be
able to see her children. She was shocked when her
children were sent to live in Minnesota, thousands of miles away.
She sunk into a deep depression when she wasn't able
to receive any updates on Marcus, Hannah, and Abigail. Here's
an excerpt from Jen's Facebook post describing the first twenty
four hours of the heart's adoption journey. It was unforgettable

(08:44):
in all the ways we weren't expecting. We had no
idea what challenges we would be facing in the coming months.

Speaker 3 (08:50):
And years. I can't even begin to imagine what it
would be like for a child that had lived their entire.

Speaker 1 (08:56):
Life with inconsistency, abuse, and neglect to be whooped twelve
hundred miles away to a new place with a promise
of this time it will be different. This is how
the first twelve hours 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

(09:16):
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. The oldest banged his
head repetitively on a rock wall until we were able
to safely restrain him.

Speaker 3 (09:36):
Blood was involved.

Speaker 1 (09:38):
This was a result of not giving him a king
sized Tutsi world that he requested at nine p m.
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 went to bed 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

(09:59):
ho over Loud crashes, banging in strange sounds, slash voices
from above us resulted in us sprinting upstairs to find
the eldest in the closet. He told us he was
possessed by demons as he growled, clad, and spoke in
multiple voices while continuing to thrash, bite, and bang.

Speaker 3 (10:16):
His head on the wall.

Speaker 1 (10:17):
My heart was breaking as 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 the others as well. Hours passed before we were
able to get.

Speaker 3 (10:29):
Him to sleep.

Speaker 1 (10:30):
That night, just when it seemed like we could breathe again,
the youngest had an asthma attack and stopped breathing. A
one A m e er visit followed. I didn't sleep
at all for the first forty eight hours of parenthood.

Speaker 3 (10:42):
I cried a lot. What had we done?

Speaker 1 (10:44):
We had no experience 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 dumb founded. That's it, That's the golden advice.
And that moment I knew what to do. We could

(11:05):
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 placed in
a residential treatment facility.

Speaker 3 (11:16):
How can a child even know.

Speaker 1 (11:17):
What they want when they haven't even been gifted with
what they need? If not us, who at twenty five
years old, we didn't have any parenting experience under our belts,
but we had boltloads of love, compassion, intelligence, and the
natural instincts to navigate these wild and unchartered waters. There
was no way on earth we were going to toss

(11:38):
these children back into the incredibly broken and abysmal foster
care system.

Speaker 4 (11:44):
It was long. I just I'm not sure how much
of it I believe, Especially when you said the social
workers said just give them whatever they want. I have
a very hard time believing one.

Speaker 1 (11:52):
A four year old smearing feces on a wall. Yeah,
and the kids, as far as we know, weren't developmentally
to and if they were, it was Slight developed slight delays.
Two years later, in February two thousand and nine, the
Heart family expanded when they adopted Davante five, Jeremiah four,
and Sierra three, also from Texas. The state of Texas

(12:16):
gives adoptees a monthly cash stipend for each child adopted
from the foster care system, as much as five hundred
dollars per child, in addition to SSI Supplemental Security Income
if the child has special needs. The Hearts likely received
the SSI benefits for at least two of the children.
The money from Texas made up about fifty percent of

(12:37):
the Heart's income. Wow, I know, I didn't know that
was a thing for her.

Speaker 4 (12:42):
Very surprised after the children, but I.

Speaker 1 (12:43):
Think it's because, you know, they pulled them out of
the foster system and adopted them. Before Davante, Jeremiah, and
Sierra went to Minnesota to live with Jen and Sarah,
the children had been living with their aunt, Priscilla Celestine,
their father's sister. Priscilla Celestine was a good and loving caregiver,
A faithful churchgoer with a steady job. She really wanted

(13:04):
the children to be in her care so they could
be around family and not be separated.

Speaker 3 (13:09):
She loved them deeply.

Speaker 1 (13:11):
Foster parents are given a monthly stipend for living cost
and medical care, but if the foster parent is a relative,
they are not qualified to receive any money. Priscilla's finances
were stretched thin. To keep the children, She needed to
move from her two bedroom apartment to a four bedroom home.
The children's mother, Sherry, struggled with crack cocaine addiction.

Speaker 3 (13:33):
Jeremiah tested positive for.

Speaker 1 (13:34):
Cocaine at birth, and Cherry tested positive for cocaine at
Sierra's birth, so the second and third children. In order
for Priscilla to be able to adopt the children, Sherry
was required to relinquish her parental rights and was forbid
from seeing the children. She agreed in order to prevent
them from entering the foster care system, or to be

(13:55):
adopted by another family, or possibly become separated.

Speaker 3 (14:00):
Yilla, desperate for childcare.

Speaker 1 (14:01):
When she was called to work an extra shift one day,
asked Sherry if she could come stay with the children.
Sherry maintained her sobriety over long periods of times, and
this was one of those times. CPS happened to show
up that day for an impromptu visit. The children were
immediately taken away from Priscilla, no second chance chances. There

(14:23):
was no evidence that Sherry had been using drugs during
her visit, but that, you know, she.

Speaker 3 (14:28):
Just broke that.

Speaker 1 (14:31):
Priscilla fought heart to regained custody, but the children were
sent to Minnesota despite her best efforts.

Speaker 3 (14:37):
Priscilla was devastated.

Speaker 1 (14:39):
And to me, that's just you know, she had one chance. Yeah,
and the children, I mean there were you know, thousands
of miles away.

Speaker 3 (14:47):
Heartbreaking.

Speaker 1 (14:48):
She really did love them and she wanted she wanted
to keep them. Sherry relapsed after she learned about her
children's death. She had always hoped to get them back somehow.
But she is clean and sober now and has been
for many years. And she went on to have former children,
and I think that some of them ended up in
CPS two. Cherry told the Oregonian, quote, they're so quick

(15:11):
to snatch children from people like us, but once they're adopted,
they don't even check on them.

Speaker 3 (15:16):
End quote.

Speaker 1 (15:18):
She hopes that she can bring her children's bodies back
to Texas so they can be closer to her. Davante, Jeremiah,
and Sierra had another brother Dante, who was eight at
the time of the adoption. He had extreme discipline challenges
and wasn't considered adoptable at the time. After he was
separated from his siblings, he attempted suicide. An eight year

(15:39):
old attempting suicides just devastating.

Speaker 4 (15:42):
Yeah, that's really not horrible.

Speaker 1 (15:45):
Yeah, he was institutionalized in a mental hospital for a
time where he was over medicated for a variety of
psychological issues by polar disorder ADHD and oppositional defiant disorder.
And once a child receives those diagnoses.

Speaker 4 (16:01):
It's hard to get out of the system.

Speaker 1 (16:04):
It's hard to get out of the system, and it
makes you kind of, you know, unadoptable. Yeah, I'm not
saying that Dante did not have those disorders, but the
person that diagnosed him probably spent an hour with him
and gave him that diagnosis that would follow him for
you know, the rest of his life. Dante requested many
times to have contact with his siblings, but Gen and

(16:25):
Sarah did.

Speaker 3 (16:26):
Not allow it.

Speaker 1 (16:27):
He was placed in eleven different foster homes until he
aged out of the system, and the more placements a
child has, the more unfavorable the outcome.

Speaker 4 (16:36):
Yeah, I can imagine.

Speaker 3 (16:37):
Dante's file was four seven hundred pages long, very complicated case.
Sometime in two.

Speaker 1 (16:44):
Thousand and nine, Jen and Sarah decided to expand their
family again. Sarah used IVF and got pregnant, but later miscarried.
They also started the process of adopting twins from Texas,
one with cerebral palsy, but it fell through Permanent Family
Resource Center, the agency that Jen and Sarah used for
their adoptions, had a history of violations, including a failure

(17:08):
to properly conduct home studies for pending placements. The agency's
license was suspended for two years in two thousand and
nine and closed permanently in twenty twelve. We're going to
take a quick break. We'll be right back, Okay.

Speaker 3 (17:28):
So the Heart.

Speaker 1 (17:28):
Family have now there's now six of them, and their
family is complete.

Speaker 3 (17:32):
They're not going to adopt it.

Speaker 4 (17:34):
They tried to adopt another, They tried to have a
one through IVF, and that neither of those worked out.

Speaker 3 (17:41):
Right, And I don't think I've said this.

Speaker 1 (17:43):
Both Sarah and Jen are white, and the six kids
are some of them are black, and some of them are.

Speaker 3 (17:49):
Of mixed okes.

Speaker 1 (17:51):
People who knew the Heart tribe a name coined by
their friends. Were in awe of the close knit, beautiful family.
The children exuded joy, always smiling and well behaved. They
thought machinery of their family was well oiled and ran seamlessly.
I showed you some pictures of the kids last night,
do you remember.

Speaker 4 (18:08):
Yeah, they looked like a lovely family.

Speaker 3 (18:09):
There's beautiful children.

Speaker 4 (18:10):
Yeah, just yeah, the pictures you showed me. Everyone looked
happy and it looked like a really like a perfect family.

Speaker 3 (18:19):
Here's a brief clip of a friend talking about the family.

Speaker 6 (18:22):
Before I actually met the Hearts, I heard about these
kids that would come to these festivals that I attended,
people mentioning like, oh, you know the Heart kids. They
give free hugs. I heard, Oh, these two brave lesbian
women went against all odds and adopted numerous children and

(18:47):
are giving them this unprecedented life. Really that no child
is so lucky to have. These kids were just pure joy.
All they could do was just smile from ear to ear.
They were always like propped up on people's shoulders, dancing
in the crowd. The memories of that are so sweet.

Speaker 3 (19:09):
They were a unit.

Speaker 7 (19:11):
Jins seemed to be leading the most exceptional life. This
super mom, this champion of racial reconciliation, willing to sacrifice
herself for the greater good of these beautiful children. We

(19:34):
all felt like.

Speaker 4 (19:35):
We were along for the ride.

Speaker 3 (19:38):
Are you at all familiar with these music festivals.

Speaker 1 (19:40):
They're like days long festivals where people are doing like
dancing in yoga and it's just a very spiritual kind of.

Speaker 4 (19:48):
I'm familiar with like Lollapalooza music festival like that, but
this sounds like a little bit different.

Speaker 7 (19:52):
Yeah.

Speaker 1 (19:52):
One of them is called the Beloved Festival. People travel
around and go to these different festivals.

Speaker 4 (19:57):
Okay, a little more spiritual in nature, I guess definitely.

Speaker 1 (20:01):
Jen and Sarah wanted their children to be socially conscious
and attended many Black Lives Matter protests and Bernie Sanders
rallies as well as the musical music festivals. One such
music festival was called the Beloved Festival. Attendees gathered off
and wearing costumes to share their love of music, art, yoga,
and culture. The Heart Tribe would show up wearing costumes,

(20:23):
matching shirts or jean jackets. Often Sarah would have to
stay home and work. She worked long hours to support
the family, usually six days a week. Friends thought they were.

Speaker 3 (20:33):
The perfect family.

Speaker 1 (20:34):
However, it was rare that anyone was invited to the
Heart Home to observe their home life. No one knew
what was happening behind the closed doors. In two thousand
and eight, Hannah, aged six, was found to have bruising
on her arm by her teacher. When the teacher asked
her what happened, she said she had been beaten with
the belt. No charges were filed. The mothers told CPS

(20:56):
that Hannah had fallen down the stairs. Jen and Sarah
removed the children from school until the next fall. The
adoption of DeVante, Jeremiah and Sarah was finalized quickly despite
the child abuse claim.

Speaker 4 (21:10):
Oh wow, that doesn't seem right.

Speaker 1 (21:13):
No, and I guess I didn't really specify this, but
when they went to live with them, there's like a
six month waiting period before the adoption was finalized, and
this claim happened in that six months that she should
have been investigated much more thoroughly than it was. In
twenty eleven, six complaints were filed with Minnesota CPS against
Sarah and Jen for physical abuse and withholding food from

(21:36):
their children. Abby six was very small for her age.
The size of a two year old. She was seen
rummaging through the trash at school looking for food. On
several occasions. Abby's teacher noticed bruises on her back, extending
from her shoulders to her waist and on her chest.
Abby told her teacher their parents thought that she had
stolen a penny and had held her head held underwater,

(22:00):
and they hit her with their fists. Her teachers stopped
telling her mothers about her taking food when she realized
that Abby was being punished at home for this. Abby
named Jen as her abuser, but Sarah took the blame.
Sarah was arrested and she told law enforcement that she
had angrily hit Abby while she was leaning.

Speaker 3 (22:18):
Her over the edge of the bathtub.

Speaker 1 (22:20):
Sarah was given community service and one year of probation.
Hannah also had hunger issues at school. She often came
to school hungry and her friends would give her food.
Not much makes me matter than people not feeding their kids.

Speaker 4 (22:36):
Yeah, like that. It's not the way to punish your kids.

Speaker 3 (22:39):
Yeah, you don't.

Speaker 1 (22:40):
You shouldn't reward your kids with food. You shouldn't take
food away, like unless it's like, you know, like.

Speaker 3 (22:44):
Oh you were naughty today. You don't get dessert, something right,
minor like that, But.

Speaker 4 (22:48):
Yeah, starving your kids is never okay.

Speaker 1 (22:51):
Starving your kids and then sending them to school is
just it just really upsets me. And January twenty eleven,
the school nurse called Sarah when Hannah said she hadn't
eaten all day. Sarah accused Hannah of quote playing the
food card and told school officials to just give her water.
The Hearts again found themselves under investigation by CPS. The

(23:13):
children were interviewed and according to Minnesota Star Tribune quote,
the children talked about not getting supper, getting sent to
bed without food, being made to stay in bed all
day or stand in the corner for a long time
end quote. Jen claimed that the kids had food issues
that no one understood because of their traumatic pasts. Others

(23:34):
came forward and told CPS that they saw Jennifer Hart
forcing the children to lie on the ground in a
dark room for four to seven hours, grabbing and dragging
the children, and not allowing anyone to say happy birthday
to Marcus. Beginning in April twenty eleven, Jen homeschooled the children.
They never again attended public school, taking away a huge

(23:55):
safety net from the already vulnerable children. Boy, it's never
a good sign.

Speaker 7 (23:59):
No.

Speaker 1 (24:00):
Jen claimed her family was targeted and bullied in the
conservative Minnesota community they lived in because of their alternative lifestyle.
She said the tires on her car were slashed and
their house was egged, but none of those claims were
ever proven. The Hearts moved to Westland, Oregon, outside of Portland,
in twenty thirteen, thinking the liberal community would be a

(24:22):
better fit for their modern family. Two years later, a
case was opened there by CPS for allegations of abuse
in male nourishment. Medical records showed that in twenty thirteen,
five of the six Heart children were so small and
thin that they didn't even registered on the standard growth
chart used by pediatricians. That's that is really very small

(24:44):
and very thin.

Speaker 4 (24:44):
Yeah, And did the kids not go to school when
they went to Oregon either? Were they still owned school?

Speaker 3 (24:48):
Were still home school?

Speaker 1 (24:50):
At age eleven, Hannah weighed just fifty pounds and was
forty eight inches tall, about the size of a six
year old. Davante weighed fifty seven pounds and was fifty
inches at age eleven, about the size of an eight
year old. Jen would say that the children were healthy
and slim because of their organic vegetarian diet. Oregon's CPS
closed the case after five months, concluding that there were signs,

(25:13):
but there was not enough evidence of neglect or abuse
in the Heart home to prolong their investigation, despite two
eye witnesses reporting harsh punishments.

Speaker 3 (25:21):
And withholding of food.

Speaker 1 (25:23):
The problem, a CPS employee said, was that Jen and
Sarah just looked so normal. They didn't look like child abusers.

Speaker 3 (25:31):
Whatever that mean?

Speaker 4 (25:32):
Yeah, what does the child abuser look like? Exactly?

Speaker 1 (25:34):
It would be an ongoing theme for years to come.
Jen and Sarah were attractive, educated, and Jen could talk
her way out of just about any situation. A CPS
official set in their report that the mothers were good
at deflecting and blaming the children for incidents in their home.
The report also noted that the children all gave the
same answers when questioned and lacked emotion. It was obvious

(25:57):
they'd been coached.

Speaker 3 (25:59):
Their punishment from.

Speaker 1 (26:00):
Misbehaving, they told CPS, was just to meditate for five minutes.
One of the people who reported Gen and Sarah to
CPS was a friend the family had visited. They ordered
pizza and the friend thought it was odd that each
child was only given one slice of pizza. Have you
ever met a kid in her life that has eaten
one piece of pizza?

Speaker 4 (26:18):
No.

Speaker 1 (26:19):
The next morning, the leftover pizza was gone. Someone had
eaten it in the middle.

Speaker 3 (26:23):
Of the night.

Speaker 1 (26:24):
Jen took each child to the bathroom and questioned them,
but none of them owned.

Speaker 3 (26:28):
Up to eating the pizza.

Speaker 1 (26:30):
She refused the children breakfast and made them all lay
down on a bed for four to five hours during
the day wearing a blindfold with their arms.

Speaker 3 (26:37):
By their sides. That's horrible and that's what she did
at a friend's house. So what is she doing in
their own home?

Speaker 4 (26:44):
Yeah, exactly.

Speaker 1 (26:45):
The friend talked to Jen about the unfair punishment, but
she angrily brushed her off. She later told authorities that
the heart children were all much too thin and they
ran a quote regimented boot camp for true kindness, love
and respect for the children was largely absent.

Speaker 4 (27:02):
I'm just curious. Did Jennifer and Sarah have any eating
issues themselves or anything. It seems like food is like
a big part of the way that they decided to
punish their kids where they overweight, underweight, any issues that
you know of.

Speaker 3 (27:16):
Their No, they both. They both looked very normal.

Speaker 1 (27:20):
Sarah was definitely on the thin side. Actually, I know
that she was five six, one hundred and twenty pounds
because of her autopsy. But Jen was heavier and actually,
at the time of her death, friend said that she
hadn't seen her in a while and it looked like
she was twenty five pounds heavier than she had ever
been before. So both of the women are pretty active
and in good shape. Yeah, and Oregon homeschoolers are required

(27:42):
to register their children with a local school district since
the deaths of two girls who were removed from schools
by their parents and later died.

Speaker 3 (27:52):
Ten year old Miranda.

Speaker 1 (27:53):
Crockett was withdrawn from public school five months before her
father's girlfriends round her in a bathtub. Is cut off
from trusted adults with whom she could confide in. In
two thousand and nine, a fifteen year old girl, Jeanette Maples,
was killed by her mother and her stepfather after a
severe beating. Her friends and family had attempted to contact

(28:14):
CPS to act in her case. After years of being
abused and starved, she had been in foster care for
five years, but was returned to her mother, who homeschooled her.
After their deaths Oregon CPS vowed to be more diligent
in following up on filed reports, especially among homeschooled children
who don't have access to traditional community supports like schools, churches,

(28:37):
or medical services.

Speaker 3 (28:38):
After parents have isolated them. Heartbreaking.

Speaker 4 (28:41):
Oh god. Yeah.

Speaker 1 (28:43):
Attorney David Paul is working on making CPS more accountable,
but he said, quote, trying to make this agency accountable
is like trying to push a freightliner with a canoe paddle.
They are interested in maintaining the status quo. People call
the hotline expecting something is going to happen, but they
are dropped into the ABYSS without any rope end quote.

Speaker 4 (29:04):
I have to believe there's like a funding issue, just
a resource issue there too. It's not I can't believe
that people at CPS are like bad people that they
just don't care about this stuff. I have to believe
they're very overworked and just don't have the resources.

Speaker 1 (29:19):
Well, it's not the case workers, and a good friend
of ours is a CPS caseworker.

Speaker 3 (29:26):
It's the system.

Speaker 1 (29:28):
They can only do so much and they are given
too many cases. And this is an ongoing problem in
this case that we're talking about today, and I wish
I had the answers, but I don't.

Speaker 4 (29:38):
They were just failed by the system.

Speaker 3 (29:40):
But the system is, the system is broken, so it's
like it's just impossible.

Speaker 1 (29:45):
The Heart children were never officially registered as homeschoolers with
the state after their move, which is illegal. Davante Heart
was the most magnetic, outgoing Heart child. His effroifescent personality
and bright smile captivated everyone he met. Say Effrofestn's funny, Yeah,
I can't think it?

Speaker 4 (30:02):
Pretty good?

Speaker 3 (30:03):
Oh boy?

Speaker 1 (30:05):
He had a way of being noticed. Everyone loved him
from a young age. He wore a sign around his
neck that said free Hugs when his family attended public events.
Friends recall his hugs being tight and full of love.

Speaker 3 (30:18):
Like having your kid wear a free hugs shirt. It's
a little old strange had not a free hug shirt
but a sign.

Speaker 1 (30:24):
It's just I don't really, I wouldn't want a bunch
of people touching my kid.

Speaker 4 (30:27):
Yeah. Do we know if that was his idea to
do that or if it was, what do you think?
I mean? Probably not, But it does sound like he
was like an outgoing kid.

Speaker 1 (30:34):
We're doing a loving kid, but I'm sure he wasn't like, hey, moms,
I have an idea.

Speaker 4 (30:38):
Yeah.

Speaker 1 (30:40):
In twenty fourteen, while attending a Black Lives Matter rally
in Portland, Oregon, after police officers were acquitted of wrongdoing
in the death of Michael Brown and Ferguson, Missouri, an
image of Davante went viral. He was wearing his free
Hug sign, along with a leather jacket and a stylish
patterned royal blue fedora when a white police officer in

(31:01):
Reiger asked him for a hug.

Speaker 3 (31:03):
And the photo is the too embrace.

Speaker 1 (31:05):
The officer has a slight smile and tears are rolling
down DeVante's face. His face is full of emotion. This
picture was coined the hug felt around the world a sign.

Speaker 3 (31:17):
Of hope and racial healing.

Speaker 1 (31:19):
But of course that's way too much pressure to put
on an eleven year old child. And I showed you
this picture.

Speaker 4 (31:24):
I mean it's a beautiful it's a beautifl picture. Yeah,
it really is. It does it makes you tear up
just like looking at the picture.

Speaker 3 (31:30):
Yeah, it's full, just full of emotion in his little facemen.
Here's a short clip.

Speaker 8 (31:36):
As someone around here said today, what the world needs
now might just be what we see in this photo.
After days of disturbing media imagery surrounding the Ferguson grand
jury decision, there's this in the midst of an emotional
rally in Portland, Oregon police Sergeant Brett Barnum and twelve
year old Davante Hart. And it turns out Davante has
a remarkable story himself, born to a drug addicted mother

(31:57):
and into a violent life. He and his two siblings
were adopted into a loving family, and DeVante was at
that rally with a message of peace and holding a
sign offering three hugs. Sergeant Barnum asked if he might
have one.

Speaker 3 (32:10):
Brian Williams remember him.

Speaker 4 (32:11):
I do.

Speaker 3 (32:13):
He had kind of a fall from grace.

Speaker 4 (32:16):
I didn't remember what happened, but I figured he must
have had some kind of He must have gotten canceled somehow.

Speaker 1 (32:21):
Well, he got put like on a I think he
might have been suspended for a while. But then he
went to like the.

Speaker 3 (32:25):
Late Lately, Late Late news.

Speaker 1 (32:28):
He embellished some stories, okay, And it wasn't clear if
he had false memories or he was lying. Knowing more
about the heart children struggles at home puts the famous
picture in a different light, was DeVante hoping this officer
could save him and his siblings.

Speaker 4 (32:47):
I would not have I would not have guessed that.
I guess but now that you say that, maybe that
is a possibility or did he.

Speaker 3 (32:53):
Not want to hug the officer? And Jen kind of like, oh,
go hug.

Speaker 4 (32:58):
Oh, So you think the tears were like I think
he was him doing this against his will?

Speaker 3 (33:03):
Maybe yeah, but it did. I mean, it does seem organic.

Speaker 4 (33:06):
It looks very genuine.

Speaker 1 (33:07):
It does look very genuine. Of course, we'll post that.
Jen later posted the photo on Facebook with a following caption,
My son has a heart of gold, compassion beyond anything
I've ever experienced, yet struggles with living fearlessly when it
comes to the police and people who don't understand the
complexity of racism that is prevalent in our society. It

(33:29):
was one of the most emotionally.

Speaker 3 (33:30):
Charged experiences I've ever had as a mother. End quote.

Speaker 4 (33:35):
So she's saying his tears were because he was fearful,
like living in fear of the police.

Speaker 1 (33:40):
I think she was just talking about racism in general,
like he was just devastated by racism. Davante told the
Oregonian when asked why he was giving hugs during the
twenty fourteen Portland protest, quote, I was trying to show
peace that there is a different way to handle it.
End quote DeVante. It was definitely Jen's favorite. He understood

(34:02):
the role and he was that he was required to
play and shined in it. It seemed that he received
special treatment as the favorite child, which brings us to
Jen's social media posts and online life. Jen was deeply
involved in an online gaming community called oz Broken Kingdom.

Speaker 3 (34:20):
Have you ever heard of this?

Speaker 6 (34:21):
No?

Speaker 4 (34:21):
I haven't.

Speaker 1 (34:23):
I think it has something to do with a Wizard
of Oz, but I don't really know anything about it.
Jen' spen hours and hours each day playing the game,
often ignoring the children. She was the co leader of
a clan.

Speaker 3 (34:33):
A clan, do you know what that is?

Speaker 4 (34:35):
I assume it's just a group within the game, like
a team.

Speaker 1 (34:38):
It's a group of about fifty people that form a
team and play the game together to defeat other teams.
Her responsibilities as a co leader in the game required
her to play as long as twelve to fourteen hours
a day. She I can't imagine playing again.

Speaker 4 (34:53):
And she didn't work outside the homes Sarah was the
breadwinner of the family, and Jen stayed home and.

Speaker 3 (34:59):
Played with the well. She was homeschooling the kids right.

Speaker 4 (35:03):
In between her twelve hours of game playing.

Speaker 1 (35:06):
She was competitive and always at the top of the leaderboard.
Her team was ranked second worldwide. She was very social
with the other members of her clan and was well
liked by the group until she abruptly left the game
in the summer of twenty seventeen. Allegedly, there was some
dispute among the players, and Jen really didn't like anyone
questioning her authority. A friend of hers from the gaming

(35:29):
community said, with the amount of hours that she spent
playing the game, there was no way she would have
been able to provide her six children with an education
because the game was so immersive and time consuming and expensive.
Six kids to homeschool with different levels and different.

Speaker 3 (35:47):
Grades, that's a lot.

Speaker 4 (35:49):
Yeah, yeah, for sure.

Speaker 1 (35:51):
And Jen was known for her lengthly effusive, sentimental and
political posts on Facebook. Her post portray a perfectly imperfect family,
which I'm going to tell you personally, the influencers that
are always posting our Ruby Frankie episode we talk about.

Speaker 4 (36:09):
This is reminding me a lot about this episode.

Speaker 1 (36:11):
The perfectly imperfect bloggers and social media. It drives me nuts, like, oh,
this is our family. We're a mess, but we Oh,
it just drives me nuts. Jen was a skilled photographer
and was good at posting the children to get the
most impactful shots. The children were beautiful with bright smiles.
She posted frequent photos of the children gardening, raising chickens,

(36:34):
and reading books in the woods. And this was their
homeschool curriculum. And a Facebook post from twenty fourteen, Jen
wrote about a visit to the grocery store and I'm
going to have you read it if you don't mind.

Speaker 4 (36:46):
Sure. An elderly man was standing at the end of
the bagging area conversing with the woman checking us out.
He spots our son looks him up and down. Man,
I can tell you're going to be a baseball player
when you grow up. Pauses, tilts his head and gives
a closed mouth grin. Actually, no, baseball isn't really my thing. Man. Well,

(37:08):
I can tell you're going to be a ballplayer son,
as his mom. I can tell. There's a slight frustration
inside of him. No, I don't even play baseball. Check out, lady,
Oh I bet you're going to be a basketball or
soccer player, then, Son, No, I don't play any sports.
It's just not my thing. There's nothing wrong with sports
or anything. I just have other interests. Check out, lady,

(37:29):
in a befuddled, nearly astonished voice, what I have never
met a kid that looks like you that doesn't play sports? Man, chuckling, Right, never,
they all do. My face was as red as my
hair at this point. It was so obviously clear what
was happening. While I wanted so badly to step in
and protect my son from the ongoing racial stereotyping, I didn't.

(37:54):
I let him step into his own power, and he
handled it brilliantly. Son, Well, of course you've ever met
a kid like me. I'm one of a kind. There's
not another person like me. Man. Well, what do you
want to be when you grow up? Son? I'm here
to help people. I'm here to inspire now. Man, Oh,
so you're going to be a doctor, as he laughed

(38:16):
while he said it, not kidding, Son, No, I'm not. Man.
While being a doctor is the best way to help people,
what are you going to do to help and inspire people? Son?
Putting the last of the bags in the cart. I'm
going to be myself no matter how much people try
to make me something. I am not. Have a great
night flash his ginormous smile. I think this kid will

(38:39):
be all right no matter what is tossed at him.

Speaker 3 (38:44):
What did you think of that?

Speaker 7 (38:46):
Just?

Speaker 4 (38:46):
I mean, I don't know what to think of it.
I think it's all made up, is what I think.

Speaker 3 (38:51):
Yeah, I don't think people talk like that.

Speaker 4 (38:53):
I don't. I mean, I know there is stereotyping for sure,
and so I don't doubt that that happens to people,
But that just whole it just sounds like a made
up story for social media.

Speaker 1 (39:02):
I have never met a kid that looks like you
that doesn't play sports. I mean, come on, And the
way like the punctuation in this post is just.

Speaker 4 (39:10):
Yeah, I don't know.

Speaker 3 (39:11):
It just all gives me a big dick yep.

Speaker 1 (39:15):
Well, thank you for reading that. You did a splendid job.

Speaker 3 (39:18):
One of the.

Speaker 1 (39:19):
Friends who contacted CPS said, quote the kids pose and
are made to look like one big, happy family, but
after the photo event, they go back to looking lifeless.
The hug heard around the world got a lot of
attention and a request for interviews. Jen claimed that they
received offers to make a reality show. She refused, saying

(39:39):
she wanted to protect her children's right to privacy, but
in reality, she was probably afraid the Heart family, if
they received too much attention the CPS reports would become
public and jeopardize her custody of the kids and the
checks that continued to come from the state of Texas.

Speaker 3 (39:55):
Jen said she got a lot of hate and death.

Speaker 1 (39:57):
Threats after the attention the hug garnered. People said the
picture was posed, or Davante was an actor, or Davante
was crying because she had forced him to hug the
police officer. After the fierce reaction to the picture, the
family became more reclusive and was seen in public less frequently.
Jen took a six month hiatus from Facebook and social
media after posting the following I understand many of you

(40:21):
have stumbled upon the dark side of the media. As
of late, things have been twisted and used for various reasons.
I can't control that, and I cannot allow that to
control me. What other people think is none of my business.
I know what really happened and how DeVante truly feels
about that encounter, and that's all that matters.

Speaker 3 (40:40):
To us.

Speaker 1 (40:42):
So she did have a big social media presidence, and
then she kind of withdrew a little bit.

Speaker 4 (40:46):
I'm a little surprised to hear that, actually, because it
seems like they really thrived. Did they really like that?
Was she attention?

Speaker 1 (40:53):
But after the hug picture, they really did get some
dac Pratson. Yeah, they were legitimate. I saw some of them,
and you know that is unpleasant, and you can't You
can't blame her for that.

Speaker 3 (41:07):
You can blame for a lot of other things.

Speaker 1 (41:09):
So I should have said earlier, like DeVante when they
were asking him if he played baseball and he said no, Well,
the kids never left the darn house.

Speaker 3 (41:16):
How could they be on a baseball team?

Speaker 4 (41:18):
Good point.

Speaker 3 (41:19):
As far as I know, they.

Speaker 1 (41:20):
Didn't do any activities outside of the home. Yeah, okay,
this is where the story starts, starts to take.

Speaker 3 (41:26):
A little turn.

Speaker 4 (41:27):
Okay.

Speaker 1 (41:28):
In twenty seventeen, the Hearts moved to Woodland, Washington. They
bought a house in an unincorporated secluded area. Sarah worked
at a Kohle's department store as an assistant manager, working
long hours, while Jen continued to stay home with the kids,
sometimes traveling to music festivals or national parks. In September
twenty seventeen, the hearts neighbors Dana and Bruce to Kelb

(41:49):
were awoken by frantic knocking on their front door. Hannah Hart,
whom the Kelbs hadn't been familiar with, ran into their
house begging them for help. They had briefly met Sarah Hart,
but they didn't even know children were living next door.
Hannah was wrapped in a blanket and covered in BlackBerry
brambles and scratches from running through the woods that separated

(42:11):
the properties at night after jumping out of a second
story window. She was sixteen years old at the time,
but that Kelbs thought she was seven or eight. Her
front teeth were missing. She frantically told them that her
parents were abusive racists and they beat her with a belt. Outside,
her family was calling her name and searching for her

(42:31):
with flashlights. She ran up the stairs and hid in
the corner of the Kelb's bedroom and begged them not
to tell her parents where she was. Her mother's barged
into the house and explained that Hannah had been having
a rough time with her brother, but assured them that
she was fine. Jennifer made Hannah apologize for the incident,
she stayed in talk with the neighbors and told them

(42:53):
that the kids were all drug babies and that Hannah's
birth mother had bipolar disorder, which she did, but still
the I mean that Hannah had read in polar disorder.
She claimed that Hannah was twelve and small for her age.

Speaker 3 (43:05):
Remember she was sixteen thirteen.

Speaker 1 (43:07):
Yeah, her front teeth had been knocked out in an accident,
and Hannah allegedly didn't want them replaced, which.

Speaker 4 (43:15):
Yeah, right, and he's sixteen year old would be fine.

Speaker 3 (43:17):
Yeah.

Speaker 1 (43:19):
At six thirty am the morning after the incident with Hannah,
I'm sure that the Kelps were really happy, like four
hours later to hear them knocking at the door at
their door that the Kelps received a letter from her
that read, Dear Dana and Bruce, I stopped by this
morning because I feel horrible about disturbing your peace and
worrying you in the middle of the night. I was
very frustrated with my brother and didn't handle things very maturely,

(43:42):
and I'm sorry for telling lies to get attention. I
am working on being more honest and finding better ways
to communicate my frustrations. I've been pretty sad about two
of my cats dying recently. So I was just very
sad and frustrated last night. Thank you for being kind, Hannah.

Speaker 4 (43:58):
Yeah, that sounds exactly like something a sixteen year old
would write.

Speaker 1 (44:01):
And I was so happy when she escaped. I was like,
go Anna, get out of there. Dana wanted to report
the Hearts for child abuse, but Bruce encouraged her to
stay out of the matter. Dana told her dad, Steve,
the bizarre story. He couldn't stop thinking of Hannah and
the trouble she might be in. He called the police
in November of twenty seventeen.

Speaker 9 (44:21):
There's some kids that I feel is being highly abused.
What's yet and how I know? Okay, I'm gonna give
to the address of my daughter's house because it's right
next door. Yeah, if you're going up the road to
her house, it's a house on the right. Okay, let's
play on there. Well, they have black children with that
part doesn't matter, and they're new here. But the other

(44:41):
night a little girls jumped out of the second story
window on the roof and then down onto the ground
and ran to my daughter. And this is like two
in the morning, begging them to help her. To help her,
and when they came looking for her, if she was
begging my daughter not to let them know she was there.
And then a actually my son in law let him know.

(45:02):
He doesn't want to get involved. But the more I
sit on it, I just can't live with it. Somebody's
got to go there and check out.

Speaker 10 (45:09):
So how old was the little kid that did that,
that ran to your daughter's house?

Speaker 9 (45:12):
About twelve years old? Thirteen? And then she had all
four of the kids come back later and to say
everything was okay, and they're all standing at attention like
they were just scared to death. And I think there's
something very serious going on there and they're here from Texas.
The kids might even be kidnapped. And basically my son

(45:35):
in law is like most people, they don't want to
get involved, and so he's keeping my daughter out of it.
But since she's told me about it, I just can't
live with it. I'm very concerned for these kids.

Speaker 4 (45:47):
Good for that man.

Speaker 3 (45:48):
Stee is my hero. I mean, I'm so glad he
did that.

Speaker 1 (45:52):
Yeah, I don't want to judge the deck helps, but
if that happened, you and I would not get a
wink of sleep.

Speaker 3 (45:59):
Yeah, we would call the police. I don't think we
would hesitate, Yeah, for sure.

Speaker 1 (46:06):
Neighbors recalled that the children were rarely if ever outside,
the blinds were always tightly closed in the home. None
of the children had a cell phone or were allowed
to use the computer, and in twenty seventeen, the kid's
ages ranged from twelve to seventeen. I'm sorry, twelve to nineteen.
They're not little kids anymore. They should have been spending
time with friends, exploring the world independently and.

Speaker 3 (46:26):
Figuring out who they were and how they fit into
the world.

Speaker 1 (46:30):
The heart kids didn't have any friends as far as
I can tell, outside of their siblings, and they had
absolutely no autonomy. On March fifteenth, twenty eighteen, Bruce de
Kelp was working on his car in the driveway when
Davante approached him and asked him for food. Nome The
other incident happened in November, so nothing happened from that.

(46:52):
There was an investigation, but you know, the kids remained.

Speaker 3 (46:55):
In the home.

Speaker 1 (46:57):
Davante approached him and asked him for food. He told
that his mother's withheld food from the children as punishment,
sometimes for days at a time. Davante returned to the
Chelbs about twelve more times over the week, multiple times
a day, and asked for fruit, protein bars, cured meat,
and other non perishable food. He asked them to put
the food in a box by the fence and not

(47:18):
to call the police or CPS because he didn't want
to be separated from his siblings. Davante told the jclbs
that everything Hannah had told them about their home life.

Speaker 4 (47:28):
Was true and they didn't call CPS.

Speaker 3 (47:32):
Not yet, can you imagine? I mean, I don't Again,
I don't want to judge them. I know they meant
well and they did give the.

Speaker 1 (47:38):
Kids food, but still got okay. So I'm going to
briefly go through the timeline just because like so much
has happened, just so you have like a better idea.
In two thousand and four, that's when Sarah and Hannah
became foster parents. Two thousand and six that's when the
first three were adopted and they came to Minnesotaw. Thousand

(48:00):
and eight is the first involvement with CPS, and then Davante, Jeremiah,
and Sierra were adopted. In twenty ten to twenty eleven,
six child abuse claims were filed against the Hearts Sarah
pleaded guilty and was sentenced to one year probation. The
children were pulled out of public school for good. Twenty thirteen,
Sarah's probation was up and they moved to Oregon. Twenty

(48:23):
fourteen is the picture of when the picture of Davante
went viral and the family became a little more reclusive.
Twenty seventeen is when they moved to Washington, Hannah escaped
and Davante starts asking for food. On March twenty third,
Davante returned and asked the Dcalps for food one last time.
Dana decides to call CPS and they paid a visit

(48:46):
to the house that very day, but no one answered
the door. Sarah left her job at Cole's and is
seen for the last time publicly. On March twenty fourth,
at three am, Sarah texted her coworker from Cole's and
told her that she was too sick to come to
work and would not be able to open the store
that day. And this wasn't characteristic of Sarah at all.

(49:08):
She always went to work. On March twenty fourth, Dana
who Diana became obsessed with watching the house. She didn't
call CPS but I think she wanted to and she
had a lot of guilt, so she was like watching
the house all the time for something to happen. So
on March twenty fourth, she noticed that the Yukon was
not in the driveway and a retaining wall had been damaged.

(49:29):
In the Heart's haste to leave the house, CPS returned
twice more, but no one ever answered the door. Later
that day, the family is believed to be about one
hundred and sixty miles away from their home in Newport, Oregon,
and by that evening they were in Fort Bragg, California,
so they're just driving along.

Speaker 4 (49:49):
The down coast.

Speaker 1 (49:51):
March twenty fifth, at eight am, Jennifer Hart is seen
for the last time on surveillance camera entering a Safeway
in Fort Bragg, California, where she purchased bananas, saltines, and
chef boyer do you Revuolie for twenty dollars and eight cents,
paying cash and using a member card, which is kind
of strange. I can feel myself like starting to tear
up because I know what's coming.

Speaker 2 (50:12):
Yeah.

Speaker 1 (50:13):
In March twenty sixth, at ten am, the CPS caseworker
returned to the Heart home for the final time, and
called police to complete a welfare check at the home
after no one answered the door at one pm. Sarah's coworker,
Cheryl Hart no relation, also called for a welfare check
after not hearing from Sarah for several days.

Speaker 11 (50:32):
Here's a short clip since I was calling to see
if I get a welfare check done?

Speaker 9 (50:36):
Okay and her?

Speaker 10 (50:37):
Are we checking on Sarah Hart? Help many reason that
we're checking on her.

Speaker 11 (50:41):
She sent out a text message at three o'clock in
the morning on Saturday morning stating that she was sick,
but nobody's being able to get a hold of her,
talk to her or seeing her since that time. Message
okay or her wife was his gen So we're just
a confirmed Okay.

Speaker 10 (51:00):
You when she said through six, did you say what
was going on?

Speaker 11 (51:02):
Or she just said that she just is unable to
come out and wasn't able to go to work and
thought she was going to have to go to the doctor.
I checked the hospital if they didn't company record over
and I think her phone is now dead.

Speaker 10 (51:19):
Okay, and just the two of them live there.

Speaker 11 (51:22):
They have six children, Okay.

Speaker 10 (51:26):
Any non medical history, not that I'm aware of.

Speaker 11 (51:28):
No, she has been sick and I think she's like
a cold.

Speaker 10 (51:32):
Okay, has she been so vital at all or not
that I'm aware of?

Speaker 3 (51:39):
Doesn't sound good, does it though.

Speaker 1 (51:41):
A man camping with his wife in an RV near
highway in northern California her tires crunching gravel. On March
twenty fifth, twenty eighteen, just after eleven pm, he peeked
out and saw a large SUV, but no one exited
the vehicle. He assumed someone had parked there just to
get a few hours of sleep. He went to bed,
but was awakened at three am when he heard the

(52:03):
SUV's engine come to life and fade off into the distance.
Moments later, off in the distance, he heard the screech
of tires and faint screams. He convinced himself that he
was just hearing animals. At three thirty pm on March
twenty six a tourists spotted the hearts crushed GMC Yukon
suv at the bottom of the cliff. It took emergency
responders until midnight for the difficult recovery of the Hart

(52:25):
family and their vehicle. Jen and Sarah were found in
the Yukon. Marcus Jeremiah, and Abby were thrown from the
vehicle and found on the rocks nearby. A month's long
search ensued for the remaining family members. Volunteers searched forty
five miles along the coast searching for DeVante, Hannah, and Sierra.
The crash was at first thought to be an accident

(52:47):
in law enforcement hope the missing children hadn't been on
the trip and were somewhere safe, But as the investigation unfolded,
it became obvious that it was something else.

Speaker 12 (52:57):
When you start putting the totality of everything together, you
would be a village idiot if you didn't think that
you know, something was rotten here. If on day one
I had said gauxious was an intentional act and it
was homicide, oh can you imagine? People would have said,

(53:19):
who are you to make that determination? You know, who
would kill six kids. I'm a dad who would kill
six kids. But if this is not an accident, that
means one thing, means it was a crime. If it's
a crime, it's murder. At the very beginning, when I

(53:42):
said I have no reason to believe this is anything
but an accident, I believed it. But that changed when
things started developing from a traffic accident to a homicide investigation.
That's not a baby step, that's a big leap, but
it is what it is.

Speaker 1 (54:02):
That was Tom Allman, former sheriff coroner of Mendocino County,
who was in charge of the Heart investigation. Sarah Heart's
Google searches and the hours before her death became important evidence.
They included his death from drowning relatively painless? How long
does it take to die from hypothermia and water while
drowning in a car? How can I easily overdose on
OTC medicine? What OTC medications can you take to overdose?

(54:27):
What will happen when overdosing with benadril? Sarah also googled
no kill shelters for their dogs. On April seventh, twenty eighteen,
Sierra's body washed ashore. Hannah's foot was found on a
nearby beach on May ninth, but it took ten months
to identify to identify it until her birth mother came

(54:47):
forward and offer her DNA. A DNA match was necessary
because there were no dental records. As far as law
enforcement could tell, the children had never visited a dentist.
The confirmation of Hannah's.

Speaker 3 (54:58):
Death dashed hopes that she and Davante might have escaped
the horrific situation. How you doing over.

Speaker 4 (55:04):
There, I'm hanging in there.

Speaker 3 (55:07):
It's rough.

Speaker 4 (55:08):
I can't even yeah, I just can't even imagine. Yeah.

Speaker 1 (55:12):
The autopsy found that Sarah had forty two doses of
benadryl in her body, Marcus had nineteen, Abby fourteen, and
Jeremiah nine. Jen was legally drunk. Her blood alcohol level
was point one h two, the equivalent of about five drinks.
Point eight or higher is considered too intoxicated to drive.

Speaker 3 (55:32):
Liquid and pill.

Speaker 1 (55:32):
Forms of benadryl were purchased in Washington at Walmart shortly
after leaving their home, indicating the murders had been premeditated.
The cause of death for all members of the Heart
family was a broken neck.

Speaker 4 (55:45):
So were the three kids that weren't found in the car.
Were they in the car but thrown from the vehicle
or were they killed in a different way?

Speaker 5 (55:52):
Yeah?

Speaker 3 (55:52):
They were, And I think police were confused.

Speaker 1 (55:55):
Yeah too, no they I mean, I will post pictures
and you'll see that the the bottom of the cliff
where the vehicle landed. It's on this rocky beach, but
it's right up against so I think.

Speaker 4 (56:09):
You know, yeah, they were just thrown from the car
and they weren't found until later.

Speaker 1 (56:14):
Authorities ruled the deaths of the Heart family intentional, but
felt a jury should decide. Tom Almon, the sheriff coroner,
opened an inquest in Mendocino County. So in California, a
lot of counties.

Speaker 3 (56:26):
Use the sheriff. Sheriff is also the.

Speaker 1 (56:28):
Coroner, which seems like a huge workload. On April fourth,
a jury of fourteen chose from four manners of death
for each of the eight people who died natural causes, suicide, accident,
or homicide. Despite his body never being found, a judge
had ruled Davante dead last night. My voice started getting

(56:49):
horse and I was losing my voice. That I was
actually kind of happy because I was like, Oh, Rich
is gonna have to You're gonna have to do this
this story today. Jurors her testimony from eight police officers,
a medical examiner, and viewed more than one dozen exhibits.
Among the evidence was the lack of skid marks or
other signs of breaking before the Yukon plummeted to the

(57:10):
Rocky Beach, and no one was wearing a seatbelt. Investigators
said it appeared that the suv stopped about seventy feet
from the cliff's edge, then quickly accelerated to twenty miles
per hour at full throttle, which I know that doesn't
sound really fast, but there was much ground to get.

Speaker 3 (57:27):
The speed up.

Speaker 1 (57:28):
The hearts GPS washed ashore weeks later after the crash,
and that was critical evidence, and under an hour, the
jurors unanimously determined that the manner of death for Sarah
and Jennifer Hart was suicide and the deaths of the
six children was homicide. Mendocino County Sheriff Lieutenant Shannon Barney said, quote,
it is my belief that both Jennifer and Sarah succumbed

(57:50):
to a lot of pressure, just a lot of stuff
going on in their lives, to the point where they
made this conscious decision to end their lives this way
and take their children's lives end quote. After the crash,
law enforcement entered the Heart home in Washington to look
for evidence as to the whereabouts of the three missing
children and a possible motive. No suicide note was found

(58:10):
or proof that Devonte, Hannah or Sierra could be alive.
Investigators said that it didn't look like the children lived
in the home. It was organized and tidy, and sadly,
there weren't enough beds for eight children. Despite claiming to
have a strict organic vegetarian diet. The refrigerator and freezer
were full of meat and processed foods, and there was

(58:32):
a large bowl of fruit on the counter, which I
don't care if they were eating. They had meat in
their house, but feed your kids. There was no reason
for these kids to go hungry. There were open bottles
of wine in the counter, despite Gen's claims that she
never drank. In the basement, there was a large screen
TV on a Facebook. Jen had proudly claimed that they

(58:53):
had given up TV for the best big screen available
planet Earth.

Speaker 4 (59:00):
See so often in these situations, their social media life
was really just a big lie, right for sure.

Speaker 1 (59:06):
I think it's who they maybe wanted to be, It's
not who they were in reality. We'll never know what
the motive was for Gen and Sarah killing themselves and
their children, but we do know that CPS was closing
in on them. They were fourteen thousand dollars in debt,
and Jen had been pretending to be the perfect parent
for over a decade. As their six children approached adulthood. Adulthood,

(59:29):
Jen and Sarah may have realized they no longer had
the ability or right to control them. Whatever the reason,
it was no fault of these six remarkable young people
who had been through so much in their short lives.
Perhaps Jen and Sarah originally had the best intentions and
found themselves over their heads and felt like they didn't
have anyone to turn to because they wanted to be
the ideal modern family and got caught up in curating

(59:51):
this perfection, sacrificing the actual happiness and well being of
their children.

Speaker 4 (59:58):
I don't know. I don't know what the mot would
have been, but it's just disgusting and horrible.

Speaker 3 (01:00:04):
Well, and knowing that other people loved these children.

Speaker 1 (01:00:07):
Yeah, friends of Jen and Sarah have ardently defended them.

Speaker 5 (01:00:12):
The kids were angels. They always beamed with smiles, and the.

Speaker 13 (01:00:19):
Heart Family, in my mind, are some of the most
precious beings on the earth that we've met.

Speaker 5 (01:00:25):
Anytime they would show up to an event, they would
show up with just an overwhelming energy of love.

Speaker 13 (01:00:33):
The Heart Family were such a great and still are
a living legacy of bringing our people together and the
importance of community, and the importance of racial equality, and
the importance of freedom. And they took day by day,
hour to hour, moment to moment to help them rejuvenate
and help teach them the language and help teach them

(01:00:53):
how to be here with community. They really found the
goodness and everybody. I hope that we can all really
learn a really beautiful lesson in that and carry that
legacy on.

Speaker 4 (01:01:06):
Okay, I don't think so.

Speaker 3 (01:01:10):
It's maddening.

Speaker 4 (01:01:11):
Well, I mean, part of that clip it sounded like,
you know, they were talking about the kids, which I'm like, okay, yeah,
but yeah, it sounds like they're kind of defending Jen
and Sarah, like that they built this beautiful family and
they should, you know.

Speaker 3 (01:01:23):
I mean, these people are clearly in denial.

Speaker 4 (01:01:25):
Yeah.

Speaker 1 (01:01:26):
Jamie Herman's a friend of Jen's since high school, said
the women were devoted parents. She said people who never
knew them are jumping to offensive and hurtful conclusions about
their motives and their parenting.

Speaker 3 (01:01:37):
Quote.

Speaker 1 (01:01:37):
Were they perfect, No, but they are not the monsters
they are being painted as. The amount of love and
good that they put into.

Speaker 3 (01:01:44):
This world is what their legacy should be.

Speaker 4 (01:01:46):
End of quote I'm sorry, I can't.

Speaker 1 (01:01:50):
Stacy Patton, an assistant professor of multimedia journalism at Morgan
State University, said the reaction to the heart case is complicated.

Speaker 3 (01:01:58):
Quote.

Speaker 1 (01:01:59):
Anytime black bodies are killed as a result of something
white people have done, there is an almost intuitive response
from white people that we shouldn't rush to judgment.

Speaker 3 (01:02:07):
We don't have all the facts.

Speaker 1 (01:02:09):
White people are constantly given the benefit of the doubt
despite the evidence that we have end quote. We talked
about this in the Ruby Frankie case that we did
for Patreon. But a parent's most basic responsibility is to
provide their children with food, shelter, and clothing.

Speaker 3 (01:02:27):
If those needs are.

Speaker 1 (01:02:28):
Not met, it's impossible for a children, for a child
to grow emotionally, physically, learn, socialize, love themselves, or anyone else.

Speaker 3 (01:02:38):
Yeah, it just just infuriates me.

Speaker 4 (01:02:42):
Yeah, me too.

Speaker 1 (01:02:43):
So part of the problem here is there is not
a nationwide registry for child abuse and child welfare, and
that hopefully can be changed. Because gen and Sarah were
able to have at least ten or more our child
abuse claims over three states.

Speaker 4 (01:03:03):
Okay, so this is because they moved from one state
to another. You think that there wasn't as much follow
up as there should have been because they weren't tracked
kind of across.

Speaker 1 (01:03:12):
Probably, yeah, they all, you know, cumulatively have been looked at.
It could have had a different outcome. Yeah, I just
wanted to say a little something about the kids as individuals,
if I can get through it.

Speaker 3 (01:03:26):
Davante was sensitive, the leader.

Speaker 1 (01:03:27):
Of the group, charismatic, outgoing, and loved to play his trumpet.
Jeremiah was a survivor, not expected to live long after
his birth. Sierra loved animals and.

Speaker 3 (01:03:38):
Her pet cat, Abigail loved.

Speaker 1 (01:03:41):
To explore nature and yoga. Marcus was quiet and studious,
and he loved to read, and he read Twilight.

Speaker 3 (01:03:47):
In one sitting.

Speaker 1 (01:03:49):
Hannah was quiet and observant, more comfortable on the periphery,
but loved.

Speaker 3 (01:03:53):
To dance and sing. Sorry, this just wrecks me. No,
that's so hard.

Speaker 1 (01:04:00):
Maybe all rest in peace and know how well they
were loved.

Speaker 3 (01:04:04):
I will never forget these kids.

Speaker 1 (01:04:09):
Dante, the brother of Davante, Jeremiah, and Sierra, has two
sons of his own today who have also entered the
foster system.

Speaker 3 (01:04:17):
Dante, the cards.

Speaker 4 (01:04:18):
Were stacked against Yeah.

Speaker 1 (01:04:20):
He has had several run ins with the law for
theft and domestic abuse. He has also had issues with drugs,
and he's been in gangs, and he has not been
able to hold a job. Roxanna Escarian, author of We
Were Once a Family, A Story of love, Death and
child Removal in America, which was one of my sources,

(01:04:41):
not only wrote an informative and devastating book about the
Heart family and the birth families of Marcus, Hannah, Abigail, DeVante, Jeremiah,
and Sierra, she became a fearless advocate for the birth
families and personally made it her mission that they received
some of the remains of the children. The Heart and
Sler families would only relinquish a portion of the ashes,

(01:05:03):
but it was something for the children's birth families to
hold on to. I can't imagine how grateful they were
toy have a tiny part of their children, except for Davante, whose.

Speaker 3 (01:05:14):
Remains have never been found. So that's the horrible story
of the Hard family.

Speaker 4 (01:05:20):
Well, thank you for telling the story. It is horrible,
and I yeah, I have no words.

Speaker 1 (01:05:27):
It's a tough one's you just can't wrap your head
around White people.

Speaker 4 (01:05:31):
Would would do this, You really can't.

Speaker 1 (01:05:34):
It's just the obsession of creating this image of perfection,
white saviorism.

Speaker 3 (01:05:39):
These I don't know. Sarah was not as bad as Jen,
but she was complicit. She could have stopped it.

Speaker 1 (01:05:49):
University of Michigan law professor Vivic Sancarum said, in our system,
once a child is adopted, we equate it with success,
and there is very little follow up. We actually know
very little about the well being of how kids from
the foster care system do after they are.

Speaker 3 (01:06:05):
Adopted end quote.

Speaker 1 (01:06:08):
Studies show that adopted children, even when placed early in life,
have more anxiety, depression, and mental health issues as compared
to the general population. Some of this stems from the
biological parent, but also environmental factors that arise in the
adoptees new home.

Speaker 3 (01:06:27):
The thought that these.

Speaker 1 (01:06:28):
Three children are better off with two white women states
away from their family members that had once fought so
hard to adopt them is unacceptable. Poverty isn't neglect. Children
are taken away from their families as a punitive measure
when other therapies could be administered. These families are plagued
by addiction, poverty, mental illness, violence, and trauma, and much

(01:06:49):
of it is intergenerational and cyclical. It doesn't mean that
they don't love their children.

Speaker 3 (01:06:54):
Yeah, it's so tough.

Speaker 4 (01:06:56):
It's such a complicated Yeah.

Speaker 1 (01:06:59):
Criticize the system because I know that there's a lot
of people that work really hard, right and the best
interests these kids. And you know, you say, like, well,
you know, the kids shouldn't have been taken away from
their their biological families, but in some cases the children
do need to be taken away from their biological families.
It's just, you know, not it's not a one size

(01:07:20):
fits all answer.

Speaker 4 (01:07:21):
Yeah, it's super complicated issue. And yeah, but in this case,
the kids were failed. It seems like numerous times, you know,
from start to finish.

Speaker 1 (01:07:31):
Yeah, and keeping the children together is so important.

Speaker 3 (01:07:33):
And my research like when at all.

Speaker 1 (01:07:36):
Possible kids should be placed with family members and never
separated from their siblings.

Speaker 3 (01:07:41):
That leads to so much trauma. So I mean, that's
that's pretty much it. Sorry for my emotion.

Speaker 1 (01:07:51):
That was a tough one one putting it off, but
I really wanted to tell the story, and I yeah.

Speaker 4 (01:07:57):
I'm glad you told the story. I think it's an
important story to tell, and I think you did a
great job.

Speaker 3 (01:08:02):
I appreciate that.

Speaker 1 (01:08:04):
I did want to talk about my sources really quick,
and as usual.

Speaker 3 (01:08:07):
I have way too many.

Speaker 1 (01:08:08):
Like I think you at one point you said to me, stop,
you're good, But I just I always just want to
tell the story the best way I can, and it's tough.
There's a podcast called Broken Hearts that I listened to
a year or two years ago that I first learned
about this story, and they do a pretty good job,

(01:08:28):
but they defend it. Seems like they can mildly defend
Jen and Sarah, and I don't think that they deserve
to be defended.

Speaker 4 (01:08:37):
No, I don't think so either. I'm sure they were
troubled and had issues, but to do what they did,
I can't. Yeah, I can't defend that.

Speaker 3 (01:08:44):
I can't defend it either.

Speaker 1 (01:08:45):
And also I listened to I watched a documentary called
A Thread of Deceit and that was horrible because it
was also defended. Really yeah, it was a lot of
their I think it might have been funded by their
festival friends.

Speaker 3 (01:09:00):
I'm not sure, but.

Speaker 1 (01:09:02):
There was a lot of people saying, oh, you know,
like that quote we heard, they put a lot of
good into the world. There was also I do recommend
a documentary called Broken Hearts, and I watched it from
HBO Max and that was really well done.

Speaker 3 (01:09:19):
That one I really enjoyed.

Speaker 1 (01:09:20):
And Roxtanna Ascarian's book was so touching. We Were Once
a Family, a story of love, death and child removal
in America. I can't recommend that enough. It's half of
it is about the.

Speaker 3 (01:09:35):
Heart family, but the other half is more about the system.
The system.

Speaker 1 (01:09:40):
Yeah, and she was in the system herself, so she
has interesting personal information.

Speaker 3 (01:09:44):
So yeah, devastating story.

Speaker 4 (01:09:48):
Well again, great job telling the story.

Speaker 9 (01:09:51):
Well.

Speaker 1 (01:09:51):
I will never forget those six beautiful children who deserved
so much more out of life.

Speaker 4 (01:09:57):
Yeah, they deserved a chance.

Speaker 3 (01:09:59):
Yeah.

Speaker 1 (01:10:06):
Thank you so much for listening to this episode of
Love Mary Kill.

Speaker 4 (01:10:10):
Please rate, review, follow and subscribe, Find us on social media,
or send us an email at Lovemarykill at gmail dot com.

Speaker 1 (01:10:18):
Please consider supporting us on Patreon dot com slash Lovemrykill
for five dollars a month. You get early ad free.

Speaker 3 (01:10:25):
Access and a monthly bonus episode.

Speaker 4 (01:10:27):
Join us next Monday for another episode of Love Mary Kill.

Speaker 2 (01:11:00):
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