Vermont accused in lawsuit of monitoring pregnant women deemed unfit to be mothers

A lawsuit filed this week charges Vermont Children’s Aid Agency using unsubstantiated allegations about a pregnant woman’s mental health to secretly investigate her and obtain custody of her daughter until the child is born.

The ACLU of Vermont and the National Pregnancy Advocacy Group filed a lawsuit Wednesday against the Vermont Department of Children and Families, the counseling center and the hospital where the woman gave birth in February 2022.

In the lawsuit, the state also faces allegations that it routinely tracks down pregnant women deemed unfit to be mothers.

The lawsuit seeks unspecified monetary damages for the woman, identified only by the initials A.V., and an end to what it describes as an illegal surveillance program.

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A copy of the lawsuit against the Vermont Department of Children and Families. (Google Maps; Supreme Court of Vermont)

The director of the shelter for the homeless, where A. V. was in January 2022, told a child welfare agency that she had untreated paranoia, dissociative behavior and PTSD, according to the lawsuit. The state began an investigation and eventually spoke to the women’s counselor, midwife and social worker at the hospital without her knowledge, even though she had no jurisdiction over the fetus.

The woman didn’t know about the investigation until after she gave birth, and her daughter was immediately taken away, according to ACLU senior staff attorney Garrison Stark.

A. V. didn’t know hospital officials were informing the state while she was in laborincluding details of her dilated cervix and the fact that she had temporarily lost custody of the child. The state even sought a court order to force the woman to have a caesarean section, although this was deemed moot because she had consented to the operation.

The woman was not able to get full custody of the child until seven months later.

“It’s a terrible set of circumstances for our client,” Stark said. “It’s also clear from what happened that this is not the first time the agency has done this. We have learned from multiple confidential sources that it is DCF’s custom and practice to consider people like our client who are pregnant, who are of interest to the agency based on a set of unofficial criteria and who the agency is tracking on the so-called “high-risk pregnancy registry” or “high risk pregnancy calendar”.

Department of Children and Family Services Commissioner Chris Winter said the agency would not comment until officials review the lawsuit and investigate the allegations.

“We take our mission to protect children and support families seriously and work hard to balance the safety and well-being of children with the rights of parents,” he said.

Representatives of the Lund Counseling Center, which was named as the defendant, said they learned of the allegations from news reports.

The ACLU of Vermont and Pregnancy Justice filed a lawsuit Wednesday against the Vermont Department of Children and Families, the counseling center and the hospital where the woman gave birth. (Getty Images)

“We take these matters very seriously and are actively working to gather more information to fully understand the situation,” said interim CEO Ken Schatz.

Copley Hospital has not commented on the lawsuit.

Several states across the country allow civil liability for pregnant women to take custody of their newborn, said Pregnancy Justice senior attorney Kulsoom Ijaz. However, it is not clear how common such situations are in the US

Ijaz said what happened to AV shows how pregnancy is increasingly being used as an excuse to block people’s rights.

The organization released a report in September detailing an increase in the number of women being accused of crimes related to pregnancy a year after the US Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade, allowing states to make their own abortion laws. Most of those cases in which an infant was identified as a victim involved women charged with child abuse, neglect or endangerment on charges of substance use during pregnancy.

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This photo shows the American Civil Liberties Union logo. (KAREN BLEIER/AFP via Getty Images)

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“What DCF did here is unbelievably cruel,” Ijaz said. “This is discrimination. His state-sanctioned surveillance and harassment violates Vermont’s newly enshrined right to reproductive autonomy in the state constitution. This is an opportunity for Vermont to signal to other states as a leader and say that these rights don’t just exist on paper, they exist in practice.”

Stark said the allegations in Vermont are particularly troubling because the state has described itself as a haven for reproductive rights.

“Finding evidence that a government agency is essentially colluding with certain health professionals to collect information without people’s knowledge or consent and to illegally expand its jurisdiction to investigate people based on what are essentially decisions about their own reproductive health, causes incredible anxiety,” he said. .

The Associated Press contributed to this report.