The least of these
By Miguel Guanipa (03/21/06)
Laheigh Poutre is a tragic example of how the frail life of a child can be destroyed when the wayward aims of selfish adults and the oppressively complex and time-consuming bureaucracies of needlessly multi-layered institutions collide.
From her bed at the Franciscan Hospital for Children in Boston, where she is being taken care of, Laheigh Poutre may have heard the nurses’ loving notes of encouragement on her twelfth birthday. That is because, unfortunately, there are not too many other responsible adults available who play a nurturing role in this little girl’s life.
Haleigh Poutre is a young girl whose perspective on life will probably be drastically altered, should she ever resume the life of a normal 12 year old, because of the hand which she has been dealt. In fact, it is very likely that, unlike the average 12 year old, and most adults for that matter, little Haleigh will become keenly appreciative of the profound notion that one should never take even one breath for granted. This is the very sad tale of a little girl, who has endured more tribulation than few adults are even acquainted with.
Her story begins with Allison Avrett, Haleigh’s biological mother, who was deemed by the Department of Social Services of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts to be unfit to take care of her own daughter, due to alleged sexual abuse against young Haleigh by her mother’s live in boyfriend. Thus Haleigh Poutre was taken from her mother’s custody and placed in the hands of adoptive parents Jason and Holli Strickland.
During the four years while Haleigh Poutre was in the custody of Mr. and Mrs. Strickland, the DSS had been repeatedly made aware of several incidents in which Haleigh had suffered serious physical injuries. In fact there were a total of 17 reports of abuse which her adoptive parents confirmed but claimed Haleigh had mysteriously inflicted upon herself. Until one day, when Haleigh was admitted to a rehabilitative hospital because she had been so severely abused that she had to be placed in a ventilator and eventually declared to be in a persistent vegetative state.
But it is not there where her story ends.
In a bizarre twist of events, Haleigh’s adoptive mother killed her own mother and herself in an apparent murder/suicide. Her adoptive father, Jason Strickland, became a fervent advocate of protecting Haleigh’s right to remain in life support. But his motives for this extraordinary change of heart were suspect. If Haleigh Poutre had died as a result of the beating she had suffered at the hands of this man, he would be charged with first degree murder. In a cruel irony, it was his instinct for self-preservation which evidently prompted this sudden urge to preserve the life of the child he had almost murdered.
But his hopes seemed dashed when the DSS stepped in, and asked for an injunction to pull the plug on young Haleigh. Astonishingly, this right to remove Haleigh from life support was granted to the people who had originally placed her in the abusive environment which landed her there in the first place.
On the following day after permission had been granted to remove Haleigh Poutre from life support, she responded to the prompting of a medical worker by picking out on command a rubber duck and a Curious George Plush from a group of three objects. Haleigh was no longer banished to the condemned state of persistent vegetation, but had now been upgraded to a minimally conscious state. Her state sponsored dehydration would be put on hold.
Haleigh’s adoptive father was not looking out after Haleigh when he was seeking the courts to halt the state from euthanizing her; he was looking out for his own interests. Don’t forget, it was because of him that she was placed in a comatose state.
Workers at he Department of Social Services were also likely motivated by a scapegoat rationale when they acted promptly to request permission to put Haleigh out of her misery. This was a very messy case by all accounts, and it would have been better and quicker to simply report and archive the immediate evidence, charge the guilty parties, and remove the clog in the assembly line of a growing number of clients in need of social services. Don’t forget also that it took them only eight days to procure an injunction to remove Haleigh from her life support system, but a full four years to decipher that she had been enduring untold suffering at the hands of the state appointed adoptive parents.
In the end, like many other neglected children, it is young Haleigh Poutre who will be left to fend for herself. Her will to survive even in the most derelict of circumstances has certainly given her the right to exist. But the unequal burden of hurried maturity has also sadly fallen upon her, who has been robbed of the innocence that used to be part and parcel of being a child, because adults at every level, who were supposed to be the responsible parties, forgot or simply refused to assume the responsibilities which came with the title. It was then left to a 12 year old to assume that role.
Copyright 2006 Miguel A. Guanipa
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