Falsely Convicted Rapists Get Better Deals Than Falsely Accused Fathers In America!
How would you like to be falsely imprisoned for a crime like rape where DNA evidence later proves your innocence, but yet you still have to serve out your entire life in prison? How would you like to be forced to pay for another man's house or car, knowing that you have no right to the control of the property? Most people with commonsense would likely say that the scenario makes little sense and would think that in a fair and just society that an order from a court saying such a thing is hardly enforceable. Tell that to David Salazar, who spent "28 days for not paying child support" for a child that was not his and where both he and his wife "told state officials he was not the father." This is not an isolated case of innocent mistake, but just one of many instances across the United States where individuals are being labeled a parent and forced to participate in the State Child Support Enforcement Programs governed by Title IV-D of the Social Security Act1.
In the article "Despite DNA, child support may be enforced2" a different ideological perspective is being told to the public and to our children by individuals that are claiming to be "advocates for children." These very same advocates for children apparently believe it is acceptable for the government bureaucracies that employ them to force one person to pay for another individual's responsibilities. "The government intervenes, even though the two people involved agree one of them is not the parent, creating the very conflict that it is supposed to be solving and racking up the bill of the U.S. taxpayer" states Lary Holland.
"The simple fact remains in this article that someone should locate the real biological parent of this child and let him pay real child support, which is time with his own progeny," states Holland. The Title IV-D Program, which governs Paternity and Child Support issues, only rewards for the creation and enforcement of paternity and child support orders, even when those orders are verifiable as incorrect partly because the state would not want to account for and send federal grant money back to the granting agency. There certainly appears to be a real incentive for mistakes in the State programs that receive Federal Title IV-D funding," states Holland.
"In the meantime, would you want to explain to Dwayne Dail, who was recently released from prison for being falsely accused and convicted of a crime, that after 18 years of false imprisonment that he to finish out the rest of life in prison because he didn't prove his innocence within the first year of his conviction?" asks Lary Holland.
The Kansas City Star reports that several "other states have passed laws allowing men to escape child support payments if DNA proves they are not the fathers" and it would make little sense to treat falsely accused fathers any differently than falsely accused rapists and murders. Lary Holland asks "is being falsely accused of being a father really that much worse than being falsely accused of rape or murder in America? Where is this man's settlement from the State?"
1. Overview of Title IV-D of the Social Security Act.
2. Kansas City Star. Despite DNA, child support may be enforced. December 30, 2007.)
