Pubdate: Fri, 30 Nov 2007
Source: Province, The (CN BC)
Copyright: 2007 The Province
Contact:  http://www.canada.com/theprovince/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/476
Author: Joey Thompson

'TREATED LIKE CRIMINALS,' WORRIED PARENTS SAY

Dad Jailed As He Tries to Rescue Teen From Drug Den

They were hard-working, rural folks determined to deliver their
daughter from the bleak, menacing world inhabited by prostitutes,
pimps and crackheads.

So the last thing the Pochs expected when they marched in to yard the
girl from a drug den was to butt heads with local law enforcers and be
criminally charged themselves.

Yes, Frank was charged with B&E and resisting arrest a year ago, after
Sparwood RCMP found him scouring a seedy dwelling for his wayward
15-year-old and the creepy meth heads she was with.

The 52-year-old construction businessman and 47-year-old Elsa, his
wife, had reluctantly decided to take the law into their own hands
after having spent the previous year struggling to convince local
Mounties to intervene in order to salvage the remnants of their
relationship with Samantha.

The Ministry of Children and Family Development supported the couple's
endeavours to get her clean, Elsa said, but social workers claimed
their hands were tied.

It didn't take officers long to put Frank's wrists in a similar state,
after they saw him trying to compel his daughter to leave her
zoned-out friend who they feared would have her hooking for drugs in
no time. Dad spent the next two days in jail while his daughter's
partner was caught and charged with shoplifting items for
manufacturing meth.

The problem, as Elsa and Frank see it, is B.C. parents have no legal
right to press a child into treatment.

In a letter last year, the Pocks asked Premier Gordon Campbell and
Attorney-General Wally Oppal to consider legislation similar to that
in Alberta and Saskatchewan which, since 2006, has enabled parents to
apply for a court order to forcibly confine a child for five days for
detox and assessment.

But their plea has gone nowhere.

Albeit unusual, Alberta's Protection of Children Abusing Drugs Act has
sent almost 400 kids between ages 12 and 17 into one of five new
treatment facilities, where windows and doors are armed and residents
sleep in dorm-style rooms and have 24/7 access to counsellors.

Calgary's program boasts a 60-per-cent success rate, meaning almost
two-thirds of the kids forced into a safe house voluntarily stay on.

Critics of the plan, which requires a judge to approve the
intervention, say it is open to abuse by parents and may violate a
child's Charter rights. Parents argue the benefits far outweigh the
risk to a youth's civil liberties. Their only complaint is that the
five-day custody limitation is too short to crack the cycle of drug
abuse. They're currently lobbying their governments to allow parents
to apply for a second confinement order if a judge deems a longer stay
beneficial.

Last month, more than a year after the arrest, the charges against
Frank were dropped. But the Pocks say they feel vulnerable and at risk
now, having laid formal complaints against the cops who arrested and
rough-handled Frank and who misled them into believing they had moved
Samantha to safer accommodations when they had not.

"When legally a parent is responsible for their child till age 19, why
can't they go and get them away from a drug home?" Elsa asked.

"We were treated like criminals and the perpetrators ruled."
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MAP posted-by: Richard Lake