Broken Laws Shatter Happy Home: The Alexandria Hill Story

This story is absolutely heartbreaking but I think it is story that needs to be told.

No commentary is necessary to highlight the (forgive my neologism) “f#@ked-upness” of this event. Basically, a Texas couple had their 2 year old daughter, Alexandria Hill, taken from them after they were found to be smoking marijuana and charged with “neglectful supervision.”

In order to “protect” Alexandria, she was placed in a foster home. During visitation with her parents, little Alex would arrive with bruising and mold/mildew on her belongings. The situation became so dire that her parents were on the verge of being arrested because they refused to let her go back to the foster home.

What was a bad dream became a waking nightmare. On Monday, August 5^th, Alexandria Hill was admitted to the hospital with severe head injuries after having been badly beaten by her foster mother. Her parents were told to come to the hospital. When the Hill’s arrived, they were informed that Alexandria was in a coma. Two days have passed. Alexandria was taken off life support and had died.

The foster mother has been arrested and charged with murder. Do you think any punishment this woman receives will assuage the Hill’s crushing sadness or bring Alexandria back?

I am livid as I write this. As a responsible, pot-smoking parent, I can’t even imagine a more terrible scenario. To borrow from the author:

“The tragedy raises questions about laws equating marijuana use with neglect, particularly when the punishment involves placing a child in a potentially abusive environment, away from loving parents. Incidents of abuse are higher than average in foster homes, and children often struggle to thrive away from their parents. Thus, the removal of children from their parents’ home should be executed rarely and only in times of absolute necessity. In the case of Alexandria Hill, she was clearly much safer with her parents than in foster care. Rather than helping her, removing this little girl from a loving home on a flimsy pretext is what killed her.”

I think that phrase “absolute necessity” should be the guiding light in these instances. If the parents are smoking pot and also happen to be running guns or a prostitution ring, then of course there is a safety issue. But pot use in and of itself should not be grounds for prosecution. I’d be willing to bet that, all else being equal, it’s safer to have pot in the house than alcohol.

I know I’d certainly rather come home early on a weekend night and find my sons had gotten into the sativa than the whisky.

Don’t even get me started on how awful our foster system is operated. Clearly this is the worst possible outcome of following anachronistic and draconian dogma. Please tell Alexandria Hill’s story. She and her parents deserve to have this injustice shouted from the rooftops.