Couple of nits...
And I won't let your children die
First off, its really not within your baliwick, unless there's something you've not told us. :)
Live children are infinitely more appealing than dead ones, wherever they are.
The question is on which side to we err? As you put it, they can't win. And you're right.
But its a very tricky line...
And Jay's point - that if we err on the side of "caution" that you seem to indicate, that we rip families apart on the mere witchhunt for evidence, that that is overall worse, than the (far less likey to happen) case of well-hidden child abuse that results in a death - (at least, that's how I read it) - I think is well taken.
Boy, we're really burning up the philosophy today, aren't we? :)
Traumatizing and turning the lives of hundreds of families to shit (And have the parents have to beg, if they're ever allowed to see their children again - and also sending the children away from home, into strangers home's, which may or may not be *better*) for the sake of potentially stopping the murder of a child.......
I gotta side with Jay on this one.. you've got to have some harder evidence (because, his other point is similarly well taken - the Social Service people do NOT have to get a warrent, show cause, and they CAN remove from you your family - on a whim, with very little recourse.) to make that call.
As cold as it might sound.
Addison