Comments on: Texas: Hannah Overton, Imprisoned Foster Parent, Requests New Trial

By: JusticeReform

JusticeReform — Thu, 05 Feb 2009 16:12:37 +0000

To Rie who posted on December 12, 2008 — I’d like to be in touch with you about your experience.

Please email me at justicereform@gmail.com.

By: geoff

geoff — Tue, 27 Jan 2009 13:49:28 +0000

Retired Special Agent you have no heart and you are looking at it from biased closed eyes. You conveniently neglected to explain the arguements for all the evidence that was left out criminally in from my perspective that should have been revealed to the jury before any decision was made.

By: Retired Special Agent

Retired Special Agent — Thu, 22 Jan 2009 19:49:46 +0000

I do not reside in Texas, but I am very familiar with this case. Hannah was responsible for this tragic death, and she should have accepted a plea. Those who blame the judge, jury, or prosecution are either poorly informed or biased. An objective review of the facts supports the verdict and sentence. Hannah’s story does not pass the smell test.

By: Steve Wilburn

Steve Wilburn — Sun, 28 Dec 2008 04:11:34 +0000

This is a perfect example of overzealous prosecution. The whole case is on nonsensical conjecture by the prosecution. There really should be a law for overzealous prosecutors, who are just interested in winning, convicting, getting the strongest sentence. The jury didn’t seem to totally understand the rule of law but they were intimidated or just thought the prosecution must be telling the truth. This was a very sad state of affairs, many of the prosecutors witnesses even thought that the case may have been overreaching. I wonder if there were a penalty for prosecutors who are just out to make a name for themselves and will stop at nothing, just to win. If there were repercussions maybe prosecutors would not be such assholes!

By: Rie

Rie — Sat, 13 Dec 2008 02:24:21 +0000

We have a child that came to us at age 4. He was very much like the descriptions I have read about Andrew. He is now seven and although he is doing better, we still live on “lockdown”. He requires 24/7 supervision. We have video cameras, motion detectors, locks on the pantry, fridges, and cabinets. For the first year he insisted on sleeping under his bed. He would urinate and deficate in beach buckets in his room or in the trash can in his room.

This child has been caught drinking tabasco, licking Tony’s (similiar to Zatarans) off of his hands while hiding in his closet, sucking on ice cream rock salt, etc etc etc. His favorite treat for a while was chile lucas, I put it in water to dilute it. (just a couple of sprinkles in a cup) This could have very easily been us.

People should not be so quick to judge unless they have raised a RAD child. It is an entirely new world. We have six children in the home. We adopted one before this child and one after. We will probably adopt again. We do it because we love these kids. CPS offers zero support in the way of information. We did not have his medical or psychological info prior to his placement. In the three years we had him prior to finalizing his adoption, we went through eight cps caseworkers.

Prior to being an approved home, one must endure an extensive homestudy. During that time, they question each of the bio kids privately about discipline in the home.

Everything I have read thus far leads me to believe that this was a tragic accident. My prayers are with all of the children involved.

By: Stevie

Stevie — Sun, 07 Dec 2008 04:19:43 +0000

The article was very vague. That is all I have.

By: Stevie

Stevie — Sun, 07 Dec 2008 04:15:59 +0000

Detective Michael Hess (the lead investegator in the Hannaho Overton case) in the criminal investigation division was put on paid leave in March..

“The department received a complaint . . . that Hess engaged in conduct that hindered the prosecution of a felony criminal case that already has gone to trial. “

By: Linda

Linda — Sat, 06 Dec 2008 13:06:20 +0000

Stevie, thanks for keeping us updated. Let us know if anything changes with Hannah’s case.

By: Stevie

Stevie — Sat, 06 Dec 2008 08:18:54 +0000

The lead investigator in this case is married to a CPS supervisor who was fired in May for “for sharing confidential case information which damaged her professional credibility in the community.”
It appears as though she was getting on the local newspaper’s blog & discussing confidential information about the case.

By: Stevie

Stevie — Tue, 02 Dec 2008 05:12:50 +0000

And Andrew was not ‘confined to bed’ for more than bedtime. If you look at what Issac said about that, he clearly states his mother would watch Andrew till he fell asleep at night before she would allow herself to fall asleep. That is going the extra mile to supervise a child. But instead of thois extra diligence been applauded, the DA tried to make it look sinister.