my motion moot i had spoken with carla blank bender the clerk i faxed it withdraw yesterday and i filed an original withdraw this morning for mr break honor on friday so i just want to make sure and show for the record and i represent john and jaclyn share in these proceedings and this is similar to a case the court heard last year i'm regarding a guardianship case that was before judge webber in macon county i'm honored to be here again to argue a case before this court this young lady has led a tragic life so far and certainly has relied on state authorities to intervene and people with good intentions to intervene and take care or i think if we look at the felicity by way of background her father's the ceased her mother was deceased as of january two thousand and thirteen an overdose her mother had a history of drug and alcohol issues there were county proceedings in which the minor was removed from the home a number of occasions through the state's attorney in that apartment children and family services during that time my client's seana jacqueline sure filed a petition for a contested adoption which was rendered moot when the minor was returned to her mother's care before her mother sometime in the passing in january of two thousand and thirteen then upon the death of her mother it's my understanding that the minor lives with her deceased mother or for two days the third week of january two thousand and thirteen and then there are sequence of events that lead to were being taken care of by former foster parents scott and emily davidson which are the opposing petitioners in this of justice standard where the court looks at the situation and look specifically at what the court thinks is fair and equitable and whether or not the trial court acted in a way that's fair and equitable so one or either stand or it will be  that the court remand this to the trial court with specific instructions to retry the case and to consider the evidence of experts and scientific evidence before the court make no mistake this court has a very significant opportunity here for the following reasons i mislead judge little as any court dealing with minors issues have to deal with what they believe or what it believes to be in the best interest of the minor and we know that there are certain sources authoritative sources in law for what governed best interests in adoption case the adoption access out specific standards this court is well aware specific criteria and i would urge this court to consider the criteria number six seven and eight are most six being the mental and physical health of the those involved in the case seven being the family ties between the child and the applicant and eight being the background aims and living arrangements of the applicant and perhaps the challenge this case that we know one case in which the apartment is involved or should be involved that there are federal state laws and regulations that right in the apartment to consider certain factors like race religious religion blood relative background in making these kinds of the citizens and of course the only supreme court as were vital guides generally on what it means to be in the best interest in these types of cases so i don't think we're likely to have any dispute on what i have said between mr daughter's perspective of the case and mine up to this point it is in evaluating whether or not just a little made a decision that's in the best interests of the minor that i think we've crossed some striking differences here and i urge the court to address these and i've never been involved in a case in mine entire life that offers a more striking difference if difference between expert testimony on one sided ace and the complete dearth of any such testimony in the refuting the experts on our side of the case  offering a different perspective in terms of expert testimony to court based on the review right but i remember when we were here on the guardianship justice why did indicate that she had read the entire record which would be another tremendous undertaking in this case y who was one of the petitioners who basically was certified based on her master's degree as an expert in these kinds of child issues it was the testimony of over these two pediatricians which have over seventy five years of fuel disease which for seventy five year and their testimony was supported by academic literature from the pediatrics association that was introduced into  the record it was their testimony that all children in circumstances and wish no one would dispute this minor was in terms of the death of a mother and not living through the removal and replacement in the home where there are drug and alcohol issues and other issues involved in the home there is no such case in which this child or any such similarly placed child is not at risk and therefore since they are all the risk under these types of circumvent circumstances doctorow stressed defied all children and this was supported by the academic literature needs to be evaluated there needs to be a baseline be first of all i think i recognize that trial for so many corps have broad discretion in order to consider evidence and how to evaluate evidence and how to proceed but here is a situation in which the trial for has substantial expertise sitting in the trial court at the same time and the relevance is if you have experts who offer your refuted testimony but the minor needs to be evaluated we need to find out what the issues are it may pertain to placement it may pertain to what she is going to need in terms of counseling it may pertain to whether or not there is any medical follow up that needs to occur here you have a trial court who had that expertise ready and available and it was not gross position that the they didn't your honor but i think what one would regularly find in medicine at the fest not infrequent regularly doctors consult with each other sometimes across the world in this day and age of technology and information they're presented with certain facts and situations with a doctor or a law for a specialize or expert opinion on what should be done in terms of treatment in this case back to try to answer your question justice harris more specifically i think if you look  at and i recognize it's not fully defined by the u s supreme court but we cited professor tan for his argument from indiana university for his article citing some of the cases in the u s supreme court's going to deal with the start with this airplane or th you of maintaining the course broad discretion in deciding these types of cases but at the same time what we're seeing in terms of scientific information being available to the core being available in terms of making a higher quality decision if we look at precedent in the law i was recently hired to handle somebody who needed to obtain a guardianship for an elderly person who was ill and could no longer make decisions for themselves it's undisputed in the record that we have to have a doctor's opinion that a person is suffering from an infirmity and a person is suffering to the extent that they can no longer handle the citizens about their medical care or perhaps even their financial affairs and only when we have that doctor's report going to trial or appoint a guardian to start representing that person advocating it for their affairs and their affairs if we deal with a real estate case how often do we have to have an appraisal or a bank record on any financial case work for uses expert evidence if you will from other areas of the law in order to make this decision on what the value of a property is what the tax rate should be if we deal with child support we deal with tax returns and income stuff a stubs so that we can have specific information would it not follow that  would be arguably a much more serious situation trying to make a decision as this trial court was and what the best interests of this child were what we're going to be that this court use the best information available us at the time which would be medical information that could be offered by significantly experienced physicians and no time to dr ro say that the girl needed to be placed with my clients he said the court doesn't have that information mission mrs davis and testified that if god called them to return to the mission field to remain or any other place in the world that they would do that and that was their preference on whether or not this court can provide guidance to trial course on what to do with scientific information we see that the united states supreme court is at least recognizing that judges should make this oldham a decision that they're responsible with the best possible information available to them how can we ignore in this case it's not just a matter of theory to decide that the girl the young lady here needed to be evaluated medically and psychologically it's not just an assertion of one of the council these two physicians testified in this case that in all such cases it is necessary to determine what's in the best interest of the minor  the testimony of dr ro specifically stated that the court should take this step before the court court makes any further seditious doctors here indicated that he would pay for it and dr ocean dr sure indicated they could provide a recommendation as to somebody who feel that could perform this a violation again this points back to this not being theoretical there were experts in the courtroom i'm so confused here what trial your honor we raised the issue during the guardianship trial in july of two thousand and thirteen which of course doesn't have a great bearing on this case but that's when a lot of these issues first came out and that request was made at the adoption probably adoption trial started in december two thousand and thirteen and was completed in january of this year and the assertion was that she needed one and that's why dr sure indicated he would pay for one and dr off indicated that there should be the next that it's clear that the davidsons were not open to my clients having additional contact with the minor you'll see a visitation proposal that the basically for the most part barred any kind of reasonable open contact between my clients and their family in there with the minor who is related to them you also see a situation in which the guardian ad litem did not open the investigation in address points that my client felt were important to them so i think given that we learned for the first time a trial that there event no valuation that there had been no treatment that they probably mean that biden was not going to step up and and requests the same it was at that point in time that dr shear and my clients thought that it was important to make that request to the court the alternative would be to appear during trial in december and january and for the point altogether i mean the ultimate issue here is did the court have the possibility that the best possible information available to us in a court did have that opportunity and we're here in august of two thousand and fourteen and apparently that's not happened because it wasn't part of the court's order i don't think the timing with all due respect this is important is the need to have that information in two thousand and fourteen with the advances that have been under oath well what it will pay for it so that point in time regardless of what happened in the future it's clear that just judge white had the opportunity to x i i simply that point and didn't do so without which we believe created an injustice which is the fact that we're almost a year over year and a half since the young lady was found in her home with a deceased mother and we still don't have information i mean the dearth of any response of or counter testimony from the other side this is not a case where the judge said no scientific available information available to ignore any opportunity this is not a case in which the judge said choose between experts on  have substantial actually he's on one side stating that there's an issue stating that there's a problem in all frank and all frankness dr over did not become involved in the case until november you look at these issues of whether or not we could have asked for an evaluation before them it was when we were concerned that we needed somebody detached from the case and not just the petitioners father the derivatives of his expertise to look at the case that we hired dr roche to evaluate the case about a month prior to trial and ultimately justify the trial so as if that point knowing nothing had happened by the time we have very important and based on dr oakes recommendation on the fact that there is no such thing as a case in which a young lady such as this doesn't need such an evaluation that we made that request that the next reasonable opportunity to do so which was a trial the alternative what event to move to have such a divided what i see my time in history you have above very good thank you i think the sensible way to try this case would have been to gather the evidence that you wanted to present to the trial court for the trial so that everything could be presented to the trial judge at the time of the hearings but castle's a suggestion here is that in the midst of trial that he presents people testify that he would be beneficial for this child to be evaluated without having taken the first step of getting that kind of evidence martially next and that's so that it could be presented to the trial judge at the hearings counsel to come into the case at the time of trial and say this is absolutely something that we need to have this kind of a sions that this child is is far too late for that for the surgeon that evaluations are necessary to do the trial judge any good had a pretrial motion for examination and made her trial the court could've determined whether it was appropriate to do so it could have expressed reservations to the court of that no a valuation and been done or that there was something lacking in terms of these the state of the evidence in advance of hearing on this no the g a o talked with the davidsons trying to talk with i think that he talked to the shares that happened to be that this particular guarded light it was also familiar with this case that he had been according to the light of the original guardianship and that had by and large had presented a very similar recommendation in the adoption case as he had in the time that as a result of the kurdish case so i think and i don't know what the parameters of the guarded lightens obligations are i think it's within the judgment but none of those concerns a race at the time of the trial i would like to to address the court called the court's attention to my second issue that i presented and i really do think that there is no reason for this court or to ignore the clear mandate of the statutes of our state for an out of state applicants for an adoption to comply with them all the fish mr mrs shear from california were not qualified that these partners from california were first cousins once removed or second cousins they are unrelated to the child as defined as defined in the statute and i can't think of anything that we can do with a definition presented by the legislature in a statute that's applicable to adoptions other than to give it effect and make it a requirement so we take the we take the point that they're not related and we find that because they are not related they must satisfy the requirement of residency they have never been never resident of the state of illinois for six months or and they are not up waiting through an agency and we asked specifically the applicants mr or mrs shearer if they had been working through an agency and their response was no they had not been acting through an agency in addition since they were not related to the child but in the definition of the statute they were required to present and then fest occasion report meeting the requirements of the statute they did not meet the requirement they did not present investigation work and enough other fingerprints and criminal backgrounds to present to the trial judge and so the trial judge naturally been concerned about their lack of compliance with every corner of the adoption statute that they have an investigation report and lastly in this in his importantly as anything we have interstate compact and interstate compact specifically says it applies to a who it is not and i will tell you that i have had a lot of experience with the interstate compact and most notably  fifteen twenty years ago i tried to get through adoption through some cousins and i wasn't in compliance with the statute and i got told in no uncertain terms that they would not approve it and that the adoption was illegal and we had to go back and backtrack and try and get some way or other but getting this thing approved and it ended up the people headed back to illinois the very get it up so what we have here is a requirement and a probation for the court to approve an adoption for mr and mrs shear without the approval of interstate compact and sis they did since they are not related within the meaning of interstate compact they were required to comply and that means that you go to the receiving state authority mr or mrs sure would have had a good at the state of california to there  receiving state that this is approved and they did not do that because they chose to take the position that they are related to to l l s and they are not related and they are required us within within the meaning of the adoption statute or within the meaning of interest to convict mr and mrs shear were not qualified to adopt this child so that the trial judge with one people who attended church with her people who had people who had children in the family that lolo referred to as for the brothers there was a time in los life  up the phone she call emily davidson by mommy can't won't wake up she saw the intervention and assistance of one person that she could trust to be to take care for and it just so happened that that day scott happened to be home for school and they jumped in the car got a babysitter for the kids and took the baby down to trial system said the police station many many years and the surviving daughter and of these of ellis that they decided at the police station that the best thing was for this child to go  with emily and scott and i would suggest also that when we talk about the walter this winter she said i've felt that this was best and i felt that even though i would like to take her that it was best for her go with that this is a family decision a responsible decision and judge little made a responsible decision in granting their petition the davidsons petition for adoption i suggest to the court that not only were the sheers prepared and familiar with this child they were not legally qualified to a statute does say first cousin but it doesn't define the extent to which first cousin relationship is extended if mr bryant doubters argument were to be followed and my clients had to follow the interstate compact process they would have to as he indicated  argument today start the process with the department of children family services if you go on even though the statute doesn't define the distinction between first cousin and second cousin and make no mistake it's your refuted that my clients are first cousins once removed which means they share i'm grandparent the set of different generational level that's the only basis for the sanction if you look at my brief at the citations to the department of children and family services qualify as for interstate compact because your own regulations indicate that if your first cousins once removed or even second cousins the person doesn't have to be subject to that process so the crowd court did make a correct decision on that process by the way cornish well prepared is of the grease on the record and we don't have time very low argument to every single point that either council would like to hear and there are several different additional issues that we've asked the court consider her placement was not consistent with her religious background her racial background or the fact that my clients are blood relatives so we are the court to consider those issues strongly that it takes we believe certain constitutional rights it is clear the department was  of workers and number of cases if they have opened at anyone who's practice in the field which i presume was probably everybody in the room that is aware that there's been a priority of the c f s not open cases unless they have to and i'm sure often that's followed in good faith but in this case it was the family members including mr school and bird has been divorced from the family for thirty nine years did not have standing to step down and make decisions regarding the mine jennifer walter didn't even travel to charleston to do so she did from her phone and monticello because she's ill the department knew about this years they knew about their interest in the minor and they knew about the circumstances and they failed to act in terms of pursuing the possibility of placement with blood relatives the davidsons were foster parents they had an obligation to provide hotline the case and to cooperate in