Home School Legal Defense Association filed an emergency appeal in February to reverse a Texas district court order that granted the state access to the Pfaff family’s home.
The order was sweeping in its breadth, authorizing the Department of Family and Protective Services (DFPS) to seize all five children for interviews, to enter the home, and to conduct medical, psychological, and psychiatric examinations of the children.
What prompted this intrusive order? On December 22, 2023—just a few days before Christmas—the family’s 8-year-old son had walked to the neighborhood dollar store without permission. Someone at the store called the police, and the boy gave the officer who showed up directions to drive him home.
The boy’s mother had already sent his teenage siblings out to look for him and was about to get in her car to look herself when he was returned home by the officer. The boy had never done this before, and the parents grounded him to teach him that it was not okay to do so again.[1]
But the gears of the DFPS system were already in motion. The police officer had to file a report of neglect (even though the child had been returned home unharmed). And a DFPS investigator had to investigate the report. A full two weeks after the incident occurred, DFPS interviewed the parents. Next on standard DFPS protocol: the investigator asked to search the home and interview the children, despite finding no evidence of abuse. The parents, understandably, declined.
CPS investigations are designed in a way that often violates the security and well-being that children rely on their parents to provide.
Nearly two months later, the parents received a letter stating that a court order had been issued requiring them to submit to the home search and interviews. DFPS had gone to a judge and obtained the court order ex parte, which meant the parents had no opportunity to appear at the hearing and were not even told about the order until it was already granted. They had only two choices: comply with the court order, or appeal.
That’s when HSLDA took action. We helped the family file an emergency appeal to the Texas appellate court, which challenged the order as unlawful and unconstitutional. One week later, DFPS dropped its demand to enter the family’s home.