Earlier this month, Josh Powell was about to have a supervised, court-ordered visit with his children, as he regularly did on Sundays. As Child Protective Services worker Elizabeth Griffin-Hall dropped off Powell's two boys, 5-year-old Braden and 7-year-old Charles, she heard Powell say, "Charlie, I've got a real surprise for you!" He then locked the social worker out of the house, reportedly attacked his children with an axe, and set off a gas-fueled fire in the home, killing himself and his young sons.
In the wake of these horrific murders, the questions still linger: How did professionals fail to spot what appears to have been a serial killer? Why was Powell allowed visits with his children? Were there not enough signs that this man was dangerous? Actually, the scariest part is that there were many red flags.
In 2009, Josh Powell became a person of interest due to the disappearance of his wife. In a news interview, Josh reported that during the night in question he had taken his two boys camping at midnight, in the middle of a snowstorm and freezing temperatures, and when he returned his wife had disappeared. He claimed that he had no idea where she had gone and that going out on spontaneous camping trips past midnight with two young children was completely normal behavior. This should have been a red flag of poor parenting skills and perhaps neglect.
After the disappearance of his wife, Josh Powell retained custody of his boys and moved with them into his father's home. However, during a police search of the house, thousands of pornographic pictures, including ones of neighborhood children in various undressed states, were found on Josh Powell's father's computer. Something was seriously wrong in the household. The father was arrested and Josh lost custody of his children. The judge required that he would have to undergo a psychosexual evaluation before she would consider granting custody again. Until then, despite family member's complaints that Josh treated his children as if they were his property, he would be entitled to a supervised visit every Sunday.
In more recent months, the boys had started to open up about what actually happened during the night of their mother's disappearance. Steve Downing, the family lawyer, said, "The oldest boy talked about going camping and that Mommy was in the trunk. Mom and Dad got out of the car and Mom disappeared." However, before anything was done with this information, it was too late. Josh Powell murdered his children and then took his own life in the process.
Looking back, one must wonder if our legal system tends to view parents in a different light than they do other criminal suspects. If Josh had been viewed as a criminal suspect in a murder case and a child pornography case and his children as potential victims, should visitation have been allowed? If he had been evaluated to determine if he was a sociopath or psychopath or for level of dangerousness, as one might be in a criminal case and with potentially vulnerable victims, maybe the kids could have been saved.
Moving forward, we must learn from this tragedy and find ways to make the system better. This case is just one more example of potentially preventable tragedy. There were signs, there were obvious red flags, but somehow the danger was not seen. So where exactly did the system go wrong?
First of all, children living in a house where child pornography was found is a HUGE red flag. Finding the grandfather's computer with child pornography makes it highly likely that sexual boundaries in the home were loose or nonexistent, and there is also the possibility that the children were being abused. Sexual behavior problems usually affect everyone in the household. What would have come to light if Josh's wife had been found or the children had lived? What was Josh covering up by killing himself and his children? We may never know.
Next, it's possible that the Department of Social Services did not assess this situation as imminently dangerous to the children. While the specifics of this case are unknown, many agencies often still use clinical judgment to determine the dangerousness of their clients, despite the fact that research has clearly shown clinical judgment of dangerousness to be no better than chance. A combination of actuarial and clinical tools, using statistical data to predict patterns in conjunction with expert analysis, is far more accurate in determining risk for future violence and what interventions will reduce that risk.
In Canada, research on risk for violence is heavily supported by the government as a necessity in cases such as this. Research on risk for violence in the U.S. is sporadic. The use of validated risk tools is almost non-existent in certain agencies.
Lastly, with the children finally having opened up about what happened on that fateful night of their mother's disappearance, the alarm should have been set off (This man could be extremely dangerous!!) with everyone involved. A psychopath, if he indeed was one, is capable of killing his witnesses (in this case, his children) to avoid prosecution. These kids should have been immediately taken into protection until the danger to them had been determined as accurately as possible with today's science.
Overall, this case needs to serve as a wakeup call. Our system cannot wait until people mysteriously disappear or children are murdered before taking action to keep children safe. The focus needs to be on the prevention of crime. We must learn to act when we see the first red flags and immediately assess the risk of violence and the treatment needed to prevent future tragedies.
We must also understand that the best way to prevent violence is to catch the problems in childhood. This is a radical departure from the "wait-and-see" system that we have currently. Studies show that the adults who commit violence today are likely to have witnessed violence as children or were abused or neglected in their early years. Therefore, in order to make the greatest impact on violence in future generations, we must focus on protecting, assessing, and treating today's abused and neglected children.
###
Kathy Seifert is the author of "How Children Become Violent."
