Ann Arbor dad's simple mistake leads to serious consequences when son is taken away
Jordan Miller
The Ann Arbor News
The sign above the Comerica Park concession stand said: "Mike's Lemonade 7.00."
So when Christopher Ratte of Ann Arbor ordered one for his 7-year-old son at the April 5 Detroit Tigers game, he had no idea he was purchasing an alcoholic beverage.
Or that his son would end up spending three days and two nights in the custody of Children's Protective Services.
Alan Warren | The Ann Arbor NewsChristopher Ratte temporarily lost custody of his 7-year-old son after giving him a drink he didn't know contained liquor.
A park security guard spotted 7-year-old Leo Ratte drinking the Mike's Hard Lemonade, confiscated the bottle and took the family in for questioning.
The guard asked Christopher Ratte, a University of Michigan archaeology professor, if he knew he had given his son an alcoholic beverage. Ratte said no.
Then the matter was then turned over to police, per protocol for minor in possession cases, said Detroit Tigers vice president of communications Rob Matwick.
Leo was sent to Children's Hospital in Detroit, where he was examined, found to have no alcohol in his blood and cleared to go home. But he was instead taken into custody by Wayne County Children's Protective Services, a division of the state Department of Human Services.
Leo spent the night sleeping on a couch in the CPS building while Ratte and his wife, Claire Zimmerman, anxiously waited outside.
"Obviously, I made a mistake in buying this lemonade, which I didn't realize was alcoholic," Ratte said Monday. "I probably should have read the label carefully, so I'm not critical of the police who were concerned. I just thought they overreacted terribly."
CPS can take custody of a child with a court order after emergency removal by law enforcement, said Michigan DHS spokeswoman Colleen Steinman.
Don Duquette, a U-M clinical professor of law and director of the child advocacy law clinic, said he got a call from the chair of Ratte's U-M department at 9 a.m. the next day. Duquette spent most of that day on the phone, trying to get Leo back into his parents' custody.
In Michigan, law enforcement officers have the power to remove a child "whose surroundings are such as to endanger his or her health, morals, or welfare." That's not the same standard as federal law, which requires proof of immediate danger to a child, Duquette said.
Duquette said he encountered a bureaucratic run-around, and at one point was put on hold for more than an hour after calling an 800 number set up by CPS for quick response to child abuse crisis situations.
A court hearing was scheduled for that Monday afternoon, and Leo was taken to a foster home in an undisclosed location. At the hearing, the judge was prepared to take the advice of the assigned case worker, who recommended the case be extended for a week pending investigation, standard protocol in emergency custody cases.
Reporter Jordan Miller can be reached at 734-994-6679 or jmiller@annarbornews.com.
But when a state official said they weren't interested in pursuing the case, the judge released Leo to his mother on the grounds that he have no contact with his father. Ratte would have to stay in a hotel until the matter was cleared.
Duquette said the fact that Ratte and Zimmerman got their son back so quickly was unusual and due only to their sophisticated legal counsel.
Ratte said he and his wife know that they were lucky to have the resources of U-M behind them.
"Class has something to do with the fact that the child was only in care for two days," Duquette said. "What the referee said was that she would have kept the case for at least a week while the department completed the investigation. ... If you're not sophisticated, the system isn't set up to give you very much of a chance to work against the ritual that's ordinarily done."
It took three more days for the judge to dismiss the complaint, allowing Ratte to return to his home. That happened after Leo and his 12-year-old sister, Helena, were taken back to Detroit for further interviews.
Ratte said Leo is doing well now.
"He described it as really weird, and said that he wanted to put it all behind him, and we do too," Ratte said. "But we explained to him that we're not ready to close the book on it quite yet. ...
"It's an extraordinary power to delegate to the state to remove parents from the children. And yes, it was really awful, and we just hope our story can highlight the overreactions authorities sometimes make so that better guidelines can be instituted for the exercise of this power."