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SALT LAKE CITY — Attorneys for Utah's Division of Child and Family Services have filed a motion asking a juvenile court judge to reconsider his ruling pulling a child from her foster parents because they are lesbian.
Attorneys were waiting to receive a copy of the judge's order before taking action Thursday but decided they couldn't wait for it any longer.
"We're feeling like we need to support this family and the placement," said DCFS director Brent Platt. "Our request is based on his oral order that our attorney heard him make in court, so we don't have it in writing, but we can't wait. … We have until next Tuesday until we have to move the kid based on this order, so we're not waiting for the written order anymore."
Though April Hoagland and Beckie Peirce are legally married and have been licensed as foster parents in the state of Utah, 7th District Juvenile Judge Scott Johansen on Tuesday ordered that the 1-year-old girl they have been caring for would be better off with a heterosexual couple, according to DCFS.
"As far as I understand, that was the only reason," Platt said. "The order was issued Tuesday, a seven-day order. Now we've got five days, so it's kind of urgent."
The placement that began in August has been going well, Platt said. DCFS had not received Johansen's order as of end of business day on Thursday.
"This judge, I'm sure, what he's trying to do is in the best interest of the child as well, but we feel like this is a good placement and his reasoning for moving that child doesn't comply with the law. If it's something we can challenge, we want to challenge it," he said.
A DCFS attorney who was present at the hearing Tuesday objected to the judge's order and requested information about the research Johansen said he had reviewed demonstrating that children do better with heterosexual couples. DCFS has not received that research, Platt said.
However, in order to not violate the judge's order, the agency is also looking for an alternative placement for the little girl.
A Utah State Courts spokeswoman who confirmed the nature of Johansen's order said judicial rules preclude Johansen or court staff from commenting on ongoing cases.
The couple has retained an attorney with the Dolowitz Hunnicutt law firm in Salt Lake City. As attention surrounding the case has skyrocketed, the couple has been advised not to speak publicly, Peirce's parents said.
Troy Williams, Equality Utah executive director, has met with Peirce, Hoagland and their foster daughter, calling them a loving family now facing a "crisis."
From Williams:
"We've got two loving parents who want to care for a child in need, and they're being blocked and targeted simply because they're lesbian. This is a family that is in crisis, these mothers clearly love their foster daughter."
The couple has support from the child's birth mother and, before arriving in Johansen's courtroom Tuesday, were making plans to adopt the girl, Williams said. Despite the anxiety that has come from the judge's order, he said Hoagland and Peirce have hope.
Williams called the situation "outrageous" and "heartbreaking" but remains optimistic for a swift resolution in the couple's favor. He was encouraged Thursday by DCFS' hope to keep the foster family together as well as statements by Utah Gov. Gary Herbert.
"Ultimately this harms the child most of all, and when Americans see that, their hearts begin to open," Williams said, noting the national attention the case has gotten. "This is a judge who is in brazen defiance of the law of the land."
At his regular press conference on Thursday, Herbert said he was "a little puzzled about the action down there" in Carbon County. Herbert called on the judge in the case to follow the law and "not interject his own personal beliefs and feelings and supersede the law."
"He may not like the law but he should follow the law. We don't want to have activism on the bench in any way, shape or form," the governor said Thursday during the taping of his monthly news conference on KUED, Ch. 7.
Same-sex couples have been eligible to serve as foster parents in Utah since October of 2014 when the 10th Circuit Court of Appeals upheld a ruling to overturn the state's definition of marriage as a union between a man and a woman.
Herbert expects the case to be reviewed and said DCFS will continue to protect the safety and the welfare of the child.
"Putting them into foster care, I know that's been vetted and I expect that's what they will continue to do, and make sure the child's welfare is the No. 1 issue for them to follow," the governor said.
Platt estimates there are about 20 same-sex couples currently caring for foster children in Utah. This is the first time that concern has been expressed about a foster placement in a same-sex home.
Johansen has made headlines in Utah in the past, including a 2012 decision where he told the mother of a 13-year-old girl he'd cut her daughter's sentence if she cut off the girl's ponytail in his courtroom. The teen had landed in court after she and a friend cut the hair of a 3-year-old girl in a restaurant.
Johansen also required the other girl to have her hair cut but allowed her to go to a salon to do it.
The judge was reprimanded in 1997 for slapping a 16-year-old boy in the Price courthouse. The Judicial Conduct Commission at the time criticized Johansen for "demeaning the judicial office."
Contributing: Mike Anderson
