Across the country, most CPS investigations begin the same way: a social worker asks (or demands) to talk to the parents, privately interview the children, and inspect the home.

In almost every case we handle, when the social worker requests permission to interview the children, we ask what questions they want to ask. CPS almost always gives us the same basic list of questions, which they call a “full” or “global” interview. In one case, the social worker sent us the list in writing.

While some questions cover basic information such as their name and whether their home has water, others involve highly invasive or mature subjects. Of course, there are situations where these questions may be completely appropriate, but those are the exception. Nevertheless, it does not matter what the allegations are or how irrelevant these questions are, a social worker will generally want to ask these questions in almost every interview with children.

In fact, in the case where the social worker provided the questions pictured, only one question (redacted) related to the allegations. All of the other proposed questions were completely unrelated to the allegations–they were a total fishing expedition. We ended up going to court to oppose CPS’ demands to ask these questions. By the grace of God, we won. The judge ruled that none of the children had to be interviewed at all, much less about such intrusive, private, and innocence-robbing matters that had nothing to do with the case in the first place.

This is one reason why we stress the importance of having an attorney. It is not just to protect your rights and to keep your children from being wrongfully taken away from you. It is also to protect your children from being unnecessarily subjected to interviews with questions like these.