Innocent Family Destroyed

January 19, 2008 permalink

Here is another case of a routine pattern in child protection cases. Texan Douglas Buchar was found not guilty of a crime. But his family is destroyed because of actions taken while the charges were pending.

expand

collapse

North Texas Man Fighting For Custody Of His Kids

Stephanie Lucero

DALLAS (CBS 11 News) ― A North Texas man has been found not guilty of the aggravated sexual assault of a child. Now, he and his wife are fighting to get their children back.

Douglas Buchar was a successful custom homebuilder when he received a phone call two years ago, almost to the day. Child Protective Services called to inform him that they had taken away his kids. "My secretary got a phone call at the office and said, 'You need to take this, it's CPS,'" Buchar recalled. "And I got on the phone and it was just like, what? And they said they took all our kids."

The children, 4-year-old Megan and 11-year-old Justin, were picked up at school and placed in foster care on January 20, 2006. This all came after the couple's 12-year-old adopted child accused Buchar of sexual assault.

"I couldn't," Buchar started, "the whole thing didn't make no sense. It wasn't logical, the charges they had. It just couldn't have happened."

Over the next two years, the couple lost their business, their house and their children.

Buchar's wife, Joy, was arrested as well, but the charges were later dropped. "It's like someone just took all my guts out," she said.

The kids lived in foster care for a year and a half. Six months ago, they were given permission to live with Buchar's sister in New York.

Earlier this week, Buchar faced his accuser during the criminal trial. "Looking at her in court and what not, it was just, she had no clue of the repercussions she has done," he said. "She doesn't realize what she has caused, nor do I think she really cares what she has caused. Yes, we do feel sorry for her."

But most of all, the Buchars said that they miss their biological children.

On Wednesday, a Collin County jury found Buchar not guilty of the crime.

"One thing I learned from all this," Buchar said, "I was a workaholic and I was working six, seven days a week, 12, 13, 14 hours a day, and I learned now. I promised Justin I'd go fishing with him so many times before. Everytime, it would be like, oh, something's come up. I got to go. That's all changed now. I'm going to definitely have weekends off, and definitely spend time with him."

The Buchars have terminated their parental rights to the adopted girl.

Kelly Davis is Buchar's lawyer who is trying to get the couple's biological children back home. She said that she never doubted their innocence. "I think that Doug was able to prove to everybody else that he was innocent by performing all the different types of polygraph and tests that they required, and performing in order to prove his innocence."

Although Buchar was found not guilty, the nightmare continues. The couple said that they will not stop until they can bring Justin and Megan back home.

Source: KTVT Dallas/Ft Worth Texas

Addendum: A Dufferin VOCA reader of Bulgarian extraction, EkaterinaEthier, has posted some details on the Buchar case on a public forum. The girl making the false accusations may not be as innocent as she looks.

expand

collapse

Posted January 20, 2008 at at 11:11am

I can give you some more insight information on the Buchars story as I have been in communication with Doug for over a year. They adopted a Gypsy girl from an orphanage in Bulgaria taking the advice from their psychologist as they had lost a child in an accident and to fill the void that way.

The girl claims to be 12, but [has] never been properly id'ed so her age was of concern as she looked older. I did check her Social Security coverage based on the data given from Doug. There were two individuals registered with social coverage – the adopted one under her new name and under her old name. In Canadian terms this would sound like one person with two different Social Insurance Numbers. Social Insurance number is needed for medical coverage and there was very strong possibility that the Buchars did not adopt the one who they were told they were adopting.

[The] Buchars wanted to reverse the adoption as the girl did not get along with their children and was constantly lying. Her own past was very well unknown and the CPS never tried to investigate or obtain any information about her from Bulgaria at least to provide her with mental treatment and address properly the issues she may have. At the time in the European Parliament [it] was made public knowledge that in the Bulgarian Gypsy community [it] is common to sell girls at age 12.

Both birth parents of the girl were listed in the Social Insurance System as unknown, so they did not seem to be diseased, not working and not in prison. [The] Buchars were told that the mother was diseased and the father was in prison.

The girl claimed that in 2-3 years she forgot [the] Bulgarian language, which is a bit strange as she came to the US at age nine. CPS never contacted the Bulgarian authorities, despite the seriousness of the matter and the fact that the girl is still [a] Bulgarian citizen. It would have been only [to] her own benefit to find about her past in order to properly provide her with mental health care.

I was told that CPS was refusing to return Buchars' children claiming that separating the children will have [a] negative effect, however they were already separated and placed in different foster homes.

[The] Buchars were asked $250 000 by adoption lawyers to provide information about the girl's past in Bulgaria.

Source: Sarnia's Smoking Gun, with some grammar changes, the author's native language is Bulgarian.