Virginia mom won’t let her kids play alone outside for fear the CPS will take them away

A Virginia mother of three can no longer let her children play outside for fear that Child Protective Services will take them away.

Emily Fields claims she is being accused of neglecting her children after her four-year-old son kicked a football into a neighbor’s cat.

Fields, who lives in Pearisburg, Virginia, says she became the target of social workers who urged her to sign a form banning her children, a boy now 6 and two daughters ages 8 and 9, from playing outside without constant supervision.

According to Fields, one of the workers lives in her neighborhood and harbors animosity towards her family.

A article for Reason magazine by Lenore Skenazyfounder of the non-profit organization Let Grow that advocates for the independence of children, recounts Fields’ struggle with social services.

Fields, who lives in Pearisburg, Virginia, says she became the target of social workers who urged her to sign a form banning her children, a boy now 6 and two daughters ages 8 and 9, from playing outside without constant supervision. She is photographed with her children.

In May 2021, her son, four years old at the time, kicked a soccer ball across the street at a neighbor’s cat but missed it, she says.

When Fields took the boy across the street to apologize, neighbors were outraged, telling her they would call CPS every day until her children were taken from her.

“They started yelling and yelling,” Fields said. “They said that everyone in the neighborhood thought she was a horrible mother and that my children abused animals.”

She also said that her children were being watched by her sister at the time.

The next day, two social workers were sent to her home. Feeling overwhelmed, she signed what the department called a “safety plan,” which required the family to “supervise the children at all times when they are playing outside.”

“If the security plan is violated, a protection order will be filed,” it said.

In May 2021, her son, four years old at the time, kicked a soccer ball across the street at a neighbor’s cat but missed it, she says.

His family was also visited by social workers in 2018 and accused of failing to supervise the children.

Fields says she was also told that a social worker had seen children knocking on doors in the neighborhood and asking to enter people’s homes.

She says that the children actually went to houses on her street to sell Easter eggs as part of a children’s scheme to earn some money.

“At no time were they out of my sight,” he said. And at no time did they enter.

One of the doors they knocked on was the caseworker’s, Fields says.

It followed another incident in 2018 when the family returned from a hike to find two CPS workers in a car on their way.

Fields has always wanted her children to play outside. Often they would be in the backyard of her house.

But CPS told her that her children had to be supervised at all times until they were 13 years old.

A few weeks later, he called to check if there were any formal charges against him and was told that his case was never officially opened.

Such cases are a focus of the grow, which has worked in several states to pass laws that better define what is meant by ‘adequate’ supervision. He argues that those laws are too vague and subject to arbitrary interpretation.

So far, it has passed ‘Reasonable Child Independence’ laws in Connecticut, Michigan and Nebraska.

DailyMail.com contacted the Giles County Department of Social Services for comment but did not immediately receive a response.