Fund for Lauren Cook and Children
Donation protected
Hi, my name is Lauren Cook. I hope to be able to tell my full story someday. For now, all I have is the cliffnotes version because it is much too long to type into this textbox. My kids and I are not missing and never were. I was in contact with multiple people, including the person who made the report, who verified this and informed the appropriate authorities but were told “their hands were tied” with ending this missing persons case.
EDIT: I am adding my latest update right here because it is important information that adds clarification on how the funds will be spent and the breakdown.
Thank you for the messages of support that I have gotten. This has been a really difficult time.
To clarify why I need to retain a lawyer and add more details about the DSS case (there were and never have been criminal charges put forth. This was always only a civil case.):
Our case was officially dismissed without prejudice on September 27th. This nightmare all began on August 28th. I have been given legal counsel that this could mean the case is not able to be reopened, or it might be, there’s no way for me to know. This means that for me to be able to return home I need to have a lawyer to help me fight these same allegations. I have been quoted that this starts at $5,000 and can easily rack up quickly to double or triple that number. It depends on how many hours have to be spent on the case and no one is able to give me a for sure number.
In addition to the legal defense I still need, I mentioned going on the offense. To get more specific, our reputations have been slandered, our rights trampled on, our business has taken a hit, and I need an additional lawyer because I am planning to sue. That is a much more potentially expensive battle that I have been quoted at starting at around $10,000, and could easily be double that much. It is likely that the $25,000 wouldn’t even be enough to cover all the legal fees but it would be a really good start.
As I have stated before, everything I have done has been under the counsel of legal advice from multiple sources. I have spoken with more than 6 attorneys and been advised all along the way in all my actions. After becoming intimately acquainted with all the details, all these lawyers came to the same conclusions and are what I have been basing all of my decisions on. If you do not have all the details, as almost no one does, please don't make assumptions about the situation.
I will leave you all with some statistics about the Franklin County foster care system that will hopefully shed more light:
The county this happened in, Franklin County, has 6x more children in foster care when accounting for the population, but fewer drug arrests.
Children in Foster Care (2021) / Population
Franklin: 100 / 96,929
Fairfax: 198 / 1,150,309
Source:
The article cites substance abuse as one of the main reasons, but Fairfax County has more drug arrests: https://www.dcjs.virginia.gov/sites/dcjs.virginia.gov/files/publications/research/virginia-index-crime-and-drug-arrest-trends-2012-2021.pdf
-Thanks to a source on reddit who took the time to do some research.
Thank you to anyone who is willing to donate and help us in this very uncertain time.
Organizer
Lauren Tousa
Organizer
Ferrum, VA