Politics & Government
Massachusetts Has Plan to Return Justina to Connecticut
Justina Pelletier will be moved next week to the JRI Susan Wayne Center for Excellence, a therapeutic education provider in Thompson, Conn.
Good news came Monday for the family of a Connecticut teen who has been at the center of a highly controversial custody battle.
Justina Pelletier will be moved next week to the JRI Susan Wayne Center for Excellence, a therapeutic education provider in Thompson, Conn., according to a report by WCVB.
The plan and conditions for the move were spelled out Monday in a letter by Massachusetts Health and Human Services Secretary John Polanowicz, MyFoxBoston reports.
The Massachusetts Department of Children and Families has had custody of the 15-year-old West Hartford resident for more than a year, despite pleas from her family, thousands of supporters and Governor Deval Patrick.
"She should be in Connecticut," said Patrick. "We have appeared in court to have her sent home to Connecticut. Believe it or not the court has jurisdiction not us."
Justina has been at Wayside Youth & Family Services in Framingham since January 2014.
The custody case has garnered national attention and created a FreeJustina movement. A judge recently decided she should remain under the care of Massachusetts' Children & Families division.
Pelletier, who has been diagnosed and treated by Tufts Medical Center doctors for mitochondrial disorder, a rare genetic disease, was sent to Boston Children’s Hospital for a bout with the flu in February 2013. Her regular doctor was unavailable at the time.
Doctors at Boston Children’s Hospital reportedly disagreed with the diagnosis and instead diagnosed Pelletier with somatoform disorder, a mental illness characterized by pain and gastrointestinal symptoms that have no identifiable physical cause.
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The Massachusetts Department of Children and Families then took custody of Justina, when the Pelletiers, who live in West Hartford, CT., disagreed with the Boston hospital's treatment.
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