Logan Marr subject of Frontline documentary
Copyright © 2003 Blethen Maine Newspapers Inc.
The case of Logan Marr, the 5-year-old Maine girl who was found dead in the Chelsea home of her foster mother two years ago, is the subject of an upcoming PBS documentary. The filmmakers hope the show will prompt a national dialogue on the child welfare system.
"Failure to Protect: The Taking of Logan Marr" will examine how the little girl's death caused a re-examination of child welfare policies, including procedures for removing children from their parents. Marr's foster mother, former Maine Department of Human Services caseworker Sally Ann Schofield, was found guilty of killing the girl by binding and gagging her with duct tape. In September, Schofield was sentenced to 20 years in prison.
The one-hour film airs Jan. 30 on the PBS investigative television series "Frontline."
The following Thursday, Feb. 6, "Frontline" will air a companion film called "Failure to Protect: The Caseworker Files." In that film, the makers of the Marr film followed four Maine caseworkers from the DHS in Bangor for four months, documenting their daily challenges in trying to protect children and keep families together. That one-hour film will be followed by a one-hour panel discussion on child welfare policies.
"We were interested in doing something on child welfare and we had heard about Logan Marr. We knew that case had caused an enormous amount of self-examination in Maine," said Rachel Dretzin, who produced both films along with her husband, Barak Goodman. "We wanted to focus on one state, which had a good reputation for child welfare, and which was small enough for us to get our hands around."
Dretzin praised DHS for giving her crew liberal access to the department and its caseworkers. She says that by making a film following DHS caseworkers, she and her husband hope to balance the emotional impact that the little girl's tragic story is likely to have on viewers.
Logan Marr and her sister, Bailey, were taken from their mother, Christy Reposa, after the DHS claimed she provided an "unsafe lifestyle" by doing things such as placing them in proximity of accused sex offenders. Reposa has denied that.
The girls were placed in the foster care of Schofield in September 2000. On Jan. 31, 2001, Logan Marr was found dead in the basement of Schofield's Chelsea home. The girl had been bound and gagged in a high chair, with 42 feet of duct tape.
But because cases such as Logan Marr's are rare, Dretzin felt it would be unfair to do a film on the case alone without presenting a wider picture of what caseworkers do and how the system functions.
"We didn't want to do something that was skewed, people focus so much on the sensational death of a child (in the child welfare system) but they are really very rare," Dretzin said.
"We also felt it was important to address the daily decisions, which are agonizing, that child protective workers face. It's very rare that people get an inside look like this, and it was very courageous and responsible of Maine DHS to give us access."
DHS spokesperson Newell Augur says that access was granted to the film crew so that people could have a look at what caseworkers really do.
"The more people know about how child and family services works, and the many challenges caseworkers face, the better for everyone," Augur said.
The caseworkers and families filmed by "Frontline" all volunteered to be on camera, Augur says. One of the Bangor-based caseworkers, Robin Whitney, says she felt a little strange being filmed at her job at first. But after a while, she didn't even realize the cameras were there. The filming took place over a four-month period last winter.
"They shot a lot of hours of footage, I think they got a good overview of what we do," Whitney said. "We don't get chances to talk about our cases a lot, even my family doesn't have a clear idea of what I do. So this will let people see what we do on a daily basis."
Though the Maine DHS gave the film crew access to caseworkers, it would not comment directly on the Logan Marr case. At the time of the filming, the DHS was wary of lawsuits connected to the case.
The filmmakers drew on interviews with Logan Marr's mother and foster mother. Schofield was awaiting trial when she was interviewed by the film crew.
Schofield's attorney, Jed Davis, says he did not stop Schofield from doing the interview because "Frontline" agreed not to use any of it until after the trial.
"My feeling was that it might help her get through a terrible time, by talking about it," Davis said. Schofield is currently appealing her sentence, though not her conviction. Davis says he does not think the "Frontline" episode will affect that appeal.
Dretzin says she thinks the films will be "controversial" but hopes they will prompt people to think and talk about child welfare in a constructive way.
"The Logan Marr film does show that some people feel some very serious mistakes were made on the part of the state," Dretzin said. "But the second film shows that (caseworkers) are very well-intentioned doing their very best. This is not about blame."