Chapter 6 - The Mothers They Worked Into Failure
The ledger showed Carter’s clinic targeted nurses, aides, cafeteria workers and single mothers with small inheritances for their children. Exhausting schedules, negative evaluations and staged domestic incidents were used to label parents unfit. Custody then passed to relatives connected to the clinic, and their funds paid inflated medical bills. Jason called it financial management. “Most of those women could not handle money anyway.” Maya’s answer filled the courtroom. “You stole from women working double shifts and blamed them for being tired.” Amber admitted recruiting families at charity events, promising help while collecting signatures. She asked for immunity. Helen refused to comfort her. “Fear explains why you obeyed. It does not erase the mothers you helped break.” A judge froze the clinic and placed its finances under worker oversight. Then auditors traced large transfers to Maya’s own account. Her nursing-school tuition had been funded by money stolen from other children.
