County of Orange v. Carl D.

A father spent 11 years fruitlessly searching for his children, who were abducted and concealed by the mother, a drug abuser. The children ultimately ended up in foster care, receiving public assistance benefits. But the same public entity that said the father could not be located for purposes of the dependency proceedings managed to track him down to garnish his wages for benefits paid while the children were on welfare. Regrettably, it was more interested in pursuing this father as a deadbeat dad than in helping him to function as a real one. The county is estopped by its own affirmative misrepresentations from recouping public assistance payments that need never have been made at all.

I

Plaintiff Carl D., a serviceman in the Navy, married Denise D. in 1984. They already were the parents of three girls, Jennifer, bom in March 1982, and twins, Carla and Christina, born in February 1983. Upon his discharge Carl and his family moved to North Carolina, where he began working for a plumbing company in May 1984. A few months later, Carl returned home from work to find Denise and the girls had vanished. The spouses had argued that morning regarding Denise’s plan to buy…