To Hug a Porcupine

"When we left there," Jorge says, "we got a lawyer."

Here's a taste of what was in those boxes — information that Debbie and Jorge would see only years later.

According to one document, the boys' biological mother, Mary, told DCF workers she'd been raped by at least six people over the course of her life — including four family members. But it was an encounter with a man at a California truck-driving school that produced her beautiful dark-haired son Brian. Then again, documents also showed she was a liar.

Mary fell for a troubled 27-year-old divorcé and had two more babies in two more states. The family was living in a car in Georgia when child protective services there got on their case. They gave authorities the slip by crossing the state line into Florida.

According to a time line in the boys' file, the family did not stay undetected for long. The children were taken into state custody in Palm Beach County on November 8, 1994, when "Brian's arm was broken by a parent in a fit of rage." He was two years and nine months old at the time. The baby, James, was only a month. Examinations showed signs of physical and sexual abuse.

The time line shows that, in keeping with standard procedures, the boys were placed together in a foster home of a woman named Alix Holley while Mary was allowed supervised visits in hopes of reunification.

Some excerpts:

2/27/95: "No visits until parents are clear of scabies."

3/29/95: "Brian's teeth all rotten."

4/27/95: "Saw all three children. Impetigo and ringworm cleared up."

4/28/95: The foster mother reported "aggressive/physical behaviors, head banging, self-inflicted, will hurt animals."

8/29/95: Foster mother reports "behaviors real bad. Giving oral sex to each other."

10/26/95: During a visit, "Brian said to [biological] mom, 'Don't hurt me.' "

Ongoing entries describe Holley's growing suspicions that the boys were being abused in the care of their mother. When the court approved continuing visits despite her objections, Holley would cancel or dawdle in bringing the boys to appointments. On February 23, 1996, Holley seemed "extremely concerned about continuing the visits." She threatened to sue the department.

Although correspondence that was later released would show that other workers shared her concerns, Holley was deemed a nuisance for interfering. "She thrives on this type of controversy that makes her feel important," a caseworker wrote in a memo. The boys were soon shuffled again.

Plans for reunification with Mary were scrapped on June 2, 1997, when, according to notes, "James was the victim of physical abuse when the mother intentionally bit him at the therapist's office." Mary was arrested and agreed to terminate her parental rights. She planned to move back to Georgia. She was five months pregnant at the time.

Documents in the boys' file would show that Brian was separated from his brothers, who landed in an immaculate, three-bedroom, one-bath house in Greenacres. Nancy Garcia and her husband took in $2,035 a month between his job at Publix and their Social Security checks. They got some extra income caring for 12 foster kids that year, sometimes five at a clip.

An abuse report details the time that a DCF worker went to check on the home after the boys complained about being kept in a chicken coop. A therapist confirmed the presence of such a structure in the yard, but when asked about it, Nancy Garcia said she only threatened to put the boys in a cage after they refused to go to bed. In a separate incident, the Garcias admitted to putting tape on Matthew's mouth "as a reminder to stop talking." The couple sometimes warned the children by rolling up a newspaper and smacking it against a hand. The toddlers were troublemakers, Nancy Garcia reported. "You can't spank them; what else am I supposed to do?"

According to the paperwork, a district staffing specialist forwarded concerns about the Garcias' "inappropriate discipline techniques" to the relicensing unit, who in turn referred its concerns to a home educator. But the home educator had left her job, so the case was closed. The Garcia home was later described as "above satisfactory" and relicensed.

But the troublesome boys were clearly not wanted, so workers sought a new placement.

Hector Rosa and his wife had room for three kids.

In 2002, Debbie and Jorge filed a lawsuit against DCF based on "negligence" and "wrongful adoption." During the years that it moved along at a glacial pace, however, something curious happened to the boys. They grew.

Matthew, the middle child, was about 8 when he sidled up to Debbie. "He said, 'Mommy come here,' " she remembers. He told her he had been lifting weights. "Guess how much I weigh now," he whispered. "'I'm getting bigger, and I'm getting stronger, and I will kill you. When the knife goes in, you'll know it."

Debbie tried to hide her panic. She'd learned that attachment disordered kids often took out their hostility on the person closest to them. Any loving gesture repulsed them. They were especially mean to women, and their favorite target was mom.

"It's like a porcupine," therapist Lori Angulo would later explain in a deposition. When a person gets emotionally close, "they act out. They can pull you in for a little bit, and you think you're getting closer. And then if they become vulnerable at all, they will sabotage that."