On April 30, JD Lott and his wife, Britney, were eating lunch with their eight children when his cell phone missed a call. For three years, the family took cross-country, homeschooling, Instagram-documenting road trips in an RV they converted. A day earlier, they had stayed at a campground in Florida. The next day, they were on their way to meet friends in Georgia—or so they thought.
Half an hour later, the missed caller sent a text message saying they were from the Florida Department of Children and Families (DCF). It continued: “Please respond, we need to follow up and verify the children’s safety. If we are unable to complete this task we will have to see a detention order enforced across the country. Please cooperate with us, So we don’t have to do that thank you.
Nationwide manhunt? Is it possible their children were taken away?
“It’s like a knife to the heart,” JD Lott said reason.
The Lotts quickly figured out what was going on: Internet trolls had figured out how to weaponize child protective services.
The Lotts’ Instagram account, @AmericanFamilyRoadTrip, has more than 500,000 followers. There is a group on Reddit called FundieSnarkUncensored that pokes fun at people who consider themselves Christian fundamentalists. The Lott family has been a frequent target of criticism from the group. Recently, snakes have become increasingly darker in color.
When Britney gave birth to her eighth child, Boone, two weeks ago and posted a video with him, Reddit groups began diagnosing him on paper. They said the healthy newborn had “severe sunburn,” “drowsiness” and “jaundice.”
Participants in the Reddit group went wild, believing Boone was in serious danger and that his parents were to blame. They used screenshots from videos posted by the Lott family at their Florida campground to locate the family. Then someone called the local DCF office in Florida, repeating verbatim the allegations posted on Reddit: The newborn was sunburned, drowsy, and jaundiced.
A county social worker drove to the campground, upset that family members were not there. She contacted the Lotts using a phone number provided by the campground, and JD Lott explained the strange situation to her.
“We discovered that there was a group of people on Reddit dedicated to defaming us,” he said.
The social worker seemed to take it all in, and the Lotts, though shocked, thought everything was fine—until they got another call at lunchtime.
A supervisor in the DCF office considered the case critical. According to JD Lott, he threatened to issue a nationwide order to detain children.
According to JD Lott, “We have you in the system and you have until the end of the day to report.” “If you don’t tell me when you will meet me, we will consider you a flight.”
At this point, JD Lott asked if he could get back to his supervisor before the end of the workday. The supervisor said yes. Britney Lott decided to call her relatives in Texas and ask them to pack their bags and book a flight to Georgia. If authorities were to remove the child, she wanted her relatives to assume custody.
Meanwhile, Lott called the Family Freedom Project (FFP), a Texas nonprofit that helps families who have been falsely accused of abuse by child services agencies.
“We were trying to find an attorney in Florida who could spare an entire work day and resolve this emergency within a few hours,” said Jeremy Newman, FFP’s vice president for policy and engagement. “ So I started calling all the different attorney networks that I knew.”
The lawyer he found agreed with the Lotts’ wish for an investigation by professional doctors. A nearby hospital was located, where DCF agreed to conduct a child welfare evaluation. As soon as the Lotts pulled into the parking lot, a police car pulled up behind them, lights flashing.
A doctor at the hospital examined baby Boone and determined he did not have jaundice, severe sunburn or lethargy. Seven other children were also tested and found to be in good health. Doctors told the family that police would not take the child away. The officer also tried to ease the tension by giving the children a tour of his vehicle and handing out stickers.
But when the state threatens to take your children, it’s not quite No harm, no foul, we apologize for the inconvenience. The Lotts said the experience still gives some children nightmares.
That’s why they decided to make the case public. They realize that many people do not have the family and legal support that they enjoy. The Family Freedom Project of Texas and other organizations including the Texas Public Policy Foundation and Let Grow have been working to narrow the scope of Texas’ neglect laws so that fewer families are subject to such investigations and fewer children are placed in foster care mechanism.
The Lott family would like to see this happen across the country. They also want to see anyone who weaponizes children’s services held criminally accountable.
“Government standards are so lax that people can weaponize them,” JD Lott said. “There needs to be some moderating force.”
