Erica Hammel hasn't stopped fighting for her son, for your daughter, for all of our children.
She's on a crusade to create a statewide online, searchable child-abuse registry, similar to the Michigan sex-offender registry, so anyone, anywhere can can find out whether a babysitter, a friend, or even a romantic partner has been convicted of abusing a child.
Hammel took her nearly two-year-long campaign to Lansing earlier this week, urging the state House of Representatives committee on Family, Children, and Seniors to approve the package of bills (HB 4973, 4974 and 4975) and push the legislation to the House floor.
Hammel's campaign was borne, like most are, of personal experience.
Her son, Wyatt Rewoldt, was violently shaken three years ago by her ex-husband's girlfriend, Rachel Edwards.
The abuse was so severe, Wyatt almost died. He had a fractured skull, a major brain bleed, suffered permanent brain damage, went blind in one eye, had broken ribs and continues to have severe cognitive and developmental delays.
It wasn't the first time Edwards had hurt a child. She was convicted twice previously for abusing the son of another boyfriend, but was sentenced only to probation in both instances.
Hammel, 28, of St. Clair Shores had no way of knowing that her ex-husband's girlfriend had a violent past.
"Had there been a searchable registry for convicted child abusers, I know this would have never happened to Wyatt," Hammel said. Edwards was convicted of second-degree child abuse in Wyatt's case, and was sentenced to 33 months to 10 years in prison for what she did to Wyatt; she could be paroled as early as March.
"If we cannot keep or put these people who are convicted — and I can't say that enough — convicted — of child abuse ... behind bars, then we as parents and guardians have a right to know who they are so we can keep our children away from them," Hammel told lawmakers as her son sat in a stroller nearby. Wyatt, 4, wore gun-metal gray glasses, and drank from a bottle that supplements his nutrition because he still has difficulty eating solid foods.
"With divorce rates as high as they are, and more people having children unwed, our children today can be exposed to a lot of different people coming in and out of their lives. Wouldn't you want to know if an adult around your child has a criminal history and was convicted of child abuse?"
State Rep. Thomas Hooker, R-Byron Center, chairman of the committee, said it's unlikely Wyatt's Law will get through the House in the few remaining weeks left in this lame-duck legislative session — despite moving testimony not only from Hammel, but from other child-abuse survivors and the mother of a boy who had been abused.
But, Hooker said, "there is no doubt in my mind that this will see a resurrection in the next term. I wanted to give it an opportunity to be heard," he said, noting that there appears to be bipartisan support for a version of the bills.
One of Wyatt's Law's biggest advocates, cosponsor Sarah Roberts, D-St. Clair Shores, is term-limited out at the end of this year.
For some, it would mean quick defeat. But Hammel made her case to Roberts' replacement, incoming Rep. Kevin Hertel, D-St. Clair Shores, and gained another ally.
"It's my intention to introduce the main bill as soon as I possibly can after taking office Jan. 1," Hertel said. "I will work across the aisle to build on the momentum that we've seen here now to ultimately ensure its final passage."
The American Civil Liberties Union of Michigan, however, opposes the idea of a state-run child-abuse registry.
The costs — both human and financial — are among the reasons, Sherri Weisberg, political director for the ACLU of Michigan, testified Wednesday.
"I don’t feel great being up here to be the one to oppose this," Weisberg said, "but I think there are very solid policy reasons."
Among them is that the registry would be expensive to manage and maintain, and the money used for it could instead be spent on helping abusers understand their crimes, and getting them help to change their behavior.
Weisberg also pointed out the long-running problems with the sex-offender registry. Among them is that people who have been convicted of minor offenses — such as public urination, or teens who engaged in sexual activity and separated by just a few years — are publicly shamed for a lifetime.
"The legislation completely copies the sex-offender registry" she said. "And, as many of you probably know, the sex-offender registry was itself started as a 5- and 10-year registry. It is a conviction-based registry. It did, in fact, have people who urinated in public on it and who are still on it.
"That public registry has evolved with a bunch of collateral laws, that have actually now done more damage ... than good. Mainly because people who are now left on the registry for life cannot get jobs, cannot get help, cannot live around their family, cannot live around the very resources they need to help them address their crimes and their behavior.
"We’ve ostracized them to the point where they get no help."
Hammel said that though the child-abuse registry would be built using the same software the Michigan State Police use to run the sex-offender registry, it's not a permanent list.
Time on the registry would be limited to five or 10 years, depending on the severity of the crime, and, she said, only people who have been convicted of child abuse would be listed.
Those who are convicted and registered would be required to pay $50 annually to maintain it, which is more than the $35 fee sex offenders pay now for their registry.
The idea, said former state Rep. Derek Miller, who also was the Macomb County assistant prosecutor who tried one of the cases against Edwards, is to ensure the child-abuse registry doesn't become a financial burden on the state.
He estimates it will cost less than the $1.3 million the state pays each year to maintain the sex-offender registry for a few reasons:
- The higher fee offenders must pay.
- The child-abuse registry would list fewer people, and therefore take less time and effort to maintain it
- The software and system is already in place to establish and maintain it.
The legislation comes at a time when child-abuse cases in Michigan are at a 25-year high. A Free Press analysis of child-abuse statistics reported earlier this year that 34,777 children were abused or neglected in the state in the 12 months following October 2014. In that year, 15.6 out of every 1,000 Michigan children was abused or neglected, the highest rate since 1990.
And support for public child-abuse registries are gaining momentum nationally. In Indiana, Gov. Mike Pence, now the Vice President-elect, signed Kirk's Law in March. That state's registry is supposed to be online by July 2017.
Similar laws in other states — including in Utah and Kentucky — also are being debated.
"I truly believe this is going to become a ripple effect from state to state," Hammel said.
"What we have now in place is not good enough. That is why I'm here today — not just because of what happened to my son, Wyatt, but also to prevent another child and another parent from having to go through what Wyatt and I went through."
Hammel's work isn't done. And she won't stop until there's a way for parents to safeguard their kids from the menace of abuse.
"Even if this legislation saved one child's life, it would be worth it," she said. "I truly believe it's going to save many lives."
Contact Kristen Jordan Shamus: 313-222-5997 or kshamus@freepress.com. Follow her on Twitter @kristenshamus.
HOW TO BE HEARD
If you have an opinion on Wyatt's Law, call your state lawmaker in the House of Representatives and tell him or her what you think.
To find contact information for your representative, go to http://house.michigan.gov/mhrpublic or call 517-373-0135.
Sign an online petition in support of Wyatt's law on its Change.org page. To do so, go to http://chn.ge/1U6YpWx.
Follow Wyatt's progress on Facebook by joining a group called Wyatt the Warrior. You can do so by going to Facebook.com/groups/237703759718130
How to get help
If you suspect the neglect or abuse of a child or adult, call 855-444-3911 toll-free at any time of the day or night. The Michigan Department of Health and Human Services offers a list online of common signs to watch for that could indicate abuse: http://1.usa.gov/23KOs7d.
Read more: http://www.freep.com/story/news/2016/12/01/wyatts-law-mom-and-mission-stop-child-abuse/94626532/
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