The legal fight for Lexi began four years ago, after relatives of the girl’s biological father, who is Native American, petitioned his Choctaw Indian tribe and the Los Angeles County Department of Children and Family Services to challenge the Pages’ temporary custody of Lexi.
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Lexi, who is 1/64th Choctaw on her birth father’s side, cried and clutched a stuffed bear as Rusty Page carried her out of his home north of Los Angeles to a waiting vehicle Monday.
Lexi, who desperately clung to her father when the authorities came to retrieve her, is 1.56 percent Choctaw Native American, however, she had been living with Santa Clarita couple Rusty and Summer Page since the age of two.
Rusty Page said that Lexi has had contact and occasional visits from the Utah family for three years, and points out that they are not Native American and only related to the girl through marriage.
The Pages plan to appeal the court’s decision to take Lexi to her extended family in Utah, but face an uphill battle.
The National Indian Child Welfare Association said in a statement the girl’s relocation to Utah was in her best interest.
As the girl was taken out of the home, someone yelled, “We’re fighting for you!”
A crowd of family and friends delayed Lexi’s planned removal from the home Sunday. “The result here is all the more senseless because placing Lexi with her non-Indian extended family members does nothing to further ICWA’s objective of keeping children connected to their tribes”.
Since Lexi’s father is a member of the Choctaw Nation, Lexi is considered a Choctaw child under the Indian Child Welfare Law. After that failed, the father, department, and the tribe agreed to place her with his relatives; they aren’t native.
In the case of Lexi, her Native American status puts her under the Indian Child Welfare Act, passed in the late 1970s.
A Los Angeles Superior Court had ruled that the child be placed with relatives in Utah, said Leslie Starr Heimov, executive director of the Children’s Law Center of California, which represents foster youths.
“We took the opportunity to talk to her in the house and let her know how much we love her, let her know that we were not giving up on her”, he said. With her biological parents suffering from drug addiction and involved in crime, she had bounced in and out of foster homes since birth before ending up with the Pages. Eventually baby Veronica was handed over to her adoptive parents. Another sister of the girl will be living down the street, she said.
The case has drawn widespread media attention and a Change.org petition launched by the foster family to keep Lexi with them had garnered more than 76,000 signatures as of 5 p.m. Tuesday.
The LA DCFS said in a statement Monday night that their priorities are to act in the best interest of children and adhere to decisions by the court. Nonetheless, she is still under the umbrella of the Indian Child Welfare Act.
“We will continue to pursue the appeal, and we will press on to the U.S. Supreme Court if that becomes necessary”, she said in an email.
‘She has a loving relationship with them, ‘ Heimov said.
“Our family is so incredibly devastated”.
A court order found Lexi’s foster parents, Rusty and Summer Page, did not prove it was a certainty that the move would cause the child to suffer emotional harm.
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To make things even more complicated, the Utah family is not Native American, though Summer Page, Lexi’s foster mom, claims Native American heritage. They lost custody of Lexi when she was 17 months old.
