Land of the free? Parents ARRESTED after refusing to vaccinate 9-month-old baby

America may be sold as the land of the free, but after the Massachusetts Department of Children and Families ripped five children from their parents' arms for allegedly refusing to vaccinate their 9-month-old baby — the word “free” seems to mean very little.

The parents, Israel Rivera and Ruth Encarnacion, were then arrested for “familial kidnapping” last month when they took their children and fled to Texas to escape the DCF.

This all began when the family’s pediatrician filed a 51A “neglect” report when the parents declined vaccination for their baby boy on religious grounds — despite the fact that Massachusetts does allow religious exemptions for childhood vaccination, and the pediatrician reported the baby boy as healthy.

“In Massachusetts, you are legally, as a parent, allowed to decline vaccines. There’s no mandate that can force you to vaccinate your child. You have a right to a religious exemption,” Liz Wheeler of “The Liz Wheeler Show” comments.

The Department of Children and Families then left a notice on the family’s front door of their apartment demanding to be let into the home in order to inspect the living situation. The parents refused, and frightened, hid.

The police came back the next day, and the family was so scared that they left and fled to Texas.

“They believed they would have more freedom to exercise their religious beliefs because though Massachusetts told them they had a right to a religious exemption to the vaccine mandate for children, that wasn’t what was happening,” Wheeler explains.

When a family member reported the family missing, the DCF filed a care and protection petition, which is an emergency order to take custody of the children away from the parents and give that custody to the state.

The judge granted the order without any due process of law.

Police then hunted down the parents in Texas, arrested them, and charged them with kidnapping their own children. The penalty, if found guilty, would be a $1,000 fine and a year in prison.

“Now, if this sounds egregious to you, it’s because this is beyond egregious,” Wheeler says.

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