SAN ANTONIO – A four-day-old baby was taken from his mother and kept at the Bexar County Courthouse last month, before Child Protective Services or the district attorney’s office were involved in the case, records obtained by KSAT Investigates show.
The incident occurred Oct. 7 in 288th District Court during a paternity hearing before Judge Mary Lou Alvarez, prompting the DA’s office to request an administrative review of what took place, records show.
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Alvarez confirmed the father’s paternity and then ruled both parents were unfit, writing on a docket sheet that the baby faced a “significant risk of imminent harm” if left in their care, according to a copy of the handwritten notes obtained by KSAT Investigates.
Emails that day show Alvarez then ordered that the baby, who was born Oct. 3, be kept in the Children’s Court Protective Room inside the courthouse until a CPS investigator could arrive.
“I have found that neither parent has demonstrated any capacity to protect the child or have the child in a safe home,” wrote Alvarez the afternoon of Oct. 7, in an email sent to court staff and the DA’s office.
Days later, Bexar County District Attorney’s Office Civil Division Chief Larry Roberson sent a letter to CPS regarding Alvarez’s “extraordinary actions” and asking that an administrative review take place.
“The court, in the absence of any petition filed by this Office, the Texas Department of Family and Protective Services, or any other governmental entity, unilaterally determined that the biological parents were unfit and that the four-day old infant was in imminent danger of harm,” Roberson wrote. “While this Office recognizes the Court’s inherent authority to take emergency action under appropriate circumstances in exigent instances to protect an infant from imminent danger, the facts of this matter could raise substantial due-process, statutory, and constitutional concerns.”
Judge Alvarez’s order prompted this scathing letter to be sent days later from the Bexar County District Attorney’s Office to CPS. (KSAT)
Roberson added that the incident was a possible deprivation of parental rights and potentially exposed county employees to unintended liability or confusion.
Judge’s decision rare, but not unprecedented in Bexar County
San Antonio attorney Meredith Chacon spent nearly two decades working in the Bexar County District Attorney’s Office.
A significant portion of her tenure was spent serving as supervisor of the office’s child abuse and neglect section.
Chacon said Alvarez’s decision was the fourth time in 20 years she could recall a judge in Bexar County taking similar action.
“A district court judge has heard something that raises to a level of concern. I do believe she has the authority to demand that the department (CPS) come and look into it, to demand that they take custody at that moment, perhaps,” Chacon said.
Former Bexar County prosecutor Meredith Chacon. (KSAT)
Alvarez declined a request to be interviewed by KSAT for this story.
In a written statement, she told KSAT it was “deeply troubling” that the DA’s office filed the letter in the court’s record.
“Such actions not only risk eroding the foundational trust between attorneys and their clients, but they also strain the integrity of the very institutions charged with protecting the most vulnerable children of our community,” Alvarez wrote.
Baby’s mother faces 20-year prison sentence for felony injury to a child
Alvarez’s case notes, which were included in the DA’s letter to CPS, potentially reveal what was behind the judge’s decision that day.
The baby’s father tested positive for THC, according to the notes.
The baby’s mother, Marissa Salas, was free on bond at the time of the baby’s birth and weeks from beginning a lengthy prison term in an unrelated felony injury to a child case.
In June 2022, Bexar County Sheriff’s deputies found a 15-month-old girl in Salas’ care with severe injuries, including burn marks, a fractured skull and a brain bleed.
Salas was sentenced to 20 years in prison in April.
Under an agreement reached this summer between prosecutors and Salas’ defense attorney, however, Salas was allowed to stay out of jail until after her baby was born, due to it being a high-risk pregnancy, the DA’s office confirmed to KSAT.
Marissa Salas was allowed to give birth while free on bond, as part of an agreement between her defense attorneys and prosecutors signed this summer. (KSAT)
Salas is scheduled to be sentenced on Nov. 17 in the 437th District Court.
Salas’ co-defendant in the criminal case, Thomas Torres, was sentenced to five years in prison in 2023, court records show.
Alvarez’s notes included multiple references to Salas’ criminal case and upcoming sentencing.
“If she had sent the baby home and something had happened, what would we be sitting here saying?” Chacon said.
Alvarez returned the baby to Salas’ care on Oct. 21, according to court records.
The judge noted in her order that CPS failed to file a case “seeking to protect Baby Boy” and referred to Roberson’s letter as “unprecedented and abnormal.”
Reached for comment, a spokeswoman for CPS told KSAT the agency only gets involved if a report is made to its statewide intake division.
Judge Alvarez is months removed from state reprimand
Alvarez is just months removed from being reprimanded by the State Commission on Judicial Conduct.
The nine-page reprimand, handed down by the commission in May, states Alvarez:
failed to comply with the law and maintain professional competence in the law
failed to accord every person with a legal interest in a proceeding the right to be heard
was found in 16 opinions by the Fourth Court of Appeals to have violated the Separation of Powers Clause of the Texas Constitution
failed to follow orders issued by the Fourth Court of Appeals in a timely fashion seven times
failed to perform her judicial duties without bias or prejudice
engaged in willful and persistent conduct that was clearly inconsistent with the proper performance of her duties and cast public discredit upon the judiciary
failed to perform her judicial duties without bias or prejudice by making disparaging remarks about someone in court
lent the prestige of her judicial office to advance her own private interests by having Bexar County pay for multiple transcripts used in her defense before the commission
Alvarez previously called the list of allegations unfounded, but did not appeal the commission’s findings.
Read more reporting on the KSAT Investigates page.
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