I wrote a post this morning to address this issue. You did what you felt you must. The struggle is that currently, we don't have close knit community to be able to help this family. If we did, this scenario would never have happened. If we look at the root causes, we are confronted with the break down of family, community, clans and even tribes as it takes a whole bunch of people to raise a child, not just one individual. I suspect that there is also a history of abuse and violence in the mother and fathers lives that resulted in this kind of abusive, self-destructive and violent behaviour.
So to get the kids out in order to protect them from such violence and abuse is necessary. But she also needed help. I think your adjectives to describe her were very harsh and I was surprised to see words like that used by you to describe another spiritual being. While I recognize that she is abusive, violent and lost, she is also sick too. It looks like she has lots of trauma to heal ... if she is willing to do that work.
From the sounds of it, she is not willing so now she will be confronted with the natural consequences of her choices. I do believe that it is our duty to engage in tough love with these individuals to help them through it through peaceful confrontation. It is not easy! If the community was in place, that process would be simpler as there would be numerous people that could help her and the kids out. As such, the state has destroyed it all, so now people depend on the state.
You stepped up and look after one of the children. A brave and honourable thing to do. You helped that little boy and I'm sure he will never forget. He has a life time of work ahead of him to heal from that trauma he experience.
Engaging in the violence of the state to make this happen is tough. Because we don't have community any more, it may be the only choice we have right now. However, let us not forget that we can turn this around by rebuilding the multi-generational family and close knit community so that this scenario does not even happen and we don't have to rescue kids from violent and abusive parents. If we can look past the symptoms and start addressing the root causes, then we will find a more peaceful and loving approach for dealing with these kinds of issues.
However, to do this requires participation, action, patience, time, commitment an dedication. For all those who are completely dependent on the state, it is not possible for them to engage at that level. That is why people then turn to the state to pick up their duties and responsibilities to the community. That should never have happened and requires that we remove those dependencies so that we can free up the time to pick up those duties and responsibilities for ourselves.
That is my thoughts on this. I pray this message finds you well.