Caledonia, Mich. — In an emotional plea before lawmakers, Brandi Morey-Pols shared how she tried in vain to save her 6-year-old son, Rowan, from the man she says was visibly spiraling. Instead, she said, every system designed to protect children — law enforcement, Child Protective Services (CPS), and the courts — failed catastrophically.
Rowan was found murdered in a suspected murder-suicide involving his father, Michael Winchell, in August 2023. Days before Rowan’s 7th birthday, deputies from the Isabella County Sheriff’s Office discovered his lifeless body after repeated pleas from his mother went unanswered for more than two days.
“I experienced a life-altering event nine months ago today,” Morey-Pols told lawmakers. “Since that moment, I have wondered what excuse a mother should accept when her child has been missing for 52 hours.”
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Instead of answers, Morey-Pols said she was met with apathy. “It’s a civil matter,” she recalled being told by multiple deputies. “We’ve done two wellness checks…we can’t do an Amber Alert because it’s a custody matter.” One sheriff even reportedly yelled at a dispatcher, frustrated that she kept calling. “Do you want to talk to my supervisor? Shut up. I’m sure he’s fine,” the mother recalled the deputy saying.
Rowan was not fine.
According to Isabella County investigators and reporting from WWMT and 9&10 News, deputies believe Rowan was killed by his father, who then took his own life. Brandi Morey-Pols said that it wasn’t even Isabella County law enforcement who delivered the news — Kent County sheriffs did.
“They weren’t even the ones that found my son,” she said. “They sent Kent County sheriffs to deliver their bad news.”
‘I Told Them. Over and Over Again.’
Morey-Pols testified that Judge Eric Jaynes, the same judge who signed the original custody order in 2020, denied her emergency motion to get Rowan back even after she presented evidence that the child was still alive. “Why did I need another motion for him to sign when he signed our original order?” she asked. “And he denied it.”
But it wasn’t just the court. According to Morey-Pols, CPS caseworkers dismissed her reports of neglect and abuse. The child’s father, she said, shaved Rowan’s head bald repeatedly — sometimes before family events and milestones — and denied the boy food and access to preschool. Rowan allegedly told his mother he lived off toast and that his father slept all day.
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“He started self-harming,” Morey-Pols said. “He threw his head into a metal table at dinner. He bruised himself at the pool. I was beside myself.”
Still, CPS closed the case, reportedly telling her that there was “nothing there.” One caseworker allegedly told her, “He can take care of his hygiene the way he sees fit on his parenting time.”
Morey-Pols was incredulous. “If he was a little girl getting his head shaved, you’d care,” she remembered saying. “And she closed it anyway.”
A System That ‘Did Nothing’
The mother testified that despite repeated calls to law enforcement, probation officers, CPS, and court referees, no one intervened — even after she warned them that her ex, a convicted felon, had weapons and was abusing prescription drugs.
“He was a felon who hit two cars doing 120 miles per hour and blew a .39. He broke his back and hip and suffered a head injury. After that, he was on Vicodin, Norco, morphine, and fentanyl,” Morey-Pols said.
She believes this was key information that CPS ignored. “I told CPS. I told Foxx (the court referee). I told Isabella County sheriffs. He was on drugs,” she said. “They did nothing.”
When deputies finally responded, the damage was done. Rowan was dead. “They had to cut into the little body I made,” she said, sobbing. “They didn’t even reach out to us. We got the autopsy report from a friend who called in a favor.”
‘No Faith Left’
After the tragedy, Morey-Pols said not a single person from CPS or the courts reached out to her — only sheriff’s deputies on the day of the death. And to this day, Judge Jaynes remains on the bench.
“There should be no wait time for children,” she said. “Eliminate that completely. And bypass the judge.”
She is now pushing for “Rowan’s Act,” a legislative reform package she hopes will force courts, law enforcement, and CPS to take high-conflict custody cases more seriously. Her suggestions include:
Mandatory mental health evaluations for both parents in contested custody cases.
Oversight of prescription drug use, particularly opioids and mood-altering medications.
Mandatory parental communication apps.
Stronger consequences for ignoring signs of emotional abuse.
“There’s not enough emphasis on mental and emotional abuse — but it almost always leads to physical abuse and death,” she warned.
A Voice for Rowan
Brandi Morey-Pols described Rowan as bright and bubbly, someone who needed “mommy’s back tickles to fall asleep” and who loved to name the moles on his body with his mother.
“I only remembered a few,” she said. “But he didn’t know that — he’d always ask, ‘What’s this one’s name?’ And I’d make one up.”
Now, Rowan’s voice is gone. But his mother’s remains.
“I did everything I was supposed to do,” she said. “And they still failed him.”
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Libertarian party disavows candidate for Governor Anthony Hudson
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Millions Of Residents Exposed To Toxic Metals From LA Fires, Study Shows
As homes ignited and burned down during the 2025 Los Angeles fire, millions of California residents were exposed to a high concentration of airborne toxic metals, a new study discovered.
Almost two years ago, wildfires spread through southern California killing at least 31 people and destroying 16,000 structures — but the extent of the blaze’s far-reaching effects remained unclear. Researchers measured the chemical signatures emitted between urban fires and wildfire smoke to find approximately 7 million Californians inhaled deadly heavy lead poisoning in the air during the first 24 hours of the devastating fires, a study published Wednesday in Science Advances found. Click here to read more.
ICE Reveals Fresh Lineup Of Foreign Nationals Accused Of Voter Fraud
U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) has revealed a new lineup of noncitizens accused of voter fraud.
Documents obtained by the Daily Caller detail 17 people connected to ICE investigations and arrests involving election-related offenses, including noncitizens who allegedly admitted to unlawfully registering to vote or casting ballots.
The documents identify individuals accused of illegally voting in federal, state, and local elections, including illegal immigrants with criminal records and lawful permanent residents. Click here to read more.
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Young Americans increasingly embrace socialism as midterm elections approach
Nearly half of young Americans now hold a favorable view of socialism, according to a new Fox News poll, highlighting a generational debate over capitalism, government intervention and the future of the American economy just days before the midterm elections.
The poll found 48% of adults ages 18 to 34 view socialism favorably, as younger Americans grapple with rising living costs, expensive housing and student debt.
At the University of Maryland, students expressed a range of opinions about socialism, including support for greater government involvement and skepticism about abandoning capitalism.
“I think socialism’s great,” one student said, explaining that “a government’s job should be to like help support the people that live in the country.” Click here to read more.
New World screwworm confirmed in Arizona dog, USDA says
Per a statement, officials with the USDA’s Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service (APHIS) confirmed the case in a dog in Cochise County.
“This is the first detection of [New World Screwworm] in Arizona,” read a portion of USDA’s statement. “APHIS is working closely with the Arizona Department of Agriculture on a joint response.”
What we don’t know:
USDA officials did not say where the dog was located in Cochise County.
Why you should care:
Officials with USDA say New World screwworm “is a serious pest that affects livestock, pets, wildlife, and, less commonly, people”.
“The larvae feed on living tissue and can cause severe wounds, animal suffering, and significant economic impacts if not detected and treated quickly,” read a portion of the statement. Click here to read more.
18-year-old charged in hate-motivated attack after luring victim through dating app, police say
An 18-year-old in Missouri was charged in a hate-motivated attack after allegedly luring a victim through a dating app, according to authorities.
Around 2:20 a.m. Oct. 21, the victim went to Bluebird Park to meet a man named Adam, whom he had been talking to on a dating site.
When the victim met the man he thought was Adam, the suspect, identified as Abdulwareth A. Alahmad, told him, “I actually hate gay people,” and four men who were hiding in nearby bushes approached him. Click here to
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James O’Keefe, Cam Higby Criminally Charged for Exposing Vulnerable Minnesota Election
Investigative journalists James O’Keefe and Cameron Higby have been hit with felony charges by left-wing Minneapolis prosecutors for their video exposing vulnerable loopholes in Minnesota’s elections.
Hennepin County Attorney Mary Moriarty accused conservative media personalities O’Keefe, 42, and Higby, 26, of “try[ing] to sow doubt about Minnesota’s secure voting systems” on Wednesday:
The journalist duo recorded footage of Higby entering Minnesota polling locations during the state’s August primary while donning Muslim garb in an effort to show how the voting system could be abused by registered voters being able to “vouch” for another person from the same precinct’s eligibility. Click here to read more.
Washington Post Ends Election Season With Dumbest Investigation Of All Time
“Democracy dies in darkness,” The Washington Post informed readers in February of 2017 — but the newspaper’s last-ditch attempt to shade President Donald Trump ahead of the midterm elections is laughable at best.
The Post’s 11th-hour investigation dug into President Trump’s proposed new monument celebrating 250 years of American independence — dubbed “Independence Arch” — and determined through digital modeling that the structure would, at times, cast a shadow over parts of Arlington National Cemetery.
The outlet ran a digital simulation showing the shadows that would be cast by the monument over the course of a full year, and then published the findings on Tuesday — one week before Election Day. Click here to read more.
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Albany’s New Assisted Dying Law Follows Canada’s Deadly Cost-Cutting Playbook
New York State assisted dying was signed into law in February, and by the end of September, an estimated 20 patients had already received prescriptions for life-ending treatment.
New York is the 14th state, including Washington, D.C., to legalize some form of the controversial procedure, with advocates arguing on moral grounds to ease suffering. Yet the debate is not about compelling anyone to endure agony. The real concern is institutional, and Britain and Canada demonstrate how assisted dying incentivizes state-sponsored death.
In Britain, MPs voted 286 to 270 against the Terminally Ill Adults (End of Life) Bill last month, halting the legislation at its second reading. The proposal would have permitted mentally competent adults in England and Wales with less than six months to live to request assistance ending their lives. Click here to read more.
Camp Grayling’s drone testing leads to Michigan deer hunting closures
More than 20,000 acres within Camp Grayling’s boundaries in Northern Michigan will be closed to hunting as the U.S. Military conducts testing on its drone program.
The temporary shuttering of more than 10% of the area within the complex operated by the Michigan National Guard will take place during deer firearm season.
A notice from the U.S. Army and Air Force said the short-term closures are to keep the public safe from “active testing zones.”
Combat-ready drones
Big picture view:
According to an October release from the military, Camp Grayling is supporting a “vital federal defense program” that includes the evaluation of tens of thousands of combat-ready drones.
The work precedes the “testing and delivering” of drones that will eventually be wielded by the soldiers fighting abroad, the release said. Click here to read more.
How Florida took the lead in battling big tech
Florida’s attorney general asked a judge to restrict children’s access to Meta’s platforms, won a court ruling allowing a social-media ban for minors and sued messaging platform Discord for allegedly failing to protect children from predators. That was all in just one week earlier this month.
Florida has staked a position as one of the most aggressive states taking on artificial intelligence and Big Tech, bucking President Trump and channeling growing consumer anxieties about AI. Spearheaded by Gov. Ron DeSantis and Attorney General James Uthmeier, both Republicans, the multi-front effort aims to rein in AI model development, guard consumer privacy and protect minors from social-media harms. Click here to read more.
