
OAKLAND -- Alameda Superior Court Commissioner Rhonda N. Burgess has a look of utter sadness on her face as she reads the flat legal words ending a family.
Her voice seems to tremble slightly as she informs the woman sitting at a table in Burgess' juvenile dependency courtroom that the mother's parental "rights are hereby terminated."
The moment seems to shake Burgess, despite the commissioner's finding earlier in the hearing that the wom... (continued)