LOVELL – A new Maine publication, Common Sense Independent, is being read in unexpected places.

Terrilyn Simpson, owner/editor, said people from as far as Washington state have been calling her since the first issue appeared featuring “Logan’s Truth,” the story of the child, Logan Marr, who died at the hands of her foster mother Jan. 31, 2001.

Simpson spoke Tuesday at the monthly program sponsored by Friends of Charlotte Hobbs Memorial Library. She described herself as a seventh-generation Mainer with 20 years experience in journalism.

She described a story she wrote that dealt with chemical injuries suffered by workers at Champion Paper mill in Bucksport. For that, she was awarded the Newman First Amendment Award in 1998.

Prior to working on the Marr case, Simpson said she had been working intensely with a family whose child had been removed by the Department of Human Services because of her “failure to thrive.” This working-class family has run up well over $50,000 in debts trying to regain custody of their child who still remains in DHS custody even though it has been determined that the “failure to thrive” is a result of the cystic fibrosis she was born with, Simpson said.

When she learned that Marr had died in DHS custody, Simpson said became interested because she was already aware of problems in Child Protective Services of DHS.

Simpson said she spoke with a few hundred people; one contact would send her to talk with another. Evidence of the failure of Child Protective Services to protect Logan mounted as person after person told her of the ways the system failed, she said.

She described a system in which young, inexperienced caseworkers from comfortable backgrounds are given the power to make the decision to remove children from parental care “with an extraordinary amount of subjectivity.” Judges are supposed to review a decision to remove a child, but in most cases, simply rubber stamp the caseworker’s decision, she said.

Simpson said as the story unfolded, “I could see there was no place I could publish this. That’s when I decided to start my own newspaper.”

The first issue, which was free, uses 28 pages of newsprint to tell the Logan Marr story, her removal by DHS and her death at the hands of a former DHS employee, Sally Schofield.

Subsequent issues of the paper will explore a variety of stories, including some lighter news. Although she expects to include stories about DHS, Simpson said she doesn’t want Common Sense Independent to be a single-issue publication.