A team of German police officers with a battering ram stormed the residence of the Wunderlich family. The raid near Darmstadt last week took all four of the family's children into state custody.

The only legal grounds were that the parents, Dirk and Petra Wunderlich, continued to home school their children. There were no other allegations of abuse or neglect. A German family court judge authorized the police to use force against the children if they resisted.

Behind the raid was the notorious Jugendamt or Youth Office. Many of the German parents who have run afoul of the Jugendamt have had their lives shattered. They've been in and out of court and have been fined thousands of euros. Some have been thrown in jail, and some have lost their children.

A few years ago the Wunderlichs fled Germany to avoid such a scenario. But the need for employment necessitated their return.

In an interview in Berlin last year, Dirk Wunderlich said he was prepared to go to jail rather than send his children to school. "But I'm not afraid of this," he said. "I'm only sad for my family. I will go (to jail) laughing. You can do what you want, but my children will not go to school."

The founder of the Home School Legal Defense Association, Michael Farris, called the Wunderlich children's abduction "an outrageous act of a rogue nation."

This is not an isolated incident.

The Romeike family also fled the German government's persecution of homeschoolers and were granted asylum in America by an immigration judge. But the Obama administration wants the Romeikes sent back to Germany, where they could face the same fate as the Wunderlich's.

Witnesses said when Petra Wunderlich tried to give her daughter a kiss and hug goodbye, one of the officers pushed her away and said, "It's too late for that."

The children were taken to unknown locations and officials told the parents they would not be seeing their children "anytime soon."

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