How many times will Texas continue to play this game?

Some of the children taken from a polygamist sect’s ranch, placed in foster care and then returned to their parents could be headed back to foster care again.

Texas child welfare authorities are asking Texas District Judge Barbara Walther to put eight children, ranging in age from 5 to 17, back in state custody, alleging their mothers have refused to limit contact with men accused of being involved in underage marriages.

Individual hearings for the four mothers involved are scheduled to begin Monday.

None of the children currently live at the Yearning For Zion Ranch in Eldorado, where authorities swept roughly 440 children into foster care in April. Officials said at the time that the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints, which established the ranch, was forcing girls into underage marriages and grooming boys to be adult abusers.

In the new CPS petitions seeking foster placement for the eight children, the agency detailed alleged underage marriages involving the children’s fathers or stepfathers, though only one faces any criminal charges.

Rod Parker, a church spokesman, said that even though the families are getting individual hearings this time, the argument that they shouldn’t be allowed to retain custody of their children remains unfair.