Despite all the hate.
I don't want to spoil the party, but the spin the Globe gives on these featured articles, sort of an "all's well that end's well" bit goes soft on the state and, imho, plays down the outrage of a poor little girl spending more than a year in an isolated lock-down inside a psychiatric ward. The best thing that could have happened here was the BCH and DCF not getting involved in the first place. Then it never happens. This idea that the Tufts guy was malpractice and the parents somehow didn't love their kid coming from a state that is criminally negligent in its duties toward children is also a bit much.
Anyway, I'm trying to turn in a new direction here and not cover all the agenda-pushing rot with such harshness and dejection so I hope you enjoy the fine journalism of the Boston Globe, who apparently went along for an ice cream before the family headed back to Connecticut.
"Justina Pelletier heads home after judge ends state custody; Ruling caps 16-month battle over diagnoses and parental rights of Conn. teen" by Neil Swidey and Patricia Wen | Globe staff June 17, 2014
Connecticut teenager Justina Pelletier spent 16 months and two birthdays in state custody as the central but largely off-stage player in an explosive drama involving parents’ rights and the controversial new field of medical child abuse. Now she is going home.
Ah, the eyes are watering up and I don't know why. Poor kid.
On Wednesday, the 16-year-old girl is expected to return to her parents’ custody and the family’s home in West Hartford, Conn., following a ruling by the same Massachusetts juvenile court judge who originally removed her from her parents’ care.
“I’m so happy. I’m so excited, oh, my gosh,” Justina said in an interview. “It’s such big news.”
She can talk and actually express herself?
In a two-page order issued Tuesday, Judge Joseph Johnston dismissed the child-protection case against Justina’s parents, Linda and Lou Pelletier, arguing that they and others had shown “credible evidence that circumstances have changed” since his decision to place Justina in the custody of the Massachusetts Department of Children and Families. He also wrote that in the month since Justina was moved to a residential facility in Thompson, Conn., her parents “have been cooperative and engaged in services,” including individual therapy for Justina and family therapy.
Meaning the public relations damage the state was suffering was unbearable.
It was a remarkable change in tone from the judge’s ruling just three months earlier, when he determined the parents were unfit and awarded permanent custody to the state. At that time, he blasted the Pelletiers for behavior he contended was erratic and had doomed numerous attempts at compromise.
He took their love and concern for their daughter who they didn't see for more than a year as a personal affront.
But that March ruling also seemed to spark intensified actions by Governor Deval Patrick’s top health official, John Polanowicz, to intervene in the highly contentious case that pivoted on dueling diagnoses from doctors at two of Boston’s top hospitals and attracted extensive national and even international attention.
Yeah, the pub was getting bad.
You know, I would like to think I had a hand in it even if you don't like me. I don't even care if you like me or not anymore.
Although her expected return will not be official until Wednesday, Justina, who has been using a wheelchair to get around since her admission to Boston Children’s Hospital in February 2013, was allowed to leave the residential facility Tuesday for what turned into a spontaneous celebration at the Outback Steakhouse in Auburn, Mass.
I'm not knowing how much more I can keep reading here lest there be waterfalls on my keyboard.
By phone, in between bites of her hot fudge sundae, she said she could not believe she would finally be returning home for good. Asked how she plans to spend her first full day back home, she said she wants to play with her dogs, go in the family’s pool, and visit friends. She said she also wants to do something she has rarely been allowed to do during the last year spent in institutionalized care. “I want to sleep in,” she said.
Justina was out shopping with her mother Tuesday afternoon, without state supervision, as part of the increasingly expanded freedom her parents have been receiving over the past month, during her stay at the JRI Susan Wayne Center for Excellence.
Linda Pelletier said she screamed with joy when she heard the judge had decided to send her daughter home. “Unbelievable,” she said. “It’s been such a long journey.”
Tears of happiness, folks.
At least for now, Justina’s parents will be free of government oversight in the care of their daughter. The child protection agency in Connecticut, which last summer opened a medical child abuse case related to the family and later substantiated the claim, has indicated it will not be stepping into the case.
Gary Kleeblatt, spokesman for the Connecticut Department of Children and Families, said that investigation “will be closed” Wednesday when Justina returns home and is officially out of Massachusetts custody. He has said his agency did little on the case because Massachusetts was already providing services and addressing Justina’s various issues.
“We wish the family and Justina the very best,” he said, “and we stand ready to be of assistance if called upon.”
In 2011, Connecticut DCF had investigated an allegation of medical neglect made by members of Justina’s medical team but dismissed it a few weeks later.
Okay, so let me get this straight: Connecticut opened a case, Globe implies it was legit, then I'm told it was nothing at all, and yet it somehow stays on the record as substantiated?
WOW! Welcome to 21st-century AmeriKa!
In his March ruling, Johnston had rebuked Connecticut child protection officials for failing to get more involved in overseeing the case, which involved a child in their state.
Justina’s story, documented in a two-part Globe series in December , has been unusual from the start. She exhibited a perplexing set of symptoms that divided specialists at two top Boston hospitals, and she was the focus of a child custody dispute straddling two states.
I've covered it; I suppose you can search my blog for more.
By the start of this year, the controversy saw a surprising collection of organizations taking up her cause. They included groups representing conservative Christians, online hacking activists, critics of psychotropic drug use, and advocates of greater awareness of hard-to-diagnose disorders.
As detailed in the Globe series, Justina’s mother rushed her to Boston Children’s Hospital in February 2013, complaining that her daughter was suffering from severe symptoms of mitochondrial disease. That is a group of rare genetic disorders affecting how cells produce energy, often causing problems with the gut, brain, muscles, and heart.
Dr. Mark Korson, chief of metabolism at Tufts, had been treating Justina for that disease for more than a year and had sent her to Children’s only because her Tufts gastroenterologist had recently moved there. The teen, who six weeks earlier had performed in an ice show, was barely able to walk and had virtually stopped eating by the time she showed up by ambulance at the Children’s emergency department on that snowy morning in February.
Turning into a horror story. Send the kid off to the hospital in an emergency and they are swallowed up by the doctors and the state.
But within three days, the team at Children’s disputed that mitochondrial disease was the primary cause of her symptoms and began to suspect that her parents were blocking psychiatric care the doctors believed Justina badly needed.
So they weren't getting on a regimen of pre$cription pharmaceuticals, is that what I am to gather there?! Bad Pelletiers not boosting bottom-line profit!
The clinicians at Children’s concluded that the girl suffered primarily from somatoform disorder, in which symptoms are real but there is no underlying physical cause. The parents complained that the Children’s team was dramatically changing Justina’s course of treatment without Korson’s involvement or even an examination by the gastroenterologist they had come to see.
Yeah, what about him?
When the parents said they wanted to discharge Justina from Children’s and take her to see Korson at Tufts, the hospital reported its suspicions of medical child abuse to the state. That relatively new term describes parents or other caregivers seeking unnecessary or potentially harmful medical interventions for children.
I guess you are better off letting your kid die then hustling the hell out of Massachusetts. Certainly don't show any concern for them. State sees some sort of evil there.
That prompted the state’s child protection agency to take emergency custody on Valentine’s Day 2013, a decision validated the next day by Johnston, the juvenile court judge.
Heartbreakingly ironic, and not in a light way.
The battle over Justina’s future was one of a handful of recent cases documented by the Globe that involved Children’s and a disputed diagnosis that led to parents losing custody or being threatened with that extreme step.
Stay away from BCH!
These conflicts, which typically involved controversial diagnoses on the medical frontier, have exposed the consequences of the ongoing failure of the Massachusetts DCF to upgrade its medical expertise. The agency, many observers have argued, is simply not equipped to properly referee such cases.
"We" gave away too much tax loot to Hollywood, well-connected and well-off corporations, lavish political perks and pensions, and the endle$$ $tream of debt intere$t payments to the tune of hundreds of millions per month.
This is the result. DCF hollowed out shell scurrying.
More than seven years after recommendations from the Legislature and outside specialists that the child welfare agency hire a physician medical director to provide expertise in complex medical cases, DCF has yet to do that.
A spokeswoman for DCF said the agency does plan to enhance its medical team, which has traditionally consisted of a handful of nurses, by adding a new position called a director of integrated health services.
Yeah, they are always a convenient flog. Last thing I want going into a hospital is a pissed-off nurse.
But spokeswoman Cayenne Isaksen acknowledged that position would not have to be filled by a physician. In addition, she said, “the department is in the process of establishing an expert panel of doctors from a variety of disciplines who can provide additional support and consultation in difficult cases.”
Other children’s hospitals have found that the best approach for wading through the difficult waters of suspected medical child abuse is to convene a wide-ranging summit involving all the child’s key providers, including teachers and counselors, before making allegations to the state. That did not happen at Children’s Hospital in this case. Korson, Justina’s key specialist at Tufts, was not invited to participate in a meeting on the case at Children’s until well after that hospital had made its abuse allegations and after Children’s had moved Justina into its locked psychiatric ward.
Hospital spokesman Rob Graham said the parents’ actions prevented that from happening. “Boston Children’s standard of care in complex cases is to hold a summit that includes all the involved disciplines at Boston Children’s and external providers if available in person and by phone,” Graham said. “In this case, that work was underway, but the family escalated the situation making the initial summit impossible. Subsequently, Boston Children’s conducted extensive and ongoing communication and coordination with physicians across the Hospital and with external providers.”
Given its high-profile intensity, the Justina case has caused ripples beyond the hospitals involved.
Alice Newton, a pediatrician who serves as medical director of the Child Protection Program at Massachusetts General Hospital, previously served in that same position at Boston Children’s Hospital when the Justina case originally exploded there. She said MGH, which is continually refining its processes, has recently decided to add an extra step in its process before reporting suspicions of medical child abuse to the state.
After Mass. General’s child protection team has gathered information but before it reports its concerns to the state child welfare agency, that hospital will convene a “medical child abuse team.”
That team will consist of hospital representatives from various specialties and disciplines knowledgeable about the terrain, but who have not been involved in the case in question. She said this new formal step in the process, which MGH has not yet had occasion to employ, will provide a mechanism for additional review and vetting before escalation with the state occurs. “We understand the potential impact of reporting suspected medical child abuse to the state,” she said.
The judge and Boston Children’s were hardly the only parties to criticize Linda and Lou Pelletier for their behavior during the ordeal. But even their critics had a hard time showing any marked improvement in Justina’s physical condition during her long time out of her parents’ custody.
“It’s a wonderful feeling to see that this little girl will be able to go home,” said Philip Moran, the lawyer for Justina’s parents. “Hopefully, we’ll see major progress because this is what she really needs.”
I agree.
--more--"
That beautiful little girl was, let's not sugar coat it, tortured.
"Pressures mounted to end Justina Pelletier custody fight" by Patricia Wen and Neil Swidey | Globe Staff June 19, 2014
When juvenile court judges and the state’s child-protection agency allow children in custody to return to their parents, there is supposed to be only one standard: the best interests of the child.
It did -- imho.
But political, legal, and financial factors appear to have also figured prominently in resolving the impasse in the 16-month-long custody battle over Connecticut teenager Justina Pelletier, and, some child welfare specialists argue, the factors may have played outsized roles. The case was locked in acrimony between the parents and the Department of Children and Families, and as recently as March the judge in the case deemed the parents unfit.
Always a "but" with them (you are not supposed to start a sentence with it, but).
Juvenile Court Judge Joseph Johnston, at the request of DCF, restored custody to the parents Tuesday, ending the case that the child welfare agency had brought against the parents, whom officials had accused of medical child abuse. On Wednesday, Justina returned to her family’s home in West Hartford, Conn., cradled in her father’s arms.
Justina’s parents and their advocates say if it is true that state officials bowed to outside pressure, then it was overdue in getting the teenager back to her home.
That's my view, yep.
But other observers say the stunning pace of change suggests political and legal factors were in play.
There they go again.
“There was such a turnaround of opinion in such a short span of time,” said a longtime child protection specialist who has followed the case closely.
Well, it is nice to know the people's voice is still heard now and then.
The impact of this week’s events will greatly alter the life of Justina, who seems physically stable and happy to be home, but still has gastrointestinal problems and trouble walking. Her parents are now free to care for their child as they see fit without state interference.
Do I have to type it?
Lou and Linda Pelletier appear to be wasting no time using that freedom, unconcerned by critics in the medical community who say they are too one-dimensional in their view of Justina’s condition.
I find anyone who is attacked or on the wrong side of my agenda-pushing state mouthpiece must have some good in them.
Linda Pelletier insisted in a telephone interview Wednesday that she is confident her child’s ailments are the result of a rare metabolic disorder and unrelated to psychiatric issues.
Asked how confident she was of this view, she replied, “a million percent.”
Though the state had encouraged psychological treatment for Justina in the belief that some of her ailments are psychosomatic, Linda Pelletier said she has no plans to take her child for counseling apart from what the West Hartford schools recommend as part of her special education plan.
Did you know Massachusetts has one of the highest rates of prescriptions per-capita? That big biotech clu$ter in Boston drives it.
The pressure to settle the case, coming from the highest levels of state government, intensified this year. As conservative religious groups, among others, picketed the State House and brought the “Free Justina” message to radio talk shows, Governor Deval Patrick dispatched his top health official, John Polanowicz, to broker a resolution.
Otherwise, this failure of a governor was going to let the status quo go.
By that time, DCF social workers, the judge, and some of Justina’s doctors were getting threatening calls and hate mail from across the country.
Not from me. It's all out here for you, and I'm stuck to the chair. The weak old man is no physical threat to anyone, and the only mental threat is the awareness of what the hell is really going on in this world.
Which brings me to another tear-jerker: That sick little girl is a lot stronger than I could ever hope to be. How she endured torture and isolation for so long and came out so well-adjusted is beyond me. I don't think I could last days, let alone weeks or months.
A major breakthrough came when Polanowicz helped secure a pathway in mid-May for the 16-year-old to leave Massachusetts: While DCF retained custody, Justina was transferred to a residential treatment center in Connecticut closer to her parents’ home.
Yeah, the state is staffed by a bunch of heroes.
I gotta remember, this is who the paper is written of and for.
Justina’s return to Connecticut had major legal and financial implications. Since February 2013, Massachusetts had kept custody of — and paid for — a child from another state. The cost of Justina’s care had climbed to at least $400,000, based on Medicaid rates that apply to children in DCF care.
I'm willing to take that out of tax revenue or whatever. That's something I'm willing to pay for. I mentioned the things not above.
Her case consumed vast amounts of energy within a state agency already plagued this year by child deaths under its watch, which led to the ousting of its commissioner.
Yeah, the poor state agency.
Judge Johnston had hoped Connecticut’s child-protection agency would agree to accept oversight of the teen, engaging in a collegial baton pass often seen between states when children move. But that was not to be. Officials in Connecticut made clear they wanted nothing to do with the contentious case involving parental rights and the controversial new field of medical child abuse.
That meant Massachusetts officials had to come up with a solution on their own.
When Polanowicz helped arrange Justina’s transfer to JRI Susan Wayne Center for Excellence in Thompson, Conn., some longtime child-welfare experts were not surprised that the child protection agency in Massachusetts, in just four weeks, moved to dismiss the case against the Pelletiers.
Massachusetts officials recognized that if they extricated themselves from the case swiftly, any new complaint involving Justina’s parents would have to be handled by Connecticut’s child protection agency. Massachusetts would be out of the picture financially as well.
So, once again, it all comes down to money in Ma$$achu$hitts.
DCF filed a motion June 6 to dismiss the case. The judge went along Tuesday, citing “credible evidence that circumstances have changed.” The order said nothing about the diagnostic dispute, one in which he sided as recently as March with Boston Children’s Hospital, saying Justina’s ailments had psychological origins.
The hospital staff had filed medical child abuse charges against the parents in February 2013, a few days after Justina arrived in their emergency room. Her mother insisted that Justina was suffering from complications of mitochondrial disorder, for which the girl had been treated at Tufts Medical Center for more than a year.
Yet, more than a year later, many child welfare officials said they could not argue that moving Justina home is not in her best interests, given some sobering truths. She had not been getting much better in DCF care, and her mobility appears worse, as the teen who once walked easily now relies on a wheelchair.
And up well the eyes again! The care she was getting was worse!
While Justina appears to be eating well and she speaks clearly — something that wasn’t true when she entered Children’s — she hasn’t had anything approaching the turnaround clinicians hoped for.
What more do you want? She getting better now that she is out of your hands.
In filing medical child abuse charges against the parents, Children’s staff alleged that the parents ignored Justina’s mental health needs and sought unnecessary medical interventions. But the extensive psychological services offered to the teenager over 16 months do not appear to have improved her physical ailments.
How many buts in this article, and what pre$criptions did they shove down her throat while she was in solitary?
Marylou Sudders, a former state mental health commissioner who now teaches at Boston College, said it appeared that Justina’s condition “plateaued,” and there was no reason to keep holding her.
The attention to Justina’s case has prompted considerable soul searching within the medical profession over how to avoid the missteps that hardened the standoff between providers and the parents.
One issue: that an excessive focus on naming a diagnosis in murky, complex cases is more likely to bring fireworks than clarity.
Dr. Danya Glaser, a British psychiatrist and coauthor of an influential paper on medical child abuse published this year in the medical journal The Lancet, suggested it might be more productive for physicians to accept that some cases involve “medically unexplained conditions” rather than insisting on a diagnosis for which there is little objective support.
The Lancet is all good until they claim millions of Iraqis have perished since 2003, then it's har-rumph, har-rumph, Lancet!
“What becomes more and more important is the question of the child’s functioning, and how best to improve it, regardless of the question of diagnosis,” Glaser said in an e-mail interview. “This approach requires, however, a ‘buy-in’ by all professionals involved and a firm approach as parents are sometimes more keen on a diagnosis than on attempts to restore the child’s functioning.”
In Justina’s case, her parents objected angrily to the insistence of doctors at Children’s that the family accept a diagnosis of somatoform disorder, which is used to describe a patient with real symptoms that have no apparent physical or organic basis.
And that is where they incurred the wrath of the doctors, state, and judge!
All because they love their little girl.
Another issue: When is it appropriate for hospitals to file medical child abuse charges? Because such cases can often be difficult to sort out and because hospital workers are mandated by law to report abuse suspicions, there can be a natural inclination to file allegations with the state early.
But more hospitals are talking about introducing summit meetings that include multiple providers, including those not directly involved in the case, to review issues before filing charges of medical child abuse.
How many buts?
Some child-welfare specialists said they wonder how Justina will fare if she faces continued publicity, as the Free Justina campaign talks about championing legislation to avoid cases like this.
I think she will be just fine.
Justina’s mother said her daughter’s original team of Tufts specialists are back in her life, including Dr. Mark Korson has resumed his leading role in her care as her metabolism specialist.
Meaning she is in a safe and familiar environment.
A child psychiatrist who has handled medical child abuse cases said such cases require deep sensitivity, including understanding how parents of children with chronic illnesses can behave, especially if they feel deeply misunderstood.
“Being the parent of a child with disabilities colors your role in the world,” he said. “You act in ways you hadn’t planned.”
Like get angry?
--more--"
She has many sisters, and even the dog is happy to see her!
"After 16-month battle, Justina Pelletier returns home; Father vows to continue fight for family rights" by Zachary T. Sampson | Globe Correspondent June 19, 2014
WEST HARTFORD, Conn. — When Justina Pelletier arrived home early Wednesday afternoon in the passenger seat of her mother’s sport utility vehicle, her father, Lou, made a cradle with his arms and carried her through the front yard.
The 16-year-old girl with the shiny sunglasses and a bow in her hair cannot walk on her own anymore. But on Wednesday, for her family, crossing the threshold of her house in any fashion was a big enough step.
For the first time in 16 months, Justina would sleep in her own bed. She was once again her parent’s daughter not just by blood, but by law.
Uh-oh.
“She wants a hamburger on the grill, and she wants to sit down and lie on the couch and watch a movie with the family,” said Justina’s mother, Linda.
You know, something any 16-year-old would do. I may not agree on the choice of fare, but it's her choice. Whatever you want!
Wednesday marked the end of a protracted legal battle pitting Boston Children’s Hospital and the Massachusetts Department of Children and Families against the Pelletier family. The case brought national attention to the issues of parental rights and a controversial new medical syndrome known as medical child abuse.
In February 2013, Linda Pelletier brought her daughter, whom doctors at Tufts Medical Center had previously diagnosed with a rare illness called mitochondrial disease, to Boston Children’s. Justina was not eating much and had been struggling to walk.
Doctors at Children’s soon reversed the earlier diagnosis, saying Justina’s condition was not physical but psychiatric.
Officials at Children’s reported suspicions of medical child abuse to the Department of Children and Families. The state took emergency custody of Justina.
Three months ago, Joseph Johnston, a Massachusetts juvenile court judge, gave the state permanent custody of Justina. On Tuesday, he reversed his ruling, saying the Pelletiers had made significant progress and their daughter could return home.
Linda Pelletier and Justina’s sister, Jennifer, went to pick up Justina early Wednesday from the JRI Susan Wayne Center for Excellence in Thompson, Conn., where she had been sent so she could rehabilitate closer to home.
Justina rode home with a pink blanket and polka-dotted pillow in her mother’s car. Before she left Thompson, she smiled and waved, saying it was awesome to see her parents again.
I'll bet it was after more than year!
The first thing Justina planned to focus on when she got home, she said, was “my family.”
Jennifer said Justina would probably have to catch up on television shows, too, including her favorite: “Dance Moms.”
She can do what-ever she wants!
After Justina had returned, Lou Pelletier reflected on the raft of ice skating medals, more than he can count, that reside in his daughter’s room.
“She was a very active girl, and now as you saw me picking her up, she’s going to have a long way to go before she’s ice skating again,” he said. “But you know what? She will ice skate again.”
The Pelletiers said they are focused on helping Justina regain her health.
Linda Pelletier said she plans to enroll her daughter in pool therapy. “There’s going to be a lot of rehabbing with her, and hopefully she can walk again,” Linda said.
Jennifer Pelletier said she would like to teach her sister to skate again, but now Justina has no muscle strength and is “like a rag doll.”
After 16 months in state care!!!
“This should have never happened to my little sister; this should never happen ever again to any child in this situation,” Jennifer said, hinting at the family’s next fight.
The Pelletiers said they intend to press their argument that hospitals are too eager to accuse families of medical child abuse without sufficient reason, seizing children from their mothers and fathers.
It does seem to be a pattern at BCH anyway.
Linda and Lou Pelletier remain adamant Justina’s ailments have always been physical, not psychiatric. They said she regressed when doctors at Boston Children’s Hospital stopped treating her for mitochondrial disease.
Lou Pelletier said he “will not stop until there is a Justina’s Law.”
“Ultimately, anybody who was involved in Justina’s deconditioning, torture, abuse, needs to be held accountable,” he said.
It's a charged word, but there is nothing else you can call it.
At first, he said, he thought his family was alone in their fight. But in the last year, they have learned of a number of parents who shared their experience. “Justina’s story is just the tip of the iceberg,” Lou Pelletier said.
That's a "but" I like, and no, none of us are alone. With the Internet, we are now legion -- and there is no going back even if government shuts it off.
Rest and personal time are in order first, he said. Lou plans to get the family pool ready and find Red Sox tickets for his daughter.
I hope she gets to see a good game. Sox currently suck.
Inside the family’s split-level suburban home on Wednesday, Justina curled up on a black leather couch with her three sisters and watched “Pretty Little Liars” on the family room TV. One of her dogs, Roxie, a doting German Shepherd, gave her a slobbering lick on the lips.
Lou Pelletier called the last 16 months a “long ordeal.”
“If there is a kid that can turn it around,” Lou said, “it’s Justina Pelletier.”
--more--"
She looks like an average 16-year-old girl -- who has been through hell.
Pelletier family is reunited, and DCF must take stock
Already have: DCF F*** Up Due to Faxes
They have been fixed:
"State filings for custody of children soaring; Advocates warn of load on system" by Peter Schworm | Globe staff June 20, 2014
The state’s child welfare agency has intensified efforts to remove children from troubled homes since preschooler Jeremiah Oliver was reported missing in December, a dramatic shift that critics say has put more strain on an already overburdened system....
Child advocates say the surge marks a clear response to criticism of the agency following the Oliver scandal, which led to the resignation of commissioner Olga Roche in April. Many describe the jump in custody petitions as an overreaction to intense public scrutiny that will needlessly send more children into foster care.
That's started to fade, though. DCF not making the papers as much these days.
“It’s symptomatic of an agency that is continuing to struggle,” Marylou Sudders, associate professor at Boston College Graduate School of Social Work, said Thursday. “You have line workers who, if there is any question, are going to default to the side of filing [for custody]. I think the entire agency is risk-averse.”
The change in practice has had direct consequences.
With more children being taken from their homes, social workers are scrambling to place them in foster care. And with so many cases, lawyers who represent parents seeking to keep custody of their children are in short supply, and hearings cannot be heard within three days as legally required.
The focus on removing children from chaotic and potentially dangerous homes is not surprising, advocates say, given the intense public scrutiny the agency has faced since acknowledging that social workers had not visited Jeremiah Oliver’s family for several months before he disappeared. The boy’s body was found in April by the side of a highway in Sterling; his mother and her boyfriend have been charged in connection with the boy’s disappearance.
Other tragedies involving children have increased criticism of DCF, including a case that month in which the agency said it had misplaced a fax sent by Grafton police about the safety of a 1-month-old infant, who later died.
That was in the fax if you didn't see it.
In a statement Thursday, DCF said that periods of “hypervigilance” typically follow high-profile cases, both within the agency and among police officers, teachers, hospital workers, and others who report abuse.
In January, Roche directed staff to investigate allegations of abuse or neglect involving children age 5 and under with parents who have a history of substance abuse, domestic violence, mental health issues, or “unresolved childhood trauma.”
“The safety and well-being of the Commonwealth’s children is our number one concern,” the agency said. “When an allegation of abuse or neglect comes to the department’s attention, we engage in a thoughtful and deliberative process to ensure a course of action that is in the best interest of the child.”
After a while you just tune out the endless spin from state authority. It's like they have a public relations playbook for damage control at the ready. Put out the platitudes, add to the imagery and illusion, and everything will be just fine. Miracles every day!
Peter MacKinnon, president of the union chapter that represents the state’s child welfare workers, said the increase in referrals to foster care is the product of “an atmosphere of extreme fear” that has trickled down from top management to caseworkers.
Too bad wealth trickles up.
“No one wants to have the next Jeremiah Oliver on their caseload,” MacKinnon said. “It used to be that we would put services into the home. Now the service is foster care.”
That's a whole other post.
DCF has also stepped up its investigations of abuse and neglect, increasing the burden on social workers, several advocates said.
High-profile deaths of children under state supervision typically spur a more cautious approach, at least in the short term. But this increase has been more pronounced and sustained, those who work with children say.
“Every few years there’s a crisis at DCF, and we go through this,” MacKinnon said. “But what’s different about the last six months is that it hasn’t slowed down.”
Looks like failure to me, and I'm tired and no longer interested in hearing explanations, excuses, or p.r. propaganda. Sorry.
The increase in petitions filed to gain custody of children stands in marked contrast to recent years. Between 2008 and 2012, the number fell 30 percent, part of an effort to keep families together whenever possible.
In May, the state’s child advocate office cited that philosophy in a report concluding that DCF erred by leaving a Lynn infant in a deeply troubled home, where he was fatally beaten, allegedly by his mother’s drug-addicted boyfriend, in July 2013.
Related: Stay Single
“Many felt that a shift in values had occurred and DCF was no longer taking custody of children when the agency should have done so and that children were remaining in their homes when they should have been removed to foster or kinship care,” the report found.
Under Roche, the agency sought a more balanced approach, advocates said. But Gail Garinger, the state’s child advocate, said the recent surge suggested the pendulum had swung too far in the other direction.
“Clearly a different lens is being used to determine whether court involvement is appropriate,” she said. Given the high threshold for taking custody, “one would hope there are no significant fluctuations in the number of petitions filed,” she said in an interview.
What gets you is they step in when they should not and miss the cases where they should intervene.
Since Jeremiah Oliver’s disappearance, social workers have taken a harder look at families already being monitored by DCF, especially families with young children. Since the death of the Lynn infant, who was born with drugs in his system, the agency has given sharper scrutiny to such cases, advocates said.
Judges, who traditionally give broad deference to the agency’s wishes, have also become more likely to remove children in recent months, advocates said.
Erin Bradley, executive director of Children’s League of Massachusetts, said the rise in young children in foster care further strains that system.
“We haven’t seen a spike like this with kids under 5 in years and years,” Bradley said. “All of my providers are maxed out.”
But we have plenty of money for.... ah, what's the u$e?
Bradley said that she expects DCF petitions to level off this summer, and that some of the increase was justified, a welcome recognition that too many children were being left in risky homes.
Yeah, try to look at the positive side. I was losing that.
Susan Elsen — attorney for the Massachusetts Law Reform Institute, which keeps a close watch on DCF — said investigations of abuse and neglect climbed 67 percent between January and March.
But heavier caseloads make it harder for social workers to determine when parents can no longer safely care for their children and to work with troubled families to help keep them stable.
“It’s important that you don’t let these increases spiral out of control,” she said. “You want to avoid separating children from their families whenever possible.”
Unless you are on staff at BCH, I guess.
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I suppose it really doesn't matter what state you live in:
"Vermont child protection chief welcomes attention" by Wilson Ring | Associated Press June 05, 2014
RUTLAND, Vt. — The head of the Vermont Department for Children and Families said Wednesday that he welcomes public attention about the challenges his department is facing as it tries to protect vulnerable children in an era of shattered families and rising drug abuse.
The commissioner, Dave Yacovone, made the comments after a group of lawmakers held three public hearings Tuesday that gave many witnesses the opportunity to point out what they felt were the department’s shortcomings.
‘‘This kind of focus on these issues gives me promise,’’ said Yacovone. ‘‘Until people look at this issue and do a deep dive and really begin to appreciate the challenges of running a system like this, the challenges that kids are facing — if I want to change the status quo, and I do, the way I do that is to get people to look at these issues.’’
The hearings were called following the deaths of two toddlers in separate incidents. The sessions were intended to learn about the workings of DCF and not investigate the deaths of the children.
The department’s workload has doubled in the last five years as the state has struggled with heroin and other opiate addiction problems.
See: The Iron Pipeline Between Massachusetts and Vermont
Think I will stay off it as often as possible.
During the 90-minute hearing Tuesday evening in Rutland, more than a dozen people told the Legislature’s Committee on Child Protection about their frustration with a system they believe puts the goal of reuniting families ahead of the best interests of children.
Yacovone said the department does put the interests of the child first, noting that over a five-year period, 4,175 children left state custody, and of those, 46 percent were returned to their biological parents.
‘‘The perception I think is that we’re not putting the welfare of the child over genetics,’’ he said. ‘‘It’s like whoops, everybody gets reunified. Hardly. That’s just not the case.’’
While the hearings were not meant to investigate the deaths of the two toddlers, the February death of 2-year-old Dezirae Sheldon of Poultney and the April death of 15-month-old Peighton Geraw of Winooski, who died several hours after being seen by a social worker, hung over the proceedings.
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Related: Vermont man pleads not guilty in death of 2-year-old
NEXT DAY UPDATE:
"Jailed transgender teenager moved to psychiatric center" by Dave Collins | Associated Press June 25, 2014
HARTFORD — A troubled transgender girl detained in the Connecticut adult women’s prison for two months without criminal charges was moved Tuesday to a psychiatric center for children following an outcry by her supporters.
It breaks your heart regardless of how you feel about them. No one deserves such things.
Department of Children and Families Commissioner Joette Katz said the 16-year-old girl was relocated to the Albert J. Solnit Children’s Psychiatric Center, a DCF-run facility in Middletown. The teen had been detained at the York Correctional Institution, the state’s only women’s prison.
The girl’s lawyer and supporters protested her detention in the prison, saying she was being held in solitary confinement that was causing her more psychological harm. The girl has been traumatized by a history of neglect and severe sexual and physical abuse, said her lawyer, Aaron Romano.
Makes me think of another little girl.
DCF officials denied that the girl, known to the public only as Jane Doe, was being held in solitary confinement.
The teen had been in DCF custody before being sent to the jail. DCF officials said she was too violent for them to handle and asked a state judge to transfer her into Department of Correction custody as authorized by a seldom-used state law. The judge approved the request in April.
‘‘All along we’ve said that jail was inappropriate for Jane and we’re pleased with this move,’’ Romano said Tuesday. ‘‘It’s not perfect, but it’s not jail.’’
Romano said DCF officials have promised to continue looking for a foster family for the girl.
DCF, meanwhile, still plans to place her in an undisclosed private youth treatment center in Massachusetts, where she has been accepted for treatment. That move is pending final approval....
We send one back, we get one in return.
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Kinda gets you full circle and set for tomorrow morning.
UPDATES:
A difficult return to hospital for Justina Pelletier
Tufts shutters mitochondrial clinic
