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Archive for the ‘Department of Children & Families (DCF)’ Category

Florida Child Abuse Attorney: Another Child, 1, Dies Who Was Known to DCF

June 20th, 2013   No Comments   Abuse, Department of Children & Families (DCF)

Another child has died. And again, in an alarming trend, the child was one known to officials at the Florida Department of Children and Families. Though the child’s death was considered “mysterious” by some, the toddler’s death is under DCF investigation.

According to news reports, the child was cold and unresponsive when found in his crib in his Cape Coral home. He was later pronounced dead at an area hospital.

A DCF report revealed that some two weeks earlier, the child arrived at an area hospital suffering multiple skull fractures. Doctors were told by his mother and her boyfriend that the boy hit his head after being knocked over by the family dog. The two gave “conflicting reports” regarding the night the boy died.

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Florida Child Advocate Attorneys’ $2.2 million Settlement vs ChildNet, DCF Profiled in Local Media

March 28th, 2013   No Comments   Court Cases, Damage Claims, Department of Children & Families (DCF), Sexual Abuse

A $2.2 million settlement negotiated by attorneys for two young girls who were repeatedly sexually abused by their mother, even after experts warned and judges admonished community based care provider ChildNet Inc., and the Florida Department of Children and Families, recently was profiled in South Florida publication, Daily Business Review.

As part of the settlement, ChildNet will pay its maximum policy limit of $2 million; DCF, which contracted ChildNet for services, will pay its statutory cap of $200,000. Read the story here.

According to news releases, ChildNet and DCF refuse to accept any responsibility for their repeated and gross negligence, regardless of the settlement, said Joel Fass, a partner with Colodny Fass Talenfeld Karlinsky Abate & Webb P.A., who along with Howard Talenfeld and Stacie Schmerling were the plaintiffs’ counsel.

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Op-Ed: Disability Rights: More Must Be Done for At-Risk Children and Their Parents

February 19th, 2013   No Comments   Advocacy, Damage Claims, Department of Children & Families (DCF)

A letter by Florida child advocacy attorney Howard Talenfeld was published today in the Daily Business Review’s Practice Focus section. Entitled, “Disability Rights: More Must Be Done for At-Risk Children and Their Parents,” the letter noted how advocates can only hope that state leaders learn that cutting budgets at the expense of at-risk children rarely delivers the result one expects – and it could lend to a class action that is certified and a federal court injunction.

Talenfeld, of Colodny, Fass, Talenfeld, Karlinsky, Abate & Webb, wrote that, “To any Florida attorney who fights to protect the rights of and prevent damages to severely disabled children, the past several years have been tough to watch.

“Children with highly complex medical conditions and who had been cared for by their parents or guardians have been wrongly denied skilled, private duty nursing hours to assist in the care. Left little choice, some parents were forced to send the children to institutions, including nursing homes.

“Many children suffered. A few died.”

Read Talenfeld’s entire letter here.

Disabled Child Attorney: In Dramatic Shift, AHCA Changes Rules to Help State’s Kids, Parents

February 4th, 2013   No Comments   Advocacy, Department of Children & Families (DCF), Disability Issues

To any Florida attorney who fights and sues to protect the rights of and prevent damages to disabled, vulnerable or foster children, the past two years have been tough to watch. Over that time, Florida’s Agency for Health Care Administration has been attempting to balance its budget on the backs of Florida’s Medically Fragile Children and their parents who want to care for them at home by violating the Federal Medicaid Act and chopping the number of hours that they are willing to reimburse parents for medically necessary private duty nurses.

Through their contracted agent, eQ Health Solutions, Inc, AHCA ignores the medical histories and the number of hours these parents have received and are entitled to in attempt to force the parents, many of whom have full time jobs to care for these children — many of whom are on ventilators, have trach tubes to breath and are fed through G-tubes. AHCA ignores the capacities or lack of capacity of many of the parents to assess emergencies and intervene with life saving procedures.

The ground is shifting. The rules are changing. In the Legislature and AHCA itself, change has come, according to this Miami Herald story.

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Divided Verdict in Rilya Wilson Child Abuse, Murder Case Raises More Questions

January 26th, 2013   No Comments   Court Cases, Department of Children & Families (DCF)

When jurors this week convicted Geralyn Graham of abusing and kidnapping foster child Rilya Wilson, who had been left in her care and later lost for almost two years by the Florida Department of Children and Families – but deadlocked on the murder charge — it represented a partial victory for the system and little Rilya. The kidnapping charge comes with 30 years to life in prison, with the aggravated child abuse bringing 30 years with five additional years for child abuse. But 10 years after her disappearance, questions and concerns still remain for those concerned about avoiding child abuse, personal injury and damages t0 Florida’s most vulnerable.

Although justice was done today when the jury finally convicted Graham of kidnapping and aggravated child abuse, Florida DCF has forgotten many of the lessons learned from the Blue Ribbon Panel about the 193 other children who are listed n DCF’s web site as missing from their placement today.

They are ages 6 through 18 and the public has no idea how long each of the children has been missing. One is as young six years old girl, and DCF does not know where she is today.

How many other Rilya Wilsons are out there. How many will perish? How many are victims of physical and sexual assault? How many are in harm way?

These are questions we need asked – and answered. Read more about Geralyn Graham’s verdict here.

Advocates Wonder About Another Lost in South Florida Child Protection Maze

January 11th, 2013   No Comments   Commentary, Department of Children & Families (DCF)

Several years ago, Rilya Wilson went missing while under the care of a foster parent – and the apparent watchful eyes of Florida Department of Children and Families case workers. Now, word has emerged that Dontrell Melvin hasn’t been seen by county and regional child protective services since summer 2011.

Another child slipped through the cracks and is lost. The news raises serious questions about the Florida Department of Children and Families, its children hotline and the wisdom of recent budget cuts. To be sure, these two cases are dissimilar. Rilya was in foster care; Dontrell is more a case of investigative woes by the Broward Sheriff’s Office and Child Net’s failure to provide protective services.

Yet, the end result is the same. A child is missing – and no one knows where he or she is. Read the story here.

More to the point, in the case of little Dontrell, no one even looked for about 18 months. Now, Hallandale Beach Police are on the hunt.

Unlike Rilya’s case, where her foster mother, Geralyn Graham is being tried in Rilya’s purported death (as no body ever has been found), one can only hope for a positive outcome. UPDATE: Police on Friday reportedly found human remains in the Melvin yard.

Still, police are asking anyone who knows anything of Dontrell’s whereabouts or details to call 954-457-1400 or Broward County Crime Stoppers at 954-493-8477.

Foster Child Attorney: Proposed Federal Changes to Florida Disabled Child Program Welcome

January 11th, 2013   No Comments   Abuse, Aging Out, Department of Children & Families (DCF)

Florida child advocates, attorneys and legal guardians who have seen physical abuse, mistreatment and neglect of the state’s most medically and at-risk disabled children applaud the U.S. Department of Justice proposed overhaul of the state’s programs for these vulnerable populations – even as  leaders from the Florida Department of Children and Families and the Agency for Healthcare Administration defend their practices.

The federal government this week pressured state leaders to improve its care and treatment of those children who suffer from severe medical conditions. The harsh indictment of Florida’s program and history of care for this population came in the form of a 17-page settlement proposal from federal civil rights lawyers, who offered “a comprehensive blueprint for overhauling the state’s system of care for frail youngsters,” wrote the Miami Herald.

In it, the DOJ “demands the state stop slicing in-home nursing services for frail youngsters, stop ignoring the requests of family doctors who treat disabled children and stop sending hundreds of children to geriatric nursing homes — where they often spend their childhoods isolated from families and peers,” the paper wrote.

Meanwhile, leaders from heads of three state agencies, including the Agency for Healthcare Administration and the Florida Department of Children and Families, defended at a Tallahassee news conference the state’s process of housing of hundreds of disabled children in nursing homes.

Read the entire article here.

At-Risk, Foster Child Attorney: Parents Speak Out about State’s Care of Disabled Children

January 8th, 2013   No Comments   Advocacy, Department of Children & Families (DCF)

As parents this week complained about the care of their disabled children – claiming the state chooses to warehouse these medically fragile youths in senior nursing homes instead of letting them be cared for by family in their own homes – Florida child advocates, attorneys and legal guardians wonder when the state’s practice will stop. The lack of appropriate oversight, as well as the potential physical abuse, mistreatment and neglect of the state’s most medically and at-risk disabled children, leaves this vulnerable populations crying for better care.

In one case, lawmakers heard about Christian Perez. Twice in the past year, state health administrators ignored the boy’s pediatrician’s prescribed care regimen and reduced how many hours caregivers assisted the severely disabled boy at his Miami-area home.

Parents at the meeting rebuked state agency leaders who said private vendors contracted to administer care and oversight huddled with children’s primary care physicians before making decisions regarding care.

Read the entire story here.

Pro Bono Attorney: Florida’s Practice of ‘Warehousing’ Disabled Children in Geriatric Nursing Homes

December 30th, 2012   No Comments   Abuse, Court Cases, Department of Children & Families (DCF)

The case was dramatic – where most tend not to be. In a hearing room, a single mother – present with her severely disabled 10-year-old daughter – fought state healthcare administrators to give her child the care doctors say she needs. With child advocacy attorney Howard Talenfeld at her side, the woman alternated between stating her case – and providing the type of care she insists the child will not get if sent off to a geriatric nursing home, like so many such disabled children are under Florida guidelines and practices.

She’s not alone. “In September, the U.S. Justice Department said Florida had ‘planned, structured and administered a system of care that has led to the unnecessary segregation and isolation of children, often for many years,’ in geriatric nursing homes,” reported the Miami Herald.

“Children in such homes often spend their days in virtual seclusion, lying in bed or watching television, the civil rights division wrote.” With Talenfeld at her side and handling the case pro bono, the single mother sought to fight the way Florida cares for its most at-risk, disabled children.

Teen’s Death in Senior Nursing Home a ‘Travesty,’ Leads Florida Department of Children and Families to Alter Policy

December 6th, 2012   No Comments   Advocacy, Commentary, Department of Children & Families (DCF)

In the wake of the death of Marie Freyre – the 14-year-old Tampa child with cerebral palsy forcibly removed from her home and placed in an adult nursing home, where she soon died – the Florida Department of Children and Families now is pushing to curb the practice of steering foster kids to such institutionalized care.

Administrators are demanding “high-level approval” before kids can be admitted to a nursing home or moved from one to another. The agency also will recruit foster parents with the skills to care for the state’s most fragile and at-risk children.

Christina Spudeas, executive director at Florida’s Children First, the state’s premier child advocacy organization, told the paper that DCF must do more than slow the move of kids into nursing homes. It must remove them all children from such institutions.

“It’s a travesty,” Spudeas told the Herald. “There is no doubt at all that children need proper supports in the home environment.”

The original policies not only seemingly made little sense – in Marie’s case, taking her from her mother, who’d provided care for all her life. In-home care and oversight can be far less expensive than in-facility services.

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Questions About Florida Department of Children and Families Surround Murder Trial of Caretaker of Foster Child Rilya Wilson

November 25th, 2012   No Comments   Abuse, Court Cases, Department of Children & Families (DCF)

Child advocates and child welfare attorneys are watching closely as a trial sparked by the disappearance of a young girl gets started. In the balance hangs how the state tracks youths – and how lawsuits, damages and personal injury stemming from children being physically abused or sexually abused, neglected or the subject of wrongful death may hold the state accountable.

As the murder trial starts for Geralyn Graham – the caretaker for foster child Rilya Wilson, who was last seen alive more than a decade ago while under the supposed watch of the Florida Department of Children and Families – many questions remain.

Rilya’s body has never been found. It had been more than a year since a state worker last saw the child. She’s long since been presumed dead. But the impact of this little girl has been dramatic upon Florida DCF, its leadership and the way kids under its watch are actually watched, documented and protected.

DCF went through an administrative house cleaning after news of Rilya’s disappearance emerged. Hearings were held. DCF employees were fired; the top administrator in Miami resigned and the DCF secretary left. A report was issued. The Florida Legislature got involved.

Advocates demanded transparency and accountability from the organization. Maybe this case will help deliver both. Read a Miami Herald article on the case here.

Newspaper Pursues Claims of Abuse ‘In God’s Name’ at Florida’s Unlicensed Religious Children’s Homes

October 30th, 2012   No Comments   Abuse, Department of Children & Families (DCF)

This investigative series from the Tampa Bay Times explores the sad story of unlicensed religious children’s homes in Florida. While most promise righteousness through military-like exercise and recitation of Scripture, the stories reveal claims of practices that border on or include physical abuse, personal injury, wrongful death and other actions. It also highlights responses and findings from the Florida Department of Children and Families. For many advocates, guardians or attorneys keen to protect the rights of foster children or any in Florida’s at-risk population, the package deserves reading. Visit the entire package here.

(UPDATE) According to the Lakeland Ledger, the DCF promises to investigate the situation.

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