Once again the Sacramento CPS has allowed another child to die. As reported here and here at The National Republicrat, CPS has serious issues telling the truth and keeping accurate records.
The SacBee.com has a very telling story about how a little girl was brutally beaten and killed.
A 3-year-old Fair Oaks girl beaten to death in her home this year had suffered a broken arm and burned hand eight months earlier, but Sacramento County’s Child Protective Services never divulged those injuries to the court or to the attorneys overseeing her welfare, The Bee has learned.
Instead, a CPS social worker assured the court in August 2007 there were “no health or safety concerns” about Valeeya Brazile and recommended that the little girl remain in her home without further court supervision.
The court agreed, and the case of Valeeya Brazile was closed – until she was brutally beaten and died.
“This kid didn’t have to die,” said a furious Robert Wilson of Sacramento Child Advocates, whose attorneys represent children in dependency court, including Valeeya.
Had Wilson’s attorney advocates been told the full story by CPS, they would have aggressively investigated the circumstances and pushed to keep the case open, he said.
“Had we seen that information anywhere along the line, we would have escalated our investigation,” Wilson said. “There would have been red lights and red flags at our end.”
Valeeya died Feb. 5 from a severe beating, though the coroner concluded that the 31½-pound girl had been a victim of battered child syndrome, suffering numerous injuries over time. The mother’s boyfriend, Thomas Jerome Martin, has been charged with her murder.
The revelations about CPS’ knowledge of the child’s injuries – and its lack of disclosure to the court – are contained in internal agency records and juvenile court documents released to The Bee after a seven-month legal effort by the newspaper.
CPS documents chronicle the girl’s injuries. But the juvenile court files show that the girl’s attorneys and the court’s referee – who ultimately decided Valeeya’s placement – were told by CPS social worker Alexis Hince in a court report only that Valeeya was up to date on medical and dental exams. The girl “appears to be meeting normal developmental milestones for her age group,” the social worker stated.
Hince did not respond to a request for comment. CPS spokeswoman Laurie Slothower, in an e-mail response to a list of questions, wrote, “We cannot discuss specific case details because the information is confidential. However, it is CPS practice to provide all relevant information in court documents.”
Juvenile Court Referee Peter Helfer, who made the decision to remove Valeeya from the court’s oversight based on the social worker’s recommendation, did not respond to a request for comment.
Children had been placed in foster care
Valeeya and her older sibling had been taken away from their mother, Milicca Holmes, in October 2006 after Holmes was arrested for trying to run over a man, whom she had been dating, in a Jiffy Lube parking lot. At the time, Valeeya was in the back seat, in a car seat not belted in.
Initially, the girl and her brother were placed into foster care but were returned home to their two-bedroom, one-bathroom apartment Feb. 15, 2007, under CPS supervision. The court was asked to decide in August 2007 whether the children should remain dependents of the court.
In her July 23, 2007, “In-Home Review Report” to the court, social worker Hince praised Holmes for successfully completing counseling, parenting classes, a 15-week domestic violence support group and alcohol and drug treatment and testing. As a result, Hince determined that the children’s risk was “low.”
“The mother immediately recognized the error of her ways and focused on changing her behaviors and reunifying with her children,” wrote Hince in her summary. The summary also bears the name of Lynn Frank, director of the county’s Department of Health and Human Services.
Hince would acknowledge after the death that she never met Martin and did not know he was living in the home, according to CPS documents.
Helfer, the Juvenile Court referee, agreed with the recommendation on Aug. 2, 2007, and Valeeya and her sibling were removed from the court’s jurisdiction and placed in the “sole legal and physical custody of the mother.”
Enough is enough…
As I have stated on numerous occasions, there needs to be a full investigation at CPS. They need to start at the top and hand out a few pink slips.
October 5th, 2008 at 6:37 am
Children Who Didn’t Have to Die -
In recent years, there have been numerous stories in newspapers around the world about the failures of the departments of Family Services and Social Services to do their respective jobs of monitoring and assisting children in dangerous situations. Do we ever read about a child murdered by a family that the Department of Children & Families or the Sheriff’s Office has not already investigated, usually more than once? What will it take to protect these innocent children?
These stories are a step in the right direction, but one wonders if perhaps they came too late. All the outrage in the world can’t resurrect a dead child.
Too many children have died as a result of wrong decisions by CPS. With power comes responsibility and accountability, which most officials ignore. A child welfare system so overwhelmed with children who DON’T need to be in foster care,the less time they have to find children in real danger.
The CPS is actually wrong on both sides more than half of the time. In fact, the figure was 80% by four different studies by four different independent organizations. The CPS took away children who were not abused nor neglected 80% of the time. The CPS passed up taking away children who were abused 80% of the time and left them in danger.
Let’s NOT allow these precious children’s death to be in vain - in the news one day, forgotten the next.
These children died needlessly,they deserve at least one minute of silent contemplation and an entire day of honor and remembrance. PLEASE SIGN PETITION
Children Who Didn’t Have to Die - Website http://suncanaa.com/
October 14th, 2008 at 3:20 am
I am not surprised at Ms. Hince’s behavior. My daughter had her children removed from her home due to an abusive relationship that involved her boyfriend using physical violence against her. None of the children had been threatened or had corporal punishment used against them, however CPS felt it necessary to remove the children. Ms. Hince was assigned the file and proceeded to encourage my daughter and her boyfriend living together once my daughter had her children returned to her care. I personally had a conversation with Ms. Hince about the situation and that I wanted my daughter to relocate to my home in Stockton area because the boyfriend was in the home and causing a financial strain on my daughter. She refused to allow my daughter to bring the children to my home, telling me that my daughter’s boyfriend needed to learn to step up and act like a father. I told her this was a bad relationship and she then accused me of being a bigot and racist since I was white and the boyfriend is black. She went so far as to tell me, “I have worked with so many white families who think that any relationship with a black person is not a good one and they have to save their family members from the outside black person by raising the children in a white family”. I later found out that my daughter’s case was Ms. Hince’s first case after having been hired as a case worker. I had telephoned Ms. Hince’s supervisor who wanted dates and times of my phone conversations with her and insisted that she knew Ms. Hince would never have said and done the things she was doing without even investigating the matter. When my daughter had a fight with her boyfriend, he took one of the three children and ran off to Oakland with her. In our attempts to try and locate the father, Ms. Hince was aware of the fact that the child had been abducted. She did not act until she found out that my daughter had moved to my house due to her fear that the boyfriend would return and either hurt her or take the rest of the children from her. Ms. Hince began demanding that my daughter return to her apartment in Sacramento after she had only been at my house for two days. Ms. Hince saw no reason to be worried about the abducted child, only the fact that my daughter was at my home in an effort to protect herself and the other two children. Ms. Hince only reported the child being missing to her supervisor in her efforts to force my daughter to go back to the apartment. When her supervisor told Ms. Hince to call the police and have the children removed from my home and taken into custody because my daughter refused to move back to her apartment, Ms. Hince had to admit that only two children would be at my home for the police to take into custody and that the third child had been taken by the boyfriend, further denying having any knowledge that the boyfriend had been living in the same apartment with my daughter while under CPS supervision. She told her supervisor that she had only just discovered that the boyfriend had been living there the day she had to speak with her supervisor about forcing my daughter to return to her home. When the police came to my home, I asked if we could drive the children to Sacramento, as we had told Ms. Hince we would do after the children finished their dinner. They phoned Ms. Hince’s supervisor who agreed to the arrangement. When we arrived, instead of allowing my daughter to say goodbye to her children, Ms. Hince began interrogating my daughter as if she knew nothing about the events which led up to the circumstances. I filed many complaints, calling CPS every turn of events that caused concern. I finally located someone through the legal review department investigator who gave me a phone number to call and report my concerns to which was outside of the CPS offices. I only wish I could remember the woman’s name (Bell). I called her regularly and she finally told me that the people to report my issues to felt that Ms. Hince had done nothing to cause concern. I wonder if anyone of them remembers our case and wish they had listened, it would have saved a young child’s life. I even sent a letter to Arnold Schwarzenegger’s office. I never received a response. CPS needs an agency to report to that is outside of itself. This is proof of just that. Ms. Hince was fresh in the job in July of ‘06 and just two years later, a child is dead due to her recognizing that lieing is okay and no one checks up on the workers or questions them when there are justified complaints. I hope Ms. Hince is brought to trial and is found guilty of intentional manslaughter!