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I had previously blogged about an independent study into foster care in Michigan and that it did not reflect very favorably.
A lawsuit that has been filed proves this case even more so. The child advocacy group, Children’s Rights has filed a lawsuit on behalf of foster children in Michigan. They content that the lack of care the children are receiving makes them as vulnerable as if they had stayed in their abusive birth home.
The lawsuit is highlighting five cases where a foster child died while in care, and the deaths could have easily been prevented.
In one case a foster home had already been sited nine times for maltreatment when a two year old boy in their care was beaten and burned. Why in the world was this foster home still licensed? There should not have been a child placed in this home.
Then there is the woman who abused her own biological daughter in the previous year, was allowed placement of a three and a half year old boy and the boy died of head injuries. Again, why was this woman allowed to have placement of another child?
Another case is for a seven week old baby who was suffocated with a pillow on an adult bed. Foster care has very strict rules about a foster child being in an adult’s bed. It is specifically forbidden.
A fifteen month old girl died in her own home because she was not being monitored by the agency as she should have been. She was abused when she was two weeks old. She had a fractured skull, fractured collar bone and fractured ribs. For some reason the child was returned to her home, and was eventually beaten to death because the monitoring agency failed to report two more incidents of abuse that this little girl suffered. Why wasn’t she removed for the abuse?
And lastly was a teenage girl who was placed with a relative. Seventeen people in a three bedroom home and the young woman had a history of mental illness. She was not treated, ran away and eventually committed suicide.
All of these deaths could have easily been prevented. I’d say that Michigan needs to do a serious overhaul of their foster care system, but then again, I believe many other states need to do the same thing.
What I was always amazed by is the nit-picky details the workers always seemed to focus on when I was licensed. How is is possible that a worker who will comment specifically on the fact that my “Pool Safety Plan” was not posted near the pool could be the same worker who doesn’t notice that a child has an inordinate amount of “accidents” in another home? I always thought they were really picky and I was such a neat freak!! I had a foster parent in our county comment to me that her worker told her that her house was “too clean” when they’d visit and that made her worry that the worker thought she was too rigid or spent more time cleaning than parenting. Ultimately it was used against her.
Yes- I don’t want Michigan to be alone in its criticism. My state has just as many problems with its system and it will take ALL of us speaking out for there to ever be any kind of reform.
Kim