A woman is suing the Los Angeles County Department of Children and Family Services, alleging she was sexually abused as a child by her foster father and two foster brothers, impregnated at age 13 by one of the brothers, arranged to have an abortion by her case worker and kept in the home and abused for another two years.
The plaintiff is identified only as F.M. in the Los Angeles Superior Court negligence suit, which does not specifically identify the DCFS as a defendant, but instead refers to it as a “Doe” agency with an address of 425 Shatto Place, the location of the DCFS offices.
“Maltreatment of children in foster care has been a problem that defendants have failed to address in a reasonable manner consistent with their duties to children under their jurisdiction,” according to the suit, which also alleges a coverup of F.M.’s abuse by the agency.
The suit filed Wednesday, July 21, seeks unspecified damages. The DCFS issued a statement Thursday regarding the suit.
“At any given time, the Department of Children and Family Services serves more than 34,000 children in Los Angeles County with an unwavering commitment to pursue child safety every day in our communities; our nearly 9,000 employees take that role very seriously and work hard to safeguard the children in our care,” the statement read. “All DCFS employees and contracted providers are held to the highest standards to ensure that the public trust in our service is honored and maintained. We cannot comment on any pending claim, litigation or lawsuit involving the department at this time.”
The DCFS placed F.M. and her sister, J.M., in foster care for about 13 years beginning in 1984, the suit states.
“The foster parents … were approved, licensed, trained, supervised and/or compensated by defendants,” the suit states.
F.M.’s foster father repeatedly sexually assaulted and abused F.M., as did the plaintiff’s two foster brothers, according to the suit. In 1993, when F.M. was 13 years old, she contracted a sexually transmitted disease as the result of one of the brother’s sexual assaults and she also experienced pain in her private parts, so her foster mother took her to a doctor, the suit states.
“At the doctor’s office, she was diagnosed with a sexually transmitted disease and advised that she was five months pregnant,” the suit states.
F.M.’s pregnancy was reported to her case worker, who told her to get an abortion and took her to a clinic to have it done, according to the suit.
The DCFS kept F.M. and her sister in the foster home for another two years and the two foster brothers continued to molest her, the suit states.
The DCFS knew or had reason to know about the one foster brother’s abuse and impregnation of F.M., and the subsequent abortion, but “covered up their knowledge of (the foster brother’s) sexual abuse of plaintiff, thereby allowing such further abuse to continue,” according to the suit.
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Jess says
They do not go above and beyond and that is the problem if they just made it a point to talk to the foster kids alone without foster families there for them to tell the whole truth about what is going on then so many things would be better but they don’t even take the time to do that, so many of these problems could be avoided if you could just take the time to seperate the foster child nd ask them how thier new home is going but nope this is why kids in the system are abused and taken advantage of , social workers think thier job is just to transport them to thier new home and that’s it
ACE says
ABOLISH THE DCFS NOW..!
THEY HURT LITTLE KIDS AND DESTROY FAMILIES FOREVER…
IT’S A BIG MONEY DEAL FOR A LOT OF CORRUPT ORGANIZATIONS…
THEIR SYSTEM TURNS FOSTER KIDS INTO DOPE ADDICTS AND PROSTITUTES…
THROW OUT BARGER TOO…
DCFS says
“…our nearly 9,000 employees take that role very seriously and work hard to safeguard the children in our care…”
The DCFS is a failure in every sense of the word.
Tim Scott says
While obviously true, what is the better option?
When birth parents fail we can’t just turn kids out into the streets.
DCFS supervision certainly fails horribly on a far too frequent basis, but does anyone think foster parents would do better without supervision?
The Church says
Just give them to us. We LOVE kids and with the supervision of our priests they be in good hands. ;)
Stinger says
lol – I saw what you did there…
Stinger says
Although there is much that needs to be addressed with the DCFS, there is one little change in the law that would help dramatically: Simply disallow for totally anonymous reporting.
The reporting of potential abuse or neglect, etc., is the opening of a legal case that can, and frequently does, upend families even just during the investigation phase. The anonymity granted in the DCFS reporting process has allowed for the system to be used by unscrupulous people that use it for revenge for any perceived slight, rather than its intended purpose of protecting children.
Totally anonymous reporting has, due mostly to the issue I noted in the last paragraph, caused a great deal of problems for the budget and effectiveness of the DCFS. Several acquaintances within DCFS have estimated somewhere upwards of 65% of their anonymously provided ‘tips’ turn out to be maliciously initiated. Investigating these take a lot of time, energy, attention, and money away from the real cases that need to be handled, making DCFS much less efficient than they could be.
Yes, people reporting potential neglect and abuse should, absolutely, have their identity shielded for protection, but the report should be treated like any other law enforcement report, with repercussions for intentional false reports. For those who are more fearful than the rest of us in reporting honest observations of abuse and neglect, protections against retaliation should be in place. But outright anonymous reporting must be curtailed for the integrity of the system to be returned.
This alone would go far in helping to clear up some of the muddy waters of the incoming reports and allow for better concentration on real cases. Which, in turn, should help to reduce these tragic situations from happening.
Tim Scott says
Good intentions gone wrong.
Author says
Totally agree but I’d like to add that the modifications to the ASFA act of 1997 and the CAPTA act of 1998 need to be revoked.
Specifically the sections that the feds entitled states to incentivize adoptions for financial compensation based completely on after the fact removal reimbursement and after the fact adoption reimbursement.
Again, good intentions gone wrong and systematically misused.
Stinger says
Seems to be a lot of that at good ol’ DCFS, huh?
I would also recommend the elimination of the unconstitutionally run kangaroo courts they use, too.
TomThumb says
Yep. They’re always right on time on payday tho.