(Another) Lawsuit: Florida Foster Care
From North Port, Florida, the mother of a boy who suffered sexual abuse in foster care has filed a lawsuit seeking ” more than $15,000 in damages from the following defendants: the Sarasota YMCA, Family Preservation Services of Florida, Manatee Children’s Services, Florida Mentor Inc., foster parent Harriet Higgs, and the Florida Department of Children and Families.”
He was removed from his mother’s care in October 2006, just shy of his 9th birthday. “After moving from one foster home to another, and having twice been sexually abused by other children, the 10-year-old North Port boy wrote a suicide note and held a broken bottle up to his throat.”
“The boy did not commit suicide, but now his mother is accusing the foster care system of failing her child, allowing him to be the victim of two child-on-child sexual abuse incidents and providing no mental health treatment until he was driven to two suicide attempts.
“By April 5, 2007, the boy was in his sixth home, the foster home of Higgs, where the lawsuit alleges the boy was sexually abused by another foster child.”
“After that incident in 2007, the boy was placed in the Manatee Children’s Services emergency shelter, where he again was subjected to child-on-child sexual abuse during the six-month stay, the suit alleges.”
Foster Care Agencies Broke Rules
“The lawsuit lists a number of ways the agencies broke state rules about treating foster children. The boy did not get mental health treatment for a year after it was recommended. And he was placed in a foster home where tenants had a history of abuse reports; that home is where the first child-on-child sexual incident took place, the suit states.”
“In November 2007, the boy finally had his first preliminary therapy session, but the lawsuit says it came too late.”
Two Suicide Attempts
The boy was reunited with his mother on May 15, 2008 and is now 13 years old.
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