Postplacement Debacle with Illinois DCFS

By now, none of you are shocked to see “debacle” and “Illinois DCFS” in the same title. It is par for the course.

Hat tip to a reader who sent this new case to us. See the pdf: Illinois Postplacement June 2012

We covered other Illinois lack-of-assistance-in-postplacement cases here and here.

This case involves a kinship care adoption of a mentally ill boy. The child was born drug-exposed and was adopted by his mother’s first cousin when he was six. He was hospitalized in a psychiatric ward FIVE times. In December 2010, the child, now 15 years old, had a physical altercation with the adoptive mother and her partner. That is where this DCFS case begins.

The adoptive mother disagreed with how DCFS was handling residential treatment placement and followup. She was charged with neglect. A custody hearing took place between August to October 2011. At one point DCFS said that she refused to sign consent papers. It turns out that she was never given any consent papers to begin with.

The appellate court DID overturn this neglect ruling on June 13, 2012. The discussion of why this was overturned starts on Page 10 of the pdf. At the heart of this discussion is point 33 “At the adjudicatory stage under the Act, parents are not adjudged neglectful; rather, minors are adjudged neglected” aka no-fault dependency. A child that cannot be cared for by the parent is also what disruptions are about. (In this case, the adoptive mother still wanted to have the parental connection.)

Ultimately, this is about states not wanting to fund mental health care. The adoptive parents are often caught in the middle, unable to care for the child and subject to criminal neglect. Thankfully this parent has been cleared from wrongdoing.

 

REFORM Puzzle Piece