How Could You? Hall of Shame-Kimberly Vollmer and lawsuit UPDATED

This will be an archive of heinous actions by those involved in child welfare, foster care and adoption. We forewarn you that these are deeply disturbing stories that may involve sex abuse, murder, kidnapping and other horrendous actions.

From Portland, Oregon, foster parent Kimberly Vollmer, 33, is accused of hitting a 4-year-old girl in the face. She was arrested on Thursday, January 24, 2013. She faces one count each of third-degree assault and first-degree criminal mistreatment. She was arraigned on Friday in Multnomah County Circuit Court.

“Court documents show that a report was filed on Jan. 13 due to a visible injury on the girl’s face. When asked how she got the injury, the girl replied that her foster mother hit her.

A detective met with Vollmer, who told her the injuries were caused by a change in laundry detergent, according to court records.

Police said Vollmer then suggested the girl was just remembering abuse by her biological mother.

Detectives informed Vollmer that doctors determined the injuries were inflicted on the girl. Police also interviewed other children in the home who said they witnessed Vollmer hit the girl.

Vollmer is a foster parent to four children, including the alleged victim.

Police said Vollmer eventually admitted striking the child in the face.

Court documents show Vollmer said she had just put all the children down for a nap, but the 4-year-old girl wanted to watch TV.

Vollmer said the girl began screaming at the top of her lungs and she was worried it would wake up the other children. Vollmer said she became frustrated, according to police records, and hit the girl with her left hand.

She said the girl then quieted down, according to investigators.

On a scale of one to 10, with 10 being the highest, police said Vollmer admitted the force she used in striking the girl was a 10.

Vollmer was released from jail and she’s due back in court Feb. 8.”

Foster mom accused of hitting 4-year-old girl in the face

[KPTV 1/25/13]

“On Jan. 13, Oregon Department of Human Services (DHS) notified Portland police detectives that a report was filed against a foster parent for allegedly striking a child. DHS officers said the 4-year-old girl had a visible injury to her face.
On Jan. 15, detectives with the Multnomah County Child Abuse Team spoke with Vollmer, who also has three other foster children.
According to investigators, Vollmer alleged that the child’s injury occurred when she was changing laundry detergent. When asked why the child would make up a story about being assaulted, Vollmer reportedly told detectives that the child had been abused when she was younger.
Doctors with CARES Northwest, a medically-based child abuse assessment and intervention program, determined that the child’s injuries were intentional, Portland police said. DHS investigators interviewed the three other children, who reported witnessing Vollmer hit the girl in the face. ”

Portland woman accused of punching 4-year-old foster child in the face

[KOIN 1/25/13 by Brent Weisberg]

REFORM Puzzle Pieces

Update: “A North Portland foster mom of four who struck her 4-year-old foster child in the face hard enough to leave behind the red imprints of her fingers was sentenced Tuesday to three days in jail.

Kimberly Janelle Vollmer, 34, pleaded guilty in Multnomah County Circuit Court last Friday to third-degree assault. She has lost all of her foster children.

Portland foster mom slapped 4-year-old girl, left finger imprints, gets 3 days jail

[Oregon Live 7/23/13 by Aimee Green]

Update 2:”A Portland jury on Friday awarded the largest sum ever levied against the Oregon Department of Human Services for failing to protect children: $4.1 million to two girls who said they were molested by their Portland foster mom, who had been reported to a child-abuse hotline seven times before state child-welfare workers intervened.

During a two-week trial in Multnomah County Circuit Court, attorneys for the girls said that the state failed to protect the then 2- and 4-year-olds from Kimberly Janelle Vollmer, who never should have been certified as a foster parent.

DHS approved Vollmer, then 31, in  January 2011, even though she had a borderline low IQ of about 70; had been hospitalized in 2005 on a psychiatric hold for five days because she’d purposely cut her arms and her face; and had been fired from a job as an adult caregiver because of repeated medical negligence, the girls’ attorneys said.

Even though Vollmer originally was supposed to care for three foster kids at most, DHS let her house as many as eight children at a time, the girls’ lawyers said.

After deliberating for three hours, the jury gave the girls every dollar their attorneys asked for: $2 million for each child’s pain and suffering, and $50,000 apiece to cover years, if not decades, of counseling.

“We only hope the Department of Human Services and the Oregon Legislature will hear and respond to the jury’s message, and do what needs to be done to ensure these vulnerable children are placed in safe foster homes,” said Portland attorney Josh Lamborn, who represented one of the girls, who was identified only as E.S. in the lawsuit.

Portland attorney Erin Olson represented the other girl, identified as N.E.

A state spokeswoman did not return requests seeking comment on Saturday.

The next largest payout by DHS for crimes committed in a child-welfare case was $3.75 million. In 2007, a Gresham man so violently shook his 2-year-old foster daughter that he blinded her in one eye and caused irreversible brain damage. The money given to the girl, Stephanie Kuntupis, was a settlement, not a jury verdict.

During the trial of E.S. and N.E., attorneys for DHS contended that the child-protection agency couldn’t have known of the terrible abuses taking place under Vollmer’s roof.

Vollmer lived in both North and Northeast Portland in the roughly two years she worked as a foster parent.

During that time, DHS received seven calls to its child-abuse hotline, Lamborn said. Some of the calls pertained to unexplained blood in the diaper of a different foster child. Another call was made by an employee of a medical clinic, who reported seeing Vollmer slap one of her foster children so hard the child fell to the floor.

“They closed it at screening,” Lamborn said of the agency’s query into the reported slap. “They called her on the phone, and she denied it, and they believed her.”

DHS finally intervened in January 2013, after 4-year-old N.E. was singing at church but suddenly stopped. She was crying, and the pastor’s wife asked her why.

N.E. said nothing was wrong, but the pastor’s wife noticed what looked like a handprint on the girl’s face. The pastor took a look and noticed blood in the corner of the girl’s mouth. The girl reluctantly told the pastor that Vollmer hit her.

At CARES Northwest, an organization that assesses children for possible abuse, N.E. told investigators that her foster mom hit her and the other children.

The girl also said her foster mother had stuck her fingers inside of her, Lamborn said, but an exam turned up no physical evidence of sexual abuse.

Vollmer was criminally charged for the incident that left the handprint on N.E.’s face, and she pleaded guilty in Multnomah County Circuit Court to third-degree assault. She was sentenced to three days in jail, and three years of probation.

At the time of Vollmer’s sentencing in July 2013, a prosecutor said he couldn’t comment on the possibility of filing charges against Vollmer tied to any sex crimes.

There also was some evidence that Vollmer had physically and sexually abused E.S., said Lamborn, the girl’s attorney. A few months after E.S. was removed from Vollmer’s home, she told her new foster mom that she’d been sexually abused.

A medical exam at CARES Northwest found evidence of the abuse, although the girl didn’t say anything about sexual abuse to an investigator, Lamborn said. But she did say Vollmer had struck her in the face.

Lamborn said even though the girl was barely 3 years old at the time of the CARES Northwest assessment, she was “extremely verbal” and exceptionally bright. Tests showed she has an IQ of 115.

Lamborn said he and Olson, the other attorney, found red flag after red flag in their investigations of Vollmer’s life before she was allowed to become a foster parent. Vollmer indicated some of her problems on her DHS application. Others, she omitted, Lamborn said.

But the now-retired employee who certified Vollmer as a foster parent failed to do a thorough investigation by, for example, checking the Portland Police Bureau’s data system, the girls’ lawyers said. Doing so would have turned up police reports about Vollmer’s 2005 hospitalization for cutting herself, and reports about a friend who’d called police in 2006 saying Vollmer was missing and reportedly expressing suicidal thoughts, they said.

No DHS employees were disciplined for lapses that allowed Vollmer to become a foster parent and allowed her to commit sexual, physical and psychological abuse of her foster children, the girls’ attorneys said.

The jury’s award will go into funds for E.S. and N.E., and a court-appointed representative will monitor how it is spent.

Since leaving Vollmer’s home, the girls have been adopted by different families.[UGH! Why?] They are both living in “safe and loving homes,” Lamborn said.”

Portland jury awards record sum against DHS: $4.1M to girls who said foster mom molested them[Oregon Live 12/13/14 by Aimee Green]