Lawsuit: Washington DSHS

By on 10-21-2014 in Abuse in foster care, Government lawsuits, How could you? Hall of Shame, Lawsuits, Washington

Lawsuit: Washington DSHS

“Foster parents who adopted a 12-year-old boy in 2013 and later found out he had molested their other children, are suing the Department of Social and Health Services.

The boy, whom the adoptive parents say is now convicted of child molestation, lives with his adoptive father’s parents in a separate house they pay for, because he is not allowed to be with his siblings who are victims.

The parents’ lawsuit was moved to federal court this week and alleges their social worker and the state failed to inform them of crucial reports about their adopted son.

Trish and Steven, who did not want to use their last names, now have seven children: four biological and three adopted.

By March 2013, they had adopted their three children who were previously in their foster care. But two months later, Trish said they discovered their 8-year-old biological son was making sexual gestures.

He told Trish that was what his oldest brother, the recently adopted boy, had done to him.

“I was getting scared,” Trish said. “Then he said, he does this to our other one too. I lost it. I was crying.”

After discussions with their other children, they verified all of them had experienced the same thing. While she said she had often talked to them about not letting adults touch them inappropriately, the children told her they thought it was OK, because their brother was not an adult.

Trish said she was not informed of the child’s previous incidents.

“I also found there was a safety plan put in place for him in another home, where he wasn’t even supposed to be in the same room as younger children,” Trish said. [That ought to be the case anyway.Duh!]

Steven said after they immediately called DSHS, the department began an investigation on them.

DSHS would not share that investigation with KIRO 7. But a spokesperson sent this statement about the lawsuit:

“We are working with our partners in the Office of Attorney General to review this lawsuit filing. At this point, it contains allegations that will be proven or disproven in court, and we do not intend to try the case in the media.”

KIRO 7 found a memo included in the lawsuit sent from the state’s Office of the Children and Family’s Ombuds to Trish in March 2014. It stated that the “decision to place and maintain this youth in your home was unreasonable.”

Another memo from 2002, sent from the assistant secretary of children’s administration to DSHS children’s administration staff, stated they had two tort claims costing the department more than t$2 million.

She wrote that “the errors are inexcusable” and “failure to share pertinent history…is unacceptable”.

“Not only did the state fail us, they failed him,” Trish said.

Trish and Steven told KIRO 7 they want to see the state take accountability for this, even as they stay committed to helping their adopted son.

“Throwing him away his not an option. We’re still trying to do everything we can,” Steven said”

Foster parents sue after they discover adopted son’s past [Kiro TV 10/17/14 ]

Honest Representation2

7 Comments

  1. I don’t think we should criminalize all sexual behavior between children. It’s not clear whether this was sexual abuse or mutual sexual play. If an adult is soliciting a child for sexual favors, it’s apparent that 1) there’s so much power differential that coercion is unavoidable, and 2) the adult KNOWS what he is doing is wrong, and why. In the case of a twelve-year-old and an eight year old, it’s uncertain whether either of these conditions exist. The fact that the kids told her that “they thought it was okay, since he wasn’t an adult” seems to indicate that they weren’t being overtly coerced.

    http://www.stopitnow.org/age_appropriate_sexual_behavior

    Either way, I’m concerned that this kid is only thirteen now and he’s already a convicted child molester. It’s not right to hold children to adult standards of judgement and self-restraint. Yes, he shouldn’t be allowed unsupervised access to younger kids– and you’re darn tootin’ that CPS should have disclosed his history to the PAPs before the foster placement KNOWING THAT THERE WERE YOUNGER EXISTING KIDS IN THE HOME!

    • That’s what “romeo & juliet laws” are for — so a kid who is within, say, +/- 3 yrs of the same age as his/her boy/girlfreind cannot be prosecuted for statutory rape or labelled a sex offender for having a consentual relationship between a close in age peer.

      A 13 yo who molests a 7 or 8 yo? That’s abuse, not a relationship w/peer.

      • Carlee,

        I think the youngsters were 12 and 8 respectively when the events took place. If both were neurotypical, that is a significant age difference. However, we don’t know if the older child WAS at the same developmental status as the average twelve year old, or how much perceived psychological power he had.

        I’m not saying what he did was okay or that he should be allowed to continue doing it. Living in another house without access to younger kids seems like a good plan to me.

        I’m just saying it’s premature to write this kid off as a sexual predator. He’s just a kid; it’s too soon to predict whether he’ll be dangerous as an adult or not, especially if he gets good therapy in the interim.

        • Playing “doctor” at 6 or 7 is VERY VERY different than doing so at, say, 13 or 14.

          The “developmental age” of a child is not LEGALLY relevant — rather a lot of ADULTS with FASD get themselves into legal trouble by having a (consentual) sexual relationship with an individual whom they consider to to be a “developmental peer”, e.g. 25 yo with FASD is “developmentally” 13 is dating an ACTUAL 12 or 13 yo. It’s statutory rape as the minor’s too young to legally consent.

          • I’m not arguing the point that children need to be protected from psychological coercion, just that nonviolent “abusers” who are children themselves SHOULDN”T be charged as adult sexual offenders.

            I’m well aware that poor children are often charged as adults for crimes they don’t have the developmental capacity to understand, while over-entitled jerks like Ethan Couch walk away with a slap on the wrist.

    • Also, incest in this PARTICULAR case. Anything sexual the 13 yo does to his (adopted or bio) siblings is incest, i.e. abuse and therefore ILLEGAL.

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