3 results for month: 03/2005
When a Child Safety Plan = Coercion
The recent trend in child protective services (CPS) of creating safety plans received a set back recently in federal court. Judge Rebecca R. Pallmeyer of the United States District Court, Northern District of Illinois ruled that in-home safety plans created by the Illinois Department of Children and Families (DCFS) were illegal because they were secured in a coercive manner.
The coercion at issue was the CPS worker's express or implied threat of to take the child into protective custody lasting more than a brief or temporary period of time. The court also ruled that DCFS failure to provide a mechanism to review safety plans once they were put in ...
Terminating Parental Rights when Visitation is Prohibited
In a matter of first impression anywhere (correct me if I'm wrong), the Wisconsin Supreme Court recently held that a statute which allowed termination of parental rights based on a judicial order which prohibited visitation was narrowly tailored to serve state's compelling interest of protecting children from unfit parents.
The Wisconsin law states that a "[continual] denial of periods of physical placement or visitation" is a ground for terminating parental rights. A finding under the provision requires that:
(a) the parent has been denied periods of physical placement by court order in an action affecting the family or has been denied visitation ...
Foster Care Law – The Book!
Mention the phrase “foster care” to nearly anyone and you may evoke one of several images: maltreated children; kindly strangers; abusive strangers; bureaucratic bungling. One image not likely evoked will be the sheer enormity of the foster care system. Foster care is big business. In 1989, the federal government spent 1.2 billion dollars to reimburse state spending on foster care. This year it will be over 6 billion dollars, an increase of more than 400%!
Foster care is a way of offering children a stable home while their own parents are unable to care for them. Some children may have been neglected or mistreated. Social workers and lawyers ...