394 results for author: James R. Marsh
Title IX’s Demise in the Public School System
Title IX is a 1972 federal law which requires gender equity for boys and girls in every educational program that receives federal funding. This includes the vast majority of public school systems in our country.
Title IX prohibits both teacher-student harassment and student-student harassment. It also prohibits a hostile environment based on gender. The goal is to eliminate sex-based discrimination in federally assisted education programs. Every public school has an affirmative obligation to prevent sex-based harassment and to lessen the harm to students if, despite their best efforts, harassment occurs.
Almost forty years after the enactment of ...
Court Rules Attorney-Client Privilege ≠ Colorado GAL-Attorneys
Last week, the Colorado Supreme Court ruled that the attorney-client privilege does not apply to conversations between guardians ad litem and the children they represent in child abuse, child welfare and custody cases. In Colorado, a guardian ad litem is an attorney appointed to represent a child who has been abused or neglected or is in foster care. They are also appointed for children are accused of crimes or involved in a custody fight.
In a very controversial 5-2 decision, the Court held that “because a child who is the subject of a dependency and neglect proceeding is not the client of a court-appointed guardian ad litem, neither the ...
Assessing Current Restitution Law to
Effectively Serve Victims in Child Abuse Imagery Cases *
This article discusses the Marsh Law Firm's pioneering work to secure criminal restitution for our client Amy. It appeared in the National Center for Prosecution of Child Abuse Update earlier this year, before our appeal to the United States Supreme Court. The NCPCA Update can be downloaded in full here.
by Angela Downes, Meg Garvin, Wanda Lucibello, Alison Wilkinson, Terry Campos, and Hon. Paul Cassell2
Amy was only four years old when her uncle sexually assaulted her and documented that assault through photographs. Although the assault took place in 1993, now nearly 20 years later those photographs continue to circulate on the Internet and are among ...
Foster Care Adoption Benefits – The Adoption Tax Credit
One of the many things I lobbied for in Washington, DC was a refundable adoption tax credit aimed specifically at foster care adoption. It was opposed for many years as being "too expensive" and a "risky proposition" which would lead to the elimination of the non-refundable tax credit for foreign adoptions claimed by wealthy white adoptive parents.
Among the many provisions of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (P.L. 111-148) of 2010 was an expansion of the tax credit for adopting parents. A new factsheet from the Internal Revenue Service, Six Things to Know About the Expanded Adoption Tax Credit, provides details about the necessary ...
Free School Meals for Children in Foster Care
According to the Children's Bureau Express, the recently signed Healthy, Hunger-Free Kids Act of 2010, make it easier for school districts to enroll foster children for free school meals. Children in foster care are now automatically eligible to receive free school meals, regardless of household income, and they can remain enrolled for the entire school year, even if they leave foster care during the year. Because of this, the process of school districts enrolling foster children into this program is simplified.
An article written by Nate Frentz and Zoe Neuberger for the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities covers six tips on how to take advantage ...
Social Worker Justice – going to jail for CPS
Last spring, the Brooklyn district attorney took the unprecedented step of charging NY child welfare supervisor Chereece Bell with criminally negligent homicide. This is just one of a few cases nationwide where child welfare workers have been charged with a criminal act for doing--or not doing--their job.
In June 2010, Philadelphia caseworkers Julius Juma Murray, Miriam Coulibaly and others pleaded guilty or were found guilty of fabricating reports and destroying documents to hide the fact that caseworkers skipped hundreds of home visits to dozens of clients, including 14-year-old Danieal Kelly who starved to death in 2006.
New York Magazine recently ...
Child Pornography Victims Abandoned at the Supreme Court
Last week, the Solicitor General filed this brief with the United States Supreme Court which effectively denies child victims the ability to obtain criminal restitution from the thousands of child molesters and pedophiles who collect and share child pornography.
The defendant in the case currently pending before the Supreme Court, Amy v. Monzel, admitted to law enforcement that he sexually abused his granddaughter and traded images of girls being sexually abused. A search of his home uncovered more than 800 child sex abuse images including pictures of Amy, the victim in this case. The defendant pleaded guilty to distributing child pornography and was ...