A woman who police said was horribly abused in her Orange Park fosterhome in 1979 while state child welfare workers looked the other way has settledher long-running lawsuit against the state

Settlement reached in abuse case

Nearly 30 years later, she'll get $100,000

http://www.jacksonville.com/tu-onlin...82859232.shtml


By Paul Pinkham, The Times-Union

A woman who police said was horribly abused in her Orange Park foster
home in 1979 while state child welfare workers looked the other way has
settled her long-running lawsuit against the state - 28 years after the
abuse occurred.



The 32-year-old woman, identified in court documents by the initials
S.A.P., settled the case this week for $100,000, the Florida Attorney
General's Office said.

The case had been scheduled for a jury trial in Jacksonville next week
after the Florida Supreme Court allowed it to proceed despite a
four-year statute of limitations on abuse claims. The court ruled 5-2 in
2002 that the statute of limitations shouldn't apply when the state is
accused of negligently monitoring a child and concealing the abuse.

"She is pleased with the settlement, and she is eager to put this
horrible episode behind her and move on with her life," the woman's
attorney, Jay Howell, said Friday. Under state law, he will receive 25
percent of the award.

Of more importance than the settlement amount are the ramifications the
case had for other victims of child abuse, said Howell, a Jacksonville
lawyer who founded the National Center for Missing and Exploited
Children in Virginia. Children like his client are often too young to
initiate legal proceedings within a proscribed time period or even know
they have been abused, he said.

For example, the case aided victims of sexual abuse by Catholic priests
in Florida in lawsuits where they could show the church concealed the
priests' behavior, Howell said.

"The Supreme Court, in this child's case, opened the door for abused
children to have access to the courts with claims they may file after
reaching adulthood," Howell said. "It was a recognition by the court of
the vulnerability of children who suffer abuse."

A spokeswoman for the Florida Department of Children and Families said
the agency wouldn't comment because the settlement hasn't been finalized.

DCF was known as the Department of Health and Rehabilitative Services in
1979 when neighbors called Clay County deputies after hearing 4-year-old
S.A.P. and her sister screaming. Deputies said they found the girls
severely physically abused and malnourished and living in a different
foster home than the one they'd been assigned.

Howell said when he first started representing S.A.P. in the early '90s,
she didn't even know she'd been abused. The victim, who still lives in
Jacksonville, has only hazy memories of what happened.

He filed the lawsuit in 1995 when she was 20, within three years of when
the department released its internal investigative report documenting
the abuse. The lawsuit accuses the department of obstructing the police
investigation, falsifying reports and altering records to conceal the abuse.

A Jacksonville judge dismissed the case after DCF argued the four-year
statute of limitations had long expired. The 1st District Court of
Appeal overturned the dismissal but forwarded the issue to the state
Supreme Court, which also ordered that the case could go forward.

"The law of this state does not bestow upon the department a special
boon to betray the children in its charge, to flagrantly flout the law,
to conceal its misdeeds and then to invoke [the law] ... as a shield for
its actions," the order said.

, (904) 359-4107




CURRENTLY CHILD PROTECTIVE SERVICES VIOLATES MORE CIVIL RIGHTS ON A
DAILY BASIS THEN ALL OTHER AGENCIES COMBINED INCLUDING THE NATIONAL
SECURITY AGENCY/CENTRAL INTELLIGENCE AGENCY WIRETAPPING PROGRAM....

CPS Does not protect children...
It is sickening how many children are subject to abuse, neglect and even
killed at the hands of Child Protective Services.

every parent should read this .pdf from
connecticut dcf watch...

http://www.connecticutdcfwatch.com/8x11.pdf

http://www.connecticutdcfwatch.com

Number of Cases per 100,000 children in the US
These numbers come from The National Center on
Child Abuse and Neglect in Washington. (NCCAN)
Recent numbers have increased significantly for CPS

*Perpetrators of Maltreatment*

Physical Abuse CPS 160, Parents 59
Sexual Abuse CPS 112, Parents 13
Neglect CPS 410, Parents 241
Medical Neglect CPS 14 Parents 12
Fatalities CPS 6.4, Parents 1.5

Imagine that, 6.4 children die at the hands of the very agencies that
are supposed to protect them and only 1.5 at the hands of parents per
100,000 children. CPS perpetrates more abuse, neglect, and sexual abuse
and kills more children then parents in the United States. If the
citizens of this country hold CPS to the same standards that they hold
parents too. No judge should ever put another child in the hands of ANY
government agency because CPS nationwide is guilty of more harm and
death than any human being combined. CPS nationwide is guilty of more
human rights violations and deaths of children then the homes from which
they were removed. When are the judges going to wake up and see that
they are sending children to their death and a life of abuse when
children are removed from safe homes based on the mere opinion of a
bunch of social workers.

BE SURE TO FIND OUT WHERE YOUR CANDIDATES STANDS ON THE ISSUE OF
REFORMING OR ABOLISHING CHILD PROTECTIVE SERVICES ("MAKE YOUR CANDIDATES
TAKE A STAND ON THIS ISSUE.") THEN REMEMBER TO VOTE ACCORDINGLY IF THEY
ARE "FAMILY UNFRIENDLY" IN THE NEXT ELECTION...