Federal judge blasts Texas Child Protective Services over missing reports
A federal judge blasted Texas Child Protective Services for appearing to withhold serious incident reports involving children permanently in the foster care system.
Judge Janis Jack had fiery remarks for the Texas Commissioner over the Department of Family Protective Services in a hearing.
"Commissioner Muth, not much will get past monitors with whistle blowers who care about children calling routinely, so you need to factor that in when you decide what not to disclose next time," said Judge Jack.
The first serious incident that was missing from shift logs involved a child who caused a concussion on a caseworker.
DFPS told the court's monitors it was inadvertent, but then the same thing happened again.
READ MORE: Texas CPS making progress in reducing number of unplaced youth
This month, a whistle blower sent the court monitors a news report from Waco.
Waco resident David Drakes was arrested for charges of sexually assaulting a 13-year-old foster child who ran away multiple times over three days.
The monitors determined that child is one only temporarily in the foster system.
However, the monitors learned from a forensic interview that the child reported another child, who is permanently in the foster system, ran away with her.
It turns out the child's caseworker had been contacted by a Waco police detective who said when the child returned to the foster care home she made an outcry that she had been raped and was taken to the hospital for a new exam.
When the monitors checked the shift logs for February DFPS only produced logs for the child the day before she ran away, and the day after she returned.
Corinth woman fighting to get her son back from CPS after being removed without court order
The boy's mother says she never imagined that taking her son to the hospital for a rash would end with him being taken from her home the next day. Her court hearing to try to get her son back is still a week away.
The explanation came down to a DFPS procedure regarding runaways that the department changed as of Thursday.
"Up until yesterday we were not uploading first night notes," said Deputy Commissioner Audrey O'Neil. "We have changed that practice. Now, any child in DFPS supervision for a portion of the day will be uploaded."
[JUDGE JACK: "I'm still not understanding why the shift notes were not uploaded. Do you have an explanation other than trying to hide the ball?"]
"Your honor, we are absolutely not trying to hide the shift logs," replied O'Neil.
[JUDGE JACK: "Well that's what happened, isn't it?"]
The next step in the 12-year-long lawsuit against the state will be for Judge Jack to determine if the state is in contempt. That could involve the state paying a fine.
The judge will also rule on the state's motion for relief from remedial orders.
Attorney Paul Yetter said in a statement nothing will improve until the state gets serious about fixing its broken system.