Facebook Suicide: Antidepressants Doubled For Teen Before Hanging

A month before 14-yer-old Naika Venant hanged herself on Facebook Live while in foster care, a doctor doubled her dosage of anti-depressant, The Miami Herald reported.
The revelation again underscores the dangers of antidepressants on the developing minds of teenagers. Venant received Zoloft despite its critical “black box” warning that there was an increase in the risk of suicide in children. She took her own life on Jan. 22, lives streaming it on the social media site.
Venant was the second suicide of a child in foster care within a two-month span. Her family says the deaths are evidence of the failure of privatized foster care. Venant was in the care of contractor hired by the Department of Children & Families.

The Herald noted that Venant is at least the second child in state foster care to kill themselves after receiving antidepressants.

Florida Department of Children & Families Secretary Mike Carroll told the Herald that the agency doesn’t prescribe medications for children in its custody, only doctors do.

George Sheldon, a former DCF secretary, said Venant should not have been on a drug with a black box warning considering she had no consistent caregiver.

Attorney Howard Talenfeld, who represents Naika’s mother, told The Herald Zoloft  was risky considering Naika’s instability “You have to be very concerned,” Talenfeld said. “Naika went through 14 non-therapeutic foster homes, and she was being prescribed very powerful psychiatric medication. She could not possibly have been appropriately monitored.”

http://palmbeachhealthbeat.blog.palmbeachpost.com/2017/03/27/facebook-suicide-antidepressants-doubled-for-teen-before-hanging/

Foster Care Children, Now Grown, Tell Their Stories

The Calizaire sisters lived with countless families, and say they were abused by some of their foster care parents

Sophia and Princess Calizaire were introduced to foster care when they were seen wandering the streets looking for their mother, who had left them alone in a South Florida motel.

“We heard this big bang at the door,” said Sophia Calizaire. “We were trying to figure out who it was.”

It was the Florida Department of Children and Families coming to take them away, and they became foster care files that night, when they were just four and seven years old.

Sophia

The Calizaire sisters lived with countless families and were moved from one school to another. They say they were abused while staying with some of those foster care parents.

“She took a belt, she started beating me with the belt, picked up a hanger, she started beating me with the hanger, picked up a heel and started beating me with the heel,” said Sophia.

Her sister, Princess, was outside the room and could hear everything.  “I couldn’t do anything about it,” Princess said, with tears coming down her face.

The Calizaire sisters remember one foster care parent making them sleep in a dog house and eat dog food. They say some foster care parents wouldn’t feed them, would keep locks on the refrigerator and would sometimes starve them as a form of punishment.

“She told me to eat in front of my sister while she watched and my sister is hungry. I took out the chewed up piece of chicken from my mouth and gave it to her,” said Sophia, who said she was caught by her foster care mother. “She filled up the bathroom sink and she took my head and started drowning me. She kept drowning me until she felt she was ready to stop.”

Princess says the abuse not only came from the parents. “I stayed in a foster home down south where this boy used to try to rape me every night before I would go to sleep,” she said. “I used to be scared to go to sleep at night. I ran away from there.”

Mez Pierre, now 24, had a similar experience in foster care when he was a little boy. He says he was sexually abused by one of the teen foster kids staying in the same home.

“I was a little kid, they knew they could take advantage of me and I couldn’t fight back,” said Pierre. “But I did tell, I did tell someone and she didn’t do anything, she didn’t do anything.”

In 2005, DCF completed privatizing foster care. They contracted with 20 lead agencies throughout the state to oversee the care and needs of children in foster care.

Our Kids manages Miami-Dade and Monroe counties, while Child Net handles Broward County. The abuse endured by Pierre and the Calizaire sisters happened before the agencies took over, but they still say the system is far from perfect.

Some child advocate attorneys say the current privatized system does not work because lead agencies like Our Kids sub-contracted other organizations to monitor foster care children.

“So you have multiple corporations and agencies who supposedly are in charge and responsible for the lives of the children but tragically these children, real human beings, fall through the cracks in the system,” said attorney Howard Talenfeld.

DCF disagrees and says when it was a statewide agency it became quite unmanageable.

“Out of the one or two cases that you hear which are horrible cases and we need to learn from, there are thousands of children and families that DCF and Our Kids helps on a yearly and daily basis,” said DCF’s southern regional director, Esther Jacobo, who added that DCF is taking steps to improve the system.

Esther Jacobo

Jacobo said case managers have to see a child in care every 30 days and must have private conversations with that child so they feel comfortable opening up. She says there is an electronic monitoring system in place for case workers, which snaps a picture of the child with a time, date and location.

“It’s kind of like a GPS and statewide Tallahassee monitors that so you know what is happening in terms of the child visit,” Jacobo said.

Currently, there are just fewer than 20,000 children in foster care statewide, according to DCF. During a two-month span between August and October, there were 127 verified abuse cases across the state, 17 of them in the South Florida area.

http://www.nbcmiami.com/news/local/Foster-Care-System-Through-The-Eyes-of-The-Ones-Who-Lived-It-140874593.html

Hall of Shame-Florida DCF Employee Sheila Ann Choice

How Could You?

Greenville woman arrested, accused of falsifying DCF records

This will be an archive of heinous actions by those involved in child welfare, foster care and adoption. We forewarn you that these are deeply disturbing stories that may involve sex abuse, murder, kidnapping and other horrendous actions.

From Greenville, Florida, another arrest of a Florida DCF employee. Maybe I need a weekly column for Florida DCF arrests? Sheila Ann Choice, 55, was fired from DCF after allegations of falsifying records.
“Agents with the Florida Department of Law Enforcement’s Office of Executive Investigations today arrested Sheila Ann Choice, 55, of Greenville, Fla., for one count of falsifying records of an individual in the care and custody of a state agency, a third-degree felony.

FDLE was provided information by the Department of Children and Families’ Office of Inspector General that Choice had allegedly falsified visitation documents on five different occasions, claiming she had completed in-home visits.

FDLE agents verified these alleged falsifications and secured a warrant for Choice’s arrest.  The alleged false visitations occurred in May and June of 2011.

 

 

 

“We have a zero-tolerance policy for this kind of behavior from our employees,” said DCF Secretary David Wilkins. “We took this very seriously and brought these actions to the attention of FDLE so that criminal charges could be pursued. We appreciate the hard work of our partners in law enforcement who worked with us to ensure that protecting children is our priority.”

Choice will be booked into the Madison County Jail.”

Former Department of Children and Families employee arrested for falsification of records
[Florida Department of Law Enforcement Press Release 7/20/12]
We will update the post when her court case records come online this week.


By Rally on 7-23-2012 in Abuse in foster care, CPS Incompetence, Florida, How could you? Hall of Shame, Sheila Ann Choice


http://www.wtxl.com/content/localnews/story/Greenville-woman-arrested-accused-of-falsifying/UWwo-DH4SkSrRQnV85HyCw.cspx

DCF Lawsuit Settlements Cost Taxpayers Millions.

DCF incompetence costly to taxpayers
South Florida Sun-Sentinel Editorial Page
     February 10, 2008

ISSUE: DCF lawsuit settlements cost

taxpayers millions.

Florida's lead social services provider has long needed an overhaul, but
state officials have chosen band-aid solutions instead. Now taxpayers
are paying the price in lawsuit settlements costing the state millions
of dollars. Such expensive payouts couldn't have come at a worse time
for a state already strapped with a $1 billion budget shortfall.

The most recent case involves a Southwest Ranches foster parent accused
of molesting little girls placed in his home. There had been previous
sexual misconduct allegations against 79-year-old Thomas Ferrara dating
back to 1992, and yet DCF continued to place children in his house. As
many as 400 children were placed in the home from 1984 to 2000, the
South Florida Sun-Sentinel reported.

The public is right to question why DCF workers kept placing children in
his care despite allegations of abuse in 1992 and 1996. True, no charges
emerged from the allegations, and those investigations were dropped. But
red flags should have been going up.

Broward Sheriff's Office arrested Ferrara in 2001 after a 9-year-old
girl told police he had molested her over a two-year period. Ferrara
pleaded no contest to the charges, and later accepted a plea deal,
getting two years house arrest and 20 years probation. No prison time.

Taxpayers didn't get off as easy. The state will end up paying $2.26
million for Ferrara's misdoings, and the trust the agency kept in him,
the result of three suits involving two different girls.

In some ways, the payments are progress and in keeping with DCF
Secretary Bob Butterworth's vow to open up the secretive agency and
admit wrong-doing. But such cases are also an enormous expense that

taxpayers can ill afford.

The agency deserves its share of blame. But Floridians must also do a
little soul-searching, for DCF's woes wouldn't have gotten this
expensive if the state's leadership had not been so inattentive and
neglectful in addressing the agency's shortcomings.

BOTTOM LINE: It's the worst time for such an expense, but hopefully a
lesson learned.

An Inconvenient Truth about Child Protective Services, Foster care, and
the Child Protection "INDUSTRY"

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

every parent should read the free handbook from
connecticut dcf watch...



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/Foster care 160, biological Parents 59
Sexual Abuse CPS/Foster care 112, biological Parents 13
Neglect CPS/Foster care 410, biological Parents 241
Medical Neglect CPS/Foster care 14 biological Parents 12
Fatalities CPS/Foster care 6.4, biological 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.

AMERICA'S HIDDEN HOLOCAUST

Currently Child Protective Services violates more Constitutionally
guaranteed liberties & Civil rights on a daily basis then all other
agencies combined, Including the National Security agency/Central
intelligence agency wiretaping programs…

THE CORRUPT BUSINESS OF CHILD PROTECTIVE SERVICES
BY: Nancy Schaefer Senator, 50th District of Georgia

http://www.senatornancyschaefer.com/articles.php?filter=6

This is Child Protection?
By Gregory A. Hession, J.D.

http://www.jbs.org/node/4632

Mercenary Motherhood: "Memoirs of a Babystealer."

http://www.latimes.com/news/opinion/la-oe-callahan16oct16,0,5019944.s...

FOSTER CARE IS A 80 PERCENT FAILURE:. A Brief Analysis of the Casey
Family Programs. Northwest Foster Care Alumni Study. By Richard Wexler

http://www.nccpr.org/reports/cfpanalysis.doc

HOW THE WAR AGAINST CHILD ABUSE BECAME A WAR AGAINST CHILDREN

http://www.nccpr.org/issues/1.html

Adoption Bonuses: The Money Behind the Madness
DSS and affiliates rewarded for breaking up families
By Nev Moore Massachusetts News

http://www.massnews.com/past_issues/2000/5_May/mayds4.htm

A recent study has found that 12-18 months after leaving foster care:

30% of the nation’s homeless are former foster children.
27% of the males and 10% of the females had been incarcerated
33% were receiving public assistance
37% had not finished high school
2% receive a college degree
50% were unemployed

Children in foster care are three to six times more likely than children
not in care to have emotional, behavioral and developmental problems,
including conduct disorders, depression, difficulties in school and
impaired social relationships. Some experts estimate that about 30% of
the children in care have marked or severe emotional problems. Various
studies have indicated that children and young people in foster care
tend to have limited education and job skills, perform poorly in school
compared to children who are not in foster care, lag behind in their
education by at least one year, and have lower educational attainment
than the general population.


*Casey Family Programs National Center for Resource Family Support

80 percent of prison inmates have been through the foster care system.

The highest ranking federal official in charge of foster care, Wade Horn
of the Department of Health and Human Services, is a former child
psychologist who says the foster care system is a giant mess and should
just be blown up.

http://abcnews.go.com/print?id=2017991

Four rigorous studies have found that at least 30 percent of America’s
foster children could be home right now if their parents had decent housing.

This study found thousands of children already in foster care who would
have done better had child protection agencies not taken them away in
the first place.

Front-page story in USA Today.

http://www.usatoday.com/news/nation/2007-07-02-foster-study_N.htm?csp...

The full study is available here.

http://www.mit.edu/~jjdoyle/doyle_fosterlt_march07_aer.pdf

The bottom line? - Child Protective Services and the Foster Care system
for the most part turns out young adults that are nothing more than
walking wreckage...

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

CHILD PROTECTIVE SERVICES, HAPPILY DESTROYING THOUSANDS OF INNOCENT
FAMILIES YEARLY NATIONWIDE AND COMING TO YOU'RE HOME SOON...

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...


http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:EUtnanxlHSIJ:groups.google.com/group/alt.support.foster-parents/browse_thread/thread/186e9c76d62e4e1e+dcf+florida+lawsuit&cd=4&hl=en&ct=clnk&gl=us

Florida can't track child welfare contractors

MIAMI (AP) — A decade ago, Florida began turning its child welfare program over to private contractors instead of state workers. Almost everyone involved feels that the change has been for the best, but that's all it is — a feeling.

 Despite spending a half billion dollars a year, the Department of Children and Families does not have a standardized system for evaluating in most areas its 20 child welfare contractors, making it impossible to prove that the 40,000 children in the system are being helped. Nor can the state show with confidence which contractors are performing well, adequately or poorly.
"We've got to create better statewide data. We have very little," new DCF Secretary David Wilkins told The Associated Press. He plans to introduce a new system next year.
Critics and advocates agree that the child welfare system has improved overall and cite numbers that prove their point:
■ Adoptions jumped from 2,008 in the 2000-01 fiscal year when the state was in charge to 3,368 last fiscal year.
■ Child abuse deaths for those who had a history with the department have remained steady at about 70 a year since 2006, when the state's current criteria that included accidental drowning and suffocations where a sleeping adult rolled on top of a child were adopted.
■ The number of children in foster care has dropped 28 percent, from 42,325 in 2000-01 to 30,541 during the last fiscal year.
■ The cost per child in foster care during that period dropped 24 percent, from $9,978 to $7,602 during that period though DCF officials and the contractors caution that those figures don't account for tens of millions of dollars spent on prevention services. DCF says it doesn't have an exact total.
Longtime child court Judge Cindy Lederman was initially skeptical about privatization but said the system is a considerable improvement over the old DCF system. Before privatization, caseworkers frequently came to court unprepared, telling a judge they'd just been assigned the case and hadn't had time to read the file. That doesn't happen now, Lederman said.
"People were not fired. Contracts were not terminated. Five o'clock would come and you couldn't find anyone at DCF. Those things don't exist anymore. They take personal responsibility for every child...it's not a bureaucracy," she said of the contractors.
But others child advocates are more circumspect in their praise. Attorney Andrea Moore says many foster children still don't go to the doctor even though they have Medicaid and some aren't enrolled in school.
"Is it better now than it was under DCF? Yes, but twice as much money is also going into the system," Moore said. "The well-being of children is still far behind where it should be given the amount of money being provided to the (contractors) and their claims of how well they're doing."
Sen. Ronda Storms, R-Brandon, was an early supporter of privatization and still backs it but says the providers have become too powerful and agrees there needs to be a way to better measure their success.
"These privatized models have grown up to be nothing more than little governments all over the state that have no accountability," Storms said. "And now it works to the children's detriment and certainly to the taxpayers' detriment."

DCF's partnership with the private contractors has been rocky at times. Publicly the two never disparage each other, but privately there's constant finger-pointing when a child's death makes headlines, including a yearlong fight over insurance premiums and who should be financially responsible when a child is harmed.
In the case of a 10-year old Miami girl found dead in the back of her adoptive father's truck on Valentine's Day, DCF officials released thousands of documents detailing their blunders but privately fumed that the contractor that oversaw the case, Our Kids, was ducking responsibility. Our Kids officials hinted DCF was trying to blame them for problems they didn't cause.
"Nobody wants to take responsibility when a child is hurt. Everybody just points fingers at everybody else and they put Band-Aids on problems rather than really fix things," Moore said.
DCF and lawmakers sheltered providers when they were first starting out. Now the providers have grown into multimillion dollar agencies with influential board members and powerful political connections.
As DCF has tried to increase oversight, the providers have pushed back using their political clout, Storms said.
Provider contracts were written in the infancy of privatization and lack immediate consequences, including financial penalties or probationary periods for failure to comply. For example, providers still refuse to use the agency's multimillion dollar computer system.
Yet DCF has little recourse other than to terminate contracts. Only a handful of providers have lost them in the past decade
"There is not a lot of teeth in those contracts," Wilkins said. He's warned providers new contracts will include more stringent accountability measures and consequences. "There is a new sheriff in town. They are subcontractors to DCF so they have an obligation to report to me and do the things we ask them to do."
The most comprehensive current measurements compares each private contractor against 15 federal performance standards, including abuse rates while kids are in foster care, how long they're in care, and whether they're placed in a stable home or bounced between foster homes. But providers say the measurements are misleading and don't capture the quality of their work.
Our Kids, which cares for 3,500 children in Miami-Dade and Monroe counties, said the standards don't consider improvements that have been made since a provider took over a region. The nonprofit group gets $74 million a year with much of that going to prevention and keeping children with their families while monitoring them. That drives up the costs.

"We can go back to the old way of having large numbers of children in foster care so that the cost per child would look better. However, experts will tell you that we are better served as a community by keeping families together with the support services that they need," spokeswoman Kadie Black said. "We know that the quality of life for children in South Florida has never been higher."


http://www.naplesnews.com/news/2011/may/03/florida-cant-track-child-welfare-contractors/

Florida DCF Caseworker Susan Cunningham Drug User Holds The Lives Of Children In Her Hands

Central Florida DCF worker arrested on cocaine charges

February 28, 2011 

This story broke on the news last night and I had to write the name down and double check this morning to make sure it was really true. It was. This woman was responsible for making sure children were not abused in Foster Care. REALLY? A Drug Addict? No wonder we are losing children to murder in Foster Care- it is past time to change this system

And she was responsible for children in foster care - Really?

Posted: 6:37 AM
Last Updated: 1 minute ago
ORANGE COUNTY, Fla. – A central Florida woman employed as an investigator for the Department of of Children and Families was arrested over the weekend after she was caught with 15 grams of cocaine in her possession, according to the Orange County Sheriff’s Office.
Susan Cunningham, 39, was seen buying drugs at a motel known for drug activity, deputies said.
She was subsequently pulled over and at first, she denied having any drugs. A K-9 unit was brought in and the drugs were found, according to wftv.com.
She was arrested and bonded out of jail on Sunday.
Cunningham’s primary role at DCF is visiting homes to make sure children aren’t being abused or neglected. She has been with DCF since 2005.
Her current investigations will be turned over to other agency workers.
In a statement to WFTV, DCF Director John Cooper said Cunningham’s termination papers are already being drawn up.
http://www.abcactionnews.com/dpp/news/state/central-florida-dcf-worker-arrested-on-cocaine-charges


This may sound like a crazy case of fiction, but I am afraid that this is happening to families all over the United States.
This occurred in ORANGE COUNTY, Florida  but if you look at other city's such as Miami, Florida or Nashville,Tennessee or even your home town you will find horror stories everywhere and not just one or two but hundreds. It is time to stand up to our state governments and tell them our children are not a commodity, parents have rights, and we as Americans have Constitutional Rights. Ignorance is no excuse.

Two More Children Abused In The System In Florida

March 30, 2011

Lawsuit Alleges Foster Children Abuse
Canadian Couple Suing Family Support Services of North Florida
POSTED: Tuesday, March 29, 2011
JACKSONVILLE, Fla. — A Canadian couple said the details about their adoptive children’s care before they became their legal guardians are horrific.
The couple is suing Family Support Services of North Florida, alleging the adoption agency never told him the real background of the two Jacksonville children.
The adoptive parents said their two children were physically, sexually and mentally abused while in foster care.
“Yeah, I am angry. I am very angry,” Andrew Dolan, the children’s adoptive father, said at a news conference Tuesday morning. “I’m angry, disappointed.”
Video: Lawsuit Filed Over Abuse
According to the lawsuit, the siblings, who are now 8 and 6, were shuttled from one foster home to another, five in all.
During that time, they suffered disturbing abuse ranging from being yelled at or beaten, being denied food and being forced to commit sex acts with adults or one another, the couple said their adopted children told them.
Dolan said that if he had it to do again, he and his wife would have never adopted the two children from Jacksonville and taken them to live in Canada.
“My wife and I have saved these children’s life, as far as I am concerned,” Dolan said. “We’ve taken them out of a system that did nothing for them and treated them terribly.”
“The years since have been hell,” the Dolans’ attorney, Brian Cabrey, said of how the adoptive parents feel. “The things that have been disclosed, the things they learned what their children have been through while in foster care in the state of Florida is nothing short of nauseating. They are egregious. They are among the worst allegations I have ever seen, and I have seen a lot.”
The family said they will never give the children back, but they believe the state should pay more for the children’s medical and psychiatric care. The parents already receive $900 a month from the state, but they said the bills are much more, and that’s why they are suing.
“(Family Support Services) saw us coming and dropped this bombshell on us and did not tell us anything about it,” Dolan said. “And not until we got (the children) back to Canada, then months later the bombshell started to blow up, and this is what we are left with.”
Jim Adams, the head of Family Support Services of North Florida, said in a phone interview that he can’t believe the allegations and what happened to the children.
“Whoever covered it up should be prosecuted and should be held civilly liable,” Adams said. “Ultimately, I am responsible for every employee who works for me. If one of our employees covered up anything, it’s just as vengeful as the attorney engaged in this case.”
Family Support Services is investigating, along with the Florida Department of Children and Families.
“It boggles my mind that the children were taken away from their birth mother for neglect, put into a foster care system that then exposed them to physical, mental and sexual abuse over a number of years,” Dolan said. “You have to wonder if they would not be better outside the system.”
The Department of Children and Families said the allegations are a concern if they are true. DCF said the family has not been cooperative and only made the claims when seeking more money.
DCF said it has notified the abuse hotline, the state attorney’s office and the Jacksonville Sheriff’s Office about the accusations.
DCF did say other children in the foster home had been interviewed and there were no reports of abuse with them.
The suit was filed on Tuesday. No court date has been set. The family’s attorney says the agency is the only one named in the suit but others might be added at a later date.
Copyright 2011 by News4Jax.com. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.




https://protectingourchildrenfrombeingsold.wordpress.com/2011/03/30/two-more-children-abused-in-the-system-in-florida/