FL: Panel To Investigate Boy's Death In Foster Care

Jun 7, 2009 10:53 am US/Eastern
Reporting
John MacLauchlan
http://cbs4.com/local/gabriel.myers.margate.2.1034777.html

TAMPA (CBS4) ― An investigative panel formed by Department of Children and Families Secretary George Sheldon to look into what led up to the death of a Margate boy living in foster home will convene Monday in Tampa.

Gabriel Myers, 7, died April 16th after he apparently hanged himself from a shower rod.

Sheldon has asked the group to conduct a full inquiry into the events that led up to the boy's death including case management, judicial decisions and the contributing effects that psychotropic drugs and sexual abuse had.

"It is incomprehensible to me—even now—to understand how a child so young may have deliberately and consciously made a decision to end his life," said Sheldon last month during a press conference on psychotropic drug among foster children. "Anyone who heard of Gabriel's story was in disbelief; and parents everywhere are wondering to themselves: how could this happen?"

The panel is being chaired by Dr. Jim Sewell, a former assistant commissioner of FDLE.

Sheldon said he's been disturbed by some of the initial findings of the work group in the case.

"Gabriel's physician had prescribed several psychotherapeutic drugs, but this information was not reflected in our database," said Sheldon. "There also was no evidence in Gabriel's files that the statutorily required parental consent or a court order where obtained."

According to documents released by the DCF, Myers was taken from his drug-abusing mother less than a year ago. He had apparently been sexually abused and exposed to adult videos since the age of three. Teachers had reported that he had exposed himself, and touched other children inappropriately.

The Margate foster home where Gabriel Myers allegedly took his life was the third for the boy in less than a year. The DCF documents obtained by the CBS4 I-Team show he first entered the foster care system on June 29, 2008. He was placed in a licensed home through Kids in Distress. Some days later, he was moved to the home of his aunt and uncle. He lived there for some three months until Broward Sheriff's Office investigators received a report alleging sexual and physical abuse.

While investigators found no signs of sexual abuse, the uncle revealed he "did try corporal punishment" and hit the child with a belt. A Broward County judge issued an emergency order and moved Gabriel Myers back to the licensed home.

According to the documents, when Gabriel first entered the system, he had with him a prescription bottle of Adderall XR, a drug typically taken for Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD). The medication appeared melted. A new prescription was filled, but ultimately stopped. The DCF documents show Gabriel began seeing a psychiatrist soon after entering the system.

The psychiatrist later prescribed Lexapro, a drug for depression and anxiety, and Vyvanse for the child's ADHD. In March, doctors took Gabriel off Lexapro, and put him on Symbyax, also for depression and possible schizophrenia.

All three of the drugs have an FDA-mandated "black box" warning -- a statement on the prescription's box which describes its possible adverse reactions, including suicidal thoughts.

OR: Death Prompts Adult Foster Home Complaint

POSTED: 4:08 pm PDT May 14, 2009
UPDATED: 4:53 pm PDT May 14, 2009
http://www.kptv.com/news/19465609/detail.html

SALEM, Ore. -- A neglect complaint has been made at a local adult foster care facility that may have ended in a 94-year-old woman's death.

Salem police confirmed that a relative found Eleanor Demsky badly burned at Amazing Grace Adult Foster Care last week.

They said she was taken to Emanuel Hospital in Portland where administrators said she died.

Salem police confirmed that they have an ongoing investigation on the case. A friend of the family said Demsky died Wednesday night after falling on a heater at the adult foster home.

Thursday afternoon, workers at Amazing Grace Adult Foster Care refused to talk to FOX 12 regarding Demsky's death. But a family friend said Demsky had just moved into the Amazing Grace Adult Foster Home May 8 and was only there one night when she fell on a heater at about 3:30 a.m., laying on the heater long enough for her nightgown to catch fire.

The friend also said that when an on-duty aide found Demsky she put new clothes on the woman and put her back in bed.

Demsky lay in pain for six hours before a family member discovered her, called police and took Demsky to Emanual Hospital's Burn Center in Portland where she died Wednesday night, the friend said.

The allegations against Amazing Grace and its operator Sherry Jemison were a shock for Ruth Keller, whose husband, Frank, spent two years there.

"That's beyond my comprehension because Sherry is very conscientious," Keller said.
She said her husband received excellent care.

"I would go over and see him and he had his own room I would say, 'Are you ready to go home?' he would say, 'Let's give it another month,'" Keller said.

The Oregon Department of Human Services has seven substantiated adult foster care complaints against Jemison who Keller said runs Amazing Grace. At least one of those complaints is for corporal punishment. The agency is also investigating this current allegation of neglect.

But the case was a huge surprise for Keller who had nothing but positive words for the home.

"They treated him. He loved it. I can't understand that," Keller said.

Salem police wouldn't release any information on the case and said it's unclear if anyone will face criminal charges.

WA: DSHS settles foster-care case for $2 million

The state Department of Social and Health Services will pay $2 million to settle a lawsuit brought by two women who claimed they suffered years of physical and sexual abuse as children in a foster home while DSHS looked the other way.

By Jim Brunner
Seattle Times staff reporter
http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/localnews/2009194120_dshs08m0.html

The state Department of Social and Health Services will pay $2 million to settle a lawsuit brought by two women who claimed they suffered years of physical and sexual abuse as children in a foster home while DSHS looked the other way.

The women, identified in court papers as A.K. and K.M., claimed they were abused beginning in the late 1980s at ages 5 and 6 after being placed in a Pierce County foster home.

In their lawsuit, filed in Pierce County Superior Court, A.K. claimed her foster father began raping her at age 6. When she was 8, she claimed, he ordered her to start showering with him and to walk around the house wearing only his wife's underwear. The lawsuit also alleged the couple subjected foster children to beatings and sadistic punishments, such as forcing the children to eat feces and vomit.

Thursday's settlement included no admission of wrongdoing by DSHS. Agency spokesman Steve Williams said the women's abuse claims were never proven. But, he added: "DSHS hopes the plaintiffs can use the settlement in ways that will help them live fulfilling and productive lives."

An attorney for the foster parents — who were never criminally charged — rejected the abuse claims in the lawsuit.

"The couple denied and continue to deny all allegations of physical, sexual and emotional abuse claimed by the plaintiffs," said the attorney, Sok-Khieng Lim, in an e-mailed statement. She added that the couple provided foster care for more than 20 years in Washington and Arizona — frequently taking on some of the most difficult children in the system — and they were "devastated" by the allegations.

The couple, who now live in England, were dismissed from the lawsuit after a $10,000 settlement earlier this year. The Seattle Times does not generally name individuals who have not been charged with a crime.

The attorneys for the women, now in their early 20s, said they'd discovered evidence in DSHS files that the agency had received multiple warnings of possible abuse over years, yet failed to act.

For example, one of A.K.'s teachers reported that the girl had seemed fearful of her foster dad and had complained that "her private parts hurt" — classic signs of possible abuse. No investigation occurred.

An elementary-school counselor reported hearing that A.K. was forced by her foster mother to eat loaves of frozen bread for several days in a row as a punishment for overeating at school.

A DSHS supervisor dismissed that as "a bizarre form of punishment" that did not rise to the level of neglect, according to court documents.

Another school counselor reported hearing that foster children in the home were sometimes forced to hit each other. If they didn't, the mother "will hit us in the mouth and knock our teeth out," one of the children said in a therapy session, according to court documents.

Despite such reports, DSHS did not launch an investigation and allowed the couple to move with the girls to Arizona in 1993.

Lincoln Beauregard, an attorney representing the women, said his clients hoped the settlement would lead other abused foster children to step forward.

"The most important thing to my clients is that the public knows what happened ... and that DSHS failed to do their job and continues to fail to do their job," he said.

Beauregard also said he was furious with what he considers a "perjured" declaration — filed by the state in a failed attempt to have the lawsuit dismissed — by the longtime DSHS caseworker for the children.

That caseworker, now retired, said in the sworn declaration that "at no point was there ever a suggestion of physical or sexual abuse," despite having been questioned that day in a deposition about reports of possible abuse in DSHS's own files.

The $2 million settlement is the latest of many to hit DSHS's supervision of foster homes in recent years.

In 2007, four siblings won a $6.2 million verdict after a jury found the state negligent for licensing an abusive Seattle foster mother. Last year, eight boys got an $11 million settlement from Seattle, Tacoma and DSHS for failing to stop sexual abuse by a foster father who also posted explicit pictures of the abuse on the Internet.

In 2004, DSHS agreed to make major changes to the foster-care system in response to a class-action lawsuit.

Jim Brunner: 206-515-5628 or jbrunner@seattletimes.com