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NYC CHILD WELFARE INVESTIGATORS COERCE, TRAUMATIZE FAMILIES, CLASS-ACTION
LAWSUIT CLAIMS



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By
Arya Sundaram

Published Feb 21, 2024

Modified Feb 21, 2024

15 comments

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By
Arya Sundaram

Published Feb 21, 2024

Modified Feb 21, 2024

15 comments

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A new federal class-action lawsuit claims New York City child welfare
investigators routinely use “coercive tactics” that violate the Constitution and
traumatize families under scrutiny.

The lawsuit, filed in U.S. District Court on Tuesday, alleges caseworkers for
the Administration for Children's Services often pressure parents to enter and
search their homes, including when there’s no emergency, with lies and
threatening to call the police and take away their children.

The searches can be "invasive," the lawsuit claims, with ACS staff rifling
through private spaces and strip-searching children, and leaving parents and
children at risk of developing depression, anxiety and sleep disorders. And
low-income Black and Latino families — who make up the overwhelming majority of
those under child welfare investigations — disproportionately bear the
consequences, the plaintiffs argue in court papers.

“ACS leaves in their wake real fear, real trauma, and real consequences that
need to be accounted for,” said David Shalleck-Klein, an attorney for the nine
families bringing the suit and the founder and director of the Family Justice
Law Center.

Marisa Kaufman, an agency spokesperson, said in a statement that, “ACS is
committed to keeping children safe and respecting parents’ rights,” adding that
the agency has worked to increase transparency for parents and reduce the number
of unnecessary investigations.

The lawsuit comes amid yearslong legislative efforts to reform child welfare
investigations. State and local bills to institute "Miranda Rights for Families”
would require ACS to inform parents under investigation of their ability to call
a lawyer and deny investigators entry into their home, among other rights.



ACS announced a policy last month to provide written notices to parents of their
rights during investigations, but parents’ rights advocates have criticized the
letters as insufficient and potentially misleading.

Shalleck-Klein, a former public defender in family court, founded the Family
Justice Law Center in 2022 to prevent unnecessary family separation and bolster
the city’s legal advocacy for families’ rights in the child welfare system. He
was one of the recipients of the $200,000 David Prize for New Yorkers who aim to
solve pressing problems in the city.

ACS conducts over 50,000 investigations every year in a process that typically
lasts about 60 days. Only 28.2% of ACS investigations last fiscal year resulted
in findings of child neglect or the less common offense of abuse, according to
the latest Mayor’s Management Report. And charges were brought to family court
in under 7% of cases in 2022, agency officials testified to City Council.

The agency is required to investigate all reports of alleged child abuse and
neglect made to the state's central hotline. Some of the reports are made by
teachers, doctors, and other professionals who are legally required to report
suspected maltreatment of children.

The lawsuit contends that under Fourth Amendment precedent, ACS workers are only
allowed to search a family’s home when they have a warrant, it’s an emergency,
or parents provide “voluntary consent.”

Yet nearly all of ACS’ searches are done without warrants, according to the
suit. The agency only sought 222 warrants across its nearly 53,000
investigations last year. Additionally, the agency rarely claims its searches
are being conducted pursuant to an emergency, according to the suit.



Shalleck-Klein said his goal isn’t for ACS to ban all investigations but rather
for the agency to better train its investigators and institute policies to
prevent coercion of parents.

“ACS falls short of what even the NYPD is doing when searching New Yorkers’
homes,” Shalleck-Klein said, pointing to the police department’s
consent-to-search forms and more robust training for searches, while withholding
comment on the overall adequacy of its search policies.

Black and Latino families made up about 80% of reported cases last year,
according to ACS annual data, despite those groups representing just over half
of the city's population.

The vast majority of reports – over 70% last year according to agency data — are
for neglect, such as providing insufficient food or clothing, rather than
physical or sexual abuse.

The lawsuit asks for money damages and an end to what it says are
unconstitutional policies and practices.

This article was updated with additional data on ACS investigations.




Tagged

new york city
public safety
Race And Justice Unit
Health and Science

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Arya Sundaram
Twitter

Arya is a reporter covering race and justice. Got a tip? Email:
asundaram@nypublicradio.org or reach Arya on Signal at 512-650-8767.

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