If you read this blog, you know how hard it is for Minnesota’s abused and neglected children to find the help they need to thrive. If you have not read the investigative report of child fatalities known to CPS by Safe Passages for Children of MN, please read it here. Pages 22+ tells the sad…
This is one of the 88 stories of children dying at the hands of their caregivers reported in the recent Safe Passage For Children investigation of child death in Minnesota. The report suggests why this tragedy is happening in our state and how we can make life safer for at risk children (in the read more at the end of the article). Lylah Koob, Goodhue County
We know that the punishment model does not facilitate healing or learning – It is responsible for most failed grade level reading, math and history scores. It is a primary reason for underperforming schools.
Are children property of their parents even if those parents
are violent, addicted, severely mentally ill or dangerously criminal?
Do teen and preteen mothers own their babies?
Is this child’s child doomed prior to birth?
88 Minnesota Children died at the hands of their caregivers recently
a cruel but accurate point. Our community has a passion for safeguarding adult rights of guns and abortion.
Safe Passage for Children investigation of child death in Minnesota
There is more to child abuse than bruises, rape and starvation.
27 states allow withholding life saving medical treatment from children if you tell people your religion forbids it . Criminal and civil immunity means it is not murder when the child dies.
A few years ago, Kansas State Rep Gail Finney vowed to pass a bill that allowed caregivers to leave bruises and cause bleeding. Arkansas State Rep Charles Fuqua promoted the death penalty for rebellious children (based on religious grounds).
CONTACT: Rich Gehrman, Executive Director, Safe Passage for Children of Minnesota (651) 303-3209; gehrm001@umn.edu Report documents multiple systemic failures in cases Of Minnesota children killed due to maltreatment 8 YEAR OLD AUTUMN HALLOW’S MURDER (KSTP video) Minnesota Child Fatalities from Maltreatment 2014 – 2022 Executive Summary From the report; This study of children who died in…
Most lawmakers know what a big percentage of their budgets is going to social programs like child welfare and child protection.
Not as many understand how tax dollars they appropriate are working to solve the problems they are meant to solve.
Minnesota’s Child Protective Services (CPS) received 85,000 child abuse calls in 2019 (about 1/3 of the calls were investigated).
Report documents system failures in cases of Minnesota Children Killed due to Maltreatment short (KSTP video)
Recent Star Tribune articles about juvenile justice and explosive growth of crime in our community miss the heart of the matter. We keep putting fires out that could have been prevented. The car jackings, transit crimes and other juvenile violence making life miserable for so many of us didn’t begin when these children became juveniles. It started with traumas suffered in the home mostly caused by parents that suffered the same violence and abuse as children.
This conversation about the study of MN child fatalities is eye opening and terribly sad. Ignoring brutality being done to children allows it to continue and to fester. Let’s all commit to caring for other people’s children. It will be a better place to live for all of us if we do.
Out of the blue murderous psychosis in normal people is rare.
It’s not likely that this boy led a normal life prior to this violence.
“I’m not for killing kids and stuff” (officer Omar Bellow). For eight seconds officers fired 66 rounds from Glock service weapons towards the children. You can read the NY Times article details here. There is nothing easy about being in law enforcement in America today (or teaching, or social work, health services or child care). The numbers of seriously troubled youth are off the charts and so many children have serious often violent behavior problems.
37% of children overall and 44% of Black children are reported to child protection services in America by the time they turn 18. (American Journal of Public Health 1.17)
When I met her, I saw a beautiful, quiet and curious little girl. I was Isabella’s (not her real name) first teacher and wish to remain anonymous.
After 7 full years of abuse and neglect she entered my special ed classroom in Arizona…
These short videos capture the realities of child abuse.
Share them widely and more of us will know how to do more for kids in painful places.
ACEs
Trauma empowerment comes from identifying and understanding what has happened. As a CASA guardian ad litem, I’ve come to know many abused children. I was the second person John ever told of the things that were done to him when he was a boy – he died last year at 80. John lived for 30…
Fairview Masonic Children’s hospital has been overwhelmed with 145 emergency pediatric psych cases since September. A makeshift shelter in an ambulance garage is all that’s available at Fairview Masonic to protect children suffering from the traumas of child abuse and homelessness.
For decades foster families have found most states unwilling to cover the costs of caring for the poor kids placed in care because of abuse and neglect.
In about half the States, kennelling/dog boarding pays more dollars than fostering a child. Dogs don’t need diapers or the near constant attention a troubled youth from Child Protective services does.
People food is also more expensive than dog food. Dogs don’t need shoes or shirts or money for “things” that children need and do.
Adolescents who had more than one suicide attempt prior to their initial hospitalization were 102% more likely to be re-hospitalized within 5 years for a suicide attempt than adolescents who had no prior attempts2.
Recent Child Welfare Articles & Statistics Summer 2022
Arianna Hunziker 1.3 million dollar settlement. Blaming child protection workers solves nothing. It’s counter productive – people in these fields are asked to do more than they ever can do. It’s very hard work with too much sadness and failure.
Are children property of their parents even if those parentsre violent, addicted, severely mentally ill or dangerously criminal?
Star Tribune’s Investigative journalist Paul Walsh coverage of toddler Kamari Gholston’s death today shines a light on the importance of public understanding and support for Child Protective Services in our state.
Kamari’s death resembles Eric Dean’s case of 2014. Except Kamari…
Child Welfare Articles and Statistics For Week of 6.10.2022
This NY Times article about Baptist Sex-abuse survivors shines a light on the commonality of child sex abuse in America. For a very long time, Tennessee allowed ten year olds to wed (almost always to older men).
To date this study documents parents who got this virtual free pass despite refusing medical treatment for children injured in a car crash, enabling sexual abuse of an infant, and a criminal conviction for malicious punishment of a child…,
CHILD ABUSE & SELF-HARM – “Up to 79% of individuals who self injure report physical and/or sexual abuse during his or her childhood”
Child Abuse and Child Protection Stories & Statistics Arizona & Arkansas
Child Protection or Child Endangerment? This article from Safe Passage for Children of Minnesota mirrors my experience as a CASA volunteer guardian ad litem. They are investigating 80 child murders by caregivers in MN since 2015.
Black girls are 49% of trafficking victims even though they only make up for 19% of
LGBTQ+ youth and young adults are at high risk of being trapped into modern day slavery. Sex Traffickers target vulnerable youth who lack support, financial resources, or those who have experienced extreme abuse in the past.
Religious exemptions = It’s Not A Crime to Abuse Your Child + NY banned child marriage today (7.23.21) but you can still withhold life saving medical care for religious reasons….
Kids At Risk Action gathers stories and statistics
about child abuse and child welfare
State By State + International)
Human Rights and the Psychotropic Medicating of Children is common in foster care and juvenile justice in the U.S. Self-harm and suicidal ideation play a roll in the early death and physical harm these children suffer.
Recent KARE11 reporting brings full circle the events, sadness as MN Supreme Court ruling
allows Child Protective Services to be held responsible for Eric Dean’s death.
This had to have been one of the most detailed Childline referrals the county had ever seen, not to mention Sally had a wonderful, dedicated psychiatrist. As the time went by, the treatment team eagerly awaited the results of her abuse referral, as she had won over the hearts of all the hospital staff and we all wanted to see her safe and free from harm.
The referral came back as unfounded.
Due to her intellectual and neurodevelopmental disabilities, she was deemed in-credible.
This is the longest and most powerful and articulate suicide note I’ve ever read and it has great meaning to me for its power to relate these two incomprehensible sorrows (abuse & suicide).
WHY CHILDREN ARE ABUSED
I’ve come to know 50 beautiful babies and children that have had their souls murdered.
All fifty of my caseload children lived with chronic and serious beatings, rape, starvation and neglect repeatedly over a period of years.
They all died a tragic death of self.
Some watched their mothers being beaten or raped repeatedly, others were beaten, neglected or raped repeatedly. Some of them were regular drug users by 8 or 9 years old.
Arianna was wrapped in sheets, left alone in a closed room and slowly starved to death. Foster parents Sherrie and Bryce Dirk will go to prison for murdering Arianna. This solves nothing.
There is something terribly disturbing about a State sanctioned foster family starving a 3 year old State Ward child to death that needs to see the light of day.
Arianna must not have had a County social worker (today’s Star Tribune article …
Woo Hoo – MN passed a restorative justice act for veterans – diverting at-risk veterans toward probation and social service programs instead of jail time when they commit certain crimes.
Why wouldn’t we?
The World Health Organization defines torture as extended exposure to violence and deprivation. Living in a war zone, bombs going off nearby or a buddy shot dead in front of you changes the brain.
Most of us want soldiers that have experienced traumas in the service of this nation to be treated for their mental health issues and have a path to rebuild their lives as productive citizens.
Arianna Hunziker was “starved, dehydrated, bound, immobilized and abandoned in a home littered in trash and smelling of of urine”. Foster parents Sherrie and Bryce Dirk went to prison for murdering Arianna. There is something terribly disturbing about a State sanctioned foster family killing a two year old State Ward child that needs to see the light of day.
The lawsuit in today’s paper points out that another MN community is having a hard time with either the resources, training or protocol for keeping at risk children safe. Being a foster child should not be one more horrific encounter with child abuse. It’s plenty hard when your birth parents make your suffering so bad that a judge removes you from their home to place you with a family you have never seen before.
As a long time volunteer County CASA guardian ad Litem it has been hard to comprehend the explosive growth of child abuse in my lifetime. This study
Historically, my community only allows the most extreme cases of extensive, repeated abuse and trauma into the system. Bruised, raped and bleeding was how one of my administrators termed it.
My family, friends and business associates hated me talking about child abuse. They would rather not know about this uncomfortable subject. To this day it’s true.
I began speaking to Rotaries and other business, religious and political groups about statistics and my experiences as a volunteer CASA guardian ad litem.
For the first few years, almost no one understood my talk.
40-day old Aiden Braden’s mother Kristina reported Aiden’s death on Facebook 38 days after social workers had responded to a child abuse hotline in Tollhouse California. Only after Aiden died did the County workers visit the home and remove Aiden’s twin brother.
Kristina Braden had already lost custody of her 3 oldest children because of her drug addiction and a long history of child neglect.
Blaming social workers for not physically intervening when they were in lockdown solves nothing.
For a teenager at home with your laptop and 7th grade course work with too many people making too much noise or drunk uncle William downstairs screaming at the TV set?
If your mom and dad are fighting and the atmosphere is toxic?
or your uncle is hurting you?
Can safety be found?
Can I call for help?
What if you are a single working parent or two parents working and no child care and no money and spending long days and troubling nights wondering about safety, food, the next day, next week and what’s next.
Follow KARA’s reporting on child abuse & well-being in your state here; stories, statistics and articles about the things most important to at risk children
These stories, articles and statistics tell the stories of childhood trauma and death in America over the past few months –
INVITE KARA’S INVISIBLE CHILDREN Program into your community.