Los Angeles, CA -
A year ago LA County Supervisors got a report labeled "confidential." It has been until it was made public today after, according to my sources, "being leaked" to the LA Times.
The report is harsh. It was prepared by an independent counsel at the request of LA County Supervisors. It states that, in the cases studied involving child deaths, children who should have been "detained" - put in Foster Care - were instead returned to birth parents. Per the report: "Individual social workers were praised for low detention numbers; all the while more children were dying while left in parents care."
An example of that is a story we have been following at FOX 11 -- the case of Tori Sandoval. She was removed from Foster Care and returned to her birthday parents. She was a tad over 2 years old when she died. She was just 25 months old.
The coroner who did the autopsy said that, besides the internal injuries that killed Tori, there were many other signs of chronic abuse. The relatively new head of DCFS is Philip Browning. He took over February 2012. The "confidential" report laid out ways to deal with the findings. His office says many of those suggestions have been implemented over the last year.
County Superviso Don Knabe's office concurs.
Hal Eisner
