Case Summary: This was a termination of parental rights case in which the judge noted "the sheer number of times that the Division or the police were required to respond to Mother's home, and the extraordinary volume of documents chronicling the Division's contacts, significant events, efforts and services are unparalleled in any case this Court has ever reviewed." While this case may not be groundbreaking in terms of the case law, it serves to highlight the extensive histories some of these cases in our welfare system continue to have.
     This case involved a mother who had seven children, the first having been born in 1975 and the youngest in 1991. The Division of Family Services began to work with this mother shortly after her first child was born. By the time this case went to a hearing on the termination of parental rights petition, DFS had been working with mother for over 23 years. In the judge's words, there was a "staggering body of evidence of mother's parental unfitness." The Court noted, "In the more than sixteen years that this Judge has served on the Family Court bench, there has rarely been a case where the extent of abuse and neglect was so extreme or the impact upon innocent children so far-reaching." The Court applied the standard of review applicable in termination cases, that of clear and convincing evidence and found that standard to be an understatement of the evidence before the Court. The Court further noted, "mother has the opportunity-virtually unchecked- to destroy the lives of all of her children, or at least to rob them of a nurturing and stable childhood." The Court optimistically hoped that the passage of the Adoption and Safe Families Act would limit cases in the system with such extensive histories of abuse; however, this case lingered in the system after the passage of ASFA due to numerous Court delays and continuances. The Court noted the deleterious effect of the delays upon the lives of the two children involved in this case.

     From the Child's Perspective: We wholeheartedly hope that the Court's belief that these types of cases will be a thing of the past comes true. Unfortunately, based on our caseload, they are not yet a thing of the past. Families with extensive histories with the child welfare system are still involved in the system and children are still yearning for permanency. The Court acknowledged many improvements in policies and practices in the wake of serious cases in the past; however, there is still work to be done.
In 2001, we hope to contribute to the further betterment of the system by highlighting those cases that come to our attention which are similar to the one described above.

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