Court of Appeals Rejects Own Panel's Decision; Agrees to Review Right to Sue for Child Welfare Refor

PRESS RELEASE

Children's Rights, Inc. wins chance to argue federal law can be used to reform child welfare system in D.C. and elsewhere.

The U.S. District Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia rejected on Friday a previous decision of it's own three-judge panel. The District Court agreed that all eleven of its judges will hear in banc the arguments of Children's Rights, Inc. that the federal court can be used to enforce wide-ranging institutional reform on the District of Columbia's child welfare system. This highly unusual decision by an appellate court negates the panel's October 1995 finding that questioned a federal judge's intervention to protect foster care children in the District of Columbia. The entire appellate court will now hear the case sometime before its summer recess and decide if District Judge Thomas F. Hogan, in the lawsuit LaShawn v. Barry, was right to hold the District of Columbia to standards set by federal law that govern the rights of children in government custody.

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This latest legal action grows out of the District's continuing efforts to have the case thrown out of court, after a federal judge ruled in 1991 that the Washington, D.C. child welfare system was "a travesty."

"This is a clear victory for the children in D.C. and throughout the country, said Marcia Robinson Lowry, Executive Director of Children's Rights, Inc., which represents the children in the LaShawn suit and is a national organization dedicated to improving the lives of children dependent upon foster care, mental health and juvenile justice systems. "If the panel's decision had been let stand, these children could have lost the chance to fight for a decent childhood. When Judge Hogan found that D.C. was failing to protect the abused and neglected children in its care, he simply upheld federal law. That's why he placed the system in the hands of a receiver, and gave him full power to institute reforms. Hogan's action was the first lifeline that had been given to these kids in years. To have that lifeline severed by a seriously-divided panel of three judges would have been a tragedy. Now these kids can have their day in court."

When the three-panel judge issued a decision in October 1995, a vigorous dissent was written by Judge A. Raymond Randolph. Randolph stated: "The majority's opinion disregards the law of this court and of the Supreme Court. My colleagues do not like the idea of a federal district court issuing a decree to govern local institutions. Nor do I, nor, for that matter, does the district judge in this case. But we are sworn to uphold the law. I therefore dissent."

The appellate court's current decision has national significance, because the panel's opinion was being used by other localities to argue there is no federal basis for challenging dysfunctional foster care systems. In another federal lawsuit recently filed by Children's Rights, Marisol v. Giuliani, defendants New York City and State had filed a motion to dismiss, relying in part on the panel's opinion in LaShawn. In Marisol, Children's Rights has asked for the entire system to be immediately placed in receivership, citing its persistent failure to care for and protect the children in its custody or those reported to be in danger of abuse and neglect. Friday's decision effectively removes one of the city's and state's primary legal arguments to dismiss the case.

"We had seen a cloud cast over litigation nationally," said Lowry. "It was clear the two judges on the Circuit's panel were opposed to any federal court role in finding child welfare systems illegal. But all we are doing in D.C. and in our other cases, is holding city and states accountable to existing laws that protect children. Unlike adults, children in government custody can't complain when their government custodians break the law, but the federal courts give them a voice against lawless child welfare systems where children routinely die or are severely abused and neglected. We are confident that the full Court of Appeals when it hears our case will agree that the good laws that do exist to protect children must be upheld by the federal courts."

Children's Rights works throughout the United States in partnership with national and local experts, advocates and government officials to document the needs of children in the care of child welfare systems. Children's Rights helps develop realistic solutions and, where necessary, uses the power of litigation to ensure that reform takes place.