Are state agencies responsible for the actions of youth wards?

[Tiassa]

The Seattle Times' Jonathan Martin reports today on a civil suit against Washington state's Department of Social and Health Services (DSHS) filed after a group of teens in the foster-care system beat a a Somalian man into a coma, apparently for the "crime" of riding a pink bicycle.

Three of the attackers came from a foster home run by a single mother; Emma Daniels, the foster parent, had sent her own son away for safety, and apparently "begged" DSHS to relocate two of the boys for as much as a year before the attack.

The victim, Said Aba Sheikh is a 20 year-old Somali refugee who is permanently brain damaged and suffers life-threatening respiratory problems. Aba Sheikh's uncle says the young man has been hospitalized seventeen times in the last two years.

Currently before a King County jury is the question of whether or not DSHS can be held accountable for a $20 million damage claim filed by Aba Sheikh's family.

"DSHS gambled that the juvenile justice system would do what DSHS should have done long before; remove Pierre and Anderson," Aba Sheikh's attorneys, Jack Connelly and Darrell Cochran, wrote in a court filing. "The price of the bet was Said Aba Sheikh's life-long debilitation."

But DSHS lawyers say the suit overreaches in the hunt for a culprit. The case is based on the "unprecedented theory that DSHS social workers ... owe a duty to protect members of the general public from criminal conduct by foster children," wrote Jeff Freimund, an assistant attorney general representing DSHS.

If the system failed these kids, Freimund argued, it was King County's juvenile-probation department, which was supposed to be supervising Pierre and Anderson at the time of the beating. Aba Sheikh's lawyers reached an undisclosed settlement with King County before trial.

And the lawyers have uncovered documents and evidence suggesting that DSHS social workers were fearful of the situation at Daniels' home but did nothing to move Anderson and Pierre to a group home.

"As bad as it sounds, these were seen as throwaway children," said Jane Ramon, a former DSHS social worker who reviewed the case for Aba Sheikh's lawyers. "I'm not saying it's not difficult to deal with these high-end children, but you have to try. I don't know how anyone could look at the case and not feel they were warehoused." (Seattle Times)