Parents sue Children and Families for more than $500 million

Wednesday, June 7, 2000

Associated Press

ORLANDO - Parents who have had children removed from their homes sued the Florida Department of Children and Families Tuesday for more than $500 million, claiming the agency abuses its power.

The class action lawsuit was filed in U.S. District Court in Orlando by a dozen families from all over the state. The lawsuit compared the agency to the Gestapo, saying it routinely ignored due process rights.

"Families have been severely traumatized if not destroyed, while parents and others have been threatened with termination of their parental rights, denied due process and subjected to arbitrary, capricious and malicious actions by DCF personnel," the lawsuit said.

Also named in the lawsuit were Children and Families Secretary Kathleen Kearney, Attorney General Bob Butterworth and the Florida juvenile court system.

Children and Families spokeswoman Cecka Green said agency lawyers hadn't seen the lawsuit and couldn't comment on it. The plaintiff's attorney, Robert Dowd, didn't return a phone message to his office.

The Department of Children and Families has come under fire during the past two years following the death of 6-year-old Kayla McKean in Clermont and other high-profile child abuse cases. Kayla's murder by her father spurred changes in the child welfare system after an investigation revealed child welfare workers repeatedly had missed signs that Kayla was being abused by her father.

But the reforms have also been criticized by some parents who say child welfare workers now overzealously remove children from homes.

The lawsuit said the state agency is motivated to take children from homes because they receive more funding from the federal government if they do.

"The profit motive has prevailed," the lawsuit said.

The lawsuit also alleged the agency was unnecessarily medicating children in its care and arbitrarily setting up the terms by which a parent can win back custody of a child.

The lawsuit accused the Department of Children and Families of picking on the poor and uneducated.

"Children are most often removed from the homes of those least able to resist the state's practices," the lawsuit said.