Today’s Court of Appeals opinion in SCDSS v. Randy S., 390 S.C. 100, 700 S.E.2d 250 (Ct.App. 2010), reverses the family court’s decision to remove children from the Father’s care, where DSS brought the lawsuit against Father as an action for intervention[1] rather than for removal.[2] Randy S. seems like a strange case for the appellate [...]
Archive for the ‘Department of Social Services/Child Abuse and Neglect’ Category
Despite children already being removed, reversible error for family court to order removal in a DSS intervention case
Posted Wednesday, September 1st, 2010 by Gregory Forman
Filed under Department of Social Services/Child Abuse and Neglect, Of Interest to Family Law Attorneys, South Carolina Appellate Decisions, South Carolina Specific
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Tags: Child Abuse and Neglect, Department of Social Services, South Carolina Court of Appeals
Posted in Department of Social Services/Child Abuse and Neglect, Of Interest to Family Law Attorneys, South Carolina Appellate Decisions, South Carolina Specific | No Comments »
When the buck stops nowhere, failure is to be expected: the problems created by the lack of tort liability for a Social Service agency’s failure to protect a child from abusive caregivers
Posted Thursday, July 22nd, 2010 by Gregory Forman
Filed under Department of Social Services/Child Abuse and Neglect, Jurisprudence, Not South Carolina Specific, Of Interest to Family Court Litigants, Of Interest to Family Law Attorneys, Of Interest to General Public
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My first year of law school the United States Supreme Court, in the case of Deshaney v. Winnebago Cty. Soc. Servs. Dept., 489 U.S. 189 (1989), rejected a claim that negligence of a child protective service agency to protect a child from an abusive caregiver was a violation of the due process clause of the [...]
Tags: Charleston Post & Courier, Child Abuse and Neglect, Department of Social Services, Jurisprudence, New York Times, United States Supreme Court
Posted in Department of Social Services/Child Abuse and Neglect, Jurisprudence, Not South Carolina Specific, Of Interest to Family Court Litigants, Of Interest to Family Law Attorneys, Of Interest to General Public | 9 Comments »
Will the Recent Changes to the Abuse and Neglect Statute Make These Cases Harder to Settle?
Posted Sunday, July 18th, 2010 by Gregory Forman
Filed under Department of Social Services/Child Abuse and Neglect, Guardians Ad Litem, Litigation Strategy, Of Interest to Family Court Litigants, Of Interest to Family Law Attorneys, South Carolina Specific
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I received an email from a recently licensed attorney noting a previous blog and asking whether I thought she, as the guardian ad litem in an abuse and neglect case, should be making recommendations on the merits. This got me thinking about how the recent changes to the abuse and neglect statute, explained here, will impact [...]
Tags: Child Abuse and Neglect, Department of Social Services, Litigation Strategy
Posted in Department of Social Services/Child Abuse and Neglect, Guardians Ad Litem, Litigation Strategy, Of Interest to Family Court Litigants, Of Interest to Family Law Attorneys, South Carolina Specific | 1 Comment »
Recent changes to South Carolina “Child Protection and Permanency” statute make it harder for parents to obtain return of their children
Posted Friday, June 18th, 2010 by Gregory Forman
Filed under Adoption/Termination of Parental Rights, Department of Social Services/Child Abuse and Neglect, Of Interest to Family Law Attorneys, South Carolina Specific
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On May 12, 2010, South Carolina enacted Senate bill 1172, which makes changes to the Child Protection and Permanency statute. Among the highlights: The revisions limits when the Department of Social Services (DSS) will be required by the family court to make “reasonable efforts to preserve or reunify a family.” S.C. Code § 63-7-1640. It [...]
Tags: Child Abuse and Neglect, Children's Law Center, South Carolina Code, Termination of Parental Rights
Posted in Adoption/Termination of Parental Rights, Department of Social Services/Child Abuse and Neglect, Of Interest to Family Law Attorneys, South Carolina Specific | No Comments »
State of Abuse
Posted Sunday, May 23rd, 2010 by Gregory Forman
Filed under Department of Social Services/Child Abuse and Neglect, Law and Culture, Of Interest to General Public, South Carolina Specific
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The first in a series on Child Protective Services in South Carolina was published in today’s Charleston Post & Courier: State of Abuse. This initial piece accurately describes what I see in family court abuse and neglect cases. Subsequent articles in the series can be found here: DSS not meeting requirements; here: The guardians; and here: Norton center [...]
Tags: Adam Parker, Charleston Post & Courier, Child Abuse and Neglect, Department of Social Services, Guardian ad litem
Posted in Department of Social Services/Child Abuse and Neglect, Law and Culture, Of Interest to General Public, South Carolina Specific | No Comments »
Updated abuse and neglect materials
Posted Friday, March 26th, 2010 by Gregory Forman
Filed under Department of Social Services/Child Abuse and Neglect, Of Interest to Family Court Litigants, Of Interest to Family Law Attorneys, South Carolina Specific
1 Comment »
Less than a year after undertaking extensive research in 2007 to draft materials for lectures on representing parents in abuse and neglect cases, South Carolina’s legislature recodified the abuse an neglect code. Unlike the recent recodification of the children’s code, this was not mostly labeling old statutes with new statute numbers in a one-to-one mapping. [...]
Tags: Child Abuse and Neglect, Department of Social Services, Litigation Strategy
Posted in Department of Social Services/Child Abuse and Neglect, Of Interest to Family Court Litigants, Of Interest to Family Law Attorneys, South Carolina Specific | 1 Comment »
Court of Appeals finds reversible error to go forward with DSS Judicial Review Hearing when incarcerated mother had order of transport and the Department of Corrections failed to transport her to hearing
Posted Thursday, December 3rd, 2009 by Gregory Forman
Filed under Department of Social Services/Child Abuse and Neglect, Of Interest to Family Law Attorneys, South Carolina Appellate Decisions, South Carolina Specific
1 Comment »
Today the Court of Appeals, in Department of Social Services v. Laura D., 386 S.C. 382, 688 S.E.2d 130 (2009), reversed and remanded a family court’s decision to proceed with a DSS Judicial Review Hearing when the incarcerated Mother was not present but when another judge had previously issued an order of transport to the hearing. Her [...]
Tags: Child Abuse and Neglect, Department of Social Services, South Carolina Court of Appeals
Posted in Department of Social Services/Child Abuse and Neglect, Of Interest to Family Law Attorneys, South Carolina Appellate Decisions, South Carolina Specific | 1 Comment »
In a DSS abuse and neglect case, when the treatment plan is resolved, should the guardian ad litem have an opinion on the merits?
Posted Friday, November 13th, 2009 by Gregory Forman
Filed under Department of Social Services/Child Abuse and Neglect, Guardians Ad Litem, Mediation/Alternative Dispute Resolution, Of Interest to Family Court Litigants, Of Interest to Family Law Attorneys, Of Interest to General Public, South Carolina Specific
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I have mediated a couple of DSS abuse and neglect cases recently in which the treatment plan was resolved (that is, everyone agreed what the defendant(s) needed to do to resume contact or custody of the children at issue) but in which the merits (that is, whether or not the defendant(s) had abused or neglected the [...]
Tags: Child Abuse and Neglect, Department of Social Services, Guardian ad litem, Jurisprudence
Posted in Department of Social Services/Child Abuse and Neglect, Guardians Ad Litem, Mediation/Alternative Dispute Resolution, Of Interest to Family Court Litigants, Of Interest to Family Law Attorneys, Of Interest to General Public, South Carolina Specific | No Comments »