Child Abuse Cases Climb, Report Finds : Crime: Incidents reported throughout Los Angeles County jumped 15.6% last year. But homicides and fetal deaths drop significantly.

Child abuse reports continued a grim and steady climb in Los Angeles County last year, but the most tragic kinds of abuse--homicides and fetal deaths--registered marked declines.

A report by the Los Angeles County Inter-Agency Council on Child Abuse and Neglect (ICAN), scheduled for release today, found that child abuse cases brought to the Department of Children’s Services jumped 15.6%, to 139,248. Cases of infants exposed to alcohol or drugs--mostly crack cocaine--climbed 16.5%, with 2,973 reported to the Department of Children’s Services.

Child abuse homicides by family members or caretakers dropped 24.6%, to 46 deaths, the same level as three years ago, but officials cautioned that most of the dozen child deaths ruled “undetermined” by the coroner involved suspicious head trauma.

“Our children continue to suffer terribly in the hands of adults. They are victimized at a terribly alarming rate,” said Sheriff Sherman Block, who chairs ICAN.

“We have to turn this around,” said Block, who attributed much of the rise in child abuse reports to the economy and unemployment.

ICAN Executive Director Deanne Tilton said county agencies’ improved reporting of abuse suffered by very young children may have contributed to the decline in homicides.

Most child abuse homicide victims were under 2 years of age. In 1992, two children were killed on their first day of life. More than one-third of those killed died of head injuries. Mothers were charged in 42% of cases, while mothers’ live-in male companions were charged in 28% of cases. In 60% of cases, the perpetrators used no weapon other than their hands.

Los Angeles’ decrease in such homicides contrasted with a nationwide 1% increase in child abuse homicides in 1992, to 1,261 deaths.

The county established ICAN in 1978 to review child deaths and abuse.

In its latest report, the agency highlighted the case of a boy named Craig, who was suffocated by his father. The father, who abused drugs, said that on the day of the murder he saw the devil in a mirror and the devil told him he would let him live forever if he killed his son.

In another case, three children who were left alone died when a fire broke out in their home. Three others were stabbed by their mother, who subsequently tried to kill herself.

Accidental deaths declined 19.8% in 1992, according to the report. In all, 73 children died, almost half of them younger than 2. Most drowned in swimming pools.

Tilton said the decline was the result of increasing awareness of the danger of unattended children near pools. A state proposal, set for hearings next month, would change building codes to require that all hot tubs, spas and pools built after Feb. 1, 1994, be encircled by a fence and have an alarm system.

The report noted that four toddlers died in separate incidents after eating their mother’s iron pills, which look like sugar-coated candy.

Meanwhile, fetal deaths dropped 26.4%, to 39, as the health department redoubled efforts to get pregnant women prenatal care, Tilton said.

Reversing a pronounced two-year decline, suicides of young people increased 13%, to 26 cases. The weapon of choice in nearly three-quarters of the cases: the family gun. The youngest victim was 11. Most were 17-year-old white males.

The deaths produced patterns: Most of the victims in child abuse and accidental deaths were under 2. Younger children irritate parents with their cries, are more fragile and lack the ability to cry out for help and are often not seen by anyone who might report suspected abuse, Tilton said.

“They can reach their fifth birthday and never be seen by anyone outside the household,” Tilton said. More than half of families involved in such deaths had a history of receiving public assistance from the Department of Public Social Services.

African-Americans, who make up 12.3% of the county’s population, were overrepresented in all areas, especially in fetal deaths, where they made up 60% of the total. In 90% of such cases, the mother was abusing drugs.

In one promising step to further reduce child homicide numbers, Department of Children’s Services Director Pete Digre said he has received a commitment from the state to establish what may be the nation’s first computerized network linking county agencies that interact with troubled families.

Child Deaths In Los Angeles County last year, child abuse reports jumped 15%. But in other areas there was some improvement: Child-abuse homicides as well as accidental deaths showed decreases. Source: Los Angeles County’s Inter-Agency Council on Child Abuse and Neglect