Task Force Tries to Ease the Pain of Abused Kids

Luz Maria Ricardo remembers the repeated interrogations by strangers after her father murdered two of her siblings. As an 11-year-old who had been abused, she was forced to relive her father’s beatings time and time again.

“We felt like we’d done whatever my father did because we were interviewed so many times,” said Ricardo, now an 18-year-old high school senior.

“You go to a therapist, they ask you about it.

“You go to a new agency, they ask about it. The sheriffs, a new social worker, they’d ask.”

“It just got to the point where it was like, ‘OK, I’ve got to say it again, like a broken record.’ It was scary and traumatic,” Ricardo said.

Her father is on death row and her mother is in Mexico after spending six years in prison.

Ensuring that victims like Ricardo don’t have to relive trauma through multiple interviews is one of many goals set by representatives from nearly 50 Los Angeles County agencies.

The group has prepared a handbook outlining guidelines for those agencies to follow in responding to child abuse cases.

The wide-ranging interagency protocol is required by the federal Children’s Justice Act and seeks uniform treatment by law enforcement, school and health officials, social workers and prosecutors on issues such as abduction from foster care homes by noncustodial parents.

It also sets up medical standards for evaluation of cases of physical and sexual abuse of children at hospitals.

The guidelines also encourage cross-reporting between law enforcement and the Department of Children and Family Services, the county agency responsible for protecting children.

“We want to ensure the child suffers the least trauma and receives the most appropriate intervention,” said Deanne Tilton-Durfee, executive director of the Inter-Agency Council on Child Abuse and Neglect, which works to coordinate and improve services to abused children in Los Angeles County.

The group has been working for nearly seven years with the Los Angeles County district attorney’s office and other agencies, including the Los Angeles Police Department, Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department and the county children’s services department to draft uniform procedures for all agencies. The result is contained in the 100-plus pages of the task force handbook.

“This is the first time we’ve had a systemwide protocol,” Tilton-Durfee said.

The document, which will be presented to the Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors on Tuesday, is considered one of the most comprehensive in the state, said Gina Roberson, a senior program specialist in the children’s section of the Governor’s Office of Emergency Services, which provides funds for helping abused children.

Other California counties have prepared plans in much less time, but a comparison is not fair, Roberson said.

“We joke that they’re a country unto themselves,” said Roberson of Los Angeles County. “Los Angeles is kind of an anomaly because of the size and the complexity of the county itself.”

The document will be distributed and training will start this month. Tilton-Durfee said the task force will ask the board Tuesday to direct agencies to use the guidelines.

William Hodgman, the head deputy district attorney for the sex crimes division, heads a group that will review the plan each year and update as necessary to make this a “living document with continued applicability.”

“We want this to be a document that will be used,” said Hodgman.

The document details the steps each agency should follow when dealing with a child abuse victim and identifies medical facilities that have trained staff to identify and report child abuse.

Tilton-Durfee recalled a case in which one young victim had been seen more than 50 times by law enforcement, child welfare, child health, mental health and domestic violence professionals.

“This protocol will hopefully establish clear guidelines for handling child abuse and neglect in an effective manner in which the child suffers the least trauma,” Tilton-Durfee said.

The guidelines should also help prosecutors bring cases to trial.

According to David Clohessy, national director of the Chicago-based Survivors Network of Those Abused by Priests, multiple interviews can deter victims from pursuing civil and criminal action by giving “the defense all kinds of trivial, seemingly contradictory statements to pick apart.”

“Child victims are almost always very traumatized and frail and confused. We must bend over backward to be sensitive to them and their families,” Clohessy said. “Anything that reduces the emotional trauma for the victim and increases the chance for a successful conviction is well worth it.”

In Ricardo’s case, she was traumatized by multiple interviews, said Miriam Krinsky, executive director of the L.A.-based Children’s Law Center, which worked with Ricardo.

“The child has already suffered,” Krinsky said, “and everyone in the system needs to be sensitive the process doesn’t deepen that injury or re-traumatize an already victimized child.”