Wednesday, February 10, 2010

Child Abuse Propaganda Machines

These are legitimate examples why all data used in child welfare, especially in child abuse and neglect policies should be considered as suspect.

Pennsylvania Judges Imprisoned For Kickback Scheme

February 9, 2010

Two judges have each agreed to plead guilty and serve more than seven years in prison for receiving kickbacks from a private juvenile detention facility. Judges Mark Ciavarella and Michael Conahan, both of the Luzerne County Common Pleas Court of Pennsylvania, were alleged to have received over $2.6 million for decisions from the bench that benefitted the construction, expansion and operation of a private juvenile detention center and also to the placement of juveniles in those facilities. In one case in 2004, it is alleged that an agreement resulted in the placement of juvenile offenders worth $58 million...more

How many children and parents are still were harmed with improper removals, malicious prosecution, and illegal incarceration? Were the state and federal data amended to reflect these horrific transgressions?

Of course not, the money continues to flow.

Ex-caseworker says she faked documents after girl’s death

February 9, 2010
By Nathan Gorenstein
INQUIRER STAFF WRITER

Within hours of 14-year-old Danieal Kelly's death, officials at the social services company responsible for her safety were rushing to produce back-dated paperwork, an effort that apparently included forging the signature of the teen's mother on a form, according to testimony today in federal court...more

If it happened in this case, how many other cases did it happen in, and how many parental rights were terminated because of it? How many children were improperly and unnecessarily removed and placed in foster care? How many children were falsely placed for adoption because of these practices?

No one will ever know.

How many of these children of this child placing agency were reunified? None.

Did the Pennsylvania Attorney General Medicaid Fraud Control Unit prosecute and recover the funds? Of course not.

For States to take any action to stop child welfare fraud, it would unravel the nation's history of abuse and neglect, being economically, technologically, politically and religiously not feasible.  Therefore, the child abuse propaganda machines keep fighting for more and more money to stay in the business, with only very few voices advocating for the ones whose lives have been masticated and mangled by this very machine.

Tuesday, February 9, 2010

Will Kansas End Backroom Fraud?

Kansas, after being selected by the federal partnership of the Department of Justice and Department of Health and Human Services Health Care Fraud Enforcement Task Force by the pattern of practice in Targeted Case Management fraud in child welfare, seems to the test case for observation on how the state is going to clean up its act.

What Kansas is really examining is its dire situation of a possible decrease in its Federal Financial Participation rates. I say cut them off and watch how fast Kansas gets its house in order.

The current state of affairs within the state administration of Social and Rehabilitative Services Department are creating a culture of fraud, waste and abuse to be cloaked and protected from public exposure.

One of the main problems, found in the States child welfare systems, is the lack of accountability and transparency in privatization. There are no contractual debarments, meaning the state will continue to renew contracts with private organizations that have been found, whether willingly and/or knowingly, to have committed fraud.

Another key issue is there is absolutely no oversight. There are no regulatory authorities that a stakeholder, referring to the parents, guardians and caregivers, can report suspected questionable activities in the realms of fraudulent claims. This only is allowed to exist because the state Medicaid Fraud Control Unit does miserably fails to investigate, prosecute and recover these funds.

Unnecessary and improper removals are performed for the intended purposes of fraudulent conversion of the custody of the child being remanded to the state.

The magnitude of fraud cover ups is so obvious, it impugns the veracity of all its child welfare programs. Here, Senator Lynn tells the Secretary of SRS very eloquently, that the operations of child welfare do not pass the stink test of fraud.



Until these child placing agencies, both public and private, are held to the same standards of scrutiny that caregivers are, nothing will change in Kansas.

Child welfare summit scheduled
National experts expected to testify to House committee

By Dave Ranney
KHI News Service
Feb. 8, 2010

TOPEKA — The chairman of the House Federal and State Affairs Committee is planning a four-days of hearings on child welfare issues.

“I’m trying to bring in some national experts to talk about best practices on foster care, adoption, family preservation and some other issues,” said Rep. Melvin Neufeld, R-Ingalls.

“We’ll spend a day with the courts – the judges – to see if there are any changes that can be made in the law to make things work better,” Neufeld said.

The hearings are scheduled at 1:30 p.m. on Feb. 24 and 25 and on March 1 and 2 in the Statehouse, Room 346-S.

Bills in play

The hearings coincide with legislators considering at least five foster care reform bills:

• House Bill 2461 would block the state from renewing its foster care, adoption and family preservation contracts with private contractors.

• HB 2494 would prohibit judges from putting a child in foster care solely because his or her parent(s) are homeless.

• HB 2511 would allow SRS to pay grandparents to care for grandchildren who’ve been removed from their parents’ custody. Payment would be commensurate with what foster parents are paid.

• House Bill 2512 would order the courts to review Kansas Department of Social and Rehabilitation Services placement decisions affecting children in foster care. Without the court’s approval a child would not be moved.

• House Bill 2513 would direct law enforcement to hold a runaway child in a secure facility until a court decides if the child should be in foster care.

Privatization

Kansas privatized most of its child-welfare responsibilities in 1996. Today, SRS investigates reports of child abuse and neglect and monitors a child’s progress within the system. Direct services are provided by regional contractors.

Several legislators – conservative Republicans, mostly – have been critical of privatization, accusing SRS and the contractors of abusing the rights of parents and grandparents.

In December, Rep. Mike Kiegerl, R-Olathe, accused the contractors of wielding “Gestapo-like powers” in their dealings with parents accused of mistreating their children.

Kiegerl is vice chair of the House Federal and State Affairs Committee.

Neufeld, a former speaker of the House and a key figure in the decision to privatize, said the hearings would focus on child welfare issues rather than specific legislation.

“What we’re looking for, really, is how do we make things better,” he said. “That’s really what this is about.”

SRS and the contractors have cited data showing that while there are exceptions, most children in foster care receive more services, remain closer to home and spend less time in the system than before privatization.

Neufeld said he’s sure there are shortfalls within the system.

“Any program that’s as diverse as this, there are going to be things that don’t happen right,” he said. “But the question to me is: How do we make the system work better and do a better job protecting chidlren in state custody.”

Neufeld is vice president of the National Conference of State Legislatures.

Kansas-Nebraska Act Just Alike

Before I even start, you have to watch this to even begin to understand what I am experiencing at this moment.



Here you have Kansas State Representative Pete Degraaf (R. Mulvane) in legislative inquiry, surviving the ad nauseum horrific-feces-filled-shovel-tossed-testimony Secretary of the Kansas Department of Social and Rehabilitative Services Don Jordan.

My deepest condolences, Rep. Degraaf.

Never in my life, I have I ever heard such, back-stepping, arrogant ignorance, idiocy, shall I continue?  And to think this man gets paid with tax-payer dollars!

The Secretary stated he did not believe Kansas was doing as doing as bad as the rest of the country. Secretary Jordan said he would "check it out".

Don't worry, Secretary Jordan, I checked it out for you.

Whenever I hear a person allow themselves to intentionally place contradictory rhetoric on public record, my fraud senses begin to tingle. I remembered the Department of Health and Human Services and the Department of Justice Health Care Fraud and Abuse Control Program Report for Fiscal Year 2008, and my eyes lit up. Here is the section I pulled for your viewing enjoyment:

HHS/OIG estimated that for State FYs 2001 and 2003 Kansas did not ensure that its $62 million ($37.2 million Federal share) in TCM claims for recipients of child welfare services was within the limit specified in the State’s Medicaid plan. Because the State could not produce the rate and cost data necessary to apply the limit, HHS/OIG was unable to express an opinion on the reasonableness of the claim, and recommended that the State work with CMS to determine the allowability of the $62 million claimed for the audit period.

TRANSLATION: The pattern of child welfare fraud had previously been tagged by the DHHS OIG that it was put on the hot plate for H.E.A.T. making it the fifth report submitted in its Targeted Case Management fraud report. The fraud was so bad in Kansas that the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid are going to be all over Kansas, or rather Secretary Jordan, as he is close to the state Medicaid Directors Andrew Allison, former, and Barbara Langner, Acting Medicaid Director. 

And that, my dear readers, is the reason why Kansas SRS Secretary Jordan was talking out the back of his neck, because the feds are breathing down his neck.  Perhaps that is why there has been musical chairs at the Kansas Health Policy Authority.

See for yourself, Kansas-Nebraska Act just alike, always did, always will, but this time its fraud. No wonder Secretary Jordan offered to write federal law.

DHHS Audit of Foster Care Nebraska 2003



Wendy M. Keats, Attorney, U.S. Department of Justice, argued the cause for appellants. With her on the briefs were Peter D. Keisler, Assistant Attorney General, Kenneth L. Wainstein, U.S. Attorney, and Barbara C. Biddle, Assistant Director. Claire M. Whitaker, Michael J. Ryan, and R. Craig Lawrence, Assistant U.S. Attorneys, entered appearances.

Phyllis D. Thompson argued the cause for appellee. With her on the brief was Jon C. Bruning, Attorney General, Attorney General's Office of State of Nebraska.

Before: GINSBURG, Chief Judge, and GARLAND and BROWN, Circuit Judges.

Opinion for the Court filed by Chief Judge GINSBURG.

GINSBURG, Chief Judge.
1

The United States Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) appeals from a judgment of the district court vacating three policy announcements for lack of notice and comment rulemaking and ordering approval of a cost allocation plan (CAP) submitted by the State of Nebraska Department of Health and Human Services (Nebraska). Because Nebraska challenged only HHS's rejection of its proposed CAP, the district court erred in vacating the announcements. The court also abused its discretion when it determined the CAP should be approved rather than remanding the matter for the Department to reconsider its decision without reference to the policy announcements.

I. Background
2

The Congress has enacted several statutes aimed at improving child welfare services provided by the several States. Title IV-E of the Social Security Act, 42 U.S.C. § 670 et seq., makes funds available to state programs that offer "foster care and transitional independent living programs for children" and "adoption assistance for children with special needs." Id. § 670. Title IV-B of the Act, id. § 620 et seq., offers federal funds to "State public welfare agencies in [order to] establish[], extend[], and strengthen[] child welfare services." Id. § 620(a). The amount of money a State may receive under Title IV-B is capped, see id., whereas under Title IV-E a State may obtain reimbursement without limit for 75% of the costs it incurs to train employees, see id. § 674(a)(3)(A).
3

In order to obtain reimbursement under Title IV-E, a State must submit to the HHS Division of Cost Allocation (DCA) a CAP detailing the State's expenditures. See 45 C.F.R. § 95.517(a) (limiting financial assistance to that provided "in accordance with [a State's] approved [CAP]"). A question that arises when a State prepares its CAP is how it should allocate expenditures that benefit more than one federal program. See id. § 95.507(a)(4) (DCA evaluates "correctness and fairness" of State procedures for "allocating all costs to each of the programs operated by the State agency"). For example, each child protection and safety worker (PSW) in Nebraska handles cases under Title IV-B and, we are told, is "expected to handle" cases under Title IV-E. Nebraska therefore must determine how to allocate the costs of training PSWs between the two programs. Title IV-E cases constitute only 21.5% of all child welfare cases the PSWs manage but, left to its own devices, Nebraska could allocate all PSW training costs to Title IV-E and thus avoid the cap on reimbursement under Title IV-B....more

Kansas is next.

Monday, February 8, 2010

Haiti Does Not Approve U.S. Legally Kidnapping Children

The Idaho missionaries are being charged with kidnapping and will be tried in Haiti. The United States will not intervene in the matters of the Haitian Government.

The United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF) made a position statement supporting international adoptions of Haitian child victims of the earthquake as a last resort.

What is on trial is the mentality of "child removals" or rather legally kidnapping children of poverty. The United Nations also reiterated that governments have an obligation to provide help to families in need, not child removals.

From around the world, Westernized nations who remove children on the basis of need are considered human traffickers, with the United States leading the so-called child welfare brigade, under the direction of God.

So why is it globally frowned upon to remove a child for being poor?

For starters, most of the other "non-Westernized" countries are poor! Haiti is poor. The United States is not.

Now for the kicker. International policy was violated. That violation is to provide assistance to those families in need. This includes finding other relatives or community members first, to care for the child.

Why did these citizens of the United States of America ignore this international policy? Because the United States is the only country in the world that refuses to ratify this policy.

United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child

There are "those" American factions that believe the U.N. Convention on the Rights of the Child (CRC) is a conspiracy to strip away individual rights by instilling the fallacy of parental rights.

Then there are "those" American factions that believe it is justifiable to promote false data in order to solicit donations.

The truth is that "these American factions" are brutally aware that the ratification of international policies on children would implode the institutional edifices that have promulgated the human trafficking on the basis of poverty.

Simply put, they would be out of business and would be forced to treat people as equals.

One main factor is in the beginning of the document, as it identifies children as being under the age of 18. States would have to amend large portions of its codified functions regarding children, the first being the age of consent. Some states recognize the age of consent at 14 years and this is a major challenge to the CRC, as it forces states to step up efforts to protect children from sexual predators, particularly on the internet. The U.S. would be forced into compliance when it comes to international internet sexual abuses of children, which is something some of "those" American factions would consider a threat to capitalism and free market principles.

The question is open on the sources and amounts the Idaho missionaries would have gained if they were successful in securing the children.

Then, the States would be coerced into international compliance of policy in providing assistance to those families in need instead of removing the child. Poverty is considered as abuse and neglect in the U.S., and that alone, is completely contrary to all U.S. child welfare policy and the direction of God. Just ask the Missionaries from Idaho.

Poverty is not a crime nor should it be a reason to give away a child.  The time has come for the U.S. to adopt the policies of giving to the child, not taking the child. 



U.S. Congress must join the rest of the world and ratify the U.N. Convention on the Rights of the Child, now.

Sunday, February 7, 2010

LK Report: February 7, 2010

My affiliates over at Legally Kidnapped have begun to publish the LK Report, brought to you by Baby LK, capping off the week of news reports on the child welfare industry.



For everything you wanted to know about the child welfare industry, visit http://legallykidnapped.blogspot.com.

Friday, February 5, 2010

Introduction to Child Welfare Targeted Case Management Fraud

The first in a series of videos, this is an introduction to Child Welfare Targeted Case Management Fraud.

The only way to stop child welfare fraud is to understand what it is.

Wednesday, February 3, 2010

States Refuse To Stop Fraud in Child Welfare

Despite federal audits, examinations and reviews, States are willing to jeopardize its Federal Financial Participation rates and take the risk of loosing all federal funding for child welfare operations because of the pervasiveness of fraud in child welfare.

Since the States refuse to stop fraud in child welfare, I am putting a formal call to action to the legal community:

START EDUCATING THE PUBLIC TO BECOME FCA WHISTLEBLOWERS

DHHS Fraud Warning to Administration for Children and Families

For more information on ways to stop fraud in child welfare, contact me, now.