Click once to enlarge photo. Video is posted at
On July 24, 2012, WKYT reported that Kentucky Judge Charles Hickman sentenced former social worker Geri Murphy to five years in prison after she admitted she had lied about sexual abuse cases involving children. She pleaded guilty to nine counts of falsifying documents. Though she had been living in Florida, Judge Hickman said she must serve her time in Kentucky.
Prosecutors said that Murphy left children in homes where they were being sexually assaulted, that she never looked into the claims, and that she then lied to the state. Among the more disturbing cases listed in her indictment is the sexual abuse of a three-year-old by the biological father.
A state official testified that abuse continues because of Murphy's actions."The fact that these children could be left in the hands of possible abusers is particularly disturbing to the court," said Judge Hickman, who denied probation, saying it "would diminish the seriousness of these offenses."
Assistant Attorney General Barbara Whaley commented "I feel like it sent a message---the system meant to protect children cannot be breached without serious consequences."
I wonder whether Rhode Island's Attorney General Peter Kilmartin will ever prosecute anyone involved in the case reported at http://LittleHostages.blogspot.com where DCYF contracted with the Providence Center to have licensed social worker Haven Miles "reunite" two sisters with their biological father despite their terror of him, as Miles described in her own reports. The case illustrates why allegations of child sexual abuse and domestic violence--often felonies--do not belong in a civil courtroom where adversarial litigation fails to investigate the most obvious evidence.
http://articles.boston.com/2012-07-29/business/32903262_1_milford-man-combat-child-photos-and-videos
How do young children disclose horrific sexual crimes to adults who would rather not understand what they are saying? In the Little Hostages case, social worker Haven Miles admitted that she had no way of knowing whether the sisters had been sexually abused by their father. But once DCYF hired Miles to reunite the girls with their father, she probably never saw their graphic artwork. The younger sister was three when she allegedly expressed her fear of her father's "sausage games" to a home child care owner, day care staff, hospital staff, and others. The girl drew her father like this, showing the multiple fingers and shaded, enlarged genitals that are common in drawings by genuine sex abuse victims:
I saw her older sister's drawing of a huge erect penis in scorching red, which was so graphic I did not dare publish it on the Little Hostages blog. Both drawings would show how farfetched the father's claim was when he blamed their mother for putting those ideas into their daughters' heads, as if she were capable of demonstrating male erection and ejaculation in such a memorable manner. And yet, DCYF became complicit in the father's defense and delivered the girls to him using federal "reunification" funds. Whether DCYF even bothered to search for evidence may never be known, since Family Court Associate Justice John Mutter imposed an unconstitutional gag order and sealed both the divorce and DCYF files.
Since DCYF appears to be so readily manipulated by defense attorneys, Rhode Island prosecutors must aspire to at least as high a standard as Kentucky's Office of Attorney General, and Family Court judges must begin to feel disturbed when apparent crimes against children are reduced to civil matters.
