ATLANTA (AP) - A statewide panel tasked with probing child deaths in Georgia is struggling to provide insight on the deaths and how future fatalities may be prevented.
The Atlanta Journal Constitution (https://bit.ly/1hXS8Yq ) reported Sunday that 464 child death investigations by county review committees in 2012 failed to question whether potential mistakes by state social service agencies the children and their guardians had been involved with factored into the fatalities. In some cases, children were left in the custody of adults with known criminal and drug abuse issues. The state Legislature created child fatality review panels for each of the state’s 159 counties.
The fatality review panels were created in 1989 after dozens of children’s deaths that were classified as natural or accidental were clarified as being linked to abuse or neglect.
The newspaper reported that nearly 500 out of the state’s 940 child fatalities in 2012 were not reviewed and were attributed to causes like disease or premature birth. However, 10 of those deaths were classified as homicides, eight were suicides and seven children drowned.
The review panels are composed of prosecutors, judges, police, coroners, social workers and other officials.
When an Atkinson County 2-year-old drowned in a pond, the investigation into the child’s death suggested that parents should “watch kids at all times near open water.” Another investigation into the death of a Muscogee County girl whose grandmother ran her over in the driveway suggested “buying cars with back-up cameras.”
Cobb County Superior Court Judge Tain Kell is chairman of the statewide panel that oversees the smaller, county-wide fatality review boards. Tain says he supports a proposal in the state Legislature to transfer the panel’s operations from the Office of the Child Advocate to the Georgia Bureau of Investigation. He said the statewide panel doesn’t have the resources to closely monitor the county review committees.
Although state law requires the county review committees to report child fatalities within three months, some deaths were not reported for a year or more. The newspaper also reports some of the investigations also took more than twice as long as they’re legally allowed to.
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Information from: The Atlanta Journal-Constitution, https://www.ajc.com
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