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Stories
of overzealous Department of Family and Children Services employees prowling
for referrals and using people's children as tools of extortion were true,
according to the Georgia Department of Human Resources investigative report.
Such stories had been circulating for months before the
watershed moment nearly a year ago when Melinda "Mindy" McCoy was
charged with reckless conduct for not removing children from a home.
Her downfall, brought about by co-workers seemingly
targeting her for reporting questionable practices to the state, shed light
on a rogue outfit operating behind a cloak of confidentiality.
After McCoy was suspended, her case and mileage
documents were found in a shredding container at the DFCS office.
Some of the more shocking revelations listed in the
64-page report compiled by DHR investigators and obtained by The Clayton
Tribune include:
€ According to Rabun County Sheriff's Chief Deputy Mike
Carnes, "deputies were sent by DFCS to schools to pick up children from
schools; no reason was ever given for the directives and no court orders were
ever issued."
€ Police Chief Tony Free told DHR in January that he
heard Cpl. Donna Terry, and a former sheriff's DFCS liaison, "bragging
that she broke the record last month by picking up" 28 or 38 children.
€ Former DFCS employee Sabrina Ritchie "knew there
were times when staff discussed a case plan for a family and included
everything they could to make the plan nearly impossible to complete,"
the report said.
€ Children were removed from the FAITH shelter, and
clients said they were forced by DFCS to get a temporary protective order or
risk losing their children, according to FAITH executive director Caroline
White. Furthermore, her shelter held women "hostage" at times to
help them keep their children.
"This is DFCS' investigation," said lawyer
Brian Rickman. "This is their investigation and this is what they found,
and it appears to verify virtually all of the allegations."
The report alleges improprieties against the four
employees terminated by DFCS since the investigation began in December, and
the transfer of a fifth to another office. Findings substantiated by DHR
investigators include children removed from homes without just cause,
excessive drug screening, lack of proper supervision and a culture of
violations that were permitted in a day-to-day environment.
Former director Linda Gragg,
former social services supervisor Lynn Justus, Nicole Allen and Ritchie made
false statements to investigators, among other violations of department
policy, the report said. Most notably, the office was guilty of numerous
conflicts of interest that violated DHR's policy
for Standards of Conduct and Ethics in Government.
Gragg declined to comment on the report until she had a chance to
speak with her lawyer. Allen and state DFCS Director Mary Dean Harvey did not
return phone calls seeking comment. Regional director Sid Jessup, who also is
acting director of the local office, referred all questions to a DHR
spokesman.
Rickman, the first person to publicly raise questions
about the conflict involving DFCS and its drug testing contractor, was asked
for a possible motive in the scandal.
"You can't help but think there was some type of
financial motive in all of this," he said.
Creative Consulting Services of Northeast Georgia Inc.,
conducted drug screens for DFCS from October 2003-January 2006. The company
is owned by Judith Mendoza, whose daughter, Allen, started working for DFCS
in March 2004.
Allen's friend and roommate, Officer Terry, and sister,
Andrea Phelps, also worked for the company. Between January 2005 and this
past January, DFCS paid the company $83,510 for 742 drug screens. Lumpkin County, with a population 50 percent
larger than Rabun's, paid out less than a third of
that amount for 733 screens.
Gragg signed the agreements with Mendoza even though she was required to
solicit a bid for anything costing more than $5,000. Gragg
told investigators it was the only place in the county that could perform the
screens.
But Mountain Lakes Medical Center Administrator Ben Busbee refuted that assertion and said he knew of no
reason why the hospital would refuse to do screening for DFCS.
The drug screening process has elicited the most
criticism since clients, lawyers and law enforcement started coming forward
with their complaints last year. Investigators determined that people were
continually tested even if they had repeated clean screens.
Justus, among others, gave Juvenile Court Judge Joanna
Temple credit for the aggressive drug screening that ran afoul of state
policy because of Rabun's methamphetamine
"epidemic." Temple,
a former DFCS lawyer, "wanted them to take it seriously," the
report said.
Sonya Neely, who was transferred to the Towns County
office amid the investigation, told investigators Temple
considered a refusal a positive test, and that the judge wanted children
removed immediately if a parent tested positive. The state manual requires a
court order to get a urine sample if a parent refuses a screen.
Neely also said, "Temple wanted her verbal orders complied
with the same as her written orders." The so-called verbal orders led to
case workers, while accompanied by officers, picking up children based on
one's word of mouth.
Carnes and Free blamed Temple for much of the problems with the office.
According to the report, Free "thought Judge Temple
was responsible for much of the trouble because she was power hungry and out
of line." Carnes also thought "Temple was the problem. He did not
understand what verbal orders were and how they were legal."
Neither Temple,
nor the person who appointed her, Chief Judge Ernest "Bucky" Woods, returned phone calls seeking comment.
To help pay for the excessive screening, Gragg approved pulling money from Prevent Unnecessary
Placement funds, typically used to help people clean or repair their homes.
Several other conflicts were revealed during the
investigation. Mendoza and Phelps got paid $20 an hour to do paperwork for
DFCS and Terry was paid for respite care by DFCS. Respite care typically is
when an officer stays with a child in a hotel room when the child can't be
placed with a foster parent.
According to DFCS receptionist Linda Brown, Mendoza had an office
at DFCS where she conducted drug screens. Phelps previously had a day care in
her home and received referrals from DFCS, some of which were from Allen,
according to Terry Salemi, a former DFCS worker.
Justus' husband, Cory, owned a vending machine in the
DFCS lobby. It was removed Jan. 16. Gragg gave him
a soft drink machine because RC Cola never came to pick it up.
According to Neely, Justus was "closer than
friends" with Ritchie and let her go on home visits even though she
wasn't qualified to do so.
Terry went on most calls with Allen while Terry was the
sheriff's liaison. Terry also performed drug screens while on duty as a
Clayton police officer, according to the report. Ritchie told investigators
the conflict wasn't discussed around Allen because she was
"protective" of her family. Terry, who was considered part of her
family, told investigators she went inside homes to make decisions; "she
didn't just sit in the car and let them make the decisions."
Some DFCS employees had covered for each other, at least
until the investigation got under way. A DFCS investigator was going to look
into a referral concerning Neely, but Justus screened out the referral on Gragg's instruction.
When previously questioned by The Tribune about her
office, Gragg routinely brought up how she was
short staffed and that her employees were overburdened with a heavy caseload.
Justus told investigators that Gragg "went
through the newspaper to look for situations in which DFCS had not received a
referral, but she would not call it shopping for referrals. Director Gragg was making sure that all the cases were being addressed."
DFCS workers also went through reports at the sheriff's
office to make sure nothing was missed. Dispatchers complained that Terry
questioned every call that came to the 911 center.
Neely acknowledged that people in Rabun knew the best
way to get even with someone was to make an anonymous call to DFCS accusing
someone of using drugs. Even when no evidence of drug use existed, "she
knew the policy was to do a drug screen."
Even people without children were not immune from
running afoul from an apparent culture of vindictiveness at DFCS.
A review of one case file showed Cory Justus, a
sheriff's office employee, reported to his wife, Lynn, that someone had a
filthy house, possibly abused drugs and had an unsupervised child. Neighbors,
including Lynn's
ex-husband, also made allegations to DFCS about the person.
Case worker Steve Gates found the reports unfounded
because no child was living in the residence.
Police often went to the house on barking dog
complaints. Cory Justus told an officer that his wife "wanted to get
something" on the family and suggested that the officer report a dirty
house. Gates did not turn in a report regarding his conversation with the
officer because he feared retaliation from Lynn Justus, his supervisor.
One of the most telling signs of how out of control the
situation became comes from the small number of referrals DFCS has seen since
January. Jessup said no child had been placed in state custody since
mid-January. He said DFCS had worked hard with family members in cases where
it appeared a child might have to be removed. In the worst cases, children
have been left with a relative or neighbor.
Case manager Kim Bell reported in January that the
number of referrals had declined in recent months. She had heard schools were
afraid to make referrals because of the media coverage.
White said FAITH had seen a decline in the number of
calls it received on its crisis line and in the number of people coming to
its shelter for assistance.
"That's what we were hearing from people who walked
through the door, that they would never call 911 again or FAITH because they
didn't want to lose their children," White said last week.
In her six years at FAITH, White had never before had a
child removed from a shelter. "I wouldn't ask for help either," she
said. "We have a lot of healing to do."
When asked who the victims were, she said it was the
community at large. "It's every social service agency in this community,
but it's also those workers who were fired because they were misguided and mismanaged.
All those people were dedicated to social services."
Allen and Ritchie told investigators Gragg
and Justus signed off on every decision they made.
"Nicole truly cared about children and was just
misguided and mismanaged. I don't think she tried to hurt anybody,
personally," White said.
Rickman said a bigger issue than the financial motives
needed to be addressed.
"It was a crusade. That's a more complicated thing
to address. People who honestly thought they were the only ones who know
what's best for kids ... and were going to do whatever it takes," he
said. "I don't think it was just about money. I think they truly believe
nothing wrong has been done."
Rickman also said no objective person could come to a
conclusion other than that some serious instances of wrongdoing occurred. The
real tragedy, he added, would be if nobody learned from it.
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