Ex-DCF worker allegedly lied skillfully

Angela Edgerton, a former child protective investigator, went into great detail in the reports in question.

By Gabriel Margasak
staff writer
August 17, 2005

The devil was in the details in the case of a Stuart social worker fired by the Department of Children and Families and arrested this week for allegedly filing false investigative reports.

Child protective investigator Angela Christine Edgerton, 30, got away with falsifications in at least 13 cases because of the elaborate detail she included in the reports she filed while investigating child abuse allegations, Stuart police said Tuesday.

Edgerton described nuances down to which posters children had in their rooms.

"Anybody reading these reports would believe an actual investigation had taken place," Stuart police Sgt. Kim Major said. "They were very detailed, right down to the types of services she offered."

Edgerton, who told police she was now working at a day care center, could not be reached for comment.

A months-long Stuart police investigation found discrepancies in at least six of Edgerton's cases. A DCF official acknowledged that a review of 102 of her case files, going back one year, had uncovered 13 cases with "some type of falsification."

"Whenever anything like this happens, we go back and review and see what we can do differently," DCF spokeswoman Christine W. Demetriades said. "Obviously you need to just keep getting better at these things, given what happened here."

She added that only two of the 13 cases contained falsified accounts of interviews with children. In the other cases, adults claimed they'd never met Edgerton, even though she reported interviewing them.

Despite the single felony charge of filing false reports, police and DCF officials said no harm came to any children involved.

Edgerton was hired by the DCF on July 7, 2003, and was fired May 19 after the irregularities came to light on May 5, Demetriades reported.

Demetriades explained that DCF workers, who generally handle 10 to 12 cases a month, are required to make face-to-face contact with alleged victims within 24 hours of a complaint. The observations are then typed into a computer as an initial risk assessment report.

All cases are reviewed by a supervisor at least twice, and police frequently accompany case workers on their calls, officials said. The DCF has used random follow-up phone calls to families as an extra check, Demetriades said.

The DCF "may need to increase these types of calls," she said.

In one case, Edgerton filed a report indicating she'd conducted a home inspection to check on a child after an allegation of mistreatment against a guardian. She even noted who let her into the home, according to a Stuart police report.

But the guardian later told a DCF supervisor she'd never met Edgerton and didn't even know about the complaint until the child told her a DCF worker had talked to her at school, the report states.

Although Edgerton was able to falsify reports for some time, Demetriades said DCF safeguards worked in the end.

"I really feel that we did everything we could have in this," she said. "We feel strongly that the vast majority of our staff would not even contemplate such behavior."

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