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Home > Blogs > Butler County News and Issues > Archives > 2009 > April > 21 > Entry
The ongoing saga of Children Services
In the midst of an eight-part series on Butler County Children Services (see previous stories here), a five-month-old girl went to the hospital with severe injuries last week allegedly at the hands of her father.
It’s a complicated tale. The child’s mother is a child herself, a teenager in the custody of Butler County children services who got pregnant by the grandson of her foster mother.
Here is part of the story (for the full version, including questions about how the foster parent was allowed to take in children after the girl became pregnant, go here):
Butler County Children Services officials are trying to figure out how a 5-month-old girl — staying in the same foster home where the child’s mother was impregnated — was reportedly squeezed so hard her ribs cracked.
The child’s father, Antoine Rucker, 21, of Cincinnati, is in Hamilton County Jail on a $100,000 bond facing two charges of felonious assault.
Rucker was arrested Thursday, April 16, after fracturing the infant’s ribs, causing her lungs to collapse and “squeez(ing) the victim’s chest cavity causing damage to her heart,” according to the arrest report.
Rucker’s case is scheduled to go before a grand jury April 27.
The child’s mother is 17 and is in the custody of Butler County Children Services, as she was when she was placed with foster parent Rosalind Hedges in Springfield Twp. in November 2007.
Rucker is Hedges’ grandson.
The young mother was removed from Hedges’ home in February 2008, but recently left the infant there for a couple weeks with the agency’s blessing so she could rest, according to interim Butler County Children Services Director Jeff Centers.
“The father had no record, no history of violence, it was essentially a family placement,” he said. “It made sense.
While Hamilton County court records say the abuse took place March 24, Centers said a caseworker saw and held the child the day before she was taken to Cincinnati Children’s Hospital on April 15 with injuries.
“What happened between the evening of the 14th and the evening of the 15th?” Centers asked. He said the child is “doing well” and appears to have suffered no long-term damage.
And our series on Children Services continues today with this story and this story.
Here’s the gist:
Twenty-four women who currently have cases with Butler County Children Services have a combined 179 children.
Before former Children Services Director Michael Fox retired from the agency at the end of March, this is one issue he lamented leaving on his desk: men and women having more children than they have the means to care for.
Fox referred to public concern over the California woman who had octuplets in January without the apparent means to support them, saying that someone who has nine children in as many years or has seven children by age 23 is just as costly to taxpayers.
“If there is one thing I would like to have done that needs to be done is you’ve got to be aggressive in approaching the community in turning off the spigot,” Fox said.
The agency even conducted a study, nicknamed the “Dirty Dozen Analysis,” of the parents who have dealings with the agency who had the most kids. Of the 21 adults surveyed — with a combined 124 children — 42 percent of the parents had no high school diploma, 80 percent had criminal records and 67 percent were unemployed.
Permalink | Comments (5) | Post your comment | Categories: Children Services
Comments
By Theresa Joseph
April 21, 2009 1:57 PM | Link to this
I think that if children services are going to place children in a foster home that they should do backgroundchecks on the family that is takeing them in for safety reasons
By brenda
April 21, 2009 2:09 PM | Link to this
Theresa, they do extensive background checks. I know because I have friends who were turned down. As for the unemployed, uneducated masses of people who think they acan keep popping out children they can;’t afford, I say shame on you. Start using birth contol. As a matter of fact it would propably be cheaper to providee the women with free birth control under the skin tso we can make sure they use it.
By brenda
April 21, 2009 2:09 PM | Link to this
Theresa, they do extensive background checks. I know because I have friends who were turned down. As for the unemployed, uneducated masses of people who think they acan keep popping out children they can;’t afford, I say shame on you. Start using birth contol. As a matter of fact it would propably be cheaper to providee the women with free birth control under the skin tso we can make sure they use it.
By yvonne butler
April 22, 2009 1:42 AM | Link to this
i am the grandparents of the 6mo old babygirl who was abuse.i adopted the teen when she was 7 . Im trying to get custody of my grandbaby.theres more to this story that meets the eye. I cant get a response from child s. Can someone please contact me.theres something i know and need to talk to athorities.
By D. Brandenburg
April 22, 2009 1:46 PM | Link to this
I am disturbed by the fact that a woman who births a child who has drugs in it’s tiny little body is not prosecuted! This should be a crime, a felony! It is certainly child abuse. Our court system should be prosecuting women who abuse their babies while in their wombs. Mandatory birth control should be the “penalty”. Permanent birth control should be an option for the judge, as well.