The Bronx Office was part of a larger organization whose principal work was indigent criminal defense. But the team was unable to secure the agencys support for unsupervised visits. View info about Brooklyn Defender Services (bds.org). The strategy worked. In countless cases over the past decade in New York City, pregnant parents have had the benefit of representation by one of the family defender offices before any case was brought against them. In 2013, the Legal Services NYC contract ended, and the South Brooklyn Services Office that was handling the Brooklyn Family Court caseload merged with Brooklyn Defender Services, a preeminent public interest law office with contracts to represent indigent defendants in criminal cases as well as immigration and other matters. 6. Before going to housing court, the defender offices housing specialist contacted the City office that was providing the rental subsidy to explain the problem and was able to get the office to write an additional check to her landlord to eliminate all arrears on her rent. Criminal, Family, Immigration and Civil Defense. The caseworker, her supervisor, and the investigating team concluded that Eduardo required surgical treatment and his fathers failure to consent to it constituted medical neglect. For new lawyers, the existence of these organizations means not only jobs, but jobs one can get straight out of law school that come with the kind of training and supervision only larger offices can provide. The family defender office assigned to represent Ms. Green handles many of these cases each year and has become expert both in cross-examining medical experts called by the agency and at engaging and communicating with knowledgeable physicians able to provide their expert medical opinion on whether an injury is more likely to be the consequence of abuse or an accident. In those situations, there is no way to give credit to the kind of legal representation the parent was given when comparing outcomes of cases between those handled by panel lawyers and multidisciplinary offices. Because Ms. Green was unable to provide a clear explanation for the injury, the hospital called the child protection agency, which immediately began an investigation. In Queens and Richmond County (Staten Island), no change to the legal representation landscape occurred at that time. See also Jason A. Oetjen, Natl Council of Juv. We are the attorneys and advocates fighting injustice for individuals and families and protecting civil rights for all people. Even these remarkable efforts would have been insufficient. By planning carefully with the mother during the pregnancy and preparing for the child to come home with her, the team ensures that living arrangements are set and baby paraphernalia (cribs, diapers, food) are at the ready. The active family defender community cannot take full credit for this this dramatic shrinking of the foster care population. Of those children who could not be returned to their families, 40 percent more children ended up with a permanent disposition of guardianship when their parents had multidisciplinary representation than children whose parents were represented by panel lawyers.41, The study concluded that family defender office representation also saves an enormous amount of money that would otherwise have been spent on children remaining unnecessarily in foster care.42 The study found that full implementation of a multidisciplinary representation model in New York City would reduce the foster care population by 472,000 bed days per year and annually reduce foster care costs by $40 million as compared with exclusive reliance on panel lawyers.43, The qualitative findings in the study were equally impressive.44 Not only did former clients praise the kind of representation and support they received from the new offices, the professionals working in the court system also indicated significant satisfaction with the new kind of representation the offices provide.45 Of the three categories of professionals interviewed in the qualitative study, two were unequivocally positive in describing the important contributions the new offices had on practice in the courts.46 These groups were the judges and court attorneys who serve as the judges trial-level law clerks and childrens lawyers employed by The Legal Aid Society who appear in most child welfare cases as the attorney for the child.47 The third group, the lawyers prosecuting the cases, also expressed very positive things about the contributions made by the new offices but, perhaps expectedly, some attorneys in this group also complained that lawyers in these offices were too litigious and fought too hard on cases that did not deserve it.48, The study found that the professionals in the court system regarded the critical tools the family defender offices introduced into the practice as an insistence that the court conduct evidentiary hearings when the agency seeks a court order that children be placed into foster care, combined with filing motions to ensure that judges oversee case planning decisions promptly.49 Court stakeholders unanimously described a dramatic increase in motion practice, most commonly brought to challenge the agencys request to remove children from their families, to seek the return of children home, and to request other specific orders from judges.50 The study concluded that the increased use of these motions played a significant role in the offices success in securing court orders returning children to their families.51 Using each court appearance to advance the parents case, filing motions to seek better services or eliminate needless ones, and asking for more visits and for the return of children from foster care promptly are leading characteristics of the family defender office model.52, The qualitative study also found that the stakeholders identified out-of-court advocacy undertaken to be a significant, and distinctive, characteristic of the family defender offices.53 This includes accompanying clients to out-of-court case conferences held at the childcare agencies.54 Finally, the qualitative study found that the multidisciplinary offices achieve distinctive results in part because they attend much better to their clients well-being than the panel lawyers do throughout the time the case is active in court.55 The study found that the family defender offices place a premium on attending to the emotional well-being of their clients.56 Emotional supports that help parents believe in their abilities are crucial, since the outcomes of many cases depend on the parents bearing up well during the process, engaging in required services, maintaining a regular visitation schedule with their children when they are in foster care, and otherwise satisfying the requirements of service plans.57. Lawyers Assn, 763 N.Y.S.2d at 407 (finding that because of the rate levels assigned counsel do not . Brooklyn Defender Services (BDS) is seeking Experienced Attorney's for the Criminal Practice's legal team. for Child.s Servs., Children in Foster Care by Borough/CD of Foster Care Placement (Dec. 31, 2019), https://www1.nyc.gov/assets/acs/pdf/data-analysis/2020/incarefostercare.pdf. They also develop training materials to enrich and support the Family Defense Practice. The problem, of course, is that the surgeon would not have written that letter without the very effective advocacy Mr. Sanchezs team brought to the meeting with him. 96. 27. Ct. Act 1046(a)(ii) (McKinney 2020) ([P]roof of injuries sustained by a child or of the condition of a child of such a nature as would ordinarily not be sustained or exist except by reason of the acts or omissions of the parent or other person responsible for the care of such child shall be prima facie evidence of child abuse or neglect, as the case may be, of the parent or other person legally responsible.). Today, we are the primary provider of legal representation to parents facing the removal of their children to the foster system in Brooklyn Family Court. The goal of our early intervention is to avoid court filings that have a harsh impact on families. make applications for investigators or other experts where appropriate . Today (A.B.A., June 4, 2019), https://www.americanbar.org/groups/public_interest/child_law/resources/child_law_practiceonline/january---december-2019/providing-parents-multidisciplinary-legal-representation-signifi/. Had Ms. Barrow not had a team committed to being with her when she gave birth, to preparing assiduously for the conference held when the baby was born, and to being ready to fight for her when the baby was removed less than a week later, her case would surely have come out differently. Through these discussions, they connected her to a social services organization in the community.
BDS | Get Help Popular Searches Brooklyn Defender Services Bds N.Y. Unified Ct. Sys. & Fam. After three years, the agency successfully prosecuted a termination of parental rights case against her. An ill-advised case plan not only wastes money; it wastes the most precious commodity in the field: time. He gratefully acknowledges the outstanding research assistance provided by Sean Eagan, New York University School of Law Class of 2019, and also thanks Luke Gerber, Chris Gottlieb, Sue Jacobs, Peter Pecora, and Tim Ross for their support and the careful attention they gave to this Article. My professional experiences in New York City include founding and co-directing the Family Defense Clinic at New York University School of Law; serving as a Founding Board Member for the Center for Family Representation; being a member of the Board of Advisors for the New York City Administration for Childrens Services from 1996 to 2013; and, most recently, since 2017, serving as a member of the New York State Commission on Parental Legal Representation. The leading characteristic of the offices method of representing parents is to participate actively in the case conferences held at the agency where the case plan for each case is established.65 These plans set the stage for all that follows and are often the single most important factor in a cases outcome. Each office was expected to accept approximately half of the new case assignments to represent parents charged with abuse or neglect of their children (what this Article calls child welfare cases).18 The remainder of the filings were to be assigned, as before, to panel attorneys. Full-time. (citing N.Y. State Admin. Brooklyn, NY . These lead to tragic outcomes, such as death at the hands of police or in jail and oppressive environments in schools and neighborhoods where low-income people of color live.
Brooklyn Law School - Lorr Sarah Hearing (Aug. 16, 2018) (written testimony of Lisa Schreibersdorf, Exec. Similarly, preventing a parent from being removed from the country for an immigration-related reason is also beyond what agency caseworkers do.92 But real-life events such as these must be given the highest possible priority if parents are to achieve their objective of regaining the custody of their children from foster care. Brooklyn, NY 11201. 20. . 88. Brooklyn residents are harmed and impacted by government policies and practices that fuel mass incarceration and the destruction of families. Every administrator of New York Citys child welfare system in this century has been committed to the principle of eliminating the unnecessary placement or retention of children in foster care. He was kind and understanding. With the positive evaluation from the court mental health clinic and letters the team gathered from Ms. Barrows service providers, the judge agreed to allow the children to return home for overnight visits, commonly a crucial step that leads to the eventual return of children to their parents custody.
Brooklyn Defender Services: Employee Directory | ZoomInfo.com Federal law requires states to have written case plans for every child in care in order to ensure that an appropriate long-term plan is identified for each foster child. 26. A goal of this Article is to lay the groundwork for leaders in child welfare throughout the United States to embrace the work new family defenders do.59 There are many ways to reform child welfare practice and policy in this country. 94. See In re Philip M., 624 N.E.2d at 172. Ms. Anderson began therapy that was designed to address her history of physical and sexual abuse in foster care and her previous relationship, helping her to understand how those experiences had shaped her adult life and her approach to parenting. Rts., Your Rights While Pregnant, Breastfeeding, or Caregiving: A Report on the 2019 Commission Public Hearing on Pregnancy and Caregiver Discrimination 14 (2019), https://www1.nyc.gov/assets/cchr/downloads/pdf/publications/Pregnancy_Report.pdf. This Article is dedicated to the outstanding professionals who work in the family defense practices at the Bronx Defenders, the Brooklyn Defender Services, the Center for Family Representation, and the Neighborhood Defender Service of Harlem. The teams successful representation of Mr. Sanchez began with a careful, nuanced interview with him allowing the social worker, who was fluent in Mr. Sanchezs native language, to grasp that he never was unalterably opposed to the surgery but merely wanted one more opportunity to see if it were preventable. Compare Child Welfare Watch, Tough Decisions: Dealing with Domestic Violence 15 (2003), https://static1.squarespace.com/static/53ee4f0be4b015b9c3690d84/t/54138debe4b037d2d5803f6b/1410567659179/CWW-vol9.pdf [https://perma.cc/P79M-8T6A], with N.Y.C. But those studies included comparisons between counties (some of which had the program and some of which did not) in addition to comparisons within counties (pre- and post-implementation of the new model). Despite a formal agency policy known as Child Safety Alert 14,74 which called for the agency to conduct a meeting prior to the birth in every case,75 agencies routinely fail to hold pre-birth planning conferences with pregnant women unless a client or her legal team advocates for or requests the court to order its convening.76 Even when such conferences do take place, experienced practitioners complain that the discussion and recommendation from the pre-birth conference is, in reality, largely irrelevant to whether the baby will be taken after delivery.77 Instead, the really important meeting takes place at the hospital, within hours of the babys birth.