Fern5827
November 17th 03, 03:27 PM
The county has already settled with the victim of the beating.
Now DSHS is being sued.
Beating brings up questions about foster-care system's responsibilities
THE ASSOCIATED PRESS SEATTLE -- A gang of boys from a state-funded foster home
kicked a teenager from Somalia so severely that he suffered permanent brain
damage. Four years later, the 20-year-old victim still needs frequent hospital
stays.
The tragedy poses difficult questions for a King County jury: Is the state's
foster-care system to blame for the boys' actions? Should the state pay for the
victim's lifelong care, estimated at $20 million?
A civil lawsuit filed against the state is now in its third week of trial, The
Seattle Times reported Wednesday.
Three of the attackers lived in the same foster home run by one woman, the
Times reported Wednesday. Evidence presented at trial suggests the house was an
unsupervised "warehouse" for troubled teens -- the most difficult wards of the
state Department of Social and Health Services.
The victim, Said Aba Sheikh, was 16 and had been in the United States just
eight months when he was attacked in 1999. He had survived a civil war in
Somalia and years in a refugee camp in Kenya.
Miguel Pierre, Mychal Anderson, Pulefano Ativalu and a boy identified by the
Times only as Michael G. because he was a juvenile when convicted ran into Aba
Sheikh and a family friend at a West Seattle gas station. Two of the boys
kicked Aba Sheikh in the head about 10 times by Pierre and Anderson.
Pierre and Ativalu, both then 16, were convicted of assault as adults and are
serving sentences of at least 10 years. Anderson, then 15, is serving more than
seven years as an adult. Michael G., then 15, was convicted as a juvenile and
is now out of detention.
Pierre, Anderson and Michael G. had all lived in Emma Daniels' foster home and
had formed a gang in the year before Aba Sheikh's beating, court papers said.
The boys' convictions during those 12 months included assault, theft, car theft
and burglary, and all had been expelled from school.
Foster parent Daniels had obtained her foster-care license in 1988 and became
the foster parent for children that no one else wanted over the next decade,
according to DSHS documents.
Daniels repeatedly asked DSHS to move Pierre or Anderson but her calls weren't
returned, according to her attorney, Stewart Estes.
But lawyers for the state agency say the suit goes too far in hunting for a
culprit.
The case is based on the "unprecedented theory that DSHS social workers ... owe
a duty to protect members of the general public from criminal conduct by foster
children," wrote Jeff Freimund, an assistant attorney general representing
DSHS.
If any system failed, it was King County's juvenile-probation department,
Freimund argued, which was supposed to be supervising Pierre and Anderson at
the time of the beating.
The victim's lawyers settled with King County before the trial for an
undisclosed amount.
©2003 The Olympian Print this story | close window x
Now DSHS is being sued.
Beating brings up questions about foster-care system's responsibilities
THE ASSOCIATED PRESS SEATTLE -- A gang of boys from a state-funded foster home
kicked a teenager from Somalia so severely that he suffered permanent brain
damage. Four years later, the 20-year-old victim still needs frequent hospital
stays.
The tragedy poses difficult questions for a King County jury: Is the state's
foster-care system to blame for the boys' actions? Should the state pay for the
victim's lifelong care, estimated at $20 million?
A civil lawsuit filed against the state is now in its third week of trial, The
Seattle Times reported Wednesday.
Three of the attackers lived in the same foster home run by one woman, the
Times reported Wednesday. Evidence presented at trial suggests the house was an
unsupervised "warehouse" for troubled teens -- the most difficult wards of the
state Department of Social and Health Services.
The victim, Said Aba Sheikh, was 16 and had been in the United States just
eight months when he was attacked in 1999. He had survived a civil war in
Somalia and years in a refugee camp in Kenya.
Miguel Pierre, Mychal Anderson, Pulefano Ativalu and a boy identified by the
Times only as Michael G. because he was a juvenile when convicted ran into Aba
Sheikh and a family friend at a West Seattle gas station. Two of the boys
kicked Aba Sheikh in the head about 10 times by Pierre and Anderson.
Pierre and Ativalu, both then 16, were convicted of assault as adults and are
serving sentences of at least 10 years. Anderson, then 15, is serving more than
seven years as an adult. Michael G., then 15, was convicted as a juvenile and
is now out of detention.
Pierre, Anderson and Michael G. had all lived in Emma Daniels' foster home and
had formed a gang in the year before Aba Sheikh's beating, court papers said.
The boys' convictions during those 12 months included assault, theft, car theft
and burglary, and all had been expelled from school.
Foster parent Daniels had obtained her foster-care license in 1988 and became
the foster parent for children that no one else wanted over the next decade,
according to DSHS documents.
Daniels repeatedly asked DSHS to move Pierre or Anderson but her calls weren't
returned, according to her attorney, Stewart Estes.
But lawyers for the state agency say the suit goes too far in hunting for a
culprit.
The case is based on the "unprecedented theory that DSHS social workers ... owe
a duty to protect members of the general public from criminal conduct by foster
children," wrote Jeff Freimund, an assistant attorney general representing
DSHS.
If any system failed, it was King County's juvenile-probation department,
Freimund argued, which was supposed to be supervising Pierre and Anderson at
the time of the beating.
The victim's lawyers settled with King County before the trial for an
undisclosed amount.
©2003 The Olympian Print this story | close window x