Today's news

While we await Governor Crist's choices to head the Regional Counsel offices, there is other news.

Democratic leaders in the Florida Legislature asked top lawmakers Thursday to convene a series of oversight hearings into recent scandals at the state's long-troubled child welfare agency, including the recent rape of a Miami foster girl.


Florida Department of Children and Families Secretary Bob Butterworth has agreed to participate in a child protection roundtable today in Fort Myers....The roundtable was inspired by the recent murder of 3-year-old Zahid Jones Jr. His mother’s boyfriend is accused of the murder.

DAYTONA BEACH -- Problems with a new computer system that tracks children in foster care have local officials scrambling to make sure children are being checked on properly.

Local officials and caseworkers say they are being forced to double check and re-enter information into the $26 million Florida Safe Families Network because state reports are "inaccurate" and have contradictory and duplicate information.

[ed: How much did HomeSafeNet cost again?]

While I'm posting links

The website for the National Coalition for Child Protection Reform is a must-visit. There are fascinating links all over the site.

Of particular interest to DependencyDefense.com are its state and local reports. I remember one of them concerning Florida, entitled "The Price of Panic" has done much to help me articulate why defense attorneys are so vital to the system -- and how good dependency defenders save the public a mountain of money.

Food for thought

Again, I'm not vouching for the information at this link, but it is a good reminder to consider the Federal Constitution in the course of a dependency defense.

Free motion templates

Here's a link that is primarily to aid those representing criminal cases in which someone is accused of child abuse.

I don't vouch for their quality, but invite you to search for things that may be helpful to you.

Note also the FREE seminars for streaming on your computer, at least one of which might be of use to dependency defenders.

Verdict against DCF

Here is a very brief story breaking now. I'll look around for more details.

A circuit court jury in Hillsborough County hit the long-troubled Department of Children and Family Services with a $6.4 million verdict Tuesday.

The jury found the department failed to act against a counselor whose abusive treatment techniques led to the suicide of a 10-year-old boy in 1998.

1 out of 60

If dependency defense is a highly specialized and under-appreciated field of law, capital murder defense seems to be more so, at least as measured by those willing to do it under the new rules.

I'll skip to the last few sentences of this story.

Fort Myers attorney Ian Mann, who will not take additional court-appointed cases, said capital murder cases could clog the system.

"When it happens, you're going to be in a position where these cases go nowhere fast," he said. "It's rare, but it will happen."

Shirley said local defense attorneys have been keeping in touch, waiting to see what happens with the new law.

"We're trying to send the Legislature a little message that we appreciate them trying to save money — this is just not the way to do it," he said. "The system is going to crash — I think this is what we're waiting on."

The entire article is worth a look.

Of the 60 attorneys listed on the circuit's registry of attorneys willing to take cases, only 36 have signed a contract with the Judicial Administration Commission, the Tallahassee agency that oversees statewide court operations and pays court-appointed attorneys. And of the 36, only one attorney, Kevin Shirley of Punta Gorda, is qualified to handle capital death penalty murder cases.

Dependency Defenders -- how you can help

As I noted below, blogging has been slow. One reason is that my family has taken priority over blogging for the last few weeks. Another reason is that there is simply no news to pass on. There have been no significant press releases or articles in the last few weeks about the selection process of the regional counsels, nor any about how the new offices of are taking shape. At least there haven't been any that I have found.

I do think about dependency defense constantly, however, and am anxious to flesh out the dependencydefense.com website. So here is what you can do to help, if you are inclined:

1. If you are a private attorney who intends to start or continue to take court appointments in dependency cases, and wish to be included on the dependencydefense.com site as part of an attorney directory, let me know via email. Those who already have done so, I still have your information and will put it all up when I have some more.

2. The website will soon include a library of appellate opinions in .pdf format that will cover basics that a defense attorney should have ready at the various stages of a dependency case. It would be great if those of you out there in this field of law in Florida would contribute. Do you know of a must-have opinion that ought to be included? Please let me know via email.

3. Are you interested in joining a message board for dependency professionals, or even of joining this blog as a co-blogger? Let me know.

To email dependencydefense.com, use the address cam @ dependencydefense.com, and remove the spaces.