Federal judge finds Texas has “broken” foster care system, says she’ll order changes
AUSTIN — Texas children who have been removed from their abusive and neglectful birth families face “unreasonable risk of harm” in the state’s foster care system, a federal judge ruled Thursday.
U.S. District Judge Janis Graham Jack of Corpus Christi said Texas unconstitutionally has thrust about 12,000 Texas youngsters, already unlucky once by birth, into an underfunded and poorly run system of “substitute care” that in too many instances indelibly wounds them.
The system, usually called foster care, is overseen by the state Department of Family and Protective Services, the defendant in the class-action suit brought nearly five years ago by New York-based Children’s Rights.
Texas’ version violates the youths’ 14th Amendment rights to be free from harm while in state custody, Jack said.
Read more: http://trailblazersblog.dallasnews.com/2015/12/federal-judge-finds-texas-has-broken-foster-care-system-says-shell-order-changes.html/
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