Child Neglect Cases Multiply As Economic Woes Spread
Lost Jobs and Homes Exacerbate Family Stress Across Region

By Donna St. George and Petula Dvorak
Washington Post Staff Writers
Monday, December 29, 2008

As the economic downturn takes its toll on struggling families, child welfare workers across the region are seeing a marked rise in child abuse and neglect cases, with increases of more than 20 percent in some suburban counties.

Neglect investigations appear to have increased most, many resulting from families living without heat or electricity or failing to get children medical care. In Fairfax County, for example, such cases jumped 152 percent, from 44 to 111, comparing July through October with the same four-month period in 2007.

"It's very concerning and certainly is reflective of what's happening in the economic environment," said Kathy Froyd, director of the Children, Youth and Families Division of the Fairfax County Department of Family Services.

Overall, there was a 23 percent jump in abuse and neglect investigations in Fairfax. Similarly, cases in Montgomery County increased by 29 percent, and Arlington County, with smaller numbers, was up 38 percent.

In the District, there was an 18 percent increase in child neglect and abuse investigations, but officials said the case of Banita Jacks, the Southeast mother accused early this year of killing her four daughters, had a large effect on hotline calls.

The well-established nexus between poverty and child abuse is reason for many child experts to be concerned that the country might see more neglect and abuse as the recession deepens.

"History and experience tell us when the economy is bad and unemployment rises, children don't do well," said Linda Spears, vice president of the Child Welfare League of America, a national collection of nonprofit groups that aid abused and neglected children. "There are so many unknowns, but I would venture to guess that we're about to see one of the larger increases in child abuse cases since the drug epidemic increases in the 1990s."

Agnes Leshner, director of child welfare services for Montgomery, said that although other economic downturns might have produced similar trends, social workers in Montgomery agree that "they haven't seen it quite as severe as now. This seems to be more severe than what people can remember for a long time."

About a month ago, Allison Jackson began to notice an increase in the number of children coming into the emergency room at Children's National Medical Center in the District with burns, broken bones, fractured skulls and injured stomachs. Puzzled, she called colleagues across the country, who told her that they, too, noticed an increase in child abuse cases.

"We are all questioning whether it's the economy and the stresses that come with a bad economy," said Jackson, who is the medical director of the hospital's Child and Adolescent Protection Center.

That connection is more evident at the hotline centers, which get frazzled parents' calls for help.

On a recent night shift at the Prevent Child Abuse Virginia hotline call center, a woman called to say that she was pregnant and out of work and that her husband's hours had just been cut. She told the hotline that she feared her temper was flaring when she yelled at her 4-year-old son.

"She said her family is doing everything they can to keep afloat," said Johanna W. Schuchert, executive director of Prevent Child Abuse Virginia, who took that call. "She was worried about what she's going to do next."

At Childhelp USA, a national hotline, calls reporting physical abuse have risen about 10 percent in recent weeks, said John Reid, executive director of the child abuse prevention organization, based in Arizona.

"We're seeing parents facing unemployment, foreclosure, losing their automobiles," Reid said. "And that increase in stress can lead to drug and alcohol abuse, and that's directly linked to child abuse."

In Alexandria, Suzanne Chis, director of social services, said that although her area has seen a 13 percent rise in investigations of child abuse and neglect, she has noted in reviewing cases that she has seen more instances in which domestic violence seemed to be part of the complaint. "That seemed to be related to the economy," she said.

Chis noted that, for families struggling with a problem such as violence or substance abuse, the addition of economic stress "could push that situation into something more."

In Loudoun County, the longer-term trend shows a significant increase in abuse and neglect cases, even though the jump is not reflected in statistics from July through October, said Laurie Warhol, division manager with Child Protective Services. She said child-welfare workers are seeing more families with serious financial problems and some on the verge of eviction or homelessness. "We anticipate the numbers are going to go higher as the economy gets worse," Warhol said.

Montgomery's swelling caseload is largely due to families living without utilities or skipping their children's medications -- for asthma, for example -- because they lack the money, Leshner said. This was particularly notable in October and November, which were up more than 40 percent compared with the previous year.

"Kids who have chronic health problems are not getting to the doctor and not getting the medications they need," she said.

Still, Cathy Mols, executive director of the state Social Services Administration in Maryland, cautioned against drawing too close a link between child maltreatment and the economy. She noted that such cases usually arise when multiple problems take hold at the same time: families struggling with substance abuse, domestic violence or mental illness, for example, that find themselves hit by hard times, such as a lost job or a foreclosed home. "The combination of those risk factors increases the likelihood, increases the risk to the children," she said.

Looking at the increases in Maryland counties -- up in some, not in others -- Mols concluded that, with the economy, "I think we're seeing the early impact of it, the very early impact of it."

More victims are likely to come, experts predict, as thousands of families that are struggling with home foreclosures, fueling an almost all-time high in the use of food stamps and facing homelessness keep quiet about their troubles.

Spears said they know of "middle-class families living in their cars, so afraid of losing their kids that they tell the kids not to tell anyone they're homeless," she said. "In late winter or early spring, I suspect we'll just begin to see the impact on kids."