Teenage girl with ‘troubled history’ left in hotel after abrupt eviction from care placement, report finds

A teenage girl with a “troubled history” was left “warehoused” in a hotel with no therapies after she was abruptly evicted without her belongings from her care placement, a report on childcare cases before the courts finds.

The case is one of “multiple” in the latest batch from the Child Law Project (CLP), formerly known as the Child Care Law Reporting Project, where a judge criticised the lack of suitable emergency care placements for at-risk children and the HSE’s failure to provide essential services to such children.

In the case of the teenage girl, the court heard she had been in care for “some time”, including in secure care.

“She had had a troubled history with numerous placement breakdowns and a history of absconding from her placements. Her mother and father had a toxic relationship and were both serving prison sentences,” says the report.

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Her latest placement, which was unregistered and where she had lived for two years, was ended while she was at school and she was not allowed to collect her belongings. She spent the first night in a hotel and was referred for psychological and psychiatric assessment.

Three months later, the court was told she was still in the hotel and was stable. Her guardian ad litem, however, said it was not approved, the girl had received no therapy to date and was “essentially being warehoused”. The judge said the situation “could not continue to exist and needed to be red-flagged”.

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Dr Maria Corbett, chief executive of the CLP, said the case was one of many that put Ireland at risk of breaching international human rights obligations.

“Today we publish examples of placements being ended in an unplanned manner, children being placed far from their families, and vulnerable children in unregistered emergency settings, which fall outside of the usual inspection regime. Such practices undermine 20 years of progress and risk Ireland breaching its international human rights obligations,” she said.

A total of 67 reports are published on Monday by the CLP, which reports on cases before the courts concerning children in care or subject to care applications by Tusla.

Of the 67 reports, 62 concern children whose cases were before the District Court, four before the High Court related to wardship proceedings and one comprised of a letter from a District Court judge Dermot Simms (now retired) about an “unprecedented crisis” facing children in care trying to access safe services.

Dr Corbett said CLP reporters were increasingly seeing examples of cases returning to court as the placement has broken down or where the judge is keeping the case under active review as a means of ensuring agreed actions were followed through.

“In at least 10 cases published today, the judge expresses concern about the actions or inactions of state bodies. We believe this reflects a growing concern and frustration on the part of the judiciary,” she said.

Echoing previous volumes, key themes throughout the reports include parental mental health, parental addiction, homelessness and domestic violence.

“The level of vulnerability of these families is apparent in that in eight cases, one or both parents was in detention. In five cases, the child’s parent had died, and, in at least three cases, the parent had themselves been in care during their own childhood.

“Several cases feature strife between the parents. In addition, many reports involve migrants, including four that concern separated children,” noted Dr Corbett.

Case study: Nine-year-old Dublin boy placed in northwest with older boy who ‘was making weapons in his room’

A nine year-old boy from Dublin was accommodated in a privately-run placement in the northwest, far from his family, and was then moved abruptly to a placement in the southeast.

The manager of the residence in the northwest had said the boy could not stay in the same room as an older boy, who had violent tendencies and was making weapons in his room. The boy’s guardian ad litem (GAL) told the court the older boy was due to be transferred but he suspected the older boy’s social work team was paying more for the placement than the younger boy’s was.

Though the boy was settling well in the new placement, which was closer to his family, the GAL said the transition happened with two days’ notice and would usually happen over a few weeks.

The judge said the case was one that could highlight systemic deficiencies and failings.

He said that this was a nine-year-old boy who had developmental trauma, who had recently been expelled from school, who could not get access to services and had been exposed to another aggressive boy.

It was not a question of blame, but of what could be done and what could be looked at, said the judge. He lifted the in camera rule to allow the GAL to bring a complaint to the Ombudsman for Children.