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Florida DCF Report: State Child-Welfare Oversight Left Wanting in Barahona Twins Case

March 8th, 2011   No Comments   Abuse, Adoption, Department of Children & Families (DCF)

Shoddy, lacking and frustrating are just some of the terms that can or have been used to describe the work of state Department of Children and Families child welfare workers in the case of Nubia and Victor Barahona, the Miami twins at the center of a horrific death and abuse case.

“In the immediate aftermath of a Miami girl’s death, state child-welfare workers acknowledged privately that the work of agency investigators left much to be desired,” wrote the Miami Herald. In the meantime, the children’s adoptive mother, Carmen Barahona, has been charged with murder.

“Four days after Nubia Barahona’s decomposed body was found in the flatbed of her adoptive father’s pickup truck, state child-welfare authorities…concluded that a series of abuse investigations lacked ‘a sense of urgency’’ and contained several instances of shoddy case work,” the paper reported.   Read the entire story here.



Child Welfare Officials Chastised by Florida Department of Children and Families Panel Over Barahona Twins’ Death, Injury

March 8th, 2011   No Comments   Abuse, Department of Children & Families (DCF)

At what has become a rough and enlightening display of dismay by community and empaneled officials, child welfare officials were questioned about what they knew and what decisions they made — and when — regarding the death of Nubia Barahona and critical injuries sustained by her twin brother, Victor.

As written in the Palm Beach Post, panelists challenged “the level of urgency given to a call made to the Florida Abuse Hotline the day before Nubia was killed” and criticized a child abuse investigator for not doing enough to find Nubia and her twin brother, Victor, the day before the young girl died.

“The panel once again said the child welfare system may have missed key
opportunities to keep the 10-year-olds safe,” the paper wrote. Read the entire story here.



Palm Beach Post Commentary: Private Child Welfare Providers Must Carry Adequate Insurance

March 8th, 2011   No Comments   Abuse, Adoption, Advocacy

By CHRISTINA SPUDEAS

How dare they? As The Post’s Pat Beall reported Friday, Florida’s privatized child welfare companies want to limit their liability and accountability by asking the Legislature to let them off the hook for having to pay for kids who are badly injured while in their care.

These companies should be cringing, knowing that their bill came out in the midst of a public investigation into the Barahona case in Miami-Dade County, one of the most horrific child-abuse cases involving foster care our state has ever seen. This bill should be called the Barahona Child Abuse Enabling Act.

Spudeas is Executive Director of Florida’s Children First, the leading statewide child advocacy group. Read her entire Letter to the Editor here.



Adoptive Parent Beat Nubia Barahona to Death Day After Child Welfare Visit: Police

March 7th, 2011   No Comments   Abuse, Adoption, Department of Children & Families (DCF)

Victor Barahona, who’s 10-year-old twin sister, Nubia, was found dead last month, heard their adoptive parent beating her to death one day after a child-welfare worker visited the home, police say Victor told them.

According to the Miami Herald, “Miami-Dade police believe 10-year-old Nubia Barahona was murdered by her adoptive parents the day after a child welfare investigator visited the family’s west Miami-Dade home, according to arrest reports unsealed Monday.”

The paper continued, “Nubia’s twin brother, Victor, told detectives that he heard his adoptive father, Jorge Barahona, beating his sister to death on Friday, Feb. 11, while Victor remained bound and locked in the bathroom of the house. Barahona’s wife, Carmen, later told Victor that his sister “had been sent away,” the police reports say.” Read the entire story here.



Twins Nubia, Victor Barahona Foretold of Mortal Fears Before Adoption

March 4th, 2011   No Comments   Abuse, Adoption, Department of Children & Families (DCF)

The tale of adopted Miami twins Nubia and Victor Barahona grows more distressing with day’s news and revelations. A panel investigating the child-abuse death of Nubia and serious injuries on twin brother Victor learned that the two had told a psychologist of their fears of death or injury.

According to the Miami Herald, in the months before a Miami-Dade judge approved their adoption by longtime foster parents, the 7-year-old twin siblings told a child psychologist they sometimes had thoughts of killing themselves.

Nubia also confided that she wished she had more friends. And that she was “sure that terrible things are going to happen to her,” the Herald reported.  Despite their fears, the judge approved their adoption in May 2009.

In time, the children’s worst — and professed — fears came true. Read the entire story here.



South Florida’s Horror Continues: Two Children Found Dead in Luggage

March 3rd, 2011   No Comments   Abuse

The brutal deaths of South Florida children continue. Police in Palm Beach County found the bodies of two young children stuffed in luggage and submerged in an area canal within hours of each other Wednesday, the Sun-Sentinel reports. Meanwhile, the region still is in shock over the death of Nubia Barahona and critical injuries to her twin brother, Victor.

In the latest discovery, a girl between 6 and 12 years old was found dead in a black duffel bag about 9 a.m. in a canal, Delray Beach police Sgt. Nicole Guerriero told the newspaper. About six hours later, police divers from Delray Beach and Boca Raton found a canvas suitcase with the body of the boy, about 10 to 12 years old. This find was about a half mile west of where the girl’s body was found, Guerriero told the paper. Read the entire story here.



Miami Herald: Therapist’s Call to Abuse Hotline Reveals Details in Barahona Home

March 1st, 2011   No Comments   Abuse, Adoption, Department of Children & Families (DCF)

Tales of alleged abuse were recounted in the transcript of a Feb. 10 call received by Florida’s child abuse hotline, the Miami Herald reports. Lisa Reiss, a children’s therapist, made the call after speaking to a child who was related by adoption to 10-year-old twins Victor and Nubia Barahona. Nubia now is dead; Victor is recovering from critical acid burns.

A task force formed by new Department of Children and Families Secretary David Wilkins to investigate the Barahona twins’ case continues its meetings today.

Read the entire Miami Herald story here.



Florida Columnist Asks: Who Remembers the Ghosts of Abused Kids?

February 27th, 2011   No Comments   Abuse, Department of Children & Families (DCF)

In the aftermath of the tragic death of Miami adopted 10-year-old Nubia Barahona and the critical injuries to her brother, Victor — and questions raised for the Florida Department of Children and Families, Miami Herald columnist Fred Grimm asks the compelling question: Who Remembers Ghosts of Abused Kids?

Grimm writes… Nothing’s so ephemeral as the community anger over the cruel life and grisly death of Nubia Barahona. The ghosts of too many other foster kids can testify that the uproar over mistreated and murdered children is as fleeting as smoke. Reports will be forgotten. Reforms will be inadequate. Budgets for the care of foster children will shrink. Caseworkers will be overwhelmed. Bureaucracies will flounder. And Florida will surely suffer outrage next year. Or the year after.

Little Nubia, 10, will simply fade from public consciousness, just another kid saved by the state from a drug-addled, wreck of a mother only to be deposited into circumstances that led to abuse, misery, neglect and an unspeakable death. Read the entire column here.



Florida DCF Review Panel: Changes Needed to Protect Children’s Lives

February 26th, 2011   No Comments   Abuse

A panel created to review the tragic death of Miami adopted child Nubia Barahona and the critical injuries of her twin brother, Victor, has raised serious questions for the Florida Department of Children and Families. Its findings: Changes are required to ensure greater protection of every child under state care.

According to the Miami Herald, “facts leading up to Nubia Barahona’s death and Victor Barahona’s injuries — including whether investigators, guardians and licensing officials followed state-mandated procedures and used “common sense” to guarantee that the children were safe — need to be analyzed before any recommendations are made, panel members said.”

“We are just starting the process, and I don’t have any judgment yet,” said David Lawrence, former publisher of The Miami Herald, who was named to the panel by DCF Secretary David Wilkins. Other panelists include Bobby Martinez and James Sewell. “The only thing that I know is that a child suffered and died. What do we do about it?”



Group to Review Department of Children and Families’, System’s Handling of Twins’ Case

February 25th, 2011   No Comments   Abuse, Department of Children & Families (DCF)

A high-profile panel of three experts, including two involved with past child death cases, will investigate how the Department of Children and Families and others handled circumstances leading up to the Feb. 14 discovery of 10-year-old Victor Barahona, covered in acid, and his twin sister Nubia Barahona’s decomposed body in the bed of their father’s pickup truck.

“Common sense approaches to suspicious behavior, better pay and training for child welfare investigators, and improved communications with law enforcement were some of the ideas discussed Friday when the panel met to open their investigation into what went wrong with the state’s efforts to protect” the twins from alleged abuse by their adoptive parents, the Miami Herald wrote. Read the entire story here.



Florida’s Children First calls for full transparency in Barahona investigation by DCF

February 22nd, 2011   No Comments   Abuse, Advocacy, Department of Children & Families (DCF), News & Events

Florida’s Children First issued a statement yesterday which called on DCF to provide full transparency in its Barahona investigation, to be sure to include a former foster child on the review team, and to continue the legacy of the Butterworth-Sheldon administration of transparency and improving our state’s child protection system.

Read entire story here



Florida Department of Children and Families Had Warnings During Abused Girl’s Life

February 22nd, 2011   No Comments   Abuse

Nubia Docter, the 10-year-old girl found dead in the back of her adoptive father’s pickup truck this month, was days old when she first came to the attention of the Florida Department of Children and Families. Now, eight reports later, advocates wonder how her story was overlooked.

Some 10 years later, after what amounted to more than a half-dozen investigations into her troubled life, she and her twin brother, Victor, are at the center of another horrific abuse case. Nubia’s body was found burned and decomposed in the flatbed of a pickup truck.

DCF officials had fielded up to four reports regarding abuse and neglect by adoptive parents Jorge and Carmen Barahona. Each report was dismissed. Read the entire story here.

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