DCF deems alleged assault of boy, 11, ‘consensual’ sex

http://bostonherald.com/ ^ | 01/21/2014 | Matt Stout, Erin Smith

[massmike]

An 11-year-old autistic Middleboro boy’s claim that he was sexually assaulted by another youth inside his foster home was dismissed as “consensual” sex by child welfare officials charged with protecting him, in a stunning case the boy’s family and school officials charge was plagued by missteps by the embattled Department of Children and Families.

According to DCF investigative reports, police reports and letters, the boy — then 11 but with the cognitive ability of a 5- or 6-year-old, his father told police — was allegedly sexually assaulted by another youth in the foster home while the parents slept during the early morning hours of May 2, 2009.

Officials at Massachusetts MENTOR, a state contractor that supervised the foster care, said they immediately removed the 11-year-old from the home, but they didn’t take him to the hospital because both boys initially said the incident entailed only touching and rubbing — actions officials described as “consensual and experimental.”

But two days later, the boy told a teacher at Amego he was “harassed” into sexual contact, prompting school officials to rush him to a hospital to be examined.

Both the autistic boy and the other youth described the contact as sexual in nature — and that it had happened three to four times — but DCF investigators, in wrapping their probe, indicated it was consensual, writing in a report that “the boys took proactive steps to avoid parental detection.”

DCF investigators never interviewed either of the boys, citing a potential criminal case, and said doctors found no evidence of “tears or bruising” on the autistic boy, though, as one social worker pointed out in the probe, the examination didn’t come until days afterward, according to an investigation report.

[Lonesome in Massachussets]

It’s too bad that in order to take the bench in Massachusetts you have to abandon any shred of common sense or decency.

[sushiman]

http://bostonherald.com/comments/1063854276?utm_campaign=bostonherald_trending_stories&utm_source=bostonherald&utm_medium=trending_stories

[sushiman]

Damn J**s .

[GeronL]

Bump!