DonFrancisco
Your Favorite Tio!
The 5-year-old boy missed 12 days of school as the 2019 school year began, and his Alief campus left his mother four voicemails.
Finally, someone from the Alief Independent School District elementary school spoke to the mom during a home visit on the 12th day of absence, records show, but the boy would again miss class 10 days later.
The attempts two years ago to get the child back into a classroom would be one of the last before the boy and his three older brothers seemingly fell off the radar. Until last weekend.
Last Sunday afternoon, the eldest called 911 with an emergency: His 8-year-old brother had been dead for nearly a year in a west Harris County apartment that the siblings were forbidden from leaving. Sheriff’s deputies found soiled carpets, no furniture or power and roaches crawling on the skeletal remains.
The scant details that have emerged encapsulate the worst fears that child abuse advocates shared when Houston-area school districts lost touch, in some capacity, with nearly 190,000 kids during spring 2020. Classrooms became vacant as instruction turned virtual, but many kids rarely, if ever, connected.
The number of child abuse and neglect reports in both Harris County and the greater Houston region decreased about 7 percent in 2020, Department of Family and Protective Services figures show, and that decrease is likely because kids were interacting with fewer adults who often report abuse, such as teachers, pediatricians and extended family, experts say.
“Here we have an extreme example of what can happen when kids fall through the cracks,” said Teresa Huizar, executive director of National Children’s Alliance, an organization aimed at ending child abuse. “They fell through essentially every crack that was surfaced by the pandemic.”
Authorities have said the slain child, Kendrick Lee, was beaten to death by his mother’s boyfriend around Thanksgiving at CityParc II at West Oaks Apartments. Both the mother, Gloria Williams, 35, and her boyfriend, Brian Coulter, 31, were arrested in connection to his death last week.
Two of the children saw the fatal beating, and Coulter allegedly abused the others, frequently, when he drank. The kids, authorities have said, were possibly locked in different parts of the apartment.
“There’s been so many events that have happened in the last year or two, from the pandemic to the civil unrest to the power outages and the arctic freeze in Texas in February and to think of those children having to fend for themselves and do this all alone — and not even have the basic necessities that they need,” said Estella Olguin, a spokeswoman for Harris County Resources for Children and Adults. “It is unbelievable.”
Pandemic disruptions
Under Texas law, anyone who suspects neglect or abuse must report it. Professional reporters, a designation that includes individuals who have contact with youngsters, are required to report any concerns within 48 hours.
Once reported, the department has 30 days to decide if there are threats to the safety of the children in a home. Probes of incidents posing an immediate risk to a child must be started within 24 hours while investigations of incidents that don’t present an immediate risk of harm should be started within 72 hours, per agency protocol.
At the end of an investigation, protective services makes rulings on each allegation of reason to believe, ruled out, unable to complete or unable to determine.
The state’s Child Protective Services, which assumed custody of the three survivors last week, confirmed it had a history with the family but a spokeswoman said she could not share any information due to confidentiality laws. There was no active investigation when the children were found, and they remained in the custody of their mother, according to the agency.
While the number of abuse and neglect reports decreased from 38,672 in 2019 in Harris County to 35,797 in 2020, the number of investigations completed remained about the same from 25,695 in 2019 to 25,253 in 2020.
“Although numbers of calls to the hotline slowed during the peak of the pandemic in the spring and summer of 2020, by fall of last year numbers had returned to historically average levels,” spokesperson Melissa Lanford said.
Any interruption to normal life — such as a hurricane or pandemic — can remove kids from places where abuse may be observed or where they may be comfortable confiding in an adult, said Kerry McCracken, executive director of The Children’s Assessment Center, an organization that aims to help heal child victims of sexual abuse.
“When life is disrupted and they don’t have access to those trusted adults,” McCracken said, “they don’t have the opportunity to report.”
The Harris County Sheriff’s Office, the main investigating entity, did not receive any reports of foul odors or other suspicious activity regarding the unit, either.
Neighbors, however, said they had complained to the front office of the apartment complex about an overwhelming odor that plagued them for weeks. One of them, Titania Shorter, who had scrubbed her front porch with Clorox and searched the bushes for any dead animals, said she never saw an employee investigate.
How the abandoned brothers in deadly Houston case 'fell through every crack' caused by COVID
Finally, someone from the Alief Independent School District elementary school spoke to the mom during a home visit on the 12th day of absence, records show, but the boy would again miss class 10 days later.
The attempts two years ago to get the child back into a classroom would be one of the last before the boy and his three older brothers seemingly fell off the radar. Until last weekend.
Last Sunday afternoon, the eldest called 911 with an emergency: His 8-year-old brother had been dead for nearly a year in a west Harris County apartment that the siblings were forbidden from leaving. Sheriff’s deputies found soiled carpets, no furniture or power and roaches crawling on the skeletal remains.
The scant details that have emerged encapsulate the worst fears that child abuse advocates shared when Houston-area school districts lost touch, in some capacity, with nearly 190,000 kids during spring 2020. Classrooms became vacant as instruction turned virtual, but many kids rarely, if ever, connected.
The number of child abuse and neglect reports in both Harris County and the greater Houston region decreased about 7 percent in 2020, Department of Family and Protective Services figures show, and that decrease is likely because kids were interacting with fewer adults who often report abuse, such as teachers, pediatricians and extended family, experts say.
“Here we have an extreme example of what can happen when kids fall through the cracks,” said Teresa Huizar, executive director of National Children’s Alliance, an organization aimed at ending child abuse. “They fell through essentially every crack that was surfaced by the pandemic.”
Authorities have said the slain child, Kendrick Lee, was beaten to death by his mother’s boyfriend around Thanksgiving at CityParc II at West Oaks Apartments. Both the mother, Gloria Williams, 35, and her boyfriend, Brian Coulter, 31, were arrested in connection to his death last week.
Two of the children saw the fatal beating, and Coulter allegedly abused the others, frequently, when he drank. The kids, authorities have said, were possibly locked in different parts of the apartment.
“There’s been so many events that have happened in the last year or two, from the pandemic to the civil unrest to the power outages and the arctic freeze in Texas in February and to think of those children having to fend for themselves and do this all alone — and not even have the basic necessities that they need,” said Estella Olguin, a spokeswoman for Harris County Resources for Children and Adults. “It is unbelievable.”
Pandemic disruptions
Under Texas law, anyone who suspects neglect or abuse must report it. Professional reporters, a designation that includes individuals who have contact with youngsters, are required to report any concerns within 48 hours.
Once reported, the department has 30 days to decide if there are threats to the safety of the children in a home. Probes of incidents posing an immediate risk to a child must be started within 24 hours while investigations of incidents that don’t present an immediate risk of harm should be started within 72 hours, per agency protocol.
At the end of an investigation, protective services makes rulings on each allegation of reason to believe, ruled out, unable to complete or unable to determine.
The state’s Child Protective Services, which assumed custody of the three survivors last week, confirmed it had a history with the family but a spokeswoman said she could not share any information due to confidentiality laws. There was no active investigation when the children were found, and they remained in the custody of their mother, according to the agency.
While the number of abuse and neglect reports decreased from 38,672 in 2019 in Harris County to 35,797 in 2020, the number of investigations completed remained about the same from 25,695 in 2019 to 25,253 in 2020.
“Although numbers of calls to the hotline slowed during the peak of the pandemic in the spring and summer of 2020, by fall of last year numbers had returned to historically average levels,” spokesperson Melissa Lanford said.
Any interruption to normal life — such as a hurricane or pandemic — can remove kids from places where abuse may be observed or where they may be comfortable confiding in an adult, said Kerry McCracken, executive director of The Children’s Assessment Center, an organization that aims to help heal child victims of sexual abuse.
“When life is disrupted and they don’t have access to those trusted adults,” McCracken said, “they don’t have the opportunity to report.”
The Harris County Sheriff’s Office, the main investigating entity, did not receive any reports of foul odors or other suspicious activity regarding the unit, either.
Neighbors, however, said they had complained to the front office of the apartment complex about an overwhelming odor that plagued them for weeks. One of them, Titania Shorter, who had scrubbed her front porch with Clorox and searched the bushes for any dead animals, said she never saw an employee investigate.
How the abandoned brothers in deadly Houston case 'fell through every crack' caused by COVID
Last edited:
