When police discovered the body of 9-year-old Devontae Williams in his Arlington home in 2004, the boy weighed 35 pounds and showed signs of severe physical abuse and malnutrition. Tarrant County Child Protective Services (CPS) had kept a thick file on the family from previous incidents but lost track when his parents withdrew Devontae from school and moved to Arlington from Fort Worth.

This case is not unusual. In 2003 more than 400 Tarrant County CPS cases were closed because families couldn’t be located.

But in 2005 nearly 90 of those “lost” families were found, thanks to a collaboration among TCU, CPS and Tarrant County United Way that hired a private eye to track down the missing.

“Hiring a private investigator to find these families is an entirely innovative strategy,” said Alan Dettlaff ’95, a TCU social work professor and former CPS caseworker who wrote the grant and monitors the work of the detective, whom United Way funds.

“When I was with CPS, I had many cases where I couldn’t find a family. There might be serious allegations of abuse, but I had no resources to hunt them down. Meanwhile, I would have 30 to 40 other cases needing my attention.”

The private investigator targets families with children aged 4 and younger because preschoolers are the most difficult to track. Geoffrey Tait, owner of Cat’s-Eye Intelligence Service, has found about 70 percent of the missing children referred to him. Now back in the CPS system, they can be monitored.

Many of the families need help. CPS determined that risk factors existed in 58 of the 89 families that have been located, and 22 families were abusing or neglecting their children. In five cases, the children were placed in foster care. Some of those children were placed in protective custody, and most of the families are now involved in therapy and mandatory parenting skills classes.

In addition to finding and protecting children who are in danger, the program helps other families to be cleared of suspected abuse. For 19 of the families located last year, CPS found no signs of abuse or neglect and removed the stigma of an unresolved CPS case.

“In the first year we’ve really shown that the program has been successful in protecting children in Tarrant County from abuse and neglect,” Dettlaff said. “We have determined that many of these families were in need and that many of these kids were being abused in these homes.”

The United Way shares Dettlaff’s excitement.

“We are very pleased with the results and have authorized funding for another full year,” said Pat Cheong, a grant specialist with United Way who helped get the program underway. “Some of the cases were very serious, and we are so happy that we were able to help protect these children.”

Meanwhile, Dettlaff plans to present the results to his peers around the country, and he’s talking with CPS about implementing the program statewide.

“With the program, we were able to protect these children,” he said. “Without the private investigator, we couldn’t even find these kids.” — SP

Learn more:
http://www.dfps.state.tx.us/Child_Protection/About_Child_Protective_Services/