Alone and ignored: Children without advocacy in child abuse and neglect courts
Date
2018
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Publisher
Stanford Journal of Civil Rights & Civil Liberties
Abstract
Decades of legal scholarship regarding children’s advocacy in child welfare
courts have assumed a non-existent reality. For the last forty years, scholars have
debated the proper role of a child’s advocate and the proper weight and
emphasis of a child’s opinion. This argument assumes that children are being
represented, albeit perhaps inadequately, by some form of adult advocate in
court. In this first-of-its-kind study, court observation data from Washington state
reveal what is actually happening day-to-day in child abuse and neglect, or
dependency, courts—widespread noncompliance with federal law and a complete
lack of advocacy for many children. By failing to ask “what is happening?”
before asking “what should be happening?” legal scholars have largely ignored
a major failing of our court system. According to the court observation study
discussed in this Article, in many cases children are left with no advocate and
their needs are completely ignored in court hearings. In order for a child’s voice
to be heard in a court proceeding, as scholars have repeatedly called for, courts
must first and foremost acknowledge that the child exists.
Description
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Keywords
advocate, child court, court system
Citation
LeVezu, A. (2018). Alone and Ignored: Children without Advocacy in Child Abuse and Neglect Courts. Stanford Journal of Civil Rights & Civil Liberties, 14, 125.