Prosecuting Child Physical Cases: Lessons Learned From the San Diego Experience.

Series: NIJ Update
Published: May 1995
4 pages
6,786 bytes

Prosecuting Child Physical Abuse Cases: Lessons
Learned From the San Diego Experience

There are many more incidences of child physical
abuse and neglect than of sexual abuse. In fact,
over 200,000 incidences of child physical abuse
occur each year in this country. A national survey
sponsored by the National Center on Child Abuse and
Neglect revealed that despite this number, district
attorneys' offices prosecute far fewer cases of
child physical abuse and neglect than cases of
child sexual abuse. To discover what can be done
about this situation, the National Institute of
Justice and the Office of Juvenile Justice and
Delinquency Prevention sponsored a study of a
prosecutor's office that aggressively pursues child
physical abuse and neglect cases by coordinating
with other agencies and using specialized staff.
The results, reported in the Research in Brief also
entitled Prosecuting Child Physical Abuse Cases:
Lessons Learned From the San Diego Experience,
indicate that the San Diego's prosecutor's office
multi-agency approach has resulted in high felony
conviction rates for child physical abuse cases.
They ranged from a low of 77 percent in 1986 to a
high of 94 percent in 1992, and averaged 85 percent
in the 7-year period from 1986 to 1992.

A multiagency approach

San Diego's multiagency approach involves
coordination among child protective services (CPS),
the police, the medical community, and the
prosecutor's office. A CPS worker is usually the
first official to respond to a report of suspected
child abuse. Initial referrals to CPS come in via a
24-hour hotline. Every hotline report and every
case that results in an investigation are forwarded
to law enforcement.

Law enforcement officers have full access to all
the information contained in any CPS report. The
police department is also required by law to report
any alleged cases of child abuse to CPS. Under the
interagency agreement, CPS's prime responsibility
is to protect the child and law enforcement's is to
investigate the alleged perpetrator. Prosecutors in
the San Diego District Attorney's Family Protection
Division work closely with law enforcement officers
to answer any questions regarding the sufficiency
of evidence or the type of evidence the prosecutors
will need to convict.

Because of the importance of collecting and
interpreting medical evidence, the medical
community also plays a crucial role in prosecuting
physical abuse cases. The Child Protection Center
at San Diego's Children's Hospital and CPS cohost a
weekly meeting for representatives from the police
department, CPS, the district attorney's office,
and the health and medical community to discuss
problematic cases and share expertise.

Specialization and training

The San Diego police department's specialized unit
of 14 investigators handles all physical abuse,
severe neglect, and sexual abuse cases. All
investigators assigned to the unit must request the
assignment, and they are required to attend four
training classes conducted by the State of
California on various aspects of investigating
child abuse.

The unit that handles child abuse cases in the
district attorney's office, the Family Protection
Division, consists of 10 deputy district attorneys,
a division chief, 2 investigators, and a victim
witness counselor. Deputies must request assignment
to the division, and they receive training from the
division chief and through State and national
seminars.

In addition to developing expertise, specialization
has enabled the police department and the district
attorney's office to build a close working
relationship. Both police and prosecutors would
like to see specialization return to CPS as well
(special units for sexual abuse and severe physical
abuse were recently disbanded due to budgetary
constraints). In the view of law enforcement, the
lack of specialization among San Diego's 600 CPS
workers makes building a rapport with individual
workers difficult, and although newly hired workers
attend a 6- to 8-week training program on
investigating child abuse and neglect cases, the
need for more intensive training was seen as acute.

Dissatisfaction with child abuse prosecution

Interviews with CPS, the police, and the
prosecutors in San Diego, revealed great
dissatisfaction with the leniency of sentences
imposed in child abuse cases, which recalled the
similar complaint of many of the 600 prosecutors
interviewed in the 1993 survey. Sentences were
usually described as "mere slaps on the wrists."

Although San Diego gives priority to physical abuse
cases and has allocated resources for successful
prosecution, the chief of its Family Protection
Division expressed the opinion that physical abuse
prosecutions are at the stage now where sexual
prosecutions were 10 years ago. Jurors tend to not
believe that parents, or caretakers, intentionally
harm their children. They tend to see injuries as
the accidental result of discipline that parents
can, and often should, impose. Unless the public is
made aware of the nature of child physical abuse
cases, prosecution and conviction will remain
difficult.

Implications for action

Public education in the area of physical abuse has
yet to reach the same level that has been reached
by public knowledge of sexual abuse. Every
professional interviewed in San Diego believed that
the jurors needed to be enlightened about the
dynamics and seriousness of physical abuse cases. 

The study also indicates the importance of
prosecutors communicating to law enforcement and
CPS that they will pursue physical abuse
prosecutions when appropriate. A case in which a
child's injury appears suspicious requires careful
scrutiny for possible criminal action and
coordinated investigations to ensure the
preservation of evidence.

Concerns that CPS workers "tip off" suspects can be
minimized by an interagency understanding that
delineates each agency's role and responsibilities.
San Diego's agencies have such a memorandum of
understanding among units dedicated to child abuse
cases. The researchers recommend other communities
consider San Diego's approach since it permits
close, collaborative working relationships that can
lead to successful resolutions of these cases.
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The Research in Brief of this case study,
Prosecuting Child Abuse Cases: Lessons Learned From
the San Diego Experience, by Barbara E. Smith,
Ph.D., of the Center on Children and the Law,
American Bar Association, can be obtained from the
National Criminal Justice Reference Service. Ask
for NCJ #152978.