“Attorney: Abducted Baby's Mom Regaining Custody - Eyewitness News” plus 4 more

Attorney: Abducted Baby's Mom Regaining Custody - Eyewitness News
DeKalb Woman Acquitted in Shaken Baby Death - Atlanta Journal Constitution
Baby P social care chief Sharon Shoesmith challenges Haringey ... - Daily Telegraph
Sharon Shoesmith seeks compensation for sacking over Baby P - The Guardian
Prenatal Care: How To Get It - KPHO

Attorney: Abducted Baby's Mom Regaining Custody - Eyewitness News

Posted: 07 Oct 2009 04:12 AM PDT

NASHVILLE, Tenn. (AP) -- A mother is reunited in Nashville with her newborn son after losing him twice, first to a kidnapper and then to state custody after someone claimed a family member had tried to sell him.

Maria Gurrolla got to hold week-old Yair Anthony Carillo briefly on Saturday before the Department of Children's Services took the infant and three siblings into state custody -- a move a spokesman said was intended to protect the children's safety.

But on Tuesday a hearing was canceled after Metro Police cleared the parents of any wrongdoing, and a news release from the Department of Children's Services said the children were no longer in state custody.

Gurrolla was stabbed several times during the Sept. 29 attack in her home and she suffered a collapsed lung. The baby was taken while she ran to a neighbor for help. An Alabama woman is in custody.

Police spokesman Don Aaron said there are still significant unanswered questions in the case, including why Gurrolla and her son were targeted.

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DeKalb Woman Acquitted in Shaken Baby Death - Atlanta Journal Constitution

Posted: 07 Oct 2009 02:27 PM PDT

Baby P social care chief Sharon Shoesmith challenges Haringey ... - Daily Telegraph

Posted: 07 Oct 2009 11:35 AM PDT

By Caroline Gammell
Published: 7:11PM BST 07 Oct 2009

Mrs Shoesmith was called a "heroine" by the chief executive of Haringey Council for facing the media after the furore over the youngster's death.

She was also given a pay rise after he died, though the council had opened a serious case review into the death.

Mrs Shoesmith, 56, was the director of Haringey's children's and young persons services when the child, later named as Peter, died in Aug 2007.

She was sacked from her £133,000-a-year post last December without compensation after Ed Balls, the Children Secretary, demanded that she be removed. She is now involved in a High Court battle seeking a judicial review against Mr Balls, Ofsted and Haringey council, claiming that her dismissal was illegal.

If she loses, Mrs Shoesmith intends to take Haringey council to the employment tribunal, claiming unfair dismissal and sexual discrimination .

Mr Justice Foskett heard yesterday how Mrs Shoesmith spoke on Nov 11, 2008, trying to justify her actions.

Though Baby Peter was on the "at risk" protection register, social workers failed to see that he had suffered months of abuse before dying at the hands of his mother Tracey Connolly, her boyfriend Steven Barker and his brother Jason Owen.

The 17-month-old boy was seen more than 60 times by social workers, health professionals and the police.

Barker and Owen were found guilty of causing or allowing the boy's death. Connolly had pleaded guilty.

James Maurici, for Mrs Shoesmith, said that on the day Barker and Owen were convicted his client faced a "hostile" press conference. Mr Maurici said although Mrs Shoesmith had not said sorry during the press conference, she later "apologised". He said: "The council's chief executive [Dr Ita O'Donovan] took the claimant out to dinner that night to thank her for all that she had done."

She received messages of support from Liz Santry, a councillor, Stuart Young, the council's assistant chief executive, Paul Enells, the National Children's Bureau chief executive, and several councillors.

"Dr O'Donovan, the chief executive, referred to the claimant as 'our heroine'," he told the London High Court.

But Mr Maurici said Mr Balls ordered an emergency Ofsted report which concluded that Haringey's children's services were "uniquely bad".

Heather Brown, who led the Ofsted's emergency review of Haringey's services, said the quality of practice in the department was the "worst I had ever seen", with "only a single example of good practice" found in the whole inspection.

At a press conference on Dec 1, Mr Balls called for Mrs Shoesmith's suspension. She was sacked a week later.

Mrs Shoesmith claims that she was given no opportunity to respond to the report, that Mr Balls illegally asked for her suspension and Haringey was at fault for dismissing her.

Ofsted, Mr Balls and Haringey all oppose her claims.

In written submissions to the court, Mr Balls insisted that he had had to intervene in the Baby P case to restore confidence nationally in the child protection system, rather than as a "knee-jerk" response to media pressure.

The hearing is expected to last three days.

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Sharon Shoesmith seeks compensation for sacking over Baby P - The Guardian

Posted: 07 Oct 2009 01:51 PM PDT

Sharon Shoesmith leaves the High Court in London

Baby Peter: Lawyers acting for Sharon Shoesmith, who was sacked over his death, say she was given no chance to comment on the accusations that led to her dismissal. Photograph: Luke MacGregor/Reuters

The children's secretary, Ed Balls, was improperly influenced by political and media pressure when he unlawfully removed Sharon Shoesmith, the council official at the centre of the Baby Peter case, from her job, the high court heard today.

Lawyers acting for Shoesmith said she was the victim of a "flagrant breach of the rules of natural justice" that ruined her career, left her penniless and led her to thoughts of suicide.

Shoesmith, 56, the former director of children's services at Haringey council, north London, was present at the court to launch judicial review proceedings for compensation against the council, Balls and Ofsted, the children's services regulator.

Haringey sacked Shoesmith in December 2008, a week after Balls unveiled an Ofsted report that identified a string of "serious concerns" about the local authority's "inadequate" child protection services, and invoked special powers to remove her from office. Her lawyers allege that this gave Haringey council no choice but to formally dismiss her from her £130,000- a-year post without compensation.

In the weeks following the conviction of Baby Peter's mother, her lover and her lodger for his killing, Shoesmith became the focus of controversy. David Cameron confronted Gordon Brown over the issue at prime minister's question time, and the Sun presented a petition to No 10, signed by a million of its readers, calling for her to be sacked.

Balls's decison to remove Shoesmith was a "kneejerk reaction to the press coverage", the court heard. Her lawyers allege that, in breach of convention, she was given no chance to hear or contest Ofsted's criticisms before it published its report. "The secretary of state's conduct in so acting without any regard to natural justice can only be labelled as truly disgraceful. It was patently unlawful," the submission concluded.

James Maurici, appearing for Shoesmith, told the court that Balls's decision "effectively ended, we say, the claimant's employment with Haringey. Indeed, we say, it ended her career."

The heart of Shoesmith's case, he added, was "whether a public authority – or public authorities – can exercise powers to end a person's career without affording them a hearing".

Maurici told Mr Justice Foskett: "As matters stand, the simple fact is the claimant will never work again. She has been financially ruined and her health has been very seriously affected." He accused Balls of "convicting the claimant with no opportunity whatever to be heard".

Lawyers acting for the children's secretary rejected allegations that his actions had been unduly influenced by tabloid pressure.

He had acted to restore confidence nationally in the child protection system following the tragedy, not to win political points, according to written submissions put before the court.

Fairness did not require Shoesmith to be given a right to comment on the Ofsted report before he removed her from her job, because she had had opportunities to say whatever she wished in the context of the review. Even if she had been given the opportunity, there was no doubt the secretary of state would have come to the same conclusion.

Ofsted said its inspectors had raised "glaringly serious" problems in Haringey's child protection regime with Shoesmith, despite her insistence that they were "never made clear" to her before the publication of the inspectors' report.

Ofsted and Haringey council are also challenging Shoesmith's claim.

Shoesmith entered the Royal Courts of Justice via a side entrance, evading the crowd of photographers and reporters who had gathered at a main door to the building.

The court heard that she was still suffering from post-traumatic shock as a result of her treatment. "She has experienced suicidal thoughts for the first time in her life," papers presented to the court said.

At one point before her dismissal the chief executive of Haringey council, Ita O'Donovan, had advised Shoesmith to "take aspirin as she was concerned that the claimant [Shoesmith] would suffer a stroke from the stress".

The council also considered renting alternative accommodation for her to avoid the media pack, the legal claim said, or that she stayed at O'Donovan's house.

In a submission to her appeal dismissal proceedings, Shoesmith said: "I had somebody who very thoughtfully at six o'clock for three or four mornings sent me 100 ways of committing suicide.

"On one occasion I was in my flat for six days and I was even trying to take exercise on the stairs inside the block because I was confined for so long behind closed curtains."

She said her 23-year-old daughter had received death threats and was advised by police to leave London for a week.

The hearing, which is expected to last three days, continues.

Prenatal Care: How To Get It - KPHO

Posted: 07 Oct 2009 06:49 AM PDT

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