{"report_id":302,"form_id":"22","user_id":81,"organization_id":13,"question_id":"319","question_type":"Free_Text","text_answer":"Contact not being made with the father during this Child Protection (CP) investigation was influenced by this case being the first child fatality that the investigator had ever worked.  As a result she was still learning what to do when child fatalities occur.  In addition to this, the staff was a new CP worker and supervisors are cautious when assigning cases such as this one to new workers.  However, several competing priorities influenced this case being assigned to a new worker.  This included the increase of number of new cases coming into the unit and ensuring that there was equal case distribution occurring.  Additionally, when this case came into rotation, the supervisor was balancing the assignment of such a difficult case to a new staff given that this would be a very hard case to work while also recognizing that this would also be good learning opportunity as a new worker.  Furthermore, the supervisor was also being cognizant of not assigning this case to other staff that may have had recent egregious harm\/fatal\/or near fatal cases assigned to them.  \r\nFurther impacting contact not being made in this case was that the manager and supervisor on this case also instructed the investigator to not make contact with anyone.  This included both Law Enforcement (LE) and the family.  This instruction was influenced by heighted media coverage during this time and the varied response protocols and processes that have occurred over the years as a result of the changing guidance issued by DHS on the requirements when child fatalities and near fatalities occur.  In high profile cases such as this one that surface in the media it is common practice within the agency that supervisors and staff are instructed by program managers to \u00e2\u20ac\u0153just wait\u00e2\u20ac\u009d and to not do anything immediately with the case.  \r\n\r\nMinnesota State Statute 626.556 Subd. 10 (b) (5) also allows agencies to defer to LE during the course of child fatality investigations including the use of their interviews and information to supplement their CP investigations when fatalities occur.  As a result agency staff indicated that during child protection investigations involving fatalities they rely heavily on law enforcement's investigation, including the utilization of their interviews. Staff in this case also believed that an interview had been done with the father through the law enforcements investigation.  Lastly, given that this was a murder suicide, staff believed that making contact with dad would not only cause additional trauma for him but there were also no other surviving siblings to interview and the perpetrator (the subject child's mother) was deceased.","created_by":81,"updated_by":81,"updated_at":"5\/26\/2021 11:44:07 am","created_at":"5\/26\/2021 11:44:07 am","id":31141}