Judge rules Missouri child welfare must keep custody of young man with severe autism
A Jackson County judge ruled Friday that a young man with severe autism must stay in the custody of the state’s child welfare agency, despite turning 21 in two days.
And, Judge Kea Bird-Riley said, he shall remain in his current placement with current services.
Lori Ross, the founder of FosterAdopt Connect, has been advocating for several weeks for the young man she calls Leo. She said she’s relieved that he will be kept in foster care and not face homelessness.
“I appreciate the tireless work of the many people who rallied to achieve this result,” she said. “The best outcome of all today is that Leo will never have to know that all of this happened. This weekend he’ll be able to celebrate his birthday to the extent he can, which is exactly what he should be doing.”
The American Civil Liberties Union of Missouri filed a lawsuit Thursday seeking an injunction to keep the state from dropping the young man from services and removing him from the group home where he lives. In that suit, the ACLU said the young man was in imminent danger and could die if he were released from care and ended up on the streets.
The young man, who turns 21 on Sunday and can’t feed or care for himself, is not named in court documents. He’s referred to as “John Doe.”
For the past four years, he has been living in a group home in Independence, licensed by the Missouri Department of Mental Health, the suit filed Thursday says. Advocates say he is doing well there.
His mother lives in a homeless shelter in Kansas City and is unable to care for him. At some point, she lost custody of him after allegations of abuse or neglect. She was present for Friday’s virtual hearing in family court.
There are two issues that have complicated the young man’s case: he was not born in the U.S., and Missouri has not implemented a new federal law designed to keep kids from aging out of foster care during the pandemic. State custody ends when they turn 21.
When a child with severe disabilities typically ages out of care, he or she then goes into the custody of the Department of Mental Health, which provides the services needed.
But, according to the lawsuit, DMH “is not providing these services to Doe because of his immigration status.”
The Star published a story about him Sunday, prompting hundreds of people to come forward wanting to help. People emailed asking who they could call and where they could send money for his care.
Child advocates said they couldn’t fathom why Missouri was not abiding by a federal law that instructs states not to release any child from foster care during the pandemic just because they’ve reached a certain age.
A spokeswoman with the Missouri Department of Social Services told The Star that the agency asked for additional guidance on the law and was waiting on that before it could go into effect in the state.
Lori Burns-Bucklew, a Kansas City attorney who often works with foster children, said she was excited when the law passed in late December. Within days, she reached out to DSS for one of her clients who had just aged out of care and wanted to re-enter under the new law. She still hasn’t heard anything from the state.
“Why Missouri thinks it’s OK to delay the implementation on this, I don’t understand. It’s so urgent,” Burns-Bucklew said. “This wasn’t passed for some frivolous reasons. It was passed because people are in dire straits.”
The Star emailed the departments of social services and mental health about the young man’s case on Thursday and neither spokesperson responded.
In a separate court hearing Friday, lawyers for the ACLU sought a temporary restraining order in federal court to keep the state from removing him from foster care.
Attorneys for the state said the young man had been an undocumented immigrant, but recently received special immigration status as a child in foster care.
With his new legal status, the state is now able to fund ongoing services, said attorney Megan Dittmann-Ryan.
After the ruling in Jackson County family court, an ACLU lawyer told a federal judge that his organization would drop its request for a temporary restraining order.
District Judge Nanette Laughrey denied the request for the temporary restraining order. But she said the plaintiffs would have to decide whether to move forward with the lawsuit as a whole.
This story was originally published February 26, 2021 at 4:03 PM.
