Jean-Philippe, Joycelyn (ACS),- Can't read for comprenesion too well. (Revised June 1, 2007)

This is a director who went around the office talking about how great it is to be a single New York man in Santo Domingo. He can't read too well, not for comprehension, anyhow.Please note that in internet style the first communication is at the bottom, the reply is above it.-

From: Jean-Philippe, Joycelyn (ACS)
Sent: Thursday, December 08, 2005 4:10 PM
To: Weixel, Eugene (ACS); Mattingly, John (ACS)
Cc: Adegbola, Maradesa (ACS); Fore, Gregory (ACS); Vargas, Ramon ECS (ACS); Malek, Hani (ACS); Malia, Patrick (ACS); Brown, Olivia (ACS); McDougall, Sharon (ACS); Chahine, Zeinab (ACS)
Subject: RE:

Hello Eugene,



I have asked your CPM, Patrick Malia, to meet with you and your supervisor in order to clarify and address the contents of your e-mail. During this meeting, the CPM will review with you our mission versus the mission of the police, our role, our mandates, our case practice guide, and our responsibility to act effectively upon all calls requiring a child abuse/neglect investigation and/or immediate preventive services. The CPM will also discuss with you our Instant Response and High Risk protocol, which requires an immediate face-to-face response on all cases identified as high risk by the SCR. This includes all IRT cases (i.e. fatalities, sexual abuse, serious injuries, severe neglect/abuse reports, etc.) There is also a fatality protocol, which requires the immediate response on all reported fatality situations and the submission of a 24-hour fatality report to the State, which the CPM will review with you. In addition, I want to emphasize that Children’s Services is a fully operational 24-hour per day agency. We operate this way because we live in a diverse and multicultural city. Some of our citizens function during the day, while others (like ECS employees) function at night. We cannot in good faith and with good conscience fully protect our children if we decided that we should not conduct home visits during certain hours.



Lastly, I want you to know that your comments are always appreciated, but you must follow the Chain of Command, as required by the Agency’s “Employee Code of Conduct,” to address all work related issues. Conferencing with you about this matter and/or directing you to follow the code of conduct is not “retaliation.” Since it seems that you are lacking clarity in this matter, your CPM will review the code of conduct with you as well. Thank you.




--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

From: Weixel, Eugene (ACS)
Sent: Thursday, December 08, 2005 6:47 AM
To: Mattingly, John (ACS); Jean-Philippe, Joycelyn (ACS)
Cc: Adegbola, Maradesa (ACS); Fore, Gregory (ACS); Vargas, Ramon ECS (ACS); Malek, Hani (ACS); Malia, Patrick (ACS)
Subject:



Dear Mr. Commissioner:



I am writing this letter to you because I have confidence in the rightness of what I am going to tell you, even though the last time I communicated directly to you regarding case practice in ECS I had to undergo an attempt at retaliation that failed.



As you may know, a one month old infant died in New York City last night. I was assigned to investigate this matter prior to the acceptance by the SCR of any report against the parents.



I spoke with the detective on the case who told me that he did not suspect child abuse or neglect at this time. He told me that the infant had been carried by the now subject mother in an ordinary baby carrier. He told me that he could not make a determination regarding crime prior to the results of the Medical Examiner's investigation. He did tell me that the home is in deplorable condition. (This is not mentioned in the Oral Report that the SCR was generating at perhaps the very moment I was getting into a car to go to the parent's home.)



My visit to the parent's home, at 2:21 AM, is described in my case notes. Basically the now subject father wanted ACS to return to his home at a more conventional hour. He stated that he and his wife are bereaved. He said that the surviving one year old sibling is in the home of a neighbor. He said he did not want to wake up that neighbor's family and that the child would be returned to his apartment in the morning.



I decided not to push, bully or coerce this father into allowing us into his home at 2:30 in the morning nor to attempt to force the awakening of the neighbor's family.



I want to bring up another matter. The police officer whose report was taken has told ACS that the report does not accurately reflect his words. He did not say that the child was being carried in a "backpack." More than once I have spoken with reporters who tell me that the ORT being described to them does not reflect the information they reported, and I can say that this has happened even tome in reports I have called in carefully going over the facts with the SCR worker. At times the information gathered by us from reporters would point to a lack of any real allegations, yet we pursue these matters, prying into the lives of people who have not been truly and factually even accused of doing anything wrong, sometimes calling them and ringing their door bells sometimes at very unconventional hours as well.



I initially objected to the assignment to go to this family’s home in the stark hours of early morning. I feel this is a brutish and heartless act, needlessly heartless at that, and in fact I question being assigned to investigate the family or ring their doorbell without a report.



I can recall another instance in which a child died on Staten Island and a report was made only accusing this family of leaving the deceased child’s siblings unattended in a hospital parking lot. I was dispatched to the family’s home and learned that the children in question were not unattended. (Such an investigation on the day a parent’s child has died!) When I called back to the IRT coordinator he wanted me to return to the home and question the family about the death that had been investigated by police and found not to be homicide and after the hospital that pronounced the child dead had not reported any neglect or abuse connected to the death itself.



In still another instance another worker told a manager that the worker suspected that a reporter was mentally disturbed. I was assigned to assist on the matter, to ring the doorbell of the reporter at around three in the morning to assess his mental state!



In still another case I was ordered to “tell the parents” of a child who just had died on the day of this death that the “had to bring the other children to the hospital right now.” I’d hope not to see those days return.



I believe in the rule of law. When lawmakers, law enforcers and government officials habitually do not abide by law then the ideas that underpin our Declaration of Independence come into play. Beyond the law and rule of law (investigation without report, investigation of reporters) there is a matter of common decency in all of this. Our office is called “Emergency Children’s Services” I think for a reason. We are conceived as an arm of Child Protection that intervenes in emergencies. It is a matter of decency if not of law that people are not to be disturbed in their abodes by the government at unreasonable times or for reasons that lack reason.



One cold February morning around four years ago I removed four little children from their homes at around four in the morning without court order and for no reason a normal person would accept, other than the old cliché “I was only following orders.” I wrote a memo to my director who thanked me for bringing the matter to his attention. A few months after this the manager retired, some say under duress. This action was ordered and insisted upon after my co worker and I told the supervisor from the home itself that there was no safety emergency in this home – and I promised myself that I would never again be the instrument of such thoughtless brutality.



I’m almost 60 years old and it is too late for me to change much. I have these hang ups about decency, respect for others and lawfulness of government actions that help make me into a misfit where I work, but it is too late for me to find another job. Maybe it is not too late for the place where I work to change.



Thank you,





Eugene Weixel