Child Injury Lawyer Blog
By David Wolf, Attorney
Published by Child Injury Lawyer Blog
Working parents and guardians rely upon day care centers to provide a safe and nurturing environment for children. Unfortunately, at some day care centers, a day can be filled with neglect and abuse at the hands of the very caregivers responsible for keeping the children safe and out of harm’s way. The truth is that many child care providers lack the training and financial motivation to do a good job. Many child care providers are immature and just lacked the proper upbringing and maturity to provide the necessary care for children. It is a known fact that children misbehave or do not follow all instructions. This is especially true for infants and toddlers. It is certainly an expected part of the job to deal with difficult children or good children who occasionally misbehave. The child care provider needs to have patience, understanding, and a strong conviction to do the right thing and to act in the best interest of the child. When a child care provider is accused of wrongdoing, a police investigation and criminal investigation may result. Police and prosecutors are quite busy and do not pursue or prosecute every case or incident that is reported. As such, many acts of wrongdoing may not be prosecuted if investigators do not believe that the injuries warrant OR if investigators believe that proof of the malicious intent cannot be provided beyond a reasonable doubt.
In Wisconsin and other States, day care centers should be safe havens for children. They should be placed where children are well cared for in supportive, nurturing environment. Unfortunately, some day care center employees and volunteers abuse the children under the care of a day care center. These reckless employees and volunteers use their positions of trust to prey on children. Some are caught while many others go undetected only to go on to abuse more children along the way.
In Louisiana and other States, children are the unfortunate victims of abuse and neglect. The victimization of a child can take place at a home, relative’s home, friend’s home, in public, and, yes, even in a day care center. When a child is enrolled in a day care center, the facility has a duty to provide the child with a safe and clean learning environment that is free from abuse. The staff should be well trained. Furthermore the staff should have the personality and patience to be able to optimally and safely work with children. Day care center workers that are unhappy with their jobs, inpatient, immature, or just lazy may end up lashing out at a young child. It is well known that children do not always listen and at times disobey adults. Furthermore, children, especially day care age children, will cry and make messes. If a day care center worker cannot handle the foreseeable and common acts associated with young children, the the day care worker should not be employed in that position. For the safety and well being of the children, a more qualified and patient day care center employee should fill the position by the day care worker who simply cannot or will not handle the serious and important responsibilities of the job.
Parents rely on day care centers to provide a safe educational environment for children. Unfortunately, many children are harmed in the very place where they should be safe. In some instances, a child enrolled in a day care center is harmed, attacked, assaulted, or molested by another child in the day care center. An attack at a day care center can have a profound effect on the victimized child as well as the family of the victimized child. Is a day care center liable for the injuries or damages caused by the attack of a child by another child enrolled in the day care center? Like many legal issues posed to me as a Child Injury Lawyer, the answer depends on the laws and regulations in place, the actions or inactions of the day care center, the knowledge on the part of the day care center, the foreseeability of the incident, preventability of the incident, and other factors.
In New York and other States, parents rely on family members, friends, neighbors, and others to serve as babysitters. While most babysitters are very caring individuals, there are some babysitters out there who lack the training, experience, personality, responsibility, and / or temperament to effectively serve, work, or volunteer as a babysitter. While it is often times helpful to do a background check on a babysitter, this is not always practical and many parents lack the funds or know how in conducting a background search on the babysitter. Some babysitters may have a clean criminal record but still present a danger to the child entrusted to the babysitter’s care. When the actions or inactions of a babysitter results in a the harm or injury to a child, there may be legal ramifications to the incident:
When a child is abused, molested, or assaulted, there can be legal consequences in the form of a criminal proceeding, administrative proceeding, and / or a civil proceeding. In each legal arena or court, proof or evidence will need to be presented so substantiate the allegations. In some cases, the evidence is overwhelming and a prosecution, conviction, or judgment is strongly supported. In other cases, law enforcement, investigators, prosecutors, government officials, and / or private attorneys are sometimes challenged to find the right evidence to prove the allegations. It should be noted that each State has a set of evidentiary laws as to what evidence is admissible and what evidence is not admissible in a given legal proceeding. As such, what may appear to be a strong case on the face may not be if the evidence is limited or excluded by the Judge. Because of the intricacies of the legal proceedings including those related to evidence, it is often times helpful to have the advice, consultation, and legal representation (when appropriate) of a 