By David Wolf, Attorney
Published by Child Injury Lawyer Network
As 24-year-old aspiring actress was arrested in Canada after the woman allegedly abducted a 1-month-old baby girl. Michelle Marie Gopaul, of New York, is accused of faking a casting call for babies in an elaborate scheme to abduct an infant. She remains in a Canadian jail and faces charges of abduction of a minor, according to Toronto police. After moving to Canada, Gopaul allegedly placed an advertisement on the popular internet website Craigslist offering $15,000 for a newborn to acting in a Bollywood-style film. She posed as a casting director and waiting in a Toronto building for the parents to arrive. Gopaul allegedly abducted the infant after the child’s mother let Gopaul take the infant into a different room. Gopaul fled with the child in a taxi. Luckily, the baby girl was found unharmed a few hours later. Gary Batasar, Gopaul’s laywer, stresses who presumption of innocence and says there is no evidence at this point that shows Gopaul did anything wrong. To read more on this story please see Infant abducted after woman places fake ad on Craigslist.
A Minnesota mother is demanding answers after her sun ran out of 2 day care centers, two days in a row. The incidents occurred on November 4 and 5, 2010. Two-year-old Ryker Hacker walked right out the front doors two separate Southern Minnesota day care centers. Jackie Downing, Ryker’s mother, said she was referred to day care provider Rosemary Marquette from her neighbor. On Ryker’s first day, Marquette said she briefly turned her back to help another child when Ryker suddenly went wandered off. Marquette said she did what any other parent or adult would do and started searching form him on her own. However, police say they did not receiving a call from Marquette reporting the child missing. In fact, police received calls from concerned citizens after they saw Ryker in the middle of a busy street, 45 minutes after the child went missing. After much persistence, Downing successful in charging Marquette with a criminal misdemeanor charge of child neglect. The second incident occurred the very next day at Caring Arms day care facility in Nicollet, Minnesota. Sonja Shay, director at Caring Arms, says the center called police and found Ryker walking towards his home a short time after he went missing. To read more on this story please see 
According to authorities, seven middle school students in San Francisco, California, were taken to the hospital after they ingested rat poison, which they mistakenly took for candy. The incident occurred at Martin Luther King Jr. Academic Middle school. A student told a parent about ingesting a blue cube found atop of filing a cabinet. A teacher later contacted poison control. Although the students showed no symptoms, they were taken to the hospitals for precautionary reasons. School officials say the incident is under investigation. To read more on this story please see 
The Archdiocese of Milwaukee, Wisconsin, publicly stated it would filed for bankruptcy in the midst of pending child abuse lawsuits. According to Archbishop Jerome Listecki, the reason for filing for bankruptcy was because the pending sexual-abuse lawsuits could leave the archdiocese with debts it could not afford. However, one lawyer claims it is a delay tactic being used by the church to avoid opening its records to public scrutiny. In fact, Jeff Anderson, an attorney of St. Paul, Minnesota, who has filed 23 lawsuits against the church, stated he thought the bankruptcy filing was done to delay his deposition of Milwaukee Bishop Richard Sklba. Anderson and his clients have been pushing the archdiocese to make public the names of the priests accused of the sexual child abuse and the church officials who protected them.
The U.S. Defense Department picked the Virginia Star Initiative and other state programs that assess child care centers and list their results to help military parents searching for day care facilities. These programs have proved to have far-reaching benefits, improving day care centers nationwide in teaching and quality standards. The Virginia Star Initiative works with Smart Beginnings Greater Roanoke, a nonprofit, with the state on the program. The process: Smart Beginnings evaluates an individual child care facility then evaluates the facility. It follows up with training and funding. The facility is then rated by the Virginia Star Initiative. Centers that volunteer for the program are given two additional years of support so they can continue to improve. One star shows the center has exceeded the minimum standards of state licensure and expectations. Five stars in perfect. A four star program, for example, represents a day care center that far exceeds the state minimum in teacher training, class size and classroom environment. Centers are initially hesitant to undergo the evaluation. However, if day care providers learn the benefits of monitoring their day care facilities will improve dramatically. In fact, the day care centers that did undergo the process improved 50%-60% from their initial evaluation.
Police officials in Baker, California, have arrested a former day are worker in connection with the October 2010 death of a 2-month-old baby at a local day care center. 22-year-old Ashley Rene Reifer was arrested and charged with one count of second-degree murder and one count of cruelty to a juvenile. The autopsy of Brody Hopper revealed that Brody died of traumatic brain injury or Shaken Baby Syndrome, said Police Chief Make Knaps. Reifer worked at Busy Bee Learning Center in Baker, California. According to investigators, Brody was in her sole care on the day of his death.
