Child Abandonment and Abuse Concepts

Definitions and Key Concepts

• Abandoned: A parent fails to contribute significantly to a child's care or maintain a positive relationship while capable.
• Substantial and positive relationship: Regular and frequent visitation, communication, and exercise of parental responsibilities.
• Insufficient relationship: Marginal efforts or token interactions do not establish a positive relationship.

Legal Provisions

• Acknowledgment of paternity: Does not limit the period considered for abandonment.
• Exclusions from abandonment: Surrendered newborns, children in need of services, and families needing services are not classified as abandoned.

Impact of Incarceration

• Incarceration and abandonment: Can support a finding of abandonment if the parent is repeatedly or excessively incarcerated.

Abuse and Harm

• Abuse definition: Willful acts or threats causing physical, mental, or emotional harm that impair a child's health.
• Inclusions under abuse: Encompasses both acts and omissions that negatively affect a child.
• Corporal discipline: Not considered abuse unless it results in harm.

Dependency and Hearing Processes

• Dependent child: A child removed from their home requiring state supervision.
• Disposition hearing: Court proceeding to determine appropriate protections, services, and placements for a dependent child.

Evaluating Injuries and Harm

• Harm definition: Injury inflicted or allowed upon a child, whether physical, mental, or emotional.
• Factors for injury evaluation: Includes age, history of injuries, injury location, injury multiplicity, and type of trauma.
• Types of injuries classified as harm: Includes bruises, fractures, brain damage, drowning, and any permanent effects.

Neglect

• Neglect definition: Failure to provide necessary care, supervision, and services for a child's health and well-being.

Physical and Sexual Abuse

• Physical injury: Includes disfigurement or impairment of bodily functions.
• Sexual abuse: Any sexual act occurring without consent, equality, or through coercion.
• Equality in relationships: Refers to both participants having equal power, without control or coercion.

Shelter and Hearings

• Shelter: Temporary placement of a child with relatives or in licensed facilities pending court review.
• Shelter hearing: Court examination of probable cause for maintaining a child's shelter status during ongoing investigations.

Substance Abuse and Compliance

• Substance abuse definition: Non-medical use of mood-altering drugs or alcohol that leads to social dysfunction.
• Substantial compliance: Circumstances indicating significant remedy of issues that ensure child safety upon returning to parents.

Custody and Victim Definition

• Taken into custody: Status of a child under temporary control by authorized personnel pending release or placement.
• Victim definition: A child sustaining injury or threatened with harm due to abuse, neglect, or related incidents.