http://www.miamiherald.com/news/local/community/miami-dade/article128806909.html
This article talks about a 14 year old girl, Naika, who had been in and out of foster care since the age of 7. She had been reunified with her mother twice during that time before going back into foster care. She was originally removed from the care of her mother due to "excessive corporal punishment" but also had a history of sexual abuse. Over the weekend Naika hung herself in the bathroom of her foster parent's home while streaming it on a live video on facebook. This article is written more from the biomother's perspective but I read a few other articles about the case. One article stated that Naika's friend saw her live video, called the police but accidentally gave them the wrong address to her home.
This article places blame on the child welfare agency because, according to mom, they did not get her the counseling services she needed. The agency had forbade her from using facebook due to her inappropriate interactions on there. I am a struck at this girl's desire to share herself committing suicide on social media and couldn't imagine being one of her friends and having to see this. I would hope that someone has reached out to the friend that called the police. She may have tremendous guilt about giving the wrong address to the police and no one being able to save her friend.
This is heartbreaking. Yet it's so hard to find the gaps in a situation like this in order to really understand why these events took place. My first thought was the same as yours - I really hope Naika's friend has found support for helping her to process this event.
ReplyDeleteI had heard a news story about this sad situation, but it did not provide much detail as to why she was moved around so much or why Naika was never provided the therapeutic support she was supposed to receive. Is the system this broken, or just understaffed and under trained? It seems that kids fall through the cracks everywhere....
ReplyDeleteIt's shocking and heartbreaking to read about this. I'm also very curious what lead her to live-stream her death, and how those involved with her case did not provide therapeutic support. It seems to me that when someone takes such drastic measures like this, there are often signs that it is coming. Although, these signs tend to go unnoticed by many people, it is my hope that professionals in child welfare agencies would be trained to look for these signs. Regardless of the reason behind the agency's lack of support, this article makes it clear that there is a major systemic issue in the child welfare system.
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