State law requires the Oklahoma Department of Human Services to promptly respond and investigate any report of child abuse or neglect.
The law also requires the District Attorney to develop a multidisciplinary child abuse team in their district.
As Lincoln and Pottawatomie Counties District Attorney Adam Panter explains the MDT is comprised of the DA, law enforcement agents with experience in child abuse investigations, medical personnel with child abuse injury experience, mental health professionals, DHS child protective services and Child Advocacy personnel.
The team is required to intervene in all reports of child sexual abuse, child physical abuse or neglect. That ensures coordination and cooperation of those agencies and further minimizes trauma on an abused child.
The local DA claims what has been brought to his attention is that in many cases DHS is receiving reports of suspected sexual or physical child abuse and going out on their own and conducting forensic interviews of those children in the field.
Panter says DHS is not properly trained to do that and closes an investigation and is not following statutory procedures by notifying law enforcement and child experts of the MDT.
Apparently some cases have been discovered only when staff of the local Child Advocacy Center notified law enforcement.
He’s alarmed enough that he plans to formally request that Attorney General Gentner Drummond utilize the Multi County Grand Jury to investigate this issue and if criminal charges are warranted, what steps might be next.
He told us last week that regardless of a meeting he has planned with the DHS director, that most likely he will do that this week.
He also indicated that if the AG determines the issue to be unique to Lincoln and Pottawatomie Counties, then he will seek to impanel grand juries within his own district to begin investigating or have his DA Task Force to initiate its own probe.
Backing up his argument, the DA provided us with some figures.
In 2024 in Pottawatomie and Lincoln Counties combined, DHS received 511 reports of physical abuse on children. The number of children provided services from the CACCO in 2024 for suspected child physical abuse was 64. In 2024 DHS received 2,532 reports of alleged sexual abuse, physical abuse or neglect in the district.
The CACCO during that same time period reports the children receiving services at the CACCO was 389. That means 2,143 reports of abuse or neglect were never brought to the attention of the CACCO or law enforcement.
We encourage the DA to swiftly move ahead with his formal request to the AG to utilize the Multi-County Grand Jury to investigate this issue. There is absolutely no reason to tolerate any type of abuse of children and it appears the DHS is continuing to fall way short of what the law requires.
Panter’s staff has a solid conviction rate of its own against these type of predators so he shouldn’t hesitate to look at initiating his own investigation if the AG delays or ignores his request in any manner.
Time is of the essence.