Mandated Reporter Cleared

A jury has found a Colorado child care owner not guilty of child neglect for leaving children unattended and failing to report inappropriate activity between two young children. As I noted in an earlier post,  a teacher in the child center briefly left a classroom unsupervised, and returned to find that a five-year-old child had tried to pull down a 3-year-old’s pants. The state licensing agency closed down the center and the Sheriff charged staff with delayed reporting.

Since then, parents in the community have been very vocal about how they believe the licensing agency and law enforcement mishandled the situation. One parent pointed to inadequate interviews of the children. Her daughter “was terrified and shy, and nodded her head in response to almost every question, though Patti believes nothing bad happened to her at the day care.”

Parents also argued that the police mistakenly applied adult standards to children. A spokesman for the school said, “These types of behavioral incidents — similar to biting, hitting, or other injuries and accidents — are considered age appropriate and are common in child care environments.”

Multiple parents signed a petition to have the criminal charges dismissed, and at least one parent testified on behalf of the center director. Before the not-guilty verdict, but after the public outcry, the Sheriff’s Department initiated a review of its response to the incident. Perhaps the review will encourage that law enforcement have training in developmentally normal behavior for children.