SPOKANE — A lawsuit filed on behalf of eight foster children, including one who starved to death, alleges negligence by the state Department of Social and Health Services, social workers and doctors.
The estate of Tyler DeLeon and seven other children placed with Carole DeLeon seek $95 million in damages for alleged abuse suffered in her home. Tyler DeLeon, 7, died of dehydration and starvation in January 2005. The boy was a foster child whom Carole DeLeon later adopted.
The suit filed Friday in Spokane County Superior Court alleges that DSHS failed to properly investigate Carole DeLeon and another caregiver in her home, or to respond to numerous abuse complaints. Also named are the boy’s doctor, psychiatrist and three social workers.
Carole DeLeon is serving a six-year sentence for criminal mistreatment of Tyler DeLeon and another boy in her care.
Associated Press
Olympia: Complaint against Rossi dropped
A divided state Public Disclosure Commission on Thursday dismissed potentially damaging campaign finance complaints against Republican gubernatorial challenger Dino Rossi.
The citizen panel voted 3-2 to accept a staff recommendation to toss state Democrats’ claim that Rossi illegally used his nonprofit group, the Forward Washington Foundation, to finance an undeclared shadow campaign and to evade the state’s strict reporting and gift-limit requirements.
Rossi, who called the complaint a smear engineered by backers of Democratic Gov. Chris Gregoire, viewed the closely divided commission’s ruling as an exoneration.
Associated Press
No right to lawyers in divorces, court rules
The Washington Supreme Court says there is no right to legal representation in divorce cases.
The justices issued the 7-2 decision in the case of Brenda King, who couldn’t afford a lawyer at the divorce trial and lost primary custody of her children. Her husband was represented by counsel.
Brenda King argued that because the state requires people to go through complex proceedings in public court to obtain a divorce, it should provide them with lawyers if they can’t afford one.
But the high court ruled Thursday that divorces are not initiated by the state, unlike criminal trials.
Associated Press
Bellingham: Man sentenced in murder
An ex-boyfriend who stabbed to death a Sudanese refugee studying at Western Washington University in May 2005 was sentenced to 25 years in prison.
Kero R. Giir pleaded guilty last month to first-degree murder for killing Roda Bec, a 16-year-old Western freshman who friends said had escaped war-torn Sudan by fleeing across the Sahara desert several years before her death.
According to charging documents filed in King County Superior Court, Giir met with Bec at a friend’s apartment in Burien and stabbed her approximately 20 times with a steak knife.
Giir told investigators he killed Bec because she had two abortions without his consent and she was “impolite” to him, according to court records.
Bellingham Herald
Idaho: Shasta Groene won’t have to testify
Shasta Groene won’t have to testify in federal court against the man who murdered much of her family so he could abduct and sexually molest her and her brother, whom he later killed.
According to an agreement reached Thursday between Joseph Edward Duncan III and federal prosecutors, only statements the girl made to law enforcement upon her rescue in 2005 will be presented at a court proceeding to determine whether Duncan gets the death penalty.
Associated Press
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