Massachusetts lawmakers blasted the the commissioner of the Department of Children and Families Thursday at an oversight hearing. The agency has come under fire in the case of Jeremiah Oliver, a 5-year-old Fitchburg boy who went missing while his family was under DCF supervision while his family was under DCF supervision.
State Rep. David Linsky, chairman of the committee, called what happened inexcusable.
“Explain to me, if you can, how it was the department lost track of this little boy for months and months and months." Linsky said.
DCF Commissioner Olga Roche — who was sitting next to the state lawyer — repeatedly tried to limit the blame.
“This was a failure of social workers and a supervisor and a manager who were not fulfilling their duties,” Roche said.
Linsky asked Roche if she was 100 percent confident than no other children under her watch have gone missing.
"Can you give me and the 6 million people in the commonwealth the assurance that you know that every single one of those 36,000 children in your care today are present, alive and healthy? Can you give me that assurance that there’s no other Jeremiah Oliver out there today?"
"Yes," Roche replied.
Earlier in the day, the Office of the Child Advocate released a report on DCF’s involvement with the Oliver family. The report concluded the social worker had a known history of failing to make home visits in other cases. It also reported the family had been observed by child services in another state — but that state did not share its information until after the boy was reported missing.
