PHILADELPHIA (KYW Newsradio) — The Pennsylvania House has unanimously passed HB954, a bill that supporters say could significantly help cooperation during investigations of crimes against children.
Current law prevents police and prosecutors from talking to agencies responsible for details of a child's life, such as foster care placement.
"It’s just an absurdity," said Montgomery County Republican Rep. Todd Stephens, the bill's primary sponsor.
"Our criminal history records act prevented law enforcement from sharing information with non-law enforcement agencies -- and that includes the office of children and youth."
Stephens called the inability to share information "shocking," but something they're now working to fix.
“We have a number of different agencies set up across the commonwealth whose role it is to protect our children," Stephens said. "We need to make sure they can exchange information and assist one another and collaborate to best protect our children in Pennsylvania from abuse.”
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Children and Youth Services (CYS) is charged with making child victims are safe, says Abbie Newman, CEO of Mission Kids, Montgomery County's child-advocacy center. But she and other child advocates say that work is handicapped by the Criminal History Record Information Act (CHRIS).
To assist with communication, Mission Kids, which is not restricted by CHRIS as state and county entities are, interviews child victims. They can bring together relevant agencies so everyone has access to a copy of the interview, and the child need not be traumatized by repeat interviews. But that doesn't happen in every case.
“Our team members saw how it impacted the care they could provide. And law enforcement had situations where they wanted to share because they knew it was in the best interest of the child but could not and cannot under the law," Newman said.
"Therefore, it hinders the other team members’ responses and ultimately all the services that can and should be provided to that child. And it’s the child and the non-offending family members that end up suffering."
In another example, Stephens says, a police officer who learns something during initial investigation on the scene, cannot share that information with CYS. So they would need to do second interview, "forcing that child to repeat all these horrific details of the abuse they experienced and further traumatize the child."
The bill now heads to the state Senate.