A Baby Is Dead - But Why?

Court Finds No Clues To Foster Child's Fate

The Atlanta Journal and The Atlanta Constitution

COVINGTON, Ga. - The first thing Kathy Herren noticed when she saw 4-month-old Demetrick Dantrell Adams lying dead on a surgical table at Newton County Hospital was the black dirt under his fingernails, in his ears and in the creases of his hands.

The baby's foster mother "had provided below minimal hygiene," Ms. Herren said, in the guarded language of caseworkers who are accustomed to both the benefits and the burdens of secrecy in investigations of suspected child abuse cases.

But in a rare departure from such customs, Ms. Herren, a child protective services investigator for the Newton County Department of Family and Children Services, spoke publicly Thursday at a juvenile court hearing to review the agency's handling of Demetrick's case.

At the end of the hearing in which Ms. Herren, the sole witness, was questioned by five different attorneys with interests in the case, Juvenile Court Judge Virgil Costley Jr. ruled that the agency "used reasonable efforts to protect the child in its placement and to secure information necessary to effect a reasonably good investigation of the circumstances."

What neither that investigation nor the one being conducted by the Newton County sheriff's department could establish is how Demetrick Adams died May 30.

The pathologist who conducted the autopsy on Demetrick declared that he had died from three blows to the head, Ms. Herren testified, and described the injuries as "consistent with those common to child abuse."

The death is being investigated as a homicide by the sheriff's department, although investigator Douglas E. Kitchens said Thursday that he has not ruled out the possibility that the blows were suffered in an unexplained accident.

"Right now, I'm willing to believe anything that makes sense," Mr. Kitchens said.

Judge Costley ordered that the hearing, which normally would have been closed, be opened to the public in response to growing concerns that Georgia's law requiring confidentiality in child welfare cases has led to cover-ups and misrepresentations of abuse cases.

The problems were identified in a recent Atlanta Journal-Constitution series, which reported that 51 children monitored by state child welfare workers died last year and that, in several instances, no autopsy was conducted and the cause of death was listed as Sudden Infant Death Syndrome (SIDS), despite suspicions that some of the deaths were homicides.

Ms. Herren testified Thursday that one of the doctors who had tried unsuccessfully to resuscitate Demetrick when he was taken to the hospital by the foster mother offered a tentative diagnosis that the child died of SIDS but asked her if she wanted an autopsy. "He gave me an opportunity to have it ruled as SIDS. I asked for an autopsy," said Ms. Herren, who had been summoned by hospital officials.

Ms. Herren testified that the agency had received no complaints against Demetrick's foster family, Willie and Mary Key, since the couple began keeping children for the agency in August 1986.

Demetrick had been taken there shortly after he was born in January. Ms. Herren gave no specifics about why the child was taken from his natural mother, Debra Adams, except to say that Demetrick was born with syphilis and that Ms. Adams had spent time in jail. Ms. Adams, who attended the hearing, declined to comment.

Four other foster children - ages 17, 11, 3 and 1 - who were staying with the Keys at the time of Demetrick's death were questioned at length, Ms. Herren said. Only one, the 11-year-old, mentioned anything that could be construed as physical abuse, she said, reporting that he once had been hit with a fly swatter.

According to Ms. Herren's testimony, Mrs. Key had given Demetrick a bottle and changed his diaper around 4 a.m. the day he died. Mrs. Key told investigators that she next checked on the child around 9 a.m. and that he appeared to be asleep, with a light blanket pulled up around him, Ms. Herren said.

But around 11:30 a.m., Ms. Herren testified, Mrs. Key called her daughter, Paulette Gotel, who was at work across the street, and told her that Demetrick appeared lifeless. Mrs. Key, she said, told investigators that she called an ambulance, then the sheriff's department, before suggesting to her daughter that th ey rush Demetrick to the hospital by car.

Demetrick was pronounced dead at 12:22 p.m. When she arrived, Ms. Herren said, both Mrs. Key and her daughter were sobbing uncontrollably.

Ms. Herren said that when she first examined Demetrick's body, she noticed only the dirt and saw no marks on the body. The three bruises, she said, were brought to her attention by pathologist Tyson Smith during the autopsy, which she and Mr. Kitchens attended. Two of the bruises, she said, were round - one about the size of a dime, the other about the size of a nickel. A third bruise was oblong, she said, as if Demetrick had bumped into a narrow table top or had been hit by a ruler.

In addition to the four foster children, Ms. Herren said, three children - ages 16, 11 and 9 - belonging to the Keys' daughter also had spent time at the house around the time Demetrick died, as had two adult friends of the family.

But Ms. Herren said that investigators were told by the family that only the youngest of the seven children were home the day Demetrick was rushed to the hospital. And no one, she said, remembered hearing the child so much as cry out that day.