Detroit foster mom a victim, ministers say

February 12, 2007

Jack Kresnak

Ministers affiliated with the Rev. Al Sharpton said Monday that Charlsie Adams-Rogers, the former foster mother charged with manslaughter in the beating death of a 2-year-old foster boy in her Detroit home in August is "the victim of public anger against the foster care system."

The National Action Network Leaders headed locally by the Revs. Charles E. Williams, Maurice L. Rudds and Horace L. Sheffield III, held a brief news conference outside the Frank Murphy Hall of Justice in Detroit around 9 a.m. Monday shortly before Adams-Rogers was arraigned.

Williams said the charges against Adams-Rogers, who also is an ordained minister, were politically motivated because authorities have "charged only one person out of the foster care system as a whole" with the Aug. 16 death of 2-year-old Isaac Lethbridge. Adams-Rogers is charged with involuntary manslaughter and second- and fourth-degree child abuse in the beating of Isaac and physical abuse of his 4-year-old sister in her home under the theory that, as a licensed foster parent, she is ultimately responsible for harm that may come to foster children in her care. Adams-Rogers, who is free on bond, was bound over for trial last week and faced arraignment Monday in Wayne County Circuit Court in a hearing to determine which circuit judge will oversee her case. Her attorney, Warren Harris, said it is wrong to hold Adams-Rogers responsible for Isaac's death of blunt force trauma, a killing apparently committed by another person. Officials said he had bruises over several areas of his body, had a broken collar bone and suffered second degree burns on his chest and abdomen consistent with someone placing a hot iron over his clothing. Isaac and his sister were placed in Adams-Rogers home by the Lula Belle Stewart Center, a non-profit agency that formerly provided foster care services for about 100 abused or neglected children.

Harris said that during the 49 days Isaac was in Adams-Rogers' care she took the boy to a doctor three times because of unexplained bruising on his body. She said Monday that she did not suspect that anyone in her home was abusing the boy. Previously, Adams-Rogers blamed her 12-year-old adopted daughter, a girl with serious behavioral and psychological problems, with the boy's death. A juvenile court judge late last year terminated Adams-Rogers' parental rights to that girl and a 1-year-old baby she also had adopted because of her failure to ensure the safety of children in her northwest Detroit home. As she has from the beginning, Adams-Rogers said Monday that Isaac's death was an accident and that "I did everything possible to protect the children in my home."

Publication date: 2007 Feb 12