CIFS in the News: Innocent Families Accused of Child Abuse

This NBC News & Houston Chronicle collaboration delves deep into the problems with child protective services and heavy reliance on child abuse pediatricians to determine whether a child has been abused. Like many other forensic science disciplines, these experts have overstated conclusions in court and relied on data that is faulty or incomplete. Additionally, as co-founder Keith Findley explains in the article, the placement of these doctors in teams primarily consisting of law enforcement and child protective services presents the same biasing problem as crime labs being housed within law enforcement organizations.

The article follows a family that suffered through a wrongful accusation of child abuse. This family has been reunited, albeit with a heartbreaking separation, job loss, stress, and serious financial hardship; others aren’t so lucky.

Read more here.