The Santa Clara County Department of Family and Children's Services has been slapped with a $400 million lawsuit by the Church of Scientology, which alleges that the agency bilked millions of dollars from state and federal social security funds by filing false claims.

The church alleges that the department charged both state and federal social security programs for taking care of children that never existed and for conducting therapy sessions that never took place.

Imagine you are a mother, plotting her getaway from an abusive relationship.

Then imagine that if you make it to a shelter for abused women, the Kentucky Cabinet for Health and Family Services might take your children away on the grounds that a shelter isn't a good place for kids.

Budget hearing on agency's reforms to be held Thursday

Without adequate funding from the state, the attempt to improve New Jersey's flawed child-welfare system is likely to fail, key players in the reform effort told a federal judge Tuesday.

Two days before the often-critical Assembly Budget Committee is scheduled to hold a budget hearing about the proposed Department of Children and Families, U.S. District Judge Stanley R. Chesler was updated on the status of reforms to the Division of Youth and Family Services.

With spending on child-abuse-prevention programs down some $15 million annually in Michigan, the state has received federal approval to take foster-care funds that help children already in the child-welfare system and divert them to kids who have not yet been harmed.

Reforms added caseworkers -- now retaining them is the challenge, commissioner says

The number of complaints flowing into the state child abuse hotline has nearly doubled in the last four months, placing enormous pressure on a child welfare work force that is short on experience due to high turnover.

Boy's death spurs review of foster care system
Cause of 2-year-old's death still undetermined

Nearly five months have passed since 2-year-old Jaime Ceballos died in a foster care home in Salinas.

Investigators said they are still unsure of the circumstances surrounding the toddler's death, but the incident has triggered criticism and a review of the local foster care system.

Domestic violence shelter directors say the state is increasingly taking children away from women who have done nothing more than move to a shelter to escape a violent home.

REPORT: STATE UNJUSTLY TERMINATES PARENTAL RIGHTS FOR FEDERAL MONEY

Kentucky’s inspector general is investigating complaints that some state child protection officials are using foster children as “bartering items” in an adoption push that a recent report equated to the “black-market selling of children.”

CABINET PUSHED FOR OUT-OF-STATE ADOPTION

The Cabinet for Health and Family Services decided in 2004 that Mary Henderson’s alcoholism and neglectful behavior were grounds for taking away her children.

When the B.C. legislature returns from its Easter break, it will once again face an issue that has haunted both B.C. Liberals and the NDP governments – child protection.

Child welfare officials and a sheriff's deputy visited Britney Spears' home because her infant son was accidentally dropped from a high chair, according to published reports.

This report describes a systems review of the Mississippi Department of Human Services, Division of Family and Children's Services (DFCS) that was conducted by the Child Welfare League of America under contract with the Mississippi office of the attorney general.