You file a formal incident report with the foster care Director and/or Attorney General’s Office, describing what you have seen, heard, and surmised. You are quickly identified throughout the agency as the person responsible for the investigation and the rest of the staff stop speaking to you.

When you are interviewed, it is clear that no evidence has been provided which supports your charges. The invitation is completed and Tom is cleared. A week later, your foster supervisor calls you in to say that your performance is inadequate and you probably should consider closing your home to foster children. When you ask for specifics, he doesn’t respond.

Finally, when your car tires are slashed for the second time, you’ve had it. You turn in your certificate and all of the children are removed from your home. You start reading the news papers to get a new license from another Child Placement agency.

There you learn. . .