Foster family seeks answers in death of 2-year-old Raffy
He had endured two broken legs, burns, bruises and at least two skull fractures — all while living with his biological parents.
Four times, the state sent Rafael to live with a foster family. Again and again, they nursed him back to health. But the state always returned him to his biological family.
His foster mother warned a family-court judge last spring that reuniting Rafael with his biological parents once more might kill him.
He died Sept. 10, one day after being flown to Spokane's Sacred Heart hospital. His biological parents told doctors their son choked on a piece of food and passed out; police are investigating his death as a possible homicide.
Rafael's foster family can't understand why state social workers couldn't see the danger they saw. State officials refuse to release any information. The family wants answers, and justice.
"If this happened to Raffy, it's happening to other children," said Char Wellner, the mother of Rafael's foster mother. "How could all those people see this child with all these injuries and believe it was an accident?"
Rafael Gomez was born on Aug. 7, 2001, with cocaine and amphetamines running through his veins. The state Department of Social and Health Services took him into protective custody, and sent him home three days later with Denise Griffith and her husband.
The Griffiths live in Royal City, Grant County, with their three children. Rafael was their first foster child.
He wasn't an easy baby. Addicted to drugs in his mother's womb, he was hypersensitive to noise and light. Denise, a stay-at-home mom, played soft lullabies in the dimly lit nursery. Rafael's favorite was John Denver.
"She had to give him total, constant care. You could not believe the patience and the love," said Wellner, who considered Rafael her grandchild. Wellner supplied most of the information for this article, including medical records and a caretaker's report submitted in court by Griffith.
Attempted adoption fails
When Rafael was 3 months old, caseworkers and his biological parents decided his aunt and uncle in Moses Lake should adopt him. Three days later, a DSHS worker called Denise Griffith and asked her to take Rafael back — his aunt and uncle couldn't handle him.
When Rafael was 11 months old, the state decided he should live with his biological parents. About two months later, the Griffiths' phone rang at 1 a.m. Rafael was in the hospital with a fracture to his right shin bone, and DSHS wanted the Griffiths to take him back.
Doctors were told Rafael broke his leg falling off a toy truck, Wellner said. After four days with the Griffiths, DSHS returned Rafael to his parents in Ephrata.
Rafael's reunion with his biological family lasted about two months. Again, it ended in the emergency room.
This time, Rafael's other leg had been broken, his left femur snapped cleanly in two. His biological mother said he slipped and fell; Rafael came home to the Griffiths in a half-body cast that weighed more than he did.
There was more. Rafael also had two red, infected sores on the back of his head, burns on his tongue, and a constellation of round burn marks on his hand. His ears were bruised and cut. A CT scan showed an old skull fracture.
Dr. David Cook, who treated Rafael at Central Washington Hospital in Wenatchee, wrote in his discharge summary that the boy's wounds "together constitute serious concern of child abuse and leaves no doubt on my mind that this child has been physically abused."
'Light of everybody's eyes'
Again, the Griffiths nursed Rafael to health. Wellner remembers Christmas 2002 with her nine children and 24 grandchildren. Rafael, olive-skinned and dark-haired, fit into her family of blond and redheaded relatives like he was the missing puzzle piece. His favorite present was a family picture, which he smudged with kisses.
"He was just so happy and so smiling," Wellner recalled. "He was the light of everybody's eyes."
Griffith and her husband wanted to adopt Raffy. DSHS had other plans.
At a March 18 family-court hearing on Rafael's fate, Griffith wrote a two-page caretaker's report detailing Rafael's history, with photos and medical records attached.
She pleaded with the judge not to return Rafael to his biological parents:
"We love Raffy very much and would gladly except (sic) him into our home as we have so many times before," she wrote. "But we will also gladly allow him to go to any other adoptive home that is safe so he can go on with a normal healthy life. Please do not let this child fall through the cracks again."
According to an internal memo dated March 11 from the office of state Sen. Alex Deccio, R-Yakima, who the Griffiths contacted for help, Rafael's fate had already been decided.
After a caseworker's Feb. 28 visit to Griffith, nine people on a 13-member panel decided Rafael should return to his biological parents, the memo says. It's unclear whether they saw the pictures of Rafael's injuries or read Cook's medical report.
Parents had drug treatment
They did know that both biological parents had received drug treatment, had tested negative for drugs, and were getting help from a state-paid "home support worker." Rafael's father had a job, and the parents had four other children living with them.
"I do not see that there is anything you will be able to do to stop this placement," Deccio's constituent-relations manager wrote to the senator.
She was right. The judge accepted DSHS' recommendation and ordered Rafael back to his biological parents.
Denise Griffith and her kids were showing hogs with their 4-H club at the Grant County Fair on Sept. 10 when her cellphone rang. A foster-parent advocate broke the news to her: Raffy was dead.
Since then, Griffith has retreated into the solace of her immediate family. Always outspoken like her mother, she now says talking about Rafael hurts too much.
"I'm very overwhelmed at the moment and just need some time to heal," Denise Griffith wrote in an e-mail to The Associated Press Wednesday night.
No DSHS information
Rafael's story is one-sided, so far. The Department of Social and Health Services refuses to release any information about him or explain why he was returned to his biological parents.
DSHS announced Friday it will conduct an internal review to find out whether state workers followed procedures in Rafael's case. An external review team will also review the case. A similar team, composed of legislators, doctors and child-welfare experts, investigated in 2000 the case of Zy'Nyia Nobles, 3, who was beaten to death after DSHS returned her to her mother.
And the state ombudsman for families and children, Mary Meinig, said Friday she will review DSHS records "right away."
'Too many red flags'
A child-abuse expert who reviewed Rafael's medical records at The Associated Press' request said his injuries should have raised official suspicions much sooner.
"There are too many red flags that are screaming out here," said Dr. Howard Dubowitz, director of the Center for Child Protection at the University of Maryland School of Medicine. He cautioned that his information about the case was limited, but said, "The picture together is extremely suspicious that this kid was badly and repeatedly abused."
His biological parents, who live in Ephrata, did not return messages left at their home. The AP is not identifying them because they have not been charged with a crime. DSHS has put their four other children into protective custody.
Ephrata Police Chief Joe Varnick says he is investigating Rafael's death as a homicide. No suspects have been named, though the police have searched the biological parents' home.
The Grant County coroner hasn't yet determined what killed Rafael. Varnick said his department is waiting for the results of tests on the toddler's brain tissue, which may show whether Rafael was subjected to repeated abuse.
"Once we get those reports, we'll see," Varnick said. It could take several weeks.
Class-action lawsuit
Meanwhile, Wellner has shown Rafael's medical records and pictures of his injuries to attorney Tim Farris, who represents foster children in a class-action lawsuit against the state.
"It makes me want to throw up," Farris said in an interview from his Bellingham office. "It's another example of the foster-care system failing to protect children from harm."
Rafael's foster family clings to a handful of photographs and memories. The last picture they took of Raffy, on March 17, shows a smiling boy wearing a yellow T-shirt printed with the words "Best Friends." Wellner has two copies framed in her house.
They remember the way Rafael laughed, the way he loved to tell them what sound a kitty-cat makes ("MEOW!"), and the way he danced to his old favorite, John Denver.
His foster family held a "Mass of the Angels" for Rafael at their church last month. They put his baby blanket beneath the altar and played John Denver's "Annie's Song," one last time for their baby:
"Come let me love you
Let me give my life to you
Let me drown in your laughter
Let me die in your arms
Let me lay down beside you
Let me always be with you
Come let me love you
Come love me again."