Missing Relisha Rudd. Via MPD.D.C. agencies could not have prevented the disappearance of Relisha Rudd from a family homeless shelter, according to a city review.
“The purpose of the review was to assess all of the facts surrounding the District’s involvement with this family, to determine whether the District’s health and human service agencies and DCPS followed internal policies and procedures in providing services to [Relisha Rudd] and her family and to make policy and programmatic recommendations if warranted,” the report states. “Even if all of the policy and practice recommendations in this report had been in place and fully implemented, the Review Team did not find evidence that these tragic events were preventable.”
The report, conducted by the Deputy Mayors for Education and Health and Human Services, reviewed interactions between the eight-year-old’s family and four agencies — Child and Family Services Agency, the Department of Behavioral Health, the Department of Human Services and D.C. Public Schools. The review team included directors from each of these agencies, as well as Judith Meltzer, the court-appointed monitor of CFSA.
Relisha Rudd was last seen with a janitor from the D.C. General shelter, where she was living with her mother, on March 1. That janitor, 51-year-old Kahlil Tatum, was later found dead of an apparent suicide. Relisha hasn’t been seen since.
“This family’s case presented a range of challenges (e.g.homelessness, poverty, and history of mental illness) that are not unique among families served by District of Columbia health and human services agencies,” reads one of the fifteen findings in the review. “The family was receiving services from multiple social service, education and health agencies and community providers. At the time of RR’s disappearance, [redacted’s] compliance with [redacted] and other services was inconsistent; however, the known family circumstances did not satisfy the legal threshold for removal of the children.”
“I do not believe District agencies could have done anything that would have changed the sad outcome,” Mayor Vince Gray said in a statement.
But several recommendations are made in the report, including better information sharing between agencies.
Tatum violated the fraternization policy between staff and residents at D.C. General, the review found. Shelter employees had knowledge of this, but were not required to report it to the Community Partnership for the Prevention of Homelessness, which runs D.C. General for the city.
“Within thirty days, TCP shall provide evidence of changes in policy and procedures so that shelter employees are required to report any information or knowledge that they have about other employees’ pre-existing or new personal relationships with shelter residents to appropriate supervisors and that such reports are documented in writing and tracked as unusual incidents,” the report recommends. “It is recommended that TCP ensure that the shelter providers investigate the reports and document in writing actions taken in response.”
The report also calls for more on-site case managers at D.C. General, which advocates have been calling for for years. Two CFSA social workers were assigned to the shelter in May.
