SARASOTA -- The Sarasota Family YMCA made
repeated mistakes that allowed a 2-year-old Florida girl to go missing for
four months, including ignoring nine state e-mails asking about her status
and a relative's warning the child's mother planned to snatch her from
foster care and take her out of state, according to a state investigation.

The report by the Florida Department of Children and Families blames the
state agency itself and the Sarasota YMCA's Safe Children Coalition, which
is responsible under contract for running state foster care services in a
six-county area including Pinellas County. Four months passed before police
got a missing-child report and began looking for Courtney Clark. She was
found 1,000 miles away in a Wisconsin home where a boy was tortured and his
mother was killed and buried.

The DCF report found a series of mistakes that DCF Secretary Bob
Butterworth called "totally, totally inexcusable." Butterworth said he was
"incensed" by the handling of Courtney's case by his agency, which he said
was ultimately responsible, and by the Sarasota YMCA.

Sarasota Family YMCA President and CEO Carl Weinrich, in a more tempered
response, said he was "frustrated" by mistakes and said the YMCA also was at
fault. But Weinrich repeatedly said that bureaucracy was part of the problem
and a subcontractor working for him had tried hard to notify police of the
missing girl.

"The care worker was trying to get help from a lot of places and kept
running into walls," Weinrich said.

Weinrich said the YMCA is now working with state DCF officials to prevent
future mistakes.

"They're going to work to eliminate bureaucratic mazes that get in the
way of allowing the police report to get filed quickly," Weinrich said.

Weinrich said case workers tried to report Courtney's disappearance to
Colorado authorities, where her mother had a scheduled criminal court
appearance, and tried to enter it into a state computer.

"They couldn't get a police report number. And you've got to have a
police report number to enter into (the state DCF computer known as)
HomeSafeNet."

However, state DCF officials disputed that.

"If you don't have a police report number, you can enter zeroes instead,"
said DCF press secretary Al Zimmerman. "According to the review, no one even
attempted to report that child missing until Jan 19. That doesn't sound like
bureaucracy led to this mistake. ... Prior to Jan. 19, no missing-child
report was filed with any police agency in the United States."

Zimmerman said there is some doubt Courtney even went to Colorado, and
she was not listed in a national crime computer as a missing person until
months later.

Even an internal analysis by Weinrich's own staff concluded the YMCA and
its subcontractor made mistakes in several key areas, including reporting
missing children.

"There appeared to be a lack of knowledge as to how to proceed to enter a
child as missing," said the YMCA analysis. "In the future, if a police
report is not available, all 0s will be entered."

Weinrich conceded that state rules and the YMCA's own policies required
immediately reporting a missing child to Florida police and that no one made
that call.

The DCF report cites at least six areas in which serious mistakes were
made, including a four-month gap in reporting Courtney as a missing child,
earlier problems with her safety, failing to make required checks on her,
placing her in another home, alerting other counties when she was moved,
failing to report the birth of a second child, and returning Courtney to her
mother's care.

Courtney was first removed from her mother, Candice Farris (who also goes
by Candice Clark) in February 2006 after Farris was jailed on a charge of
identity theft.

After her release from jail, Farris had another daughter. Farris later
moved to Seminole County and was arrested on a larceny charge. Her children
were placed with friends in Lake County. Farris abducted her children Sept.
23 and left Florida, according to the state report.

More than a month earlier, on Aug. 15, a relative had telephoned a
warning to the YMCA's contract caseworker "expressing concerns about (the)
mother absconding with children out of state." But the YMCA's analysis says
there is no indication that the caseworker ever talked to Farris about
concerns she would abduct the children.

After Courtney was abducted, state DCF officials sent e-mails to the YMCA
nine times between Oct. 6 and Dec. 28 asking about Courtney, including
"alerts that Courtney had not been seen by her case manager as required."
But Sarasota YMCA officials did not respond accordingly or follow
missing-child policies -- even though some e-mails went to YMCA
administrators and managers, the report says.

Asked if the YMCA got e-mails that alerted them, Weinrich said:
"Absolutely not." But Weinrich said he is still researching e-mails and how
high up the management chain they reached.

"We're still looking at that," Weinrich said. "It got as high as our
quality assurance person." YMCA Vice President Lee Johnson also got an
e-mail with a list of names including Courtney's, Weinrich said.

DCF officials said other e-mails "were specific to Courtney and the
department's concerns about her whereabouts." But Zimmerman concedes that
one of DCF's big mistakes was not being more aggressive, adding: "We didn't
just pick up the telephone."

Another arm of DCF is doing a detailed investigation and has interviewed
at least five YMCA employees, Weinrich said.

The Sarasota YMCA has a subcontract with Directions For Mental Health to
manage care for children 5 and under in Pinellas County, but the Sarasota
YMCA is still responsible for care under its state contract. The YMCA's
contract with the subcontractor was renewed for a year starting today.

Weinrich said it is "too early" to discuss if that contract might be
revoked or if YMCA employees could face discipline.

UPDATE

What's new: State officials say the Sarasota Family YMCA, which oversees state foster care services in Southwest Florida, did not respond to numerous e-mail messages asking about a 2-year-old girl who was reported missing.

The story so far: Courtney Clark was kidnapped by her mother last fall and found four months later in Wisconsin. Also found at the home were a boy, who was tortured, the body of his mother, who was killed and buried, and Courtney's two younger sisters.

What's next: The Sarasota Family YMCA and the Florida Department of Children and Families are investigating the matter. Both vow to make any changes necessary to ensure that mistakes are not repeated.

http://www.heraldtribune.com/article/20070701/NEWS/707010305