Case Notes

A woman whose child neglect case was investigated and ended in a determination that did not fully exonerate her has lost her bid to keep her federal complaint against the City of New York, and three of its employees, alive in federal court because she failed to assert the elements of claims for federal malicious prosecution. Gordon v. City of New York, 2016 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 96062 (E.D.N.Y. 7/22/16).

In 2000, plaintiff Karlene Gordon was accused of child neglect. These allegations followed Gordon's own accusations of sexual abuse against her husband's (her son's father) children of another relationship. These half-siblings, she claimed, were abusing her son when he visited with his father. At the time of her allegations, Gordon and her son's father were divorcing, and the husband was seeking custody of the couple's child. The Administration for Children's Services (ACS) investigated the sexual abuse allegations. Its report stated that Gordon “ha[d] a history of reporting allegations of sex abuse concerning [her son] every time [he] return[ed] from weekend visits [with his father],” prompting “numerous trips to hospital ER rooms all over New York,” where the child underwent physical examinations that included the use of a least one rape kit. None of these exams turned up any physical evidence of sexual abuse. ACS determined that no abuse had occurred, but did find that Gordon had coached her son to make the accusations.