“Every year, thousands of children are removed from their homes by officials who fear for their safety—only to be returned. It ‘felt like being kidnapped,’ one [child] said.”
Child Removal Hearing Delays
Cases
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In August 2024, FJLC filed an amicus brief in support of parents whose hearing had taken nearly 10 months. In September, 2024, FJLC argued in front of the Appellate Division, First Department. Nine days later, the First Department reversed the lower court’s decision and reiterated that family courts must conduct such hearings “expeditiously.”
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A lawsuit against the New York Office of Court Administration (OCA) to compel the agency to provide memos and directives from family court judges about scheduling emergency child removal hearings. These materials are critical for advocates to understand and remedy the longstanding problem of delays in emergency child removal hearings, to minimize the consequences of prolonged and unwarranted family separation.
When the government separates a child from their parent, the family has the constitutional right to promptly challenge that removal. In New York, the law requires that these hearings be concluded within hours or days of the removal. But judges routinely deny families prompt hearings and instead prolong hearings over many weeks and even months, while children languish in foster care. In nearly one-third of cases, the judge ultimately sends the child home. That means thousands of children spend weeks or even months in foster care when they could have been safely returned home the very same day they were removed had the court’s hearing taken place when it should have.
For example, in Bronx Family Court, one emergency hearing took six months, spread over twenty-three court appearances. At the end, the judge found that the child could be safely returned home. Over the course of another emergency hearing that lasted four months, a six-year-old separated from her mother emotionally “deteriorated” and “began expressing suicidal ideation.”
Internal court leadership has acknowledged that this “compromises the administration of justice.” Delays are neither benign nor inevitable. They reflect complete disregard for the poorest families in our communities. They unnecessarily prolong family separation. They are plainly unconstitutional and cause profound harm to children and families.