Eyewitness Newsmakers explores why children in the Antelope Valley are at a higher risk of abuse than the rest of Los Angeles County
ByThe High Desert is a dangerous place to be a kid. The sprawling Antelope Valley in northern Los Angeles County is where children die of neglect and abuse at a much higher rate than the rest of the county.The High Desert is a dangerous place to be a kid. The sprawling Antelope Valley in northern Los Angeles County is where children die of neglect and abuse at a much higher rate than the rest of the county.
Captain Paul Bartlett from the Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department's Lancaster Station says his office receives roughly 1,400 calls for child abuse every year. Two deputies respond solely to those reports. Captain Bartlett believes there are several factors for the increased number of child abuse and neglect cases in the Antelope Valley, from gang violence and drug abuse to mental health issues. The sheer size of the Antelope Valley is an added challenge for law enforcement.
This following statement was given to Eyewitness News from Brandon T. Nichols, Director of the Los Angeles County Department of Children and Family Services. For more than a decade, the Board of Supervisors has made meaningful investments in this geographic area and DCFS' two local offices in Lancaster and Palmdale today have more social workers and fewer child abuse and neglect cases than ever before. The trend we have observed, however, is that the cases in the Antelope Valley are among the most complex in the county. In general, families have more complicated dynamics and experience greater needs in this vast, under-resourced area.
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