Intellectually disabled parents sue Allegheny County CYF for taking away their baby

Andrew and Lauren Hackney’s daughter was 7 months old when they took her to the pediatrician because she’d been refusing her bottle.

The doctor diagnosed her with dehydration and recommended she be evaluated at a hospital.

Within weeks of the baby being admitted for treatment, a caseworker with Allegheny County’s Office of Children, Youth and Families launched an investigation into the couple, who have intellectual disabilities. In short order, the county took the Hackneys’ baby — and then gave her to foster parents who are not disabled.

What unfolded since that day in 2021 has been a nightmare for the Robinson couple.

Now they are suing Allegheny County, two caseworkers and their supervisors for disability discrimination.

The Hackneys claim that the agency engaged in a scheme to terminate their parental rights solely because the county believed that their disabilities prevented them from properly caring for their daughter, who is now 3.

The couple and their lawyers dispute that. They claim that the Hackneys took good care of their baby, made doctor’s visits and immediately brought her to the hospital when told to do so.

“It’s very hard to think about. It’s stressful,” Lauren Hackney, 28, told TribLive Thursday during an interview in the Downtown Pittsburgh offices of the couple’s lawyer, Maggie Coleman.

Her husband said he’s sad and angry.

“It’s very confusing,” said Andrew Hackney, 34.

The lawsuit, filed last week in Allegheny County Common Pleas Court, claims that the county agency ignored court orders, presented false and misleading testimony, withheld services, suppressed evidence and imposed arbitrary restrictions on the couple.

An agency spokesman said Thursday that the office cannot comment on pending litigation.

But according to information in the lawsuit, county caseworkers were concerned that the baby wasn’t being fed enough and claimed that the Hackneys did not understand the gravity of the situation.

According to the complaint, Andrew Hackney has borderline intellectual functioning and a post-stroke neurocognitive disorder. Lauren Hackney is diagnosed with a mild intellectual disability and anxiety.

He works as a lot attendant at a local grocery store, while she works at two fast-food restaurants.

After their daughter was born, the family lived at the home of Andrew’s mother, who helped care for the infant.

The couple claims that they took their daughter to all scheduled well-baby visits, and she was found to be healthy. Their pediatricians described the couple as “supportive of each other” and said that they “were comfortable caring for [the baby], were responsive to her needs, and had a support network,” the lawsuit said.

The Hackneys said that when they arrived at UPMC Children’s Hospital of Pittsburgh on Oct. 25, 2021, they waited five hours before their daughter was seen.

She was admitted for treatment and diagnosed with dehydration and malnutrition, they said.

The baby continued to resist her bottle and required a feeding tube, the Hackneys said. The family stayed with her around the clock, and she remained in the hospital until Nov. 8, when she was transferred to The Children’s Home of Pittsburgh & Lemieux Family Center, a nonprofit in Pittsburgh’s Bloomfield neighborhood that helps families care for medically fragile children.

The lawsuit alleges that the Hackneys were not given any explanation about why their daughter was transferred. But they said they remained by her side, as they had done at the hospital.

On Nov. 10, according to the lawsuit, the county agency received a referral from ChildLine, the state’s child abuse hotline. It said: “‘Both parents and the aunt who lives in the household have intellectual disabilities. They do not appear to understand that [the girl] needs to be fed more often. They are struggling to feed her as often as she needs.”

Five days later, Jenna Reed, a caseworker with Children, Youth and Families, went to Children’s Home to start an investigation, the complaint said.

“Upon her arrival, a nurse who was working at the desk told Reed that she ‘would not send [the child] home with this family’ because ‘they all seem to have disabilities,’” the lawsuit claimed.

The Hackneys said that Reed interviewed them individually at Children’s Home, and that they believe she misunderstood how often they were feeding their daughter.

Andrew Hackney said that the members of their household, which included his mother and sister, took turns feeding the baby, who ate six to nine times per day. But Reed recorded in her notes that the baby was being fed only two to three times per day, the lawsuit said.

On Nov. 17, Michelle Veselicky, a casework supervisor with the county agency, filed an application for an emergency protective custody, the lawsuit said. “‘Mother and father appear to have intellectual disabilities, but deny significant issues,” she wrote.

”‘No adult caretaker in the home recognized that the child was not been [sic] fed enough food,’ ” Veselicky stated, and “‘the parents do not appear to recognize the severity of the child’s condition and that it is a result not being fed.’”

The next day, Veselicky met with the family at Children’s Home.

“She just came in her room and said, ‘Say your goodbyes,’ and took her away,” Lauren Hackney said.

They had an hour with their daughter before she went to foster care.

The baby was placed in a temporary foster home and then family friends of the Hackneys, who had previously served as foster parents, agreed to take their daughter.

She has been with the foster parents since Dec. 7, 2021.

When contacted Thursday, the foster mother said, “I’m not legally allowed to talk about the case as a foster parent. I’m represented by CYF.”

The lawsuit alleges that the foster care was facilitated through Adoption Connection PA, a Beaver County nonprofit that assists foster parents to adopt children in their care.

At some point earlier, the family friends had used Adoption Connection, but the child they had fostered earlier was returned to its birth parents over their objection, the lawsuit said.

The lawsuit accused the nonprofit and the Allegheny County agency of telling the foster parents that they would collaborate on helping them adopt the Hackneys’ baby.

Since their daughter moved into foster care, the Hackneys have been allowed two, four-hour visits twice per week, during which they play with her, share meals and cuddle.

“She’s very energetic. She walks and runs. She knows who we are. She’s happy. She’s playful,” Lauren Hackney said

They also have been permitted to attend the girl’s medical appointments.

Initially, the visits were supervised by the foster parents, the lawsuit said. But the Hackneys found them “awkward and uncomfortable” and said they “prevented them from interacting naturally with [their daughter,]” according to the lawsuit.

The visits now occur at Adoption Connection, which declined comment.

After the visits, the foster parents would report minor complaints to the county, including that the Hackneys didn’t understand their daughter’s word for bottle; that they didn’t hold the spoon close enough to her mouth; and that they did not play with her in a way to help her development, the lawsuit said.

At a family court hearing, Reed, the caseworker, testified that the Hackneys should not have unsupervised visits because their disabilities prohibited them from safely caring for the daughter.

However, Reed also acknowledged that the agency made no effort to have the couple evaluated to see what services they might need.

Coleman, the Hackneys’ lawyer, said that early orders in the family court case sought to have her clients evaluated for in-home services and parenting coaches.

But for five months after they lost custody, Coleman said, no services were put in place for the Hackneys. Eventually, services began for the couple.

A caseworker met with the Hackneys at their home and found it to be clean and well-maintained with working utilities, the lawsuit said. The baby also had her own bedroom with toys and clothes.

The lawsuit claims that the couple have complied with every county agency demand, including spending hundreds of hours driving to their supervised visitation, working with parenting coaches and disability support specialists, undergoing psychological evaluations and intelligence tests, as well as spending thousands of dollars on attorneys.

“Every time they do what CYF wants them to do, it’s never enough,” Coleman said.

The lawsuit alleges that the couple received favorable reports from a parenting coach and disability support specialist after repeated visits, but the agency never called those witnesses to testify in court.

Instead, at one proceeding, the agency called an early intervention specialist who had observed the Hackneys’ visits in the foster parents’ home and said the couple was making no progress in their care for the girl.

On Jan. 31, Family Court Judge Paul Cozza granted the county’s request to seek to place the girl permanently with the foster parents instead of reuniting her with the Hackneys.

A hearing to decide whether the foster parents will be given permanent custody is scheduled for May 2.

“What seems very clear to me, from the moment CYF got involved, there was no effort to get [the child] reunited with the Hackneys,” Coleman said. “They did the least they could possibly get away with.”

But Coleman said that has been the problem with the case from the beginning. The county agency should not be representing the foster parents, she said.

“If anything,” Coleman said, “CYF should be representing the family.”

The lawsuit includes claims of conspiracy and violation of the Hackneys’ due process rights.

Other defendants include Emma Embar and Monica Anderson-Rhones, both caseworkers with the county agency, as well as Michele Haney, a supervisor.

Messages left for the agency employees were not returned Thursday evening.