Credit: Bucks County DA’s Office
In the wake of the high-profile murder of a 14-year-old girl, Bucks County District Attorney Matt Weintraub has announced he’s supportive of proposed legislation to overhaul the child welfare system in Pennsylvania.
The legislation was made public Wednesday during a press conference at the Justice Center in Doylestown Borough by State Rep. Craig Staats, a Republican from Richland Township, and State Rep. Chris Quinn, a Republican from Delaware County.
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The legislative package includes:
- House Bill 1843 would require the implementation of the statewide child welfare case management system. Mandated by a 2014 law, the system still has not been put into use. The Commonwealth of Virginia, which like Pennsylvania has county-based child welfare agencies, has had a statewide case management system since the late 1990s.
- House Bill 1844 would change the requirement to retain records in most cases from one year or 10 years to 30 years; eliminate the provision providing for expunction for a perpetrator who was a minor at the time of the alleged abuse upon that individual reaching age 23; eliminate much of the discretion the secretary of Human Services can exercise in expunging records.
- House Bill 1845 would define a “valid” report in the Pennsylvania Child Protective Services Law.
All three bills have been referred to the House Children and Youth Committee.
The legislation was written in honor of Grace Packer, a 14-year-old girl who was sexually assaulted and killed in the Quakertown home where she lived with her adoptive mother and her adoptive mother’s boyfriend in July 2016. Grace’s remains were dismembered and dumped in Luzerne County where they were found by hunters months later. The girl’s adoptive mother and her adoptive mother’s boyfriend were sentenced to prison.
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Following the teen’s murder, information came out that frequent moves let Grace slip through the cracks of the child welfare system. The moves caused multiple county child welfare agencies and contractors of those agencies to lose track.
“The lack of communication between county child welfare agencies impeded discovery of that abuse by authorities. An Office of State Inspector General investigation commenced in 2019 and is still ongoing,” the lawmakers said in a statement.
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“Grace Packer was murdered five years ago. The child protective services system failed in its mission to protect her,” Weintraub said. “This proposed legislation is long overdue.”
Weintraub read a letter from Grace’s brother, Josh, who called on lawmakers to support the changes.
“Please, this will help me heal. I lost everything that all of you take as normal. The best my life can ever be again is close to normal, but I can never have normal because of what happened. If you all care about the impact of my loss, you will help make sure Grace becomes the hero that I know she is,” the teen wrote in his letter.
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