Three practices. All in service of one mission: families.

CPS Investigations.

When a social worker knocks on your door, calls your phone, or shows up at your child's school. What you do before a case is filed often decides whether one is filed at all.

By the time most parents call a lawyer, the petition has already been filed and the child has already been removed. By then, the parent has typically already said too much, signed too much, and let CPS into the home.

The most consequential phase of any CPS case happens before it is a case. A social worker on your doorstep is not yet a court order. A "voluntary" safety plan is not yet a court finding. The interview you give in your living room is not yet sworn testimony. But every one of those things becomes the foundation of the petition that comes next.

Our firm represents parents at this earliest stage, when most lawyers will not even take the call. That means attending the CPS interview with you, reviewing every document before you sign it, defending against a CACI listing, and preparing you for TDM and CFT meetings.

Federal Civil Rights Litigation. Section 1983 against CPS.

When CPS violates the constitutional rights of a family, that violation can be heard in federal court, after the dependency case closes.

Most CPS defense attorneys in California will not touch this kind of case. Some do not know how. Some are afraid of the federal courts. Some do not want to make enemies of the agencies they appear before every week.

Our firm builds our practice around it.

When a social worker enters a home without a warrant or court order, removes a child without exigent circumstances, fabricates evidence in a petition, or otherwise violates a parent's constitutional rights, that may be a violation of 42 U.S.C. § 1983, the federal civil rights statute, and it can result in money damages against the individual workers, their supervisors, and the county itself.

What a § 1983 claim looks like.

Section 1983 allows a parent to sue a state actor, a social worker, supervisor, or government entity, when that actor violated a federal constitutional right while acting under color of state law. The most common claims in the CPS context include:

How we sequence these cases.

A § 1983 case is filed in federal district court, not state court. It is a separate proceeding from the dependency case, and unlike most firms, we do not run them at the same time.

We focus on getting your babies home first and holding CPS accountable later. Running both cases at the same time exposes families to retaliation from the very agency that still holds decision-making power over their child. We protect our clients by sequencing these cases deliberately. Reunification comes first. Accountability comes second.

Evidence from the closed dependency case, agency records, social worker testimony, court findings, the things the agency cannot un-say, becomes the foundation of the federal civil rights claim. The statute of limitations gives us the time. The closed case gives us the proof. Our clients get protection from retaliation and the strongest possible federal case.

The defendants in a § 1983 case face two major hurdles: qualified immunity, which protects officials unless they violated clearly established law, and Monell, which requires showing the county itself had an unconstitutional policy, custom, or practice. These doctrines are not insurmountable, but they require a firm that knows federal civil rights law as deeply as it knows juvenile dependency law.

What you can actually recover.

Successful § 1983 cases can recover compensatory damages for emotional distress, the trauma of family separation, lost wages, and out-of-pocket expenses. In cases of particularly egregious misconduct, punitive damages may also be available. Attorney's fees in § 1983 cases are recoverable from the defendant under 42 U.S.C. § 1988, meaning meritorious cases can be pursued without parents paying out of pocket.

Read the plain-English definition of § 1983 →