Social workers charged in starvation death

May 02, 2009|Associated Press

PHILADELPHIA - By all accounts, there is blame to go around for the 2006 starvation death of disabled teenager Danieal Kelly.

Her mother, Andrea Kelly, pleaded guilty to murder this week for criminally neglecting the once-vivacious girl. Her case worker and a supervisor are charged with involuntary manslaughter for alleged "ghost visits" to the family's squalid home.

Yesterday, federal prosecutors took aim at their entire company, MultiEthnic Behavioral Services, which had a $1 million-a-year contract with the city to provide in-home services to needy families. "At some point, they realized they could get paid for doing nothing," US Attorney Laurie Magid said at a press conference.

Magid's office charged four company founders and four social workers of the now-defunct firm with fraud, and a ninth with perjury before a grand jury.

Company owners furiously forged documents before routine audits and in the panic that followed Danieal's death, the federal indictment charges. Worried supervisors tried to destroy computer evidence and client files, prosecutors said.

District Attorney Lynne Abraham called the girl's death slow and torturous.