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 THE CASE
 STATE OF GEORGIA v. ERIK A. COOPER
Erik served as a volunteer foster parent for the Gwinnett County (Georgia) Department of Family and Children Services ("DFACS"), for a period of eighteen months. Erik never planned to foster any children. As a single man wanting to marry and have his own children one day, by age thirty and still single, Erik chose to pursue adoption of a child to become a single-parent-by-choice. In 2000, Erik completed a ten-week adoption certification program and was approved by DFACS to adopt children. Before authorizing Erik's application for adoption, however, the child welfare agency required Erik to foster children first. Reluctantly, Erik agreed with only one request - the agency would only place children with Erik who were available for adoption. Though the agency agreed to this stipulation, forty-two children later, none of the children DFACS placed in Erik's home were available for adoption.
How did this happen? In the first several months of fostering children, Erik identified a horrifying reality for children sentenced by the Juvenile Court to serve their time in foster care. The children who were placed into foster care for protection due to abuse or neglect in their own homes were being victimized by the Georgia child welfare agency. Many children endured painful immunizations as caseworkers failed to timely obtain the child's medical history or school records. Some children were unable to receive necessary medical and psychological care while DFACS took weeks or months to provide foster parents the child's medical insurance information. Frustrated and sick of the government's method of caring for children, Erik spoke up and spoke out against the child welfare agency and its failure to provide adequate and necessary care for foster children. In 2002, Erik founded and served as chairperson of the Gwinnett Foster Care Alliance, an outreach project focused on improving the quality of care for children in need. Erik was a whistleblower revealing corruption and mismanagement within Georgia's child welfare agency. He wrote to the Governor, his State legislators, and United States Senators. As punishment for his efforts, the child welfare agency and its conspirators targeted Erik for retaliation.
CLICK HERE to read a TRIAL SUMMARY of Erik's criminal case, written by Douglas N. Peters, attorney at law and co-defense counsel for Erik A. Cooper. |
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