BATON ROUGE, La. — A lack of urgency, missed warning signs and an overworked case worker all contributed to the death of a 2-year-old Baton Rouge child in 2022, the state inspector general said Monday when the agency’s investigative report was presented to the public.
Mitchell Robinson III died of a fentanyl overdose on June 26, 2022.
The report indicates that was after two times in the previous two months that the child had to be revived by Narcan after being brought to the emergency room at Our Lady of the Lake and nine days after the state Department of Child and Family Services (DCFS) was contacted about a positive fentanyl test on the child from his previous emergency room visit.
The report laid out a series of failures to protect Robinson III that included an overworked case worker who was constantly assigned other emergency cases that the worker not to be able to attend to Robisnon’s case, a lack of recognition by the hospital that the child had suffered from an opiate overdose in his previous two visits, no contact made with law enforcement on those two visits, but, most of all, it concluded:
“Notwithstanding all of the above, there is no factor more significant than the critical nine-day period between June 17, 2022 and June 26, 2022, during which DCFS personnel, including the assigned case worker and supervisor, had specific knowledge that Mitchell Robinson III had tested positive for fentanyl at the time of his June 4 hospital admission. During those nine days, DCFS personnel took no action whatsoever to ensure the safety of the child.”
Essentially the report said that opportunity after opportunity was missed to save Robinson.
On April 12, 2022 and June 4, 2022, Robinson was brought to the emergency rook of Our Lady of the Lake North. Both times DCFS was contacted to report the hospitalization, and that he had needed Narcan, which is used to reverse the negative effects of opiate overdose, but both times it was also indicated that his drug test was negative. The report states that most drug testing does not include testing for fentanyl.
Following the June 4 hospitalization and eventual discharge, a pediatric emergency physician contacted DCFS’ hotline about Robinson on June 17. That physician, noting the use of Narcan to revive the child had ordered additional testing that, when it arrived, confirmed that Robinson III had fentanyl in his system during the June 4 hospitalization.
“She informed the call-taker that the child had ‘overdosed in his own house twice’ and ‘went home with parents who nearly killed him twice’ after being admitted and treated at Children’s Hospital,” according to the OIG report.
That report raised Robinson’s case from a CP-2 rating to a CP-1 rating, where contact is needed within 24 hours.
The report states that the caseworker had left a note at the home of Robinson’s mother, Whitney Ard, and had eventually arranged to meet with her on June 16.
However, the report showed the caseworker had to work “all-nighters” on June 14 and 15 and that a meeting with Ard never materialized.
The account from the report shows the amount of work and serious cases involved in the DCFS’ caseworker’s load.
The caseworker told OIG investigators that she was called out on another case on the night of June 14 and worked until 3 a.m. She was back at her office on Wednesday, June 15, at 8 a.m. and worked all day taking custody of a child. That night, she was again called out and worked all night into her regular work hours on Thursday, June 16. This call-out also required children to be taken into DCFS custody. She stated that she was instructed to go home after she completed the necessary paperwork regarding the children taken into custody. The meeting with the mother, Whitney Ard, scheduled for June 16 did not occur. State offices were 8 closed for the Juneteenth holiday on Friday, June 17. Nevertheless, she said she was called out three times on that day. On Saturday, June 18, the caseworker was contacted by her supervisor and directed to respond to another call out. She informed her supervisor that she was ill, but she responded and worked all that day. On Sunday, June 19, she was again called out on a Priority 1 sex abuse case and worked the entire day. On Monday, June 20, the caseworker contacted her doctor and went on sick leave. She was on sick leave from June 20 through June 24 and returned to work on Monday, June 27, the day after Mitchell Robinson III died.
The caseworker’s supervisor eventually resigned as did the DCFS secretary.
Ard and the child’s father, Mitchell Robinson II, faced numerous felony drug and weapons charges. Robinson II pleaded guilty to possession with intent to distribute controlled substances, furtherance of a drug trafficking crime and possession of a firearm by a convicted felon on October 18, 2023.
Ard was also indicted on a charge of second-degree murder.
