The Battered Mother’s Struggle in New York: the Laws and Policies That Led to the Removal of Children from Their Abused Mothers Baed on the Child’s Exposure to Domestic Violence

Ms. Sharwline Nicholson probably did not realize that what she experienced on January 7, 1999 would change her life, the lives of her two children, and ultimately, the lives of many other battered mothers and children in New York. A thirty-two-year-old mother of two, Ms. Nicholson worked as a full-time cashier and attended classes full-time at Mercy College. Mr. Barnett, the father of Ms. Nicholson’s children, lived in South Carolina but visited the children in New York on a monthly basis. Ms. Nicholson told Mr. Barnett she was ending their relationship during one of his visits in early 1999. Mr. Barnett, who had never behaved violently toward Ms. Nicholson, “punched her, kicked her, and threw objects at her. When he left, her head was bleeding profusely.” During this brutal assault, one of her children slept in her crib in another room and the other child was at school. In the emergency room, Ms. Nicholson provided police with the phone numbers of her cousins who could care for her children, then remained in the hospital overnight. That night, while Ms. Nicholson lay in her hospital bed, caseworkers from New York City Administration for Children’s Services (ACS) removed her two children from a babysitter’s home. ACS charged Ms. Nicholson with child neglect, alleging that her children were in “imminent risk if they remained in the care of Ms. Nicholson because she was not, at that time, able to protect herself nor her children because Mr. Barnett had viciously beaten her.” Sharwline Nicholson and several battered mothers, whose children were similarly removed by child welfare caseworkers, filed a class-action lawsuit against ACS and the City of New York. These abused mothers alleged that ACS’s policy and practice of removing children from their mother’s custody solely on the grounds that the mothers were victims of abuse violated substantive and procedural due process. The District Court enjoined ACS from its practices,