NYC Pays Compensation to Mother Separated from Newborn Because of Cannabis Use

A settlement has been reached between the New York City Department of Child Protective Services and a mother whose baby was taken away just days after his birth.

According to an article in the New York Daily News, the New York City Department of Child Services will pay a $75,000 settlement plus legal fees to Chanetto Rivers, who says she was drug tested without her consent.

Rivers’ case first made headlines in May when the New York Times published an article titled “She Legally Smoked Weed, Then Gave Birth.” New York Took Her Baby,” and that indeed seems to be an apt description, as Rivers gave birth to her baby boy in August 2021, five months after New York legalized recreational cannabis.

The new laws didn’t stop ACS from taking custody of Rivers’ baby just two days after his birth. Rivers’ lawsuit against ACS argued that the organization’s own policy, published in 2019 before legalization, prohibits the separation of mother and child solely because of cannabis use.

“A positive marijuana toxicology of an infant or mother at the time of birth is not sufficient alone to support a finding that the child was abused, nor is such evidence alone sufficient for ACS to assume (remove) custody of the child. can. a child or file a case in family court,” – excerpted from “ACS Policy and Practice on Cases Involving Marijuana Use by Patients.”

The Daily News article states that the whole situation began when Rivers told her doctors and nurses that she had used cannabis at a family gathering just hours before she arrived at the hospital. A drug test was allegedly conducted without Rivers’ consent, the results of which came back positive for cannabis on both Rivers and her baby. Two days later, ACS ordered the hospital to retain custody of the baby and not release it to Rivers.

“Just a few days after birth, [Rivers] had to travel every day in physical pain, to the hospital to visit her baby because they were not allowed to be together,” Niji Jain told the imprint. Jain was the lead attorney in this case and is head of the Impact Litigation Practice at Bronx Defenders.

In total, the baby was separated from Rivers for a week. During that time, she had to travel to and from the hospital to see the child, while also traveling to and from court to get a judge to intervene, and that’s exactly what happened. A judge issued an emergency order and Rivers regained custody of her son, but faced several more months of investigations, home visits, drug testing and state-mandated anger management and parenting classes. RIvers’ lawsuit alleged that she was excluded and discriminated against because of her race.

“I filed this lawsuit not just for myself, but for every Black family that ACS has torn apart. They know what they did was wrong and now they are being notified,” Rivers said in a statement released by her attorneys.

An ACS spokesperson issued a statement on the matter after the lawsuit was finalized, saying it was evaluating each case individually, but reiterated that cannabis use alone does not necessarily mean harm will come to the child.

“In all of our cases, including cases involving substance abuse allegations, we evaluate child safety on a case-by-case basis, considering the actual or potential harm to a child and the parent’s ability to care for the child,” the spokesman said a statement. “State and city policy provides that marijuana use by a parent is not, in and of itself, a basis for making a report or filing a neglect lawsuit. This means that a case should not be reported simply because a parent uses marijuana, but that a child protection specialist should assess the impact, if any, on the child’s safety and well-being.”

Aside from the settlement she received, Rivers’ case is not unique. Substance abuse and cannabis use are regularly used as justification for removing newborns from their mother’s care, and a study published in the Journal of the American Medical Association in April this year found that black mothers were disproportionately more likely to be drug tested at birth than white mothers , 2.2% more likely, to be exact.