Community leaders are highlighting resources for family support and child safety after Peoria saw two alleged incidents of homicide of young children last week.
Peoria County Coroner Jamie Harwood calls the cases “intolerable.” An 18-year-old Peoria man was ordered held until trial Tuesday for the death of a 1-year-old boy in his care. Another Peoria man has been charged with first-degree murder in the death of his 7-month-old son.
Harwood said his office handles eight to 10 deaths a day, with an average of 3,700 reported a year. Though infant deaths are a very small fraction of that total, around two to three a year, Harwood said the strain on his office and the need for community conversations is high.
“There's clearly a right and wrong when it comes to this, right? We can't take that away the right from wrong. People know right from wrong,” said Harwood. “However, we can't neglect the other factors that feed into why a child actually gets abused.”
Harwood says he believes, even with resources available for struggling families, connecting with those resources is a major issue. He describes seeing homeless individuals, clearly without a resource to rely on, passing his office on North Sheridan.
“I can easily drive to a pharmacy from where I live. In fact, there’s a Walgreens, a CVS. I can easily drive to a grocery store. My mom lives close to me, my sister lives close to me, like five miles. I have a great, strong community and friend group. I have everything at my fingertips,” said Harwood. “Not everybody has that. Not everybody has a car to drive to a certain location to get child care, or to get their groceries, to get this, to get that and to be able to support their family.”
Barriers to entry of social support systems are a recurring theme when Peoria-area experts on parenting and childcare talk about prevention.
“There’s lots of wait lists,” said Morgan Wertz, lead parent educator with Families 2000 at the Boys and Girls Club of Greater Peoria. “Or maybe a family that we’re working with might not have transportation.”
Families 2000 meets with Peoria-area parents they find through referral services or walk-in requests. Parent educators help parents get connected with area services and have conversations covering life skills, caregiving and, most frequently, mental health.
“They’re stressed out, they’re frustrated and they may not, it’s not that they’re a bad parent,” said Porshia Dawson, another parent educator with Families 2000. “And even though we’re equipping them, we can only do so much. And we’re only with them twice a month at the max.”
Dawson said her clients frequently wait six months to a year to receive mental health care after undergoing assessment and screening with Families 2000. She mentions one family that’s been waiting two years for speech therapy.
Program Supervisor April Hudson says it’s important Families 2000 provides help in an environment and style that’s comfortable for the families they work with.
“We just allow them to talk and give them guidance, but not in a way this feeling they’re being talked to, but we are talking with them in this partnership,” she said. “We help them feel like they’re able to guide their children and parent their children. If they have questions, they may find this a little difficult and they need answers, we’re here to give that and assist.”
Dr. Channing Petrak is the medical director of Peoria’s Pediatric Resource Center, which is a part of the University of Illinois College of Medicine. As a medical professional, Petrak’s guidance for parents is prescriptive.
Petrak says the younger the child, the higher the risk of child maltreatment. She says the risk is particularly high when a caregiver leaves a need unmet, either due to stressors from an economic situation or the family’s living environment, or because the caregiver isn’t sure how to care for the baby.
“It’s usually something that triggers an overwhelming sense of, ‘I just can’t handle it anymore,’” said Petrak. “That is frequently what happens. So there are resources, but we know that people don’t always know where to go upfront.”
Petrak says the first and best resource, if a family has access to it, is the child’s medical provider. Many pediatricians' offices, she says, have a 24-hour triage line where parents can get vital information.
Crisis nursery and Safe Havens
Petrak also mentions a resource mentioned by every expert interviewed for this story: Peoria’s Crittenton Center Crisis Nursery.
“Not only do they have a nursery where you can take your children if you truly just need a break and children can stay for several days if needed, but they can also offer some crisis counseling,” said Petrak.
Dawson with Families 2000 says she also believes parents in extreme situations don't understand Safe Haven programs that allow families to surrender infants at hospitals and fire and police stations without criminal consequence.
"It’s the type of things that can build a community up. They make a difference."Jamie Harwood, Peoria County coroner
"I know that I've talked to plenty of parents that had no idea that they could that was even an option for them," she said. "So just making them aware that there are places a safety, places that you can take them without any repercussions. Because sometimes parents just need that moment."
Petrak has some other advice for parents that find themselves overwhelmed by the stress of caring for a young child. It includes formulating a “crying plan”, having a prepared list of a couple people to call and talk to in a moment of extreme stress and recognizing when you may be taking crying personally.
“Babies cry for communication. That’s the only reason they cry. They’re trying to tell you something, but some people don’t understand that,” said Petrak. “They may take it personally. ‘The baby doesn’t like me, they’re trying to get back at me, I just need them to go to sleep because I’m tired and they’re doing this to get back at me.’”
Petrak says it can be hard for parents to recognize these thought patterns in the moment. But it’s times like these that it’s most important to have a plan to walk away for a moment and have someone to call and talk to.
Petrak also stresses that it’s important for parents to take care when selecting other caregivers and babysitters. Parents should observe a caregiver around their child, have resources and numbers to call available for them and make sure the person is comfortable with babies.
“You don’t want the person who says your baby is spoiled. You hold them too much. They cry too much or they get really frustrated when a child cries,” said Petrak. “That’s probably not the person you want to leave your baby with.”
When it comes to what the general public can do to help support struggling families and keep small children safe, the interviewed experts agree that it starts with having honest conversations about caregiving and child abuse. But it's also important to get involved in a community and provide general support to neighbors.
“It’s the type of things that can build a community up. They make a difference,” said Harwood. “And others might say, ‘Well, no, this stuff doesn’t really matter.’” It really does matter. The neighborhoods, the safety of the neighborhoods, neighborhood alliances and partnerships, Nextdoor and things like that, reaching out to your neighbors and helping them.”
