Local Lawyer Appointed State’s First Chief Child Protection Attorney

By Shannon Hicks

Carolyn A. Signorelli has been named Connecticut’s first chief child protection attorney. The Sandy Hook resident will begin her new job in the state’s Department of Child Protection on March 31. Until that date, Ms Signorelli will continue serving as an Assistant Attorney General for the State of Connecticut.

Established in June 2005 during a Legislative Special Session, the chief child protection attorney (CCPA) is a result of House Bill No. 7502, which also established a Commission on Child Protection that will consist of 11 members, each serving a three-year term.

The chief attorney will be responsible, by July 1 of this year, for establishing a system for the provision of legal services to “indigent respondents in family contempt and paternity matters, and legal services and guardians ad litem to children and indigent parents in proceedings before the superior court for juvenile matters. The commission’s creation is aimed at improving the quality of legal representation in child protection matters,” according to HB 7502.

The next three months will be busy ones for Ms Signorelli, but this is what the attorney has wanted to do — defend children — since becoming an attorney 15 years ago. Ms Signorelli is a graduate of William & Mary Law School.

She has been a resident of Newtown for 13 years. She is a member of Rotary International, active in the Republican Town Committee, and in January 2004 she was appointed to the Children’s Fund Council by State House Minority Leader Robert M. Ward. In that position she was a strong advocate for The Nurturing Families Network. Last May she was a guest speaker during Danbury Hospital’s annual Child Abuse Prevention Conference, presenting “The Anti-Social Child: Predictors of Violence.”

“I think the fact that children are completely dependent on the adults in their lives and their communities for their well-being, and when you see and you hear about cases where that need is not being met, and children are being neglected, for me, I can’t but say I want to do something about that,” Ms Signorelli said last week. “Before I became an attorney this was something that was a worthy goal, to prevent that as much as possible.”

Simply put, “It’s something I’m interested in,” she said.

Ms Signorelli’s career has been focused on child protection for 12 years, nine of which have been as a child protection attorney prosecuting petitions of neglect and abuse on behalf of the Department of Children & Families.

Ms Signorelli applied for the position of CCPA when she heard about the position’s creation last year. She was selected from more than 20 applicants to lead the new office.

“First and foremost, we are taking over from [the] Judicial [branch] all the work entailed in contracting with the attorneys who represent indigent parents in juvenile court, and indigent parents in family and support contempt matters,” explained Ms Signorelli.

“For example, if you owe child support and you’re not paying for it, and the support magistrate is thinking about finding you in contempt, and you might be facing some jail time, the state can find you an attorney. My office will be responsible for finding that attorney and paying that attorney.”

One of the largest obstacles the new CCPA office will have to overcome is the low pay most juvenile court lawyers receive. Under the current system, according to the August/September 2005 issue of Connecticut Lawyer, attorneys receive $350 for the first 30 hours of a case, which averages to $11.66 per hour.

Attorneys may bill for time in excess of 30 hours at a rate of $40 per hour, but must obtain prior permission of the court in ten-hour increments.

Special public defenders, in contrast, receive $60 per hour for in-court work and $40 for out-of court work.

Besides contracting with attorneys, it will also be the responsibility of the CCPA’s office to help train attorneys, to advocate with legislature for better pay for the attorneys and for more money for resources to help them do their job better, and to provide comprehensive training in all the areas an attorney needs to be familiar with in children protection cases.

One of Ms Signorelli’s duties will be to give initial and in-service training to attorneys and to establish training, practice, and caseload standards. In 2001, the Legal Representation of Children and Parents in Juvenile Matters Discussion Group convened to formalize performance standards and training and evaluation of counsel in preparation for the new legislation. One of the suggestions by a subcommittee of that discussion group was that caseloads not exceed 100 new assignments per year for full-time attorneys.

“The other thing our office will be doing is studying other models in the child protection fields,” said Ms Signorelli. “Different states have different models of child representation other than a contract system. We’ll study those models and determine whether Connecticut wants to try to move toward another model of child protection.”

Arkansas and Massachusetts already have systems in place. The Children’s Law Center in Los Angeles, Calif., has a model that has proven effective nationally.

“I have unofficially been looking at California and Colorado,” Ms Signorelli said. “I haven’t officially started the new job — I’m still cleaning up current jobs and tasks — but I’ve been looking.”

“The main focus of this [new] office,” she emphasized, “is on the child protection system, the cases that go to juvenile court for abuse and neglect.”