HOUSTON — Texas child welfare workers and family courts will be required to consider additional medical opinions before taking children from parents in cases of suspected child abuse, underThe law, signed by Gov. Greg Abbott on Friday, also orders a state commission to study the work of state-funded doctors who are tasked with diagnosing child abuse.
Under the new law, caregivers accused of abuse based on a medical report will be allowed to request that CPS get another opinion from a doctor whose expertise is relevant to the child’s injuries. And when parents get a second medical opinion on their own, the law will require judges to consider that evidence before issuing orders for children to be taken into state custody.
The first thing Timmerman saw when she woke up Saturday morning was a text from an advocate with a single sentence bearing the news: The governor signed the bill. She shook her husband awake: “It’s official!” she told him., made several trips to Austin to testify in support of the law. She said if it had been in place five years ago, her baby might not have been stripped from her care.
The law also might have made a difference in the case of Melissa and Dillon Bright, whose ordeal was chronicled in theIn their case, a Houston child abuse pediatrician told CPS that their 5-month-old’s head injuries didn’t match the Brights’ account of him accidentally falling head-first from a lawn chair onto their concrete driveway.