Tennessee Fact Sheet

Quick two-page fact sheet on child abuse and neglect

New Hope for Preventing Child Abuse and Neglect in Tennessee

Child Abuse News

Too many of Tennessee's police chiefs, sheriffs, prosecutors, and other police leaders are arresting or prosecuting adults who they first met as victims of child abuse and neglect. In 2004, almost 15,000 Tennessee children were confirmed as abused or neglected. Though most abused or neglected children grow up to be productive adults, research shows that kids are nearly one-third more likely to be arrested for violent crimes later in life due to the abuse they endured. Fight Crime: Invest in Kids estimates that in Tennessee alone, child abuse and neglect results in 380 new criminals yearly. The tragedy is that we can prevent most child abuse and neglect and reduce future crime. In-home parent coaching programs have been shown to cut child abuse and neglect in half. The programs provide a range of support to at-risk mothers before their child is born and through the earliest years. Nurses or other trained professionals help parents manage stress, understand newborn health and nutrition needs, identify early warning signs, make their home child-safe, teach practical steps to avoid hurting their kids and more. The program also saves as much as $4 for every $1 dollar invested. Yet, due to underfunding, only a fraction of Tennessee's at-risk families are being helped. When kids are seriously abused and neglected, they need the protection of foster care. Research shows that leaving kids in dangerous homes where they face continuing abuse and neglect increases the risk by 27 percent that they will become violent criminals. Four out of 10 children who are seriously abused and neglected and left in their homes, but later need to be placed in foster care because of further abuse, commit violent crimes when they grow up.

Three in five police officers believe that Congress could reduce crime in Tennessee by providing funds to reduce child abuse and neglect, according to a poll by Fight Crime: Invest in Kids Tennessee. Members seek to educate lawmakers and citizens about the possibility to cut crime by preventing child abuse and neglect.

Reports

All Fight Crime: Invest in Kids Tennessee reports on child abuse and neglect prevention, in-home parent coaching and foster care:

"We discovered that this poor little kid had been beaten and punched so hard it left the imprint of knuckles of a hand on his stomach...It came out at the trial that his (the abuser's) grandmother beat him. It's sad that nobody intervened to help him and he turned out to be a predator. By no means does every child who is abused grow up to be a criminal. But there is a common denominator among many offenders we see; they have been neglected or abused early in life and they act out that way. If we can prevent child abuse, we can break that cycle.”

-James C. Backstrom, Dakota County Attorney, Minnesota

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• A poor mother who had been abused or neglected as a child is 13 times more likely to abuse or neglect her children than mothers who were not abused.
• Children of mothers not in an in-home parent coaching program had more than twice as many arrests as the children of mothers who received services.