Former social worker accused of tapping into youth’s funds: lawsuit
Kelowna man alleges he was pulled from his foster home to get control of his assistance payments
A former youth in care is suing the B.C. government and a former social worker accused of stealing funds designated for children entrusted to his care.
As a ward of the Ministry of Children and Family Development, K.L. bounced between foster and group homes in the Kelowna area throughout his childhood before being assigned to social worker Robert Riley Saunders.
In a civil claim filed in Supreme Court in Kelowna on Monday, K.L. alleges that, in early 2008, Saunders pulled him from his first stable living situation, moving him into an unstable living arrangement in order to make K.L. eligible for benefit payments by the ministry.
That action “was part of a deliberate and dishonest plan by Saunders to ensure that he had control over the funds and benefits designated for the plaintiff ’s care,” K.L. claims in his court filing.
The claim alleges Saunders manipulated K.L. into opening a joint account with him at TD Bank then “stole the funds deposited by the ministry into the joint bank accounts by moving them to his own individual account and by paying his personal expenses by electronic transfer from the joint bank account.”
Saunders failed to consider K.L.’s best interests, failed to ensure he received adequate care and support, and failed to provide for his basic needs, the court filing alleges. As a result, K.L. ended up in an unstable and transient living situation, including “sleeping on the streets during winter periods and was subject to periods of hunger.”
Saunders has been named in another lawsuit and faces allegations of financially exploiting children in his care, most of them Indigenous youth such as K.L.
Saunders is no longer a ministry employee. None of the allegations have been proven in court. No criminal charges have been laid and Saunders has not yet been called upon to file a defence in the lawsuits.
Postmedia was unable to reach Saunders for comment.
K.L., whose name Postmedia has elected not to publish, said Saunders became his social worker when he was 13.
At 14, he found himself in a loving home with a foster mother who still plays an important role in his life, he said. For 18 months, he had stability, food and his own bedroom. He played hockey, attended school and cut back on cigarettes and beer, and the foster mom began taking the steps to adopt him, he said.
But K.L., now 26, alleges he was robbed of that life when he was suddenly pulled from the foster mother’s care.
“Saunders removed the Plaintiff from a settled foster home and in so doing caused the plaintiff to miss out on the opportunity of adoption by the Foster Parents,” the lawsuit alleges.
“My world went to shit,” K.L. said in an interview in Kamloops.
K.L., who said he had been led by Saunders to believe the adoption “just fell through” for some unexplained reason, said he was hurt by the move.
“I was extremely depressed and completely lost because that (the foster home) was the first place I moved into that I actually felt like was home,” he said. “I was so welcomed and so loved, and I just didn’t understand and I never got an explanation of why I got ripped out of there.”
Because of Saunders’ actions, K.L. claims in his lawsuit that he missed out on the opportunity of adoption by the foster parents. The move into an unstable living situation led K.L. to develop severe depression, alcohol dependency, and other health issues.
In addition, the suit alleges Saunders was verbally and emotionally abusive to K.L., something K.L. says was intended to undermine the teen’s self-confidence and his belief he might be entitled to financial support from the state, it said.
The lawsuit — which also names the Ministry of Children and Family Development and the director of child welfare as defendants — alleges Saunders “sought out and exploited Aboriginal high-risk youth because he knew that his supervisors and managers would not look too closely at their affairs or adequately safeguard their interests.”
K.L. is represented by Penticton lawyer Michael Patterson, who has taken on the cases of several former clients of Saunders who have aged out of ministry care.
K.L. said he was horrified when he saw Saunders’ name and face in the news last month following the announcement of a proposed class-action lawsuit against the social worker.
That lawsuit, filed by the public guardian and trustee in B.C. Supreme Court, alleged Saunders manipulated teenagers into an “independent living program only to pocket their benefits and abandon them.” The plaintiffs are represented by Vancouver lawyer Jason Gratl, who is acting on behalf of the public guardian and trustee.
In the proposed class-action lawsuit, the director of child welfare was accused of not adequately supervising Saunders and failing to have protections in place to restrain, control, detect and prevent misappropriation of funds and benefits. The lawsuit alleges the ministry team didn’t hold weekly and monthly consultations with Saunders as required by policy, failing to ascertain whether the children assigned to him received adequate care.
Gratl has identified roughly two dozen youths allegedly victimized by Saunders, but there may be as many as 90, mostly Indigenous. Sums of up to $40,000 were involved in each case, he alleged.
The lawsuit filed by Gratl said that the representative plaintiff, identified only as R.O., was “vulnerable to abuse given his or her history of parental neglect, medical neglect, transiency and exposure to traumatic circumstances.”
In early 2016, Saunders moved R.O. from a “stable home environment into an unstable residential or independent living arrangement” in order to make R.O. eligible for government financial benefits, the public guardian alleged in the court filing.
R.O. alleges in the lawsuit that Saunders then opened a joint bank account with R.O. at Interior Savings Financial Services Ltd. and stole the money deposited by the ministry by moving it into his own account or by paying his own personal expenses by electronic transfer from the joint account.
“As a result of Saunders’ actions, (R.O.’s) living situation was unstable and transient; he or she was from time to time homeless as a result of Saunders’ actions,” stated the lawsuit.
“The plaintiff’s physical and psychological health suffered as a result of Saunders’ actions. The plaintiff ’s trust and confidence in parental and authority figures has been severely compromised.”
Back in Kamloops, K.L. said he fears the effect of losing his stable home and loving foster mom may last forever.
“Still to this day — and I think for the rest of my days on the Earth here — I suffer with depression and PTSD, fetal alcohol syndrome and bad anxiety,” he said.
“The depression and anxiety just hit me. It’s like a whole classroom threw a bunch of bricks at my head and I was just dazed and confused of what happened. So, yeah, my world went to uber shit when I got taken from her.”
It felt important for him to come forward with his story, he said. He wonders what would happen if money allegedly skimmed from victims was returned to them. It might help his seven-month-old daughter live a life better than his own, he said.
But more important than that, K.L. said, is that other children never suffer the agony of being pulled from a loving, stable home.
“I want justice for us vulnerable children that this crazy bullshit happened to,” he said. “I know I’m not alone and it doesn’t matter if I got the brunt of it, the worst. I want justice for these kids and I want justice for all of us.”