DENVER — An attorney hired to help a desperate mother keep custody of her child took on the Department of Human Service and the Denver district attorney and won after she disclosed allegations of misconduct by social workers.
Jessica Peck filed a lawsuit after she was hit with a gag order in 2019 after speaking with a local newspaper.
Her client hired her after DHS filed a dependency neglect case. Peck believes the case was brought because her client did not believe her ex of many years was guilty of murdering a child after he was arrested in 2018.
The mother says uncomfortable conversations with caseworkers began immediately after he was arrested.
“She quickly jumped into, "Well, I need you to tell me that you know what happened and that, you know, he did it." And my response to her was and has always been, "I wasn't there. I don't know what happened. I can't tell you that,"” said the mother, who wishes to remain anonymous.
The two share a child but did not live together, and he was in a new relationship at the time of the crime.
Peck says intimidation quickly moved to outright misconduct by caseworkers.
“In fact, they went so far as to fabricate the existence of jailhouse phone calls. They attributed statements to my client that she never made in court. And they even went so far as to claim that they attended court hearings that they hadn't even attended,” Peck said.
That’s when Peck spoke to a local paper about the misconduct.
“I was hit with a gag order, told I could not speak about anything that DHS had done in that case,” Peck said.
That gag order came with the possibility of jail time.
Ultimately, Peck says, DHS removed the caseworker from her client's investigation and the case was dropped. But Peck sued DHS and the Denver district attorney for silencing her, eventually winning the case and the appeal.
“Victims remain protected under this decision. What's not protected is censorship and government secrecy,” she said.
The mom at the center of the case says if it wasn’t for Peck taking on the system, there’s a good chance she wouldn’t have custody of her daughter today.
They both hope for more government transparency so good parents don’t lose their children to bad actors.