Judge was warned about oversight of Schaibles

To protect the children of faith-healing parents whose beliefs had already led to the death of one child, a Philadelphia judge gave the job to the city probation department even though the prosecution and the couple's own defense lawyer warned that the agency was ill-suited for the role.

Four months later, those warnings were underscored at a key 2011 hearing when probation officials balked at the job and questioned their authority to carry out the judge's order to monitor the health of the six children, according to a transcript obtained Thursday by The Inquirer.

"Because I don't have - I don't - they're not my children," probation officer La'Trail Dorsey responded when the judge asked why the agency seemed unsure of its responsibility.

The transcript shows the probation department was not even aware the judge had ordered it to make sure the children saw doctors. Because of a computer mishap, the terms of the order were not communicated to its staff, the transcript shows.

"I assume there will be visits next year, regular medical visits once a year?" Common Pleas Court Judge Carolyn Engel Temin asked the agency at the hearing.

"I don't know, your honor," replied Dorsey.

After the death last week of a second Schaible son, 8-month-old Brandon, critics say the transcript raises further questions about the decision to give the probation agency - normally tasked with keeping track of criminals - the complex social-service function of monitoring the medical attention of children being raised in a family that chose prayer over medicine.

"It's not their job," said Richard Gelles, dean of the University of Pennsylvania School of Social Policy and Practice.

Dorsey's response alone - that the children were not hers - should have illustrated the need for a better safety net, Gelles said.

A simple HIPAA release form, as child welfare workers are taught, would allow access to the Schaible children's medical information, he said.

"That comment shows no understanding of what a professional has to do to safeguard children not your own," Gelles said.

Robert Malvestuto, chief probation officer with the city's Adult Probation and Parole Department, did not return calls seeking comment.

When sentencing Herbert and Catherine Schaible to a decade of probation for the death of their 2-year-old son, Kent - whose bacterial pneumonia his parents tried to heal through prayer - Temin insisted over the defense attorney's urging that she could not order DHS social intervention.

While experts agree that Temin could have ordered the Schaibles to cooperate with DHS as a term of probation, it is uncertain if trained social workers could have saved Brandon Schaible, who died April 18 after days of labored breathing and other signs of illness, prosecutors said.

By again turning to praying instead of medicine - as the Schaibles told police - the couple allegedly broke the most explicit of Temin's orders, one that only they could enforce.

"You are to consult a medical practitioner whenever a child exhibits signs of being sick," Temin told them at sentencing, "and you are to follow the medical practitioner's advice to the letter."

Prosecutors are awaiting the results of an autopsy before deciding whether to charge the Schaibles in Brandon's death.

Court records show that after their bungled start at the 2011 hearing, probation officials did seemingly enforce the conditions of Temin's instructions.

Satisfying the judge's order, Herbert Schaible took each of Brandon's older siblings - who ranged in age from 16 to 7 - to a District 10 Health Center for medical exams in 2011 and 2012. None of the children had follow-up visits, according to court records.

Brandon was examined by a doctor 10 days after he was born in August 2012, but that was the last time the child saw a doctor.

Sources who reviewed the Schaibles probation summaries said the records listed no future doctor visits for the infant other than his annual exam, set for later this year.

That was far too low of a bar of coverage for Brandon's medical needs, Gelles and other experts said.

Even before he was born, the transcripts of the 2011 hearing show that Assistant District Attorney Joanne Pescatore argued for more careful oversight of the children and questioned whether the probation department could provide it.

"I knew this problem was going to happen," she told the judge. "It's going to take a lot to deal with this situation. It's going to be a lot of work for the probation department."

Temin - who has retired from the bench, and was traveling Thursday and unavailable to comment - disagreed with the prosecutor.

Despite the probation department's computer issues and lack of records, Temin said, she was satisfied that the Schaibles were complying with probation.

And she said she didn't see the need for future hearings to monitor the Schaibles' - or the probation department's - progress.

Only if there were another violation would there be another hearing, she said.

"Probation is continued," she told them. "You're free to go."