When the state takes a child, it claims the power to protect. Across the country, documented cases show what happens when that promise collapses, removals triggered by low-severity claims, warnings ignored in placements, children harmed, missing, or dead, and accountability arriving late, if it arrives at all.

West Virginia’s child welfare system is spending millions to ship foster kids out of state while investigations fail at home, oversight breaks down, and children end up in crisis placements. This report lays out the documented pattern.