Family Defense Clinic Files Landmark Class Action Over Unlawful Child Removals

A coalition of legal advocates led by NYU Law's Family Defense Clinic filed a major class action lawsuit against New York City’s Administration for Children's Services (ACS) this week, challenging what they describe as a decades-long pattern of removing children from their families without first obtaining a court order—a practice they argue violates both New York State law and the Fourth and Fourteenth Amendments of the U.S. Constitution.

The suit, believed to be the first of its kind, is brought on behalf of both parents and children—groups the child welfare system has too often positioned as being at odds. “As courts have repeatedly recognized, children's and parents' interests are aligned most of the time, and they always share an interest in due process,” said Professor of Law Chris Gottlieb, who directs the Family Defense Clinic. “We are trying to breathe life into constitutional protections that are being trampled on a daily basis.”

ACS’s own data shows that approximately 50% of child removals occur without a court order—a figure Gottlieb believes is an undercount. Over 25% of children taken under these circumstances are sent home immediately when the case goes before a judge, and even more go home after extended hearings, suggesting they never should have been removed in the first place. Those children often spend time at ACS’s Children’s Center, sometimes without medication, a change of clothes, or any explanation of what is happening to them.

At the heart of the lawsuit is a straightforward legal argument: barring a genuine emergency, caseworkers are required to go before a judge and obtain a court order before removing a child—just as law enforcement must obtain a warrant before conducting a search or seizure. The case also makes a race discrimination claim against a system that admits Hispanic children into foster care at a rate 8.4 times higher than white children and Black children at a rate 15.6 times higher. “Rights are only rights if we're protecting them in all communities,” Gottlieb said.

The coalition bringing the suit reflects the growing recognition of family defense as a mainstream civil rights issue. NYU Law's clinic is joined by the CUNY Family Defense Clinic, the Family Justice Law Center—founded by NYU Law alumnus David Shalleck-Klein ‘16—and the Center for Constitutional Rights, whose chief litigator, Baher Azmy ‘96, another NYU Law alumnus, also teaches a civil rights law class at NYU Law. The Legal Aid Society will represent the children's class. A recent Second Circuit ruling, won by the Family Justice Law Center, bolstered the coalition's position by holding that caseworkers are not protected by qualified immunity when they bypass the court order requirement.

Gottlieb, who has carried forward the family defense movement that her predecessor, Martin Guggenheim, nurtured at NYU Law over decades, is hopeful that the filing will prompt near-term changes in ACS practice—even before the case reaches a final resolution. “I would hope the Mayor will say to his staff, ‘I want to stop doing this illegally,’” she said. The longer-term goal is to permanently transform how the city's child welfare system interacts with families.