NEW MEXICO

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WHO:        EVERY person MUST report if s/he knows or has a reasonable suspicion that a child is abused or neglected.  [Stat. Ann. § 32A-4-3(A)]                 

These are mandatory (particularly MUST report): • Licensed physicians • Residents or interns examining, attending, or treating a child • Law enforcement officers • Judges during proceedings • Registered nurses • Visiting nurses • School teachers • School officials • Social workers acting in their official capacity • Members of the clergy who have information that is not privileged as a matter of law.  [Stat. Ann. § 32A-4-3(A)]

·       STANDARD:  [Stat. Ann. §§ 32A-1-4; 32A-4-3(A)]  Child means under age 18.

(1)      For ALL reporters: knows or has a reasonable suspicion that a child is an abused or neglected child. 

·       PRIVILEGE:  Clergy need not report privileged info. But physician-patient or similar privilege does NOT apply in proceedings.  [Stat. Ann. §§ 32A-4-3(A); 32A-4-5(A)]

WHEN:      IMMEDIATE report.   [Stat. Ann. § 32A-4-3(A)] 

WHERE & HOW:  To ONE of: [Stat. Ann. § 32A-4-3(A); Admin. Code tit. 8, §§ 10.2.7; 10.2.10] 

(1)      A local LAW enforcement agency.  A directory is at https://www.usacops.com/nm/

(2)      The Children, Youth and Families Department (CYFD). Its Protective Services Division (PSD) includes the Statewide Central Intake (SCI) Unit to receive, screen, and prioritize reports, including from police departments, and assign them to county investigators.  More info is available at https://cyfd.org/child-abuse-neglect

o   SCI child abuse hotline (24/7): 1-855-333-SAFE  (= 1-855-333-7233) or reporters can dial #SAFE with a cell phone.

(3)      For an “Indian child residing in Indian country”, the tribal law enforcement agency or tribal social services agency take reports  A map with NM reservations and links to central contact information is posted at the site below.

http://www.kstrom.net/isk/maps/nm/nmmap.html#Ute%20Mountain%20Ute%20Tribe

In an emergency:                                           Dial 911; report afterward.

The Division of Health Improvement’s Incident Management Bureau (DHI/IMB) has its own reporting process for abuse, neglect, or exploitation, suspicious injury, death, or environmental hazard (ANE) of individuals under its care in home- and community-based Medicaid waiver programs and licensed health facilities, including for children there.

·       Its ANE 24/7 HOTLINE is 1-800-445-6242; another report must follow within 24 hours after the call, on an Immediate Action and Safety Plan form (SFY 2020 DHI/ANE Incident Report) filed at https://ane.health.state.nm.us/ or faxed to 1-800-584-6057.

·       For internal investigations DHI/IMB has priority over outside agencies, but a bystander child is reported to DCYF or law enforcement.  [Admin Code tit. 7, §§ 1.14.1 ff.]  

·       DHI/IMB Resources: (1) Guidelines are at https://www.nmhealth.org/about/dhi/ane/ with a 1-800-797-3260 number for child protection. (2) A recent reporter’s guide is at https://www.nmhealth.org/publication/view/guide/2188/  (3) A 2017 fillable incident report form is at https://ironline.health.state.nm.us/elibrary/ironline/hflc_irpg1.php

OTHER ASPECTS (for reports to CYFD and law enforcement)

·       REPORT DETAILS: Written reports (law enforcement summaries to CYFD and vice versa) MUST contain: (a) the names and addresses of the child and parents, guardian, or custodian; (b) the child's age; (c) nature and extent of the child’s injuries, including any evidence of previous ones; (d) any other info the reporter believes might help establish the cause of injuries and the suspected perpetrator’s identity. (When available) CYFD forwards the reporter’s name, address, and phone number to law enforcement, and vice versa, along with the report.  [Stat. Ann. § 32A-4-3(B)]

·       REPORTER PROTECTION: (1) The identify of a reporter mandated by profession is verified before investigation is initiated.  [Stat. Ann. § 32A-4-5(C)]  But CYFD accepts anonymous reports.  [Admin. Code tit. 8, § 10.2.10]  (2) Disclosures to a parent, guardian, or legal custodian do not include identifying information about the reporter.  [Stat. Ann. § 32A-4-33(C)]  (3) Any reporter acting in good faith is immune from civil and criminal liability; good faith is presumed, but there is no immunity for reports in bad faith or with malicious purpose.  [Stat. Ann. § 32A-4-5(B)]

WHY:        ANYONE who fails to report (to CYFD or law enforcement) is guilty of a misdemeanor, sentenced under § 31-19-1, with a definite county jail term < 1 year and/or < $1,000 fine.  [Stat. Ann. § 32A-4-3(F)]  

WHAT:      In New Mexico, child abuse means: (a) serious harm or risk of it; (b) physical, emotional, or psychological abuse; (c) sexual abuse or sexual exploitation; (d) endangerment; or (e) torture, cruel confinement, or cruel punishment. In New Mexico, child neglect means: (f) abandonment; (g) non-provision of care, control, subsistence, education, medical, or other necessity; (h) failure to protect from physical or sexual abuse; (i) inability due to incapacitation; or (j) unlawfully placing a child for care or adoption.  [Stat. Ann. §§ 32A-4-2(B),(E)]    

Initial Screening Criteria: (a) whether statutory abuse, neglect or exploitation is alleged; and (b) response priority.  [Admin. Code tit. 8, §§ 10.2.8(B); 10.2.13(A)-(C)]

·        EMERGENCY (E), 3-hour response: serious, immediate safety threat & vulnerable child, such as: an abandoned infant; a physically injured infant; a potentially life-threatening situation; recent sexual abuse; a law enforcement request for immediate response; and recent serious trauma, e.g., a head injury, burns, or broken bones.

·        PRIORITY 1 (P1), 24-hour response: a vulnerable child  with a physical injury who is in a safe environment at the time of the report, or who faces a serious impending safety threat but the alleged perpetrator will not have access to the child for the next 24 hours.

·        PRIORITY 2 (P2), 5-calendar-day response: vulnerable child with impending safety threat BUT no immediate concern for the child’s safety. Examples: (a) alleged physical abuse with no indication of injury; (b) abuse or neglect when the alleged perpetrator no longer has access to the child or a protective parent or guardian already intervened.

Reportable: (a) a parent, guardian, or custodian for any ABUSE (serious harm or risk of it; physical, emotional, or psychological abuse; sexual abuse or sexual exploitation; endangerment; or torture, cruel confinement, or cruel punishment) or for any NEGLECT (abandonment; non-provision; failure to protect from physical or sexual abuse; inability due to incapacitation; or unlawfully placing a child for care or adoption); or (b) anyone else for unlawfully placing a child for care or adoption [the statute is not limited as to who does it.]  [Stat. Ann. §§ 32A-4-2(B),(E)]  NOTE: abusers who fall outside this description may be committing a crime that is reportable to police.

·        Parent means a biological or adoptive parent who retains duties, authority, and legal custody of the child, unless limited or altered by court order.  [Stat. Ann. § 32A-1-4(O)]   

·        Guardian means someone empowered to make decisions for the child for medical care, lawsuits, visitation, legal custody (if vested), adoption in the absence of parental rights, and consent for (early) marriage or military enlistment.  [Stat. Ann. § 32A-1-4(I)]   

·        Custodian means a person other than a parent or guardian who has physical control, care, or custody of the child, including any residential facility employee or anyone providing out-of-home care.  [Stat. Ann. § 32A-1-4(E)]   

Child Abuse means that a parent, guardian, or custodian does any of the following to the child: (a) has action or inaction by which the child suffers SERIOUS HARM or risk of it; (b) inflicts or causes physical, emotional, or psychological ABUSE; (c) inflicts SEXUAL abuse or sexual exploitation; (d) knowingly, intentionally or negligently places the child in a situation that may ENDANGER his/her life or health; or (e) knowingly or intentionally TORTURES, cruelly confines or cruelly punishes the child.   [Stat. Ann. § 32A-4-2(B)]

(A)     Great bodily harm means an injury that: (a) creates a high probability of death; (b) causes serious disfigurement; or (c) results in permanent or protracted loss or impairment of function of any body part or organ.  [Stat. Ann. § 32A-4-2(D)]

(B)     Physical abuse includes but is not limited to any case in which the child exhibits evidence of skin bruising, bleeding, malnutrition, failure to thrive, burns, bone fracture, subdural hematoma, soft tissue swelling or death and: (a) there is not a justifiable explanation for it; (b) the explanation given is inconsistent with the degree or nature of the condition or with the nature of the death; or (c) circumstances indicate the condition or death may not be accidental.  [Stat. Ann. § 32A-4-2(F)]

(C)     Undefined: in the statutes, regulations, and documents reviewed emotional abuse and psychological abuse are not defined by law or CYFD.

(D)     Sexual abuse includes: (a) criminal sexual contact; (b) incest; or (c) criminal sexual penetration.  [Stat. Ann. § 32A-4-2(G)]

(1)     Criminal sexual contact means unlawful intentional touching or force applied to intimate parts between a minor and someone else; intimate parts means the primary genital area, groin, buttocks, anus or breast.  [Stat. Ann. § 30-9-13(A)]

(2)     Incest is marriage or sexual intercourse, knowing the partner is one’s: (a) parent, child, or grandparent or grandchild of any degree; (b) brother or sister of half or whole blood, or (c) uncle or niece, aunt or nephew.  [Stat. Ann. § 30-10-3]

(3)     Criminal sexual penetration means unlawfully intentionally causing someone to engage in sexual intercourse, cunnilingus, fellatio or anal intercourse or nonmedically causing penetration, to any extent with any object, of another’s genital or anal openings, regardless of any emission.  [Stat. Ann. § 30-9-11(A)]

(4)     Context: the age of consent is 17. A minor who is age 13, 14, 15, or 16 may have sex with another minor in that age range (13-16) or with someone who is less than four years older than him/herself. There is an exception for an underage spouse. Sex with a child age 13-18 is prohibited for non-spouse adults from the child’s school, whether they are licensed or unlicensed employees, contractors, health service providers, or volunteers.  [Stat. Ann. §§ 30-9-11(G); 30-9-13(D)(2)]

(E)     Sexual exploitation includes: (a) allowing, permitting, or encouraging a child to engage in prostitution, (b) allowing, permitting, encouraging, or engaging a child in obscene or pornographic photographing; or (c) filming or depicting a child for obscene or pornographic commercial purposes.  [Stat. Ann. § 32A-4-2(H)]

(F)     Undefined: in the statutes, regulations, and documents reviewed endanger(ment), torture, cruel confinement, and cruel punishment are not defined by law or CYFD.

Child Neglect means that a parent, guardian, or custodian does any of the following to the child: (a) ABANDONS him/her; (b) has faults or habits, or failure or refusal, that result in LACK of proper parental care and control or subsistence, education, medical or other care or control necessary for the child's well-being when the parent etc. is able to provide them; (c) FAILING TO TAKE REASONABLE STEPS TO PROTECT the child from further harm, despite knowing (or should) of physical or sexual abuse to him/her; (d) being unable to discharge responsibilities to and for the child because of incarceration, hospitalization or physical or mental disorder or INCAPACITY; or (e) (anyone) PLACING a child for care or adoption in violation of law.  [Stat. Ann. § 32A-4-2(E)]

(A)     Abandonment means that a parent (etc.) does either of the following without justifiable cause:  [Stat. Ann. § 32A-4-2(A)]:

(1)     Leaves the child for 14 days without providing for his/her IDENTIFICATION; or

(2)     Leaves the child with others (even the other parent or an agency) without providing support or communicating for: (a) 3 months if the child is under age 6 when it starts; or (b) 6 months if the child is [at least] age 6 when it starts.

(B)     Non-provision is not defined in the statutes, regulations, or documents reviewed, but it is NOT neglect to treat a child’s medical condition by an accredited practitioner’s prayer alone in accordance with a recognized church or denomination, yet the child may still be treated medically by law.  [Stat. Ann. § 32A-4-2(E)]

(C)     Undefined: in statutes, regulations, and documents reviewed failure to protect and conditions for being inability or other incapacity are not defined by law or CYFD.

(D)     Lawful placement and the conditions for it are described by adoption laws, foster care laws, CFYD empowerment, etc. In addition, an infant may lawfully be left with a hospital within 90 days after birth, anonymously or not.  [Stat. Ann. § 24-22-1 ff.]