Report: Florida child-abuse hotline erred in dismissing call about girl who was thrown off bridge

On the morning of Jan. 7, John Jonchuck arrived at his lawyer's office in his pajamas, his curly haired daughter in tow. He'd been driving around Tampa clutching a tattered Bible which he insisted was written in Swedish. He'd spent the morning searching for God at one church after another.

His lawyer's office told the state's child-abuse hotline that Jonchuck was "delusional," and that his 5-year-old daughter, Phoebe, was in danger.

"I'm worried he's out of his mind," the caller said. "I wanted to be sure I called somebody. If something happens to that child, I'd called somebody."

But instead of mounting an investigation to determine whether Phoebe was safe, the hotline counselor suggested Jonchuck's lawyer call the Department of Education to ensure she wasn't truant.

Hours later, Phoebe was dead. Her father, police say, flung her from a bridge that approaches the iconic Sunshine Skyway connecting St. Petersburg with Manatee

County to the south.

Counselors dismiss calls

Counselors at Florida's child-abuse hotline erred by dismissing the call, and another one that was received about a week earlier, a Department of Children & Families report released Monday concluded. A year earlier, caseworkers had erred by failing to offer the youngster's father services that may have left her safer.

Still, a team of investigators that reviewed Phoebe's death concluded the agency could not have foreseen the tragedy that unfolded Jan. 8 near the Skyway bridge, nor prevented it.

"Though there was a well-documented history of concerns related to this family, there was nothing in the preceding several years that could have reasonably been interpreted as predictive of such an event," a DCF Critical Incident Rapid Response Team reported. The team had been dispatched to Pinellas County after Phoebe's killing caused a firestorm in Tampa Bay, even as child welfare administrators have been trying to regain the state's confidence.

Father ruled incompetent

A judge Tuesday ruled that Jonchuck was "mentally incompetent" to stand trial. Any case against Jonchuck, who remains in jail on a murder charge, cannot continue until the court is confident Jonchuck understands the charges and case against him. A third mental evaluation of Jonchuck will take place Feb. 17.

By the end of 2014, Phoebe already had been the subject of six calls to DCF's hotline, records show. The last two calls -- received Dec. 29, 2014, and Jan. 7 of this year -- were "screened out" by workers at the state's hotline, meaning the allegations never were dispatched to investigators for action, the report said.

The Dec. 29 call "alleged past physical harm to Phoebe and current concerns regarding her living arrangements," the report said. The hotline counselor "accepted" the report for investigation, but somehow "terminated" the call without verifying an address for Jonchuck. The worker was later unable to determine where Phoebe was living, and then discarded the case as lacking agency jurisdiction. Both the failure to obtain an address, and then screening the call because of that, were mistakes, the report said.

The hotline call the next month was not handled well either, the report said. The call was made by a law firm that represented Jonchuck in a bitter custody dispute. The caller said Jonchuck was "completely delusional" and driving around with Phoebe in his car. Jonchuck had arrived at his lawyer's office with an "ancient Bible" insisting it was written in Swedish and asked an office worker to read it to him. Jonchuck had insisted the office worker was "the creator" or God.

Worried about the child

The firm had attempted to have Jonchuck involuntarily committed, but officers dispatched to evaluate his competence determined he did not meet criteria for an involuntary examination under the state's Baker Act, and left him at a nearby church. "He showed up in his pajamas," the caller told the hotline. "He's been driving all around town.

"He's going back and forth thinking the child is not his," the caller said. "It's all crazy. It does not make any sense, and he's out of his mind."

"I'm worried about the child," the caller said, adding Phoebe "didn't want to leave the office."

Like the police, DCF's hotline counselor concluded that Jonchuck's behavior did not meet the criteria for a DCF abuse or neglect investigation. So that call was screened out, as well.

"Based on the information you've provided, unfortunately it doesn't rise to the level of Florida statutes for us to be able to accept this report at this time," the counselor said. She, instead, recommended that the caller speak to educators to make sure Phoebe was attending school.

Monday's report attributes the dismissal of the Jan. 7 call to a "lack of clarity" in agency procedures concerning the significance of mental illness on the safety of children. The confusion "regarding the impact of mental health issues on a parent's ability to provide adequate supervision contributed strongly to the counselor reaching the conclusion that Phoebe was not in danger."

This story was originally published February 11, 2015 at 12:00 AM.