A little help please! (Child Services question)

I don't have a answer, sadly, just a suggestion: title your post more specifically (like "Child Services practices" or "minors/relatives and child services"). You'll probably get more answers that way, because it will be easier for people to see what you're asking about. I think every post in this forum could be entitled "a little help, please!"

Where? The answer would vary for some locations.

I'm not sure how responsible you intend the girl's mother to be--or the father--but as a parent, my wife and I have a plan in case we were to be killed leaving our daughter alone. Since none of our immediate family live nearby, my daughter's godparents would take care of her until my wife's sister and husband could come and take her back home with them.

Assuming the girl's father in your story cares about his daughter, the authorities would consult with him if the mother left no instructions.

Either way, I think the girl would remain at the police station (assuming the police responded to the suicide) if her parents left a plan in place. She would wait there until her guardian could claim her.

How would Child Services know about the distant cousin? They certainly can't know if they're a suitable person to leave a child with, especially not on such short notice when they haven't had time to run checks on that person.

With her father in prison and unable to take care of her then emergency foster care would surely be the most likely course of action until they can sort out her long term living situation.

Yeah, it's really going to depend on where this is, how large of a city, etc.
In a small town, if the "distant cousin" is known and local, that might (big might) go over...
Otherwise, what's likely to happen is the child would be taken to a temporary shelter/facility until legal issues could be sorted out.
Absent an immediate family member or known relative right there and easily available, or Mom having arranged for the kid to be picked up by someone, Child Services would have no way of knowing all the details of the mother's wishes. The will isn't going to be read the very instant the mother is pronounced dead. Even with a family attorney, there will be some delay.
Minor children without a guardian are usually taken to a temporary facility (group home, temporary foster care, etc) until those details can be worked out.

nicoleM said:

Excellent. I can include a plan in the mother's will which specifies that she should be taken to her relatives in case of any tragedy, etc. In that case, would it be okay for the family lawyer to take her to said relative's place?

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You'd have to eliminate the father's rights in the situation in some way. For example, the child's parents divorced and the father either agreed that the mother would have sole custody, or the court granted the mother sole custody in the course of the divorce. Then, if the mother, in her will, designated a guardian for the child in the event the mother died while the child was still a minor, the executor of the mother's estate would make arrangements to bring the child to the guardian or have the guardian pick the child up.

The police would contact Child Services, and Child Services would take over from there, finding relatives, placing her, even finding a place for her to stay until relatives came to get her.

If the mother committed suicide, the police are probably involved at some point and if they find a child in the picture they call Child Protection Services. A case worker will be on call even at night. They come and they will often have a mental health crisis worker (a counselor/psychologist/social worker) who is also on call at all times (my mom is one of these). There are emergency places where a child would be taken immediately. Depending on if the child knows the phone number of a relative, it could take awhile to find out where to take the child. Calls will be made first. The social worker doesn't just stick the kid in a car and drive to an address. And if the relative is a distant relative, they may or may not agree to take custody of the child. A relative could also become a foster parent. But any of that would take awhile. Primarily the child would be taken to an emergency shelter (possibly an emergency foster family) for a few days and then either the relative would come and pick them up or they might be driven there by a case worker. This is sort of in the case worker's job but it's a duty that can be tossed around a lot. My mother, who works for a mental health agency that is sort of privatized in this weird day and age, sometimes drives foster children around. Sometimes the foster parents do it. None of them are usually paid by the hour to do it and often they can choose not to and choose to have the child just wait until someone picks them up. So, if the case worker takes the child, it may be because the case worker is good-hearted and doesn't want the frightened child to have to stay in the emergency shelter longer if the relative can't come and pick them up.

If you just mean how the long distance transportation would occur, the way I've seen it done in the US is the children stayed in a short term emergency CPS placement (private foster home or group home) until the relative arrived to pick them up. Otherwise, I'd think they'd have a caseworker, foster parent or group home worker drive the child before they'd let an estate attorney do it. They have strict guidelines and, unlike the others mentioned, the estate attorney would not have been checked out by them or involved in their system.

Once CPS was involved, they'd probably first have to do a basic screening of the relative, such as check for criminal records for anyone living in the relative's home and have CPS in the county the relative lives look over the home to be sure it meets minimum standards.

CPS always tries to find a relative placement rather than have kids put into the system, although a very short term emergency placement might be necessary. Aside from the benefit (hopefully) for the child, relatives don't usually have to be paid like foster caregivers do.

Beyond that, the father might still have parental rights when he gets out, especially if his jail stay will be short term.

OP, where is this story set? It could make a difference. Also, if you are in the U.S., does the relative live in the same state as the child?

Everything Fruitbat said is accurate from what I've seen of the system here in Minnesota. I would just add that if the child is being moved across state lines, there are additional complications. Child Services in her locality would need to coordinate with the authorities wherever the relative lives. The authorities in the relative's location would screen the proposed placement and they would become responsible for ongoing case supervision.

That won't necessarily change the outcome, but there could be some delay involved in transferring the case from one jurisdiction to another. Also, I think it's highly unlikely that child protection workers would let an unrelated adult transport a child across state lines. If the relative couldn’t come to pick her up, my best guess is that one of the social workers involved would travel with her.