- I'm Steve Sweigart. 
I'm a criminal lawyer
located in Riverside County, California.
If you're facing or being investigated for
allegations of child abuse,
there's something you
should consider immediately
and that is Child Protective Services.
And Child Protective Services
oftentimes gets involved
when there's allegations of child abuse.
The immediate significance is,
is that Child Protective
Services, in theory,
operates separately from the police
and therefore they do
their own investigation
and Child Protective
Services investigations
involve questioning of the people involved
including my prospective client,
oftentimes way earlier than when
the police may be involved in the case
and Child Protective Services shares
all that information with law enforcement,
so you kind of end up
having two separate entities
going against you at the same time,
but yet sharing information
with one another
to maximize the success of both entities,
law enforcement and Child
Protective Services.
If you've been charged with or are facing
an investigation regarding
child abuse allegations,
my advice is to reach out to an attorney
at the earliest possible stage
because oftentimes,
you're not just dealing
with law enforcement in
these types of cases,
but you're also dealing with
Child Protective Services
that has their own agenda.
It's really important, where possible,
for you to get the
attorney involved in a case
to serve as a buffer between the client
and Child Protective Services,
as well as law enforcement
because ultimately,
a resolution may have to be reached
with everybody involved, not
just the law enforcement.
Another piece of advice I
would give you immediately
in a case or allegations
involving child abuse,
don't talk about the
case with third parties
or anyone else except the attorney
because oftentimes when
you discuss the case
with other people, if
you post about the case
or about facts on social media,
those things have a way,
in child abuse cases,
of coming back to bite the people that
are making those statements and
that doesn't need to happen.
So if you want to talk about this further
give me a call.
951-777-1111.
