Warning: This story contains graphic content.
The numbers are sobering.
By 14, a young Perth girl had lived in four group homes, had been hospitalised three times over threatening to kill herself and was bounced between 70 care arrangements by the Department of Communities – all before her death by suicide in April 2022.
A coroner’s inquest is examining whether more could have been done to help a young girl who died by suicide after a life spent under the care of the Department of Communities.Credit: Fil photo/John Donegan
Now, a coroner’s inquest is examining the circumstances surrounding the teenager’s death in an attempt to identify any missed opportunities that could have potentially saved the young girl’s life.
The coroner’s court was told on Wednesday that the girl, known only as “Child RK”, came to the attention of the department at just six weeks old.
She was the eldest of her four maternal siblings and was subject to “several” child safety interventions before she was taken into care at four after it was found she had been neglected.
The girl kept up regular visits with her mother until she was seven, but had to cut contact when an “incident” occurred, the court was told.
She bounced between foster carers, and ultimately endured 70 care arrangements during her short life, and more than 80 counselling sessions.
Two foster carers had deemed the girl too difficult to care for, and counsel assisting the coroner Daniel McDonald told the inquest on Wednesday the girl had become increasingly violent and volatile over time.
She repeatedly self-harmed, threatened staff at one group home that she wanted to drown herself, hit herself over the head with a brick, and cut herself with a broken bottle.
But between 2021 and 2022, two psychiatrists deemed she was not an “acute psychiatric risk” and discharged her, referring her to other health services for help.
The inquest was told she often failed to take their follow-up phone calls or engage with services further.
On the afternoon of April 19, 2022, McDonald said a worker at her latest group home was driving her to a doctor’s appointment.
At one point she asked him to stop the car so she could run away, and she got out at a nearby shopping centre.
She was gone for about five hours when she called the worker and asked him to call for a taxi to bring her home, and returned to the group house.
Staff said she went to her bedroom and started playing music too loudly about midnight, which they asked her to turn down.
The 14-year-old was found dead about 10am the next day.
“The inquest will explore whether there were any missed opportunities in relation to Child RK’s mental health issues, or any areas where treatment could have been improved,” McDonald told the coroner.
The inquest is set down for two days.
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