MT. VERNON, IL — A new pilot program where a law enforcement officer will accompany child welfare workers during high-risk home visits is the first of its kind in the state and will be launched in southern Illinois with the Jefferson County Sheriff’s Office.

Sheriff Jeff Bullard says it’s important to understand that front line social workers find themselves in unstable situations that can turn dangerous because of unstable people.

36-year-old Deidre Silas, an investigator with the Illinois Department of Children and Family Services, was stabbed to death on January 4th when she responded to a call of possible endangerment of children in a home in the central Illinois town of Thayer. Silas’ death is the second time in five years that state officials and the social work community are asking what should have been done, but wasn’t, to prevent it. DCFS investigator Pamela Knight (59) died following a brutal beating while attempting to remove an endangered child from his father in September 2017.

Currently, individuals who attack a DCFS worker would be charged with aggravated battery, a class 3 felony.

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