Child Abuse: Identification, Investigation, and Legal Framework

This training material from Basic Peace Officer Course focuses on child abuse and neglect within the context of Texas law, aiming to educate officers on relevant codes and their impact on performance. The sources provide extensive national and Texas statistics regarding child abuse, including prevalence, types, and perpetrators, noting that neglect is the most common form nationally. Furthermore, the material offers detailed legal definitions of abuse and neglect from the Family Code, outlines the physical indicators of abuse such as different types of bruising and injuries, and specifies the mandatory reporting requirements and procedures for law enforcement and professionals, including penalties for failure or false reporting. Finally, the text ...