Plenty of people said they tried to love and safeguard a little boy named Joseph Wallace.
All of them-relatives, government officials and foster parents-failed.
Each wanted most of all to protect 3-year-old Joseph from his mother, Amanda Wallace, a mentally ill and violent woman who had threatened to kill him, his baby brother and herself.
Relatives said they asked the Illinois Department of Children and Family Services to award them custody of Joseph and his 1-year-old brother, Joshua. And Cook County’s public guardian, along with Joseph’s foster parents, had pleaded with a judge to keep the two boys in a foster home.
But DCFS caseworkers and private agencies hired by the state convinced at least two judges that Joseph was best off in the care of his mother, who had spent more than a decade in and out of mental institutions.
Early Monday morning, police said, Wallace made good on the death threat against Joseph. Wallace, 27, tied an electrical extension cord around his neck and hanged him from a door transom in their West Side apartment, police said. The other child was not harmed.
The tragedy has caused anger-and some guilt-among those who knew Joseph was in danger. And it has prompted questions: Why was he returned to a parent so prone to violence? Why, relatives and foster parents ask, would the state trust a mother who had swallowed batteries and Drano?
The bureaucratic answer-that Wallace convinced officials she was capable-comes from an overburdened social service system created to protect children like Joseph. He became the 16th child under age 15 who has been murdered in the Chicago area this year-the fifth allegedly at the hands of a parent.
The evening leading up to his death had been pleasant: The family watched a movie at Wallace’s sister’s house on the South Side. It had been uneventful, with none of the frequent outbursts Wallace was known for.
But while watching the video, Joseph sat up on his grandmother Bonnie Wallace’s lap and she playfully tweaked his cheek. The boy cried out.
Wallace became enraged at her son, the grandmother said.
” `Oh, you make me sick,’ ” the angry mother told her son, according to Wallace’s sister Jerry. ” `All you ever do is cry and holler.’
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“For this little, little thing, Amanda said to Joseph, `I’m going to get you.’ “
Frightened by Wallace’s outburst, Wallace’s mother and sister drove her and the children back to their apartment in the 5100 block of West North Avenue.
“I feel guilty for letting (Joseph) out of the car last night,” Bonnie Wallace said Monday.
Police said that Wallace killed Joseph between 1 a.m., when they returned to their apartment, and 2 a.m., when she called the police.
Officers responded to the call, and found Joseph dangling from the electrical cord. Wallace admitted to them that she had killed her son, said Grand Central Cmdr. Charles Roberts.
“She said she was angry with the child and DCFS,” Roberts said. “Our understanding is that the child was `acting up.’ “
At 9 a.m., Wallace was charged with first-degree murder. She was denied bond Monday night.
On Monday, the DCFS granted custody of Joshua to Wallace’s sister.
Jerry Wallace, after picking Joshua up at the police station, said “the system failed.”
“They released the kids right back to her, knowing there was a problem, knowing that she said she was going to kill. . . . We tried to get custody, but the system wouldn’t let us,” she said.
Relatives said Wallace had beaten her children in the past. Last week, she tried to set her apartment on fire.
At the police station Monday, Wallace was asked if she was sorry.
“Yeah, I’m sorry about it,” she said before officers hustled her away.
Cook County Public Guardian Patrick Murphy, whose office represents abused and neglected children in Juvenile Court, said he was devastated after learning of Joseph’s death. Murphy said he personally handled Joseph’s case the first time it went to court.
Murphy said he argued, unsuccessfully, to keep Joseph in a Park Ridge foster home and away from his mother. But on June 26, 1990, Juvenile Court Judge Walter Williams disagreed with Murphy and sent Joseph back to his mother.
In April of last year, Wallace had another run-in with the DCFS, Murphy said. At that time, Joseph and Joshua were removed from Wallace’s custody, he said. But another Juvenile Court judge returned the children to their mother on Feb. 16.
Murphy also said a DCFS caseworker did not tell his office of complaints by the children’s foster mother that the youths appeared to have injuries when they returned from unsupervised visits with Wallace.
DCFS issued a terse statement Monday afternoon, saying it has “initiated a full review of the case.”
In the second case, Murphy said, his office went along with the DCFS’ reunification recommendation.
“The fact is, under law, if Mom does what is required of her, the kid goes back home,” he said.
Murphy spent Monday attempting to have Joseph’s body released to the foster parents for burial.
“This was my personal case,” he said. “I can’t tell you how sick I am now.”
Murphy said Wallace had been hospitalized for mental problems at the state-run Elgin Mental Health Center for “most of the previous 12 years.” She, like her children, also had been a ward of DCFS.
State officials confirmed that Wallace had been “in and out” of the Elgin Mental Health Hospital and the state-run Chicago-Read Mental Health Center for years.
While at Elgin, Murphy said, Wallace exhibited severe mental problems. In court documents, one state psychiatrist said he had clinically diagnosed Wallace as “anti-social, and borderline personality disorder.”
“She ate batteries and coat hangers, she stuck pop cans and light bulbs up her vagina. She drank Drano,” Murphy said. “She had surgery twice to remove foreign objects.
“During her pregnancy (with Joseph), she stuck pop cans up her vagina. She set herself on fire. She denied that the child was hers.”
Murphy said a report prepared by the DCFS Division of Child Protection, which investigates abuse cases, stated that if Joseph was returned to his mother, “she will maim or kill the child,” according to Murphy.
Joseph was placed with foster parents in Park Ridge, and then with another foster family on the South Side, before Williams returned him to his mother, citing “family preservation,” Murphy said.
“I remember telling Williams, `This is not family preservation. There is no family to preserve here,’ ” Murphy said.
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It is unclear who fathered each of Wallace’s children, relatives said.
One set of Joseph’s foster parents also argued, vocally, against reuniting him with his mother.
Michael Callahan, the foster father from Park Ridge, said he was even held in contempt of court for screaming at Judge Williams.
“The system murdered this boy,” he said through tears Monday. “They are killing children. The system can’t function.
“Anyone who had anything to do with Amanda knew she was crazy.”
The Callahans’ living room table was strewn with pictures of Joseph, who called the couple “mommy and dad.” The couple said they bought necessities for Joseph, such as a crib and clothes, whenever he returned to his natural mother.
“Christ, he was my son,” a distraught Callahan said. “I’ve had seven natural children. He was just as important to me as all the others.”
Callahan said that Joseph could have stayed in Park Ridge indefinitely.
Wallace often called the Callahans to take care of Joseph when she checked into a mental hospital, he said. The couple would then pick up Joseph at the hospital.
On Monday, Callahan wished that Wallace had made that call Sunday night.
“All she had to do yesterday was to ask us,” he said. “I would have gone to get him.”