Staff at Vermont's Department for Children and Families received 85 threats from members of the public in the two months after a social worker was fatally shot in Barre. The statistics are being highlighted as a Vermont legislative committee looks at several aspects of the state's child protection system — including how to keep social workers working in it safe.
Concern has been heightened following the death more than two months ago of Lara Sobel, a social worker with the Department for Children and Families, who was fatally shot as she left work at the DCF office in Barre.
Forty-year-old Jody Herring has pleaded innocent in Sobel's death, as well as those of three of Herring's relatives. Authorities say Herring was angry about Sobel's role in a DCF decision to remove a child from Herring's home.
Department Commissioner Ken Schatz says 73 of the threats have come to staff at the Family Services Division, which investigates cases of child abuse and neglect.
Schatz says several other states also are seeing an uptick in threats against social workers.
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