1964 Mississippi
Michael Schwerner
Social Work Student |
1987 Washington
Norman W. Fournier
Social Worker |
1987 Kentucky
Paul T.Grannis
Social Worker |
1988 Pennsylvania
Linda Rosen
Hospital Caseworker |
1988 West Virginia
Ladonna Wolford |
Schwerner, 24, a New York native and social work student, went to Mississippi in January 1964 with his wife, Rita, after ...
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Norman W. Fournier, a social worker for 25 years, served as a mental health coordinator for Pierce County. He was shot by a client whom he went to pick up on an involuntary commitment order on Aug. 4, 1987.
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In 1987 Paul Grannis was a social worker in northeastern Kentucky. After a removal of an adolescent, the client’s father shot him to death.
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In a psychiatric emergency waiting room at the St. Francis Medical Center in Pittsburgh, Linda Rosen, age 27, a hospital caseworker, was interviewing Edith Anderson, to determine if she needed help. Anderson suddenly pulled out a gun. Rosen immediately turned and ran calling for security guards. At that point Anderson began shooting. After killing Rosen, she took three hostages. After negotiation the hostages were released and Anderson was taken into custody.
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At a shelter for runaways, in July 1988, two teenagers beat Ladonna Wolford to death with a baseball bat.
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1989 California
Robbyn Panitch
Psychiatric Social Worker |
1991 Maryland
Tanja Brown-O'Neil
Social Worker |
1992 New York
Florence A. Pike
Denise Van Amburg
Nancy Wheeler
Phyllis Caslin |
1993 Michigan
Rebecca Binkowski
Resident Manager |
1993 Michigan
Barbara Synnestvedt |
Robbyn Panitch, 36, a psychiatric social worker from Los Angeles County, was counseling a client at a Santa Monica health clinic. In this county Health Department office, her deranged client, a psychotic Air Force veteran, stabbed her to death multiple times on Feb. 21, 1989.
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In June 1991, Tanja Brown-O'Neil, 29, a Baltimore social service worker, was stabbed to death at her workplace by a man who was apparently furious at not receiving his food stamps.
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The four women and their killer died when 50-year-old John T. Miller walked into the Schuyler County offices. For 26 years, he had denied paternity of a daughter born to a former girlfriend in his hometown, nearby Montour Falls. Through four arrests and two six-month jail terms for failure to pay child support, and a life apparently spent evading Schuyler County authorities, he refused to...
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Rebecca Binkowski, a graduate student at Western Michigan University, was awarded her master’s degree in social work posthumously. She was stabbed in her car on Feb. 3, 1993, by a tenant at an apartment complex for persons with mental illness, where she worked as a resident manager.
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Barbara Synnestvedt, worked at the W.J. Maxey Training School. She was beaten and strangled by a teenage inmate and sex offender at a juvenile detention center on April 25, 1993.
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1996 Massachusetts
Linda Silva
Social Worker |
1996 South Carolina
Josie Curry
Michael Gregory
Jimmy Riddle
Case Worker |
1997 Indiana
Steve Tielker
Family and Children’s Services Supervisor |
1998 Connecticut
Donna Millette-Fridge |
1998 Michigan
Lisa Putman
Child Protective Services Worker |
Linda Silva, a social worker with the state Department of Social Services, had been assigned to investigate the case of Paul Dubois, who, after years of fighting in Barnstable Probate Court, called DSS to make complaints about his ex-wife's parenting of their two children. She was...
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The three caseworkers were killed on Sept. 16, 1996, at the North Augusta office of the Aiken County Department of Social Services. Police say David Mark Hill walked into the office armed with a semi-automatic handgun and shot them, upset that his children were being put into foster care.
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Steve Tielker, a Family and Children’s Services supervisor, counseled both victims and perpetrators of sexual abuse. He was counseling a client on probation for child molestation under court order on April 28, 1997, when that client shot him. The client also fatally shot a probation officer before taking his own life.
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Donna Millette-Fridge, 36, had recently received her master’s degree from the University of Connecticut School of Social Work in West Hartford. While walking to work at a community mental health outreach program on Sept. 22, 1998, she was stabbed by a client.
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Child Protective Services worker Lisa Renee Putman was killed during a home visit in May 1998 in Macomb County.
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1999 Ohio
Nancy Fitzgivens
Social Worker |
1999 Wisconsin
Carlos Hernandez
Social Development Commission Youth Outreach Worker |
2004 Kansas
Teri Zenner
Social Worker |
2005 Washington
Marty Smith
Crisis Responder |
2005 Illinois
Marilyn Bethell
Substance Abuse Counselor |
For her entire life, Nancy Fitzgivens dreamed of becoming a social worker. Marriage and three children delayed but did not deter her dream. At age 50, she obtained her degree, concluding a 10-year educational journey. In 1999, she became a social worker at the Franklin County Children Services ...
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Carlos Hernandez, a Social Development Commission youth outreach worker, was killed outside an SDC office by a masked gunman.
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Teri Zenner, while visiting a 17-year-old client, Andrew Ellmaker, at his home, was stabbed to death. Ellmaker was charged with her death. Zenner’s slaying validated her husband’s concerns and those of many of the 320,000 licensed social workers nationwide who frequently venture into the homes of clients in hopes of getting lives back on track.
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In 2005, Marty Smith, 46, a Washington state crisis responder for the state mental-health system, was checking on a schizophrenic client whose mother had called to say he wasn’t taking his medications. Instead of consenting to a hospitalization, Larry Clark attacked Smith with his fists and then a carving knife as Clark’s mother screamed for help outside.
Smith, died in Clark’s dining room. He is the first designated mental-health professional to die on the job in Washington since 1987.
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Marilyn Bethell had wanted to be a substance abuse counselor for years. Just as she was getting the chance to live her dream, she disappeared. Police say they suspect foul play after the bizarre crash involving her car and two armed men, after which it was revealed that Bethell was missing.
Bethell graduated from the College of DuPage with an associate degree in applied science, specifically addiction counseling.
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2006 Kentucky
Boni Frederick
Social Service Aide |
2008 Massachusetts
Diruhi Mattian
Psychotherapist |
2009 New York
Lakisha Scriven
Case Worker |
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On Oct. 16, 2006, Boni Frederick, a Social Service aide in western Kentucky, was murdered while supervising a home visit with an infant. The killing sent shock waves through the community and the agency.
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Mattian, a psychotherapist from Wilmington, was the program director for the Lawrence FLEX program, which provides services to families with children with chronic mental illnesses and requiring intensive therapeutic involvement. According to police, Diruhi Mattian, 53, was stabbed to death by her teenage client, Thomas Belanger, 18, during a visit to his apartment. He then turned the knife on himself and slit his throat, police said.
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Lakisha Scriven was a caseworker for New York City’s child welfare agency, a job known for its grinding stress, high turnover and power to make anyone cynical. For four years, her days were spent investigating reports of abuse and neglect, calming angry parents, testifying before judges and, most painfully, removing children from their homes.
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