Kypselis case: How a fragmented protection system left children exposed
Warnings, reports and prosecutorial orders proved insufficient to protect children in Kypseli. Experts tell Ta Nea about institutional fragmentation and the absence of a unified protocol.
Kypseli: Signs were there — the protection system did not respond in time
Behind the closed doors of the house in Kypseli, the indications were present from early on. Reports had been filed, files had been opened at social services, prosecutorial orders had been issued, the children had been hospitalised repeatedly, and they were systematically absent from school. All together they formed a puzzle that would hardly have gone unnoticed. Yet none of these pieces triggered a timely and effective protection mechanism for the three children and the infant who lost his life.
According to Ta Nea, the case does not simply reveal a family tragedy. It exposes the structural weaknesses of a system that has services, responsibilities and institutional tools, yet continues to falter in practice. It exposes how easily a child can be lost within the cracks of a fragmented system, when no one has the full picture, no one bears overall responsibility and no one is obliged to join the pieces together.
Seven networks, no unified supervision
Georgios Nikolaidis, psychiatrist and director at the Department of Mental Health and Social Welfare of the Institute of Child Health, emphasised to Ta Nea that at the heart of the problem lies administrative fragmentation. "Specifically, we have seven different social welfare service networks from different ministries, which have different responsibilities, different management models and different ways of working. And all of them are understaffed, with two-thirds of staff being contract workers, so there is also a constantly changing workforce."
The social services of municipalities, regions, the General Secretariat of Social Welfare, the child protection company of the Justice Ministry, the Health Ministry and the education sector operate in parallel, without a unified line of action. The result, as Mr Nikolaidis explains, is that "everyone focuses on the small piece that corresponds to their responsibility and ultimately the person with the problem is 'lost'."
Protocol from 2023 remains on paper
For child protection to function effectively, Nikolaidis emphasises, a coherent network of services with clear responsibilities and interdisciplinary cooperation is required. "There is a need for interdisciplinary cross-sectoral cooperation, so that the prosecutor, the police officer, the social worker, the child psychiatrist, the paediatrician and the teacher can work together. In Greece, we have a very weak tradition of interdisciplinary cross-sectoral cooperation."
The Institute of Child Health has produced relevant protocols. In July 2023, within the framework of institutional regulation by Government Gazette, a unified national protocol was completed for dealing with cases of child sexual abuse, with clear steps for each service involved. "We submitted it in July 2023, and it has not been enacted. It is still on paper. There is generally no unified protocol for any kind of child abuse or neglect in Greece," Mr Nikolaidis stated.
He emphasised that the children from Kypseli are currently hospitalised, with no one in charge of overseeing what will happen next. "We are talking about a tragic system deficit. This does not happen anywhere else in the rest of the geographical European continent, as a child would go to a foster family within the framework of professional emergency foster care."
Staff shortages in the Juvenile Prosecution Service as well
Lawyer and criminology doctorate holder Panagiotis Papaioannou emphasised to Ta Nea that the Kypseli case dramatically exposed the absence of substantial coordination between critical services, including the Juvenile Prosecution Service, which operate in parallel with serious staff shortages.
"When in a society three people are needed to do three jobs, and in the end there is only one, the work will not be done properly either. It is necessary to strengthen the frontlines of all services with more and better trained and experienced staff," Mr Papaioannou stated.
The critical question posed by both experts remains unanswered: how many warnings must be recorded and how many files must be opened before someone takes full responsibility for a child's safety? In the Kypseli case, all the pieces were visible — but no one joined them together in time.
Source: Ta Nea