BAKERSFIELD, Calif. (KGET) — A judge has granted a motion brought by four defendants and dismissed them from a federal lawsuit filed in connection with the disappearance of Orrin and Orson West.
U.S. District Judge John A. Mendez last week dismissed Kern County Human Services, its former director, Dena Murphy, social worker Anna Zavala-Garza and Kim Johnson, director of the state Department of Social Services, from the lawsuit filed by Ryan Dean and Dana Moorer, the boys’ biological mother and grandmother.
Mendez found the statute of limitations had passed and that Dean and Moorer’s attorneys failed “to provide any factual specificity of how each (defendant) contributed to the alleged abuses,” according to the ruling filed last week.
The judge also stayed the case against against the remaining defendants, Trezell and Jacqueline West, the boys’ adoptive parents, for 120 days pending their sentencing. Accused of killing the boys, the couple was convicted of charges including second-degree murder and child cruelty and is scheduled for sentencing next month.
The suit sought damages in an amount of $100 million for alleged civil rights violations and wrongful death, arguing Orrin and Orson were unlawfully removed from Dean and placed in danger by allowing the Wests to adopt them.
In 2016, Dean was suspected of child abuse after she took Orrin to Memorial Hospital for a broken leg. According to the suit, Dean filed reunification requests and completed parenting classes to regain custody but had no luck. In 2017, she gave birth to Orson only to have him removed a week later.
In late 2018, both boys were removed from a foster home and placed with the Wests. Afterward, Dean noticed during visits that her children seemed scared and were losing weight and Orson had scratches on his face, the suit says.
The Wests reported the boys missing in December 2020, but at trial prosecutors said the boys died three months earlier.
