Reporting Child Abuse - South Dakota

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South Dakota

 

Under South Dakota law, certain professionals (including doctors and health care professionals, mental health care professionals, social workers, parole officers, law enforcement officers, teachers and school officials, employees of a child advocacy organization or child welfare organization, and others) who know of or suspect child abuse are required to report that information by telephone or orally otherwise to the state attorney for the county where the child resides, to the department of social services or to local law enforcement.

Abuse is defined to include physical, mental, and sexual abuse and neglect.

To access the entire child abuse chapter in the official South Dakota Code online, follow:

http://legis.state.sd.us/statutes/DisplayStatute.aspx?Type=Statute&Statute=26-8A

Links to the specific sections summarized above, including definitions, of the official South Dakota Code online are available as follows:

http://legis.state.sd.us/statutes/DisplayStatute.aspx?Type=Statute&Statute=26-8A-3
http://legis.state.sd.us/statutes/DisplayStatute.aspx?Type=Statute&Statute=26-8A-2
http://legis.state.sd.us/statutes/DisplayStatute.aspx?Type=Statute&Statute=26-8A-8

For contact information for the local departments of social services, follow:

http://dss.sd.gov/cps/protective/reporting.asp