Information That Might Help you obtain your CPS records

The information below might help you obtain your CPS records for a CLOSED case in Washington State.

I spoke to someone at the DSHS Administration in the state of Washington and asked how a person would obtain a copy of his or her records from a closed child abuse/neglect investigation.

This is what I was told...

1). Go in person to a local Washington state DHS Office and speak to someone in Children's Administration. You do not need to go to the same Washington state office that investigated you in the past.

2). Tell them you were investigated for neglect/abuse and you want to get a copy of your records from a closed case.

3) Fill out the form they will give you, and show your driver's license, or some other form of personal identification that they will accept.

You can call any office and they will email the form to you. However, you will still have to bring the form to a local office because you will have to show ID before they will accept your records request.

Once you have filled out the form and showed ID, the Children's Administration office will forward your request to The Office of Public Disclosure in Olympia Washington. That office in Olympia will then contact you.

The records can take some time to get (weeks), and I could not get a straight answer as to whether the Olympia office would charge you for the records or not. I am sure when the Olympia office contacts you, they will let you know.

To locate a Children's Administration Office near you...

1). Go to https://www.dshs.wa.gov/

2). Choose "Locate a Service Office" in the gray bar at the very bottom of the screen.

3). On the next page choose "Children's Administration (CA)". From there you can find any child welfare office in the state of Washington.

If would like to know if anyone has success with this or not.