Last Edited: Tuesday, 12 Sep 2006, 7:39 PM CDT

Child Protective Services admits it knew very little about Beverly Latimer, the Coriscana foster mother who is accused of beating Christian Nieto to death on September 4.

No one at Mesa Family Services in Addison wanted to about talk about her. CPS says Mesa is the family placement agency that hired Latimer as a foster parent for the state.

"Right now they are on probation," said CPS spokesperson Marissa Gonzales. "We are not placing children with them right now because we want to make sure they are doing something to provide a safe place for our children."

Gonzales also told FOX 4 that Mesa Family Services was already under microscope. The Texas Department of Family and Protective Services sent Mesa a twelve-page probation letter, documenting close to 200 violations in just over a year.

Numerous times the agency is told:

• "Physical punishment may not be used"
• "Children may not be abused or neglected" "Children should not be subjected to harsh, cruel, unusual or humiliating behavior"

Before Christian Nieto died in Beverly Latimer's home, she had been cited three times for allegedly abusing three other foster children in her care.

"How many times do you need, before you pull their license?" fox 4's Rebecca Aguilar asked CPS.

"There's not a set number of things that accumulate [before] there needs to be a corrective action," Gonzales replied.

Jessica Nieto knows anything now is too late for her dead baby.

"Nothing can bring Christian back," she told FOX 4. "But if it saves any other child to make people aware, that's important to us."

Back at mesa family services, FOX 4 got nowhere on the phone with the worker who refused to identify herself, then hung up. CPS says for now everyone is to blame for Christian Nieto's death.

http://www.myfoxdfw.com/myfox/pages/ContentDetail?contentId=866225