What did the Administration for Children’s Services know about Francis Cabello, the mentally ill mother who murdered her 5-year-old daughter last week?

Because Gov. Hochul refuses to hold ACS accountable, the public may never find out why no one rescued little Fabiana, despite clear signs her mother was unstable.

On Wednesday afternoon, Francis took Fabiana upstairs in their Queens home and asphyxiated her. The 32-year-old then called 911 and told the dispatcher, “I killed my daughter.” Since Cabello’s arrest on murder charges, information has trickled out suggesting that this was yet another preventable tragedy.

Cabello’s history of mental illness seems to be long and widely known. In addition to her months’ long stay in a psychiatric facility earlier this year, a neighbor whose grandchildren played with Fabiana said she noticed a significant change in the mother’s behavior.

“She used to come around to take her daughter to school — and then, from one moment to another, she stopped coming out,” he said. The neighbor noticed she was no longer leaving the house and not taking her child to school either. Francis also told her father that she was no longer taking her medication per doctor’s orders. But he says he didn’t believe her and also thought she was acting strange

None of this is particularly surprising. Serious mental illness is often a factor in these tragedies. At Lives Cut Short, a joint project with UNC Chapel Hill and the American Enterprise Institute to document child maltreatment fatalities, my colleagues and I have compiled more than 5,000 records from around the country between 2022 and 2026. These represent only a fraction of the victims in that time period. But 830 of the cases involved a parent’s mental illness. In New York, there were 151.

Anyone familiar with these cases would have questions about Cabello: Did her neighbors or her father report their concerns to the Administration for Children’s Services? And what about the school? Was Fabiana absent for a long period of time? Did her teachers call ACS? Did the NYPD notify ACS when they were called to Cabello’s home? Who cared for the child when the mother was hospitalized? Did her doctors know she was the sole caregiver for a young child? Did they express concerns to ACS about sending Francis home? Did ACS investigate any reports? What did they find out? Was there a plan in place for ensuring the child’s safety?

ACS won’t say.

“Our top priority is the safety and well-being of New York City children,” an ACS spokesperson said.

But how can we know if ACS is doing a good job with that priority if the agency won’t answer any questions? How did Fabiana fall through the cracks?

Unfortunately, the Department of Investigation won’t be able to get any answers either. The watchdog agency has been prevented from accessing records of Administration from Children’s Services concerning child fatalities.

DOI’s leaders have complained that the state Office of Children’s and Family Services prevented it from investigating 17 of 18 child fatalities last year in which there was previous ACS involvement. The records can legally be withheld if ACS deems reports about a family “unfounded.” But this is absurd. What if the investigations were unfounded because of incompetence on the part of ACS?

Understanding the circumstances of these fatalities and mistakes made by ACS along the way is crucial to improving our child welfare system and saving other children from this fate.

In June, New York’s legislature passed a bill that would end this insanity. It would require ACS to hand over all child fatality records with ACS involvement.

But Governor Hochul has failed to sign it. She’s got until the end of the year. What is stopping her from demanding greater transparency in these tragedies? No one knows, but this strategy of circling the wagons needs to end. We owe it to Fabiana and all the other children killed by abusive parents to find out the truth.

Naomi Schaefer Riley is a senior fellow at the American Enterprise Institute.