The mother of a 5-year-old South Pasadena boy who was killed by his father is suing Los Angeles County, alleging the Department of Children and Family Services is partly to blame for her child’s death.

Ana Estevez’s Los Angeles Superior Court lawsuit, filed Monday, comes nearly a year after she publicly criticized the DCFS.

Aramazd Andressian Sr, who is accused of killing his 5-year-old son, at preliminary hearing on Tuesday, August 1, 2017 (Pool feed via KABC TV)

Ana Estevez, center, is comforted during a memorial for her son, 5-year-old Aramazd “Piqui” Andressian Jr., at the Los Angeles County Arboretum in Arcadia, Calif. July 17, 2017. Detectives allege Aramazd Andressian, Sr. killed the boy to get back at his estranged wife during their divorce. After nine weeks of searching, detectives found the child’s body at Cachuma Lake Recreation Area in Santa Barbara County, Calif. on June 30. (Photo by Leo Jarzomb, SGV Tribune/ SCNG)

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This undated photo posted on the South Pasadena Police Department’s Facebook page shows Aramazd Andressian, Jr., as they seek the public’s help in locating him. Authorities throughout Los Angeles County are searching for the 5-year-old, reported missing after paramedics found his father passed out in a park. Police in South Pasadena say the boy’s mother reported Saturday, April 22, 2017, that her estranged husband had failed to drop the boy off at a pre-arranged meeting place. (South Pasadena Police Department via AP)

South Pasadena honored Aramazd Andressian Jr., a slain 5-year old boy with memorial bench at Garfield Park in South Pasadena Monday, January 22, 2018.The bench was located on a walkway that leads to the park’s Children’s Memorial and Healing Garden located in the north section near Grevelia Street and Stratford Avenue. Ana Esteves, mother OF Aramazd Andressian Jr, is working to gather support passage of H. Con. Res. 72, legislation H.Con.Res.72 – Expressing the sense of Congress that child safety is the first priority of custody and visitation adjudications, and that State courts should improve adjudications of custody where family violence is alleged. There have been at least 623 children murdered since 2008.(Photo by Walt Mancini/Pasadena Star-News/SCNG)



“The system failed my son and it was this injustice that ultimately led to Piqui’s death,” Estevez told reporters last August outside the Alhambra Courthouse after her estranged husband, Aramazd Andressian Sr., was sentenced to 25 years to life in prison for killing “Piqui” Andressian Jr.

“The evil man that committed this heinous act will receive justice in this life and the next, I have no doubt about that,” she said. “However, true justice has yet to be served. The system that failed my son will be addressed and held accountable for their incompetent actions, their horrific and uninformed decision-making when presented with undeniable evidence and their belief that they can make decisions that destroy lives and not be held accountable for such injustices.”

She singled out DCFS social workers and a supervisor involved in the case, saying she believes they “are partially responsible for my son’s death.”

The lawsuit alleges negligence, wrongful death and violation of the state Penal Code. Estevez is suing on behalf of herself and her son as a survivorship action and as a wrongful death action for the benefit of his heirs.

A county representative did not immediately reply to an email request for comment.

Los Angeles County Sheriff’s detectives said that the boy was killed within an hour of arriving in Santa Barbara County in April 2017. His father drove the child to the Lake Cachuma area, then smothered him with his own clothes, detectives said. He then sat in the car with the boy’s body for eight hours before burying him, detectives said.

The couple were in the process of a divorce before their son was killed. The suit alleges the DCFS knew both that the boy was being abused by his father before the child’s death and that a video existed in which the boy stated that his father wanted to hurt Estevez “and send her to the hospital.”

The DCFS also was aware that the boy was afraid of his father and that sole custody needed to be granted to his mother to ensure his safety, the suit alleges.

Instead of taking action to protect the boy, the DCFS granted his father unmonitored partial physical custody of the child, putting him “in immediate danger,” the suit states.

“Ultimately, the actions of all the named defendants can be described as both gross negligence and a complete disregard of their legal duty to protect a 5-year-old from obvious and immediate physical harm,” the suit states.