Audit of the Disabled Persons Protection Commission (June 30, 2025)

This is a state performance audit of the Disabled Persons Protection Commission, the Massachusetts agency that investigates abuse involving adults with disabilities.

“In accordance with Section 12 of Chapter 11 of the Massachusetts General Laws, the Office of the State Auditor has conducted a performance audit of the Disabled Persons Protection Commission (DPPC) for the period July 1, 2021 through June 30, 2023.”

Auditors checked whether DPPC tracked investigation deadlines, monitored protective service plans, and kept its abuser registry accurate and up to date.

“The purpose of our audit was to determine the following:”

DPPC handles reports of possible abuse of adults with disabilities, so delays or weak follow-up could affect people who may need protection.

“The agency received 13,310 and 16,043 abuse reports requiring investigation in fiscal years 2022 and 2023, respectively.”

For residents, this audit gives some assurance that the state reviewed whether abuse investigations, protection plans, and the abuser registry were being handled properly.

“For this objective, we found no significant issues during our testing.”

DPPC generally met the audit objectives, but the auditor still wants more timely filing of investigation reports.

“However, during the course of our audit, we identified issues with the filing of investigative reports.”

DPPC is expected to keep working with partner agencies and its own investigators to reduce late filings and meet required deadlines.

“DPPC should continue to work with the Department of Developmental Services, the Department of Mental Health, the Massachusetts Rehabilitation Commission, and its internal APS investigators to meet required timeframes by filing IRs for nonemergency cases within 10 calendar days, Investigation Reports within 45 calendar days, and RI Reports within 60 business days.”

The audit shows improvement from the prior audit because late reports now had documented reasons, but many reports still missed filing deadlines.

“Our previous audit report disclosed that 56% of late abuse investigations during the prior audit period did not have any documented reasons for delays, compared to our current audit, which revealed that all late Initial Responses (IRs), Investigation Reports, and Retaliation Investigation (RI) Reports had documented reasons for delays.”

An Initial Response is the early fact-gathering step in an abuse case; a Protective Service Plan is the plan for protective steps after substantiated abuse; the Registry of Abusive Care Providers is a confidential list used to help prevent certain abusers from working with people with intellectual or developmental disabilities.

“This report is composed of two parts: the first part is known as the Initial Response (IR) and the second part is known as the Investigation Report.”