BOSTON (AP) – The head of the state Department of Social Services fiercely defended the agency’s actions in the case of an 11-year-old girl allegedly beaten into a coma, saying every health professional involved believed the girl was injuring herself.

DSS Commissioner Harry Spence said Friday the agency did nothing wrong before Haleigh Poutre was hospitalized in September. Haleigh’s brain stem was badly damaged, allegedly after severe abuse by her adopted mother and stepfather.

“It seemed this was a clear case of severe self injury by the child,” Spence said. “Haleigh consistently said I injure myself.’ Again and again, she would claim self-injury.”

Haleigh had been on life-support since her hospitalization. This week, the state’s highest court gave DSS the right to remove the child from life support.

DSS officials said earlier this week that Haleigh was removed from a ventilator and was breathing on her own. Spence said Friday he could not discuss Haleigh’s medical condition, but said the state now has no immediate plans to remove her life support.

Spence said the agency didn’t think Haleigh’s parents, Holli and Jason Strickland, were beating her until she was hospitalized.

He said the agency wanted her removed from the home and taken to a residential treatment center because the couple seemed incapable of handling her apparent problem of self-abuse.

Spence said DSS first became aware that Haleigh was being hurt in early 2003, when the department received an anonymous call alleging that Haleigh might have been abused.

After investigating that report and several others during the following two years, Spence said DSS and Haleigh’s doctors concluded the girl was hurting herself. He said social workers had interviewed teachers, family members and Haleigh and found no inconsistencies in the stories of self-abuse.

“All through the entire period, every expert – medical and clinical – believed the circumstances were the circumstances of a self-injurious child with a mother deeply involved in trying to resolve the problem.”

Spence said that Haleigh’s doctors insisted she was making improvements and should remain at home with the Stricklands in Westfield, but DSS officials wanted Haleigh placed in a residential treatment facility where she would receive more constant attention.

He said Haleigh spent about a month attending day-long sessions at a psychiatric hospital between May and June of last year.

Despite reports of her improvements, the DSS still “decided Haleigh should be removed from the household,” Spence said.

He said that the agency felt Holli Strickland “was not able in fact to protect her from the injuries she was doing to herself.”

Spence said DSS officials convinced Holli Strickland to place Haleigh in a residential treatment facility. A week before Haleigh was brought to the hospital in a coma, Strickland visited a facility with DSS workers, Spence said.

While Spence said his department handled Haleigh’s case properly and did not blame her doctors for their disagreement in how the girl should be treated, Gov. Mitt Romney said: “Clearly there were mistakes made with respect to the events that occurred prior to Haleigh Poutre’s hospitalization.”

Holli Strickland was charged with beating Haleigh after the girl was hospitalized, but died about two weeks later along with her grandmother in what authorities say was either a murder-suicide or double-suicide.

Haleigh’s stepfather, Jason Strickland, was also charged with assault and could face a murder charge if she dies.

DSS wanted to remove Haleigh’s ventilator and feeding tube after two doctors said she was in a permanent vegetative state. The agency was granted permission by a Juvenile Court judge to terminate the life support about three weeks after she was hospitalized.

Jason Strickland had appealed that decision to the state’s Supreme Judicial Court, which ruled he has no say in her medical care.

One of Strickland’s lawyers, John Egan, criticized DSS for moving too quickly in wanting to remove Haleigh from life support.

“It looks as if once again the child is being pushed aside while the agency rushes to defend itself,” Egan said. “I wish someone would take some time to defend this child and devote some energy to the medical options available to her.”

Spence said he would “like to draw in additional medical input.”

Because the court documents in the case have been sealed, Egan could not say whether he filed any motions to force DSS to get more opinions on Haleigh’s condition.

“I cannot speak specifically to this case,” Egan said. “But I can assure you that is my practice in any case involving a serious medical situation.”

AP-ES-01-20-06 1850EST