Kansas City, Mo. ? The father of two girls allegedly abused by their mother and her boyfriend called the Missouri Division of Family Services’ child-abuse hot line about 40 times trying to help his children.

“I’ve been beside myself,” said the father, a 40-year-old Kansas City man who says he had an eight-year relationship with the girls’ mother, Theresa L. Smith, 35. “If DFS had acted the first time I called, my girls would be fine.”

The girls’ father says his first hot line calls were about educational neglect because his daughters were not attending school. Later calls involved abuse and sexual abuse, he said. At least two other people also made calls, he said.

Kansas City Police said Tuesday that 32 hot line calls were made between 1992 and 2001 while the girls lived in Jackson County. Division of Family Services officials would not confirm those numbers Tuesday but said they were looking into the agency’s handling of the case.

The father’s name is being withheld to protect his daughters, ages 11 and 9, because they share his surname.

The father said he thought that a Division of Family Services investigator ignored him because he was a convicted felon. His daughters did little to help investigators, he said, because they were afraid of being beaten if they told what happened.

Authorities allege the girls were sexually abused for five years by their mother’s live-in boyfriend, Kevin Donovan, and that their mother, Smith, told them not to tell.

The girls’ stories of sexual abuse eventually spilled out months after they entered foster care in Clay County in August 2001.

Donovan, 25, was charged last week with 17 counts, including forcible sodomy, rape and child abuse. He pleaded innocent Monday and remains in jail on $350,000 bond.

Smith of Independence was charged with sodomy and rape, though she is not accused of participating. She also is accused of letting the older girl ingest alcohol and marijuana and of allowing an unnamed registered sex offender to stay with the girls.

Smith surrendered to authorities Tuesday. She later pleaded innocent and was jailed on $350,000 bond.

The Division of Family Services has a panel studying “what has happened and what our involvement has been,” said Fred Simmens, who oversees children’s services for the agency in Jackson County.

Simmens said it was unclear as of Tuesday whether the Jackson County office ever obtained sufficient information to ask court permission to remove the children from their home.

The girls’ father is upset that police didn’t do more and that the Division of Family Services failed to act until the girls moved to Clay County.

“It’s a very sad deal,” he said. “They just blew me off like I was talking in the wind.”