NEW YORK >> A New York City child welfare supervisor charged in connection with the death of a starved and beaten 4-year-old girl says she told her superiors the caseworker couldn’t handle his workload.

In an interview with The Wall Street Journal, Chereece Bell says she had asked her bosses to transfer caseworker Damon Adams out of her Brooklyn unit three months before Marchella Brett-Pierce died. Adams is also charged in connection with the girl’s September death.

Bell says she and her bosses also discussed taking Adams’ cases away from him but that didn’t happen.

Adams’ lawyer tells the Journal he can’t confirm that.

The Administration for Children’s Services workers pleaded not guilty last week to criminally negligent homicide and other charges.

The Journal says the agency declined to comment.