Do you know how institutions can be liable for not protecting victims?
Sexual abuse lawsuits don’t just involve the person committing the crime. Oftentimes, organizations who allowed it to happen can also be held legally liable.
Let’s lay it all out:
Schools, churches, hospitals, youth organizations have a responsibility to keep others safe. When they don’t take action… victims pay the price.
Sexual abuse continues to be a major problem across the country. In fact, data from the U.S. Sentencing Commission shows offenses rose by 62.5% from last year.
Survivors may be able to receive compensation through what’s called institutional negligence. If you or someone you know are filing an institutional abuse lawsuit, organizations such as Kayla’s Survivors can help guide survivors through the legal process and connect them to helpful resources.
Table of Contents
You’ll Learn:
- What Is Institutional Negligence?
- How Duty of Care Legally Applies to Organizations
- Common Types of Institutional Failures
- Proving Negligence During Sexual Abuse Lawsuits
- Recent Landmark Verdicts and Settlements
What Is Institutional Negligence?
Institutional negligence is when an organization fails to do what’s reasonably necessary to protect others from harm.
Think about it like this:
Whenever someone walks into a school, hospital, or youth group… they should feel safe. That is the institution’s duty to those they serve.
Providing that safety normally includes:
- Properly screening employees and volunteers
- Supervising staff and monitoring behavior
- Responding immediately to concerns or warning signs
- Reporting suspected abuse to law enforcement
When institutions fail to do these things, they can be held legally liable for injuries that occur as a result. That’s institutional negligence and the premise of most institutional abuse lawsuits today.
How Duty of Care Legally Applies to Organizations
Any organization that works with children, patients, or at-risk groups has what’s called a “duty of care.”
Essentially, this is the legal responsibility they have to protect people from being injured.
Let’s be clear…
It’s not enough for these institutions to simply have policies on paper. They actually have to enforce them.
The courts will look at if an institution knew about potential abuse or should have known about it. If so, they’ll examine what action (if any) was taken to prevent it.
That duty of care extends to:
- Public & private schools
- Religious organizations & churches
- Youth sports teams & camps
- Hospitals & healthcare facilities
- Foster homes & care systems
- Juvenile detention centers
When an institution violates that duty, victims can pursue monetary damages through civil lawsuits. Proving negligence was the cause of how they hold these organizations accountable.
Common Types of Institutional Failures
In what ways can institutions be considered negligent?
Here are several patterns that consistently show up in sexual abuse cases:
Failure to properly screen employees: Many abusers have previous records of complaints or even criminal history. If an institution didn’t run a background check, they failed to do their due diligence.
Ignoring red flags or warning signs: This is common in many cases. Staff members would come forward about another employee’s suspicious behavior. Instead of investigating, the institution did nothing. Sometimes they’d even intimidate victims or witnesses into staying quiet.
Covering up allegations of abuse: Some would rather ruin a victims life than face public scandal. These organizations quietly move abusers to another branch, destroy evidence, and even threaten victims into silence.
Failing to properly supervise staff: If employees are left alone with at-risk individuals without proper oversight, abuse can happen. Institutions need to have checks and balances in place to prevent these situations.
Any one of these failures can allow predators to thrive for years…. even decades.
Proving Negligence During Sexual Abuse Lawsuits
Survivors looking to file an institutional abuse lawsuit must prove four things.
First, the organization owed them a duty. If someone was attending a school or treatment facility, that institution automatically has that duty.
Second, the organization breached that duty. They may have ignored complaints, didn’t properly background check employees, or knowingly kept a criminal on staff.
Third, the breach caused the abuse to happen. If the institution did their job, the abuse would never have occurred.
Lastly, victims suffered damages as a result of being abused. This can include:
- Physical & emotional injuries
- Cost of therapy or treatment
- Lost wages or earning capacity
- Pain & suffering
Here’s something many people don’t know…
Victims do not have to prove that the institution purposely allowed the abuse to happen. They only need to show that the organization wasn’t careful in upholding their duty. That is significantly easier than proving malicious intent.
Recent Landmark Verdicts and Settlements
Large institutions have been forced to pay millions (if not billions) in recent years.
In 2023, The Boy Scouts of America agreed to pay survivors $2.46 billion in settlements. Over 82,000 survivors stepped forward with allegations of being sexually abused as children. The lawsuit exposed how the organization covered up abuse for decades and allowed known predators to maintain leadership positions.
An Illinois jury awarded $535 MILLION against The Pavilion Behavioral Health System in March 2024. A 13-year-old patient was sexually assaulted by another patient. The jury found that the institution’s safety protocols and supervision were so inadequate, it was “grossly negligent.”
Later that same year, New Hampshire awarded a survivor $38 million after he was sexually assaulted at the Sununu Youth Services Center. The jury determined the state was negligent in failing to protect him from staff members with unchecked authority over teens.
Here’s the bottom line:
Institutions will no longer be able to hide behind insurance and asset protection laws. There will be serious financial consequences when they fail to do their job.
The Changing Laws
Many survivors were unable to file lawsuits against institutions years ago. By the time survivors were able to process what happened, the statute of limitations had expired.
Times are changing. 30 states across the country have extended or eliminated statutes of limitations for child sexual abuse cases according to ChildUSA. This allows survivors more time to take legal action against negligent institutions.
Bringing Everything Together
Here’s why institutional negligence matters in sexual abuse lawsuits:
When organizations work with at-risk groups, they owe those people a duty of care.
If they fail to uphold that duty through insufficient hiring practices, ignoring warning signs, lack of supervision, or coverups… they are negligent.
Negligence is the failure to provide others with a reasonable level of care.
Survivors can file lawsuits against institutions which allowed sexual abuse to happen through their negligence.
Over the last few years, courts have begun holding institutions accountable with record-breaking verdicts and settlements.
Laws are changing and giving survivors more time to file these kinds of lawsuits.
Institutions have a duty to protect people from being harmed. When they don’t, victims have a right to hold them accountable through civil lawsuits.
Understanding how institutional negligence affects sexual abuse lawsuits empowers survivors to take action.
Too many institutions got away with negligent behavior for too long. Survivors can finally seek the justice they deserve.
