Defendants Seek To Be Dismissed From Pierceton Woods Lawsuit
Defendants Seek To Be Dismissed From Pierceton Woods Lawsuit
Posted
Amanda Bridgman-
Defendants Seek To Be Dismissed From Pierceton Woods LawsuitThe civil lawsuit between a former student at Pierceton Woods Academy and the school’s administrators is heating up as defendants are asking to be dismissed from the suit.
The lawsuit was filed by the father of a juvenile who went there and reported he’d been the victim of sexual assault while under their supervision.
Pierceton Woods Academy, 27 Pequignot Drive, is a residential placement facility for boys in grades 7 through 12 in need of services. It is a private Christian alternative school with a teacher-to-student ratio of 1:7, according to privateschoolreview.com. The facility is managed by LifeLine Youth & Family Services Inc. and Lasting Change Inc.
The suit is against Lasting Change Inc.; LifeLine Youth & Family Services Inc.; Darby Ellis Perry, an employee there; Brian Perry, an employee; Joe Gough, vice president of residential services; and Mark Terrell, CEO.
According to court papers, the lawsuit alleges Darby engaged in a pattern of conduct over multiple years where she methodically seduced multiple children to engage in sexual acts with her on the grounds of the academy and at local venues during unsupervised outings with the minors. The lawsuit alleges the outings were permitted by LifeLine and Lasting Change, “in conformity with the institution’s lax policies.”
The suit claims both LifeLine and Lasting Change were negligent and owed a duty to prevent sexual assault against the residents under its charge.
The suit claims that in 2017 Darby was the suspect of an investigation with law enforcement involving accusations of sexual assault on another resident at the academy. Other staff members there also told of Darby’s inappropriate activities, the suit alleges.
The lawsuit further says that LifeLine and Lasting Change took no preventative actions in response to the 2017 accusations and investigations against Darby but rather promoted her and kept their “deficient policies in place to protect residents from sexual assault by its employees and agents.”
The lawsuit goes on to say that Lasting Change and LifeLine allowed Darby to take minor residents to areas of the campus that are not recorded or visible to third parties and on unsupervised outings off premises. The company allegedly did not require more than one staff member to go on the off-premise outings as a cost-saving measure, according to the lawsuit.
The suit alleges all defendants engaged in a conspiracy to “negligently operate the Pierceton Woods facility in disregard for the well-being of its residents, namely failing to protect them from sexual assault,” even after the situation was investigated by the Indiana Department of Child Services and Pierceton Police Department, who both allegedly determined the offenses have occurred, according to the suit. The suit further claims that Darby continued to have access to the building where residents lived during the investigation.
In December, Bryan Perry, Gough and Terrell asked the court to dismiss them from the lawsuit, citing they did not conspire by the legal definition to be held liable.
“The pleading lacks any allegation constituting even a single independent fact of concurrence or of a concerted sentiment that the three individuals, all of whom occupied far different roles and had drastically disparate levels of authority at the company, intended to accomplish to cause harm to this plaintiff. This illustrates a broader point as well – the crux of the allegations contained in the pleading fail to constitute averments framing a claim that this plaintiff has standing to bring. How does ‘unfettered access to residents’ cause damage to this plaintiff, and which ‘multiple allegations of sexual assault’ against Ms. Darby damaged this plaintiff? The pleading does not tell us this and it is fatally deficient where it fails to do so. But more importantly, for the purposes of dismissal, the allegations styled as conspiracy claims against the Lifeline Employees are merely trumped-up negligence claims that are duplicative of the same claims brought against their employer earlier in the same pleading.
“One need look no further than the pleading itself, which closes each conspiracy-styled count with the following language: ‘All of these wrongful actions herein were made in furtherance of the conspiracy to negligently operate the Pierceton Woods Facility ...’ Indeed, the pleading casts a wide net of alleged wrongdoing by Lifeline – again, it only scantly references actions that relate directly to the plaintiff – which all boil down to a failure to act. Individuals cannot conspire with each other to act negligently. ... There is no civil cause of action for conspiracy in Indiana and the allegations contained in the pleading fail to state any claim that the Lifeline Employees acted together to commit a recognizable tort.
“At their heart, the claims against the Lifeline Employees, styled as Counts V, VI and VII, are merely duplicative of the negligence claims brought against their employer, and are designed to harass these individuals because no separate, additional claim for relief against the individuals can conceivably be fashioned beyond what is alleged against their employer. Therefore, the conspiracy claims should be dismissed,” attorneys for the men wrote in their argument.
Travis J. McConnell, the attorney representing the father in the case, asked the court to deny the dismissal and said discovery for the case has not yet commenced, which may provide additional facts that would further support the conspiracy claims. McConnell also reports that a half dozen witnesses are set to give depositions Feb. 3 in the matter.
According to court records, a phone conference with all attorneys is scheduled to take place at 2:30 p.m. Thursday to discuss the dismissal.
