Posted on 09/16/2024 2:02:04 PM PDT by xxqqzz
ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. (AP) — A jury has awarded $485 million in damages in a civil case brought on behalf of an 8-year-old girl who was repeatedly sexually assaulted in a New Mexico foster care program.
The verdict came late Friday after Rio Arriba County jurors heard nearly two weeks of testimony that focused in part on allegations of corporate negligence.
The program allegedly placed the girl in the home of a foster parent despite knowing that he had been accused of sexual assault, according to the lawsuit, which was filed in 2019. It was one of more than a half-dozen cases arising from sexual assaults of children in the program.
Clarence Garcia, 66, pleaded guilty in January to seven counts of criminal sexual contact with a minor and was sentenced to up to 20 years of probation. Court records show Garcia was accused of sexually abusing six children under his care over six years.
(Excerpt) Read more at usnews.com ...
No doubt a monetary settlement was indicated here. But $485 million?
Half a billion seems like a lot to me too. Rio Arriba county in NM is like Mississippi. A plaintiff attorney heaven. A corrupt grifting county.
Who dreams up this crap? Why not make it $50 trillion?
"corporate negligence"
I'll bet some big corporate insurance policy is involved and we're all going to pay for this in our insurance premiums.
Why not a billion?
Probation? I understand prosecutors also want to avoid trials, but some crimes need to be prosecuted to the maximum.
As usual J.Q. Public pays the bill. Was the lawyers percentage anything like the “Tobacco Case”?
If it’s the standard third, then $160 million plus change.
Hanging would be the appropriate sentence here.
Prayers for those children.
It's a certainty they are all liberal Rats, too.
Of course compensate the victims, but do it from the personal retirement funds of the bureaucrats and judges who let this happen.
Judges and bureaucrats right now, as is is, have NO skin in the game. They have NO peer pressure from the legal profession to act responsibly. They all need to suffer.
I have friends who did foster care for a while.
They said that any child in the system for two years or more was guaranteed to have been sexually abused at some time.
It is not negligence to place a young child in the care of a pedophile
It is callous disregard for the welfare of a child. They placed a child in a situation where she was guaranteed to be sexually tortured.
These public servants should be fired, lose their pensions and never again be able to hold a position in any government job.
They place this girl in the custody of this pedophile just to get her off their books.
It was bad he had been accused of molesting children multiple times, but they kept sending children to him anyway. Then they shredded documents.
The won’t collect the full $485 million, since like $80 million was against the pedophile who probably can’t pay.
Yeah, in counties like that, you have poor jurors who will make the corporations pay and they probably give the judge etc. a cut not to reduce the award, etc.
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