A facility tasked with treating children with mental health issues and disabilities in the Pittsburgh area is facing five new sexual abuse lawsuits.
Amy Mathieu with HKM Employment Attorneys said negligence has been occurring for decades at Southwood Psychiatric Hospital in Upper St. Clair. She said that is why the center is facing five more lawsuits, on top of the three it has already been litigating with Kline and Spector, in the span of a year.
“The families want answers as to why this happened, how this happened, and how Southwood let it happen over and over and over again,” Mathieu said.
All eight cases allege years of physical and sexual abuse of patients at the hands of other patients and staff members.
“The eight cases altogether speak to a systemic problem at Southwood of not supervising the patients in a way that promotes safety,” Mathieu said.
The newest cases involve children who ranged in age from 10 to 17, with the lawsuits claiming much of the abuse happened at night, with vast understaffing.
“There’s no possible way that one employee could be responsible for 22 children in shared rooms without any supervision outside of that one staff member,” Mathieu said.
One lawsuit describes that in one instance, “[a staff member] forcefully removed plaintiff’s pants, removed his own pants, physically restrained plaintiff, and [raped] plaintiff…”
Another alleges that a child’s guardians, alerted to abuse by the police, were prevented by Southwood from visiting their child.
“Anyone who’s presenting for a psychiatric hospital is not only in a desperate state, but a state where they really need care, and they need supervision and treatment, and that’s exactly what this institution is supposed to provide, and it’s exactly what they are not providing to these kids,” Mathieu said.
In many cases, Mathieu said these children needed to go to another facility for treatment of the abuse they received at Southwood, abuse she said could be stopped with better background checks, staffing numbers, single bedrooms, and supervision.
“If they are able to keep kids safe, then I think it is a public service that we need in our community, but not at the peril of our children suffering abuse while they’re there,” Mathieu said.
Mathieu believes more victims are out there and hopes these plaintiffs coming forward will inspire others to do the same.
KDKA reached out to Southwood for comment. In a statement, a spokesperson said, in part, that “We will not comment on threatened litigation. Any claims will be addressed through the appropriate legal process.”
More from CBS News