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BALTIMORE — Dozens of girls filed lawsuits on Tuesday accusing a Baltimore County facility for troubled youth of sexual abuse and blaming Maryland state businesses for failing to guard them.
In complete, 39 ladies joined the lawsuit in opposition to the businesses that contracted Good Shepherd Providers, a facility ran by a Catholic non secular order that operated in Halethorpe, Maryland, for almost 50 years however is now shuttered and deserted.
One of many attorneys stated he expects the variety of plaintiffs to triple.
The power was the location the place an opportunity at reform changed into trauma for dozens of girls, in line with the lawsuits.
“It is extraordinarily emotional,” stated lawyer Frank Natale, who’s representing 26 of the 39 ladies who declare they have been sexually abused at Good Shepherd Providers.
This system was based in 1864 by the Sisters of the Good Shepherd, a Catholic non secular order targeted on serving to ladies and women.
Natale’s lawsuit is one in every of two filed Tuesday below the Baby Victims Act that alleges the Maryland Division of Juvenile Providers and the Division of Human Providers despatched kids to this system, and together with the Maryland Division of Well being, failed to watch it as kids have been allegedly sexually abused by guards, counselors and lecturers, in addition to nuns and monks.
The lawsuit accuses employees members of bribing and grooming kids earlier than abusing them. Some abusers allegedly drugged their victims and advised them to not inform, in line with the lawsuit.
“The state was sending kids to this facility,” Natale stated. “They put warnings out about this facility, but they nonetheless allowed kids to go there.”
That is simply the newest spherical of allegations of abuse in opposition to juvenile services in Maryland.
In October 2023, CBS Information spoke with Claudia McLain, who at 13 was despatched to the Charles H. Hickey Faculty, a state-run juvenile detention heart in Baltimore, for stealing bikes and different minor offenses. She stated she was abused on the college repeatedly.
“I used to be in my room, it was night time. The door opened, [and] your physique clenched as a result of you do not know what the f*** is happening. You[‘re] so shocked,” McLain defined in an interview with CBS Information. “[A] quick time later [the assaults] occurred once more, then once more, then once more.”
McLain is one in every of a dozen individuals who have reported sexual abuse whereas within the care of Maryland’s juvenile detention facilities in recent times.
“I used to listen to the keys flip at night time, however I by no means knew what it was till it occurred personally to me,” McLain stated.
Her story is echoed by those that stepped ahead on Tuesday claiming these entrusted to guard them at juvenile services did the other.
In a joint assertion, spokespersons for DJS, DHS and the Maryland Division of Well being stated that they had not been served with the lawsuits but, however that they took the allegations of sexual abuse of youngsters within the state’s care critically.
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