Abuse can affect children and teens long after adolescence ends. Its effects can last a lifetime.
Survivors of abuse at Hartgrove Hospital in Illinois may have the grounds to pursue a claim against the facility where the abuse occurred. Through this legal action, survivors can get justice for the crimes against them and access to the resources that can help them cope with the trauma they have been through.
Pursuing a lawsuit doesn’t have to be complicated. Our compassionate child abuse lawsuit attorneys offer free, confidential consultations and handle every aspect of a legal claim. To have your case reviewed at no cost, call (866) 778-5500 today or complete our online form.
The psychiatric hospital known as Hartgrove Hospital in Chicago, IL, was “a dangerous place for children,” according to a United Press International, Inc. article archived by the Unsilenced Project, Inc. This nonprofit public benefit corporation that fights against institutionalized abuse in the “troubled teen industry” maintains a comprehensive archive of news articles and other documents pertaining to abuse at Hartgrove Hospital dating back to 2009.
Numerous violations were reported at Hartgrove Hospital as far back as 2009. March 2009 brought the revelation that Hartgrove Hospital had exceeded the allowed number of patients on 52 occasions in just three months. The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services cited the facility for this violation, UHS Behind Closed Doors reported. In August 2011, a whistleblower who was hired in October 2009 came forward to claim that the facility was again admitting more patients than permitted by law, another UHS Behind Closed Doors article reported.
The facility and its parent company Universal Health Services also became the subject of federal investigations related to fraudulent billing (per the Philadelphia Inquirer). Universal Health Services ultimately paid $127 million dollars to settle the civil investigation that pertained to 30 of the company’s facilities, including Hartgrove Hospital, The Philadelphia Inquirer reported.
We are here to help.
The details of the abuse that allegedly occurred at Hartgrove Hospital came to light in 2011. The September 2011 United Press International, Inc. article noted that the psychiatric hospital was an “understaffed and overcrowded facility.”
In what the Chicago Tribune called “a damning new report” by child welfare experts, “an environment of chaos, physical attacks and sexual assaults that regularly puts its young patients in harm’s way” was revealed at Hartgrove Hospital.
According to the Chicago Tribune article, attacks and assaults against child and teen patients were perpetrated by both other patients and hospital staff. Between December 2010 and mid-June 2011, 100 “violent incidents” occurred at Hartgrove Hospital, the report documented.
The report ultimately concluded that Hartgrove Hospital demonstrated a “consistent pattern of unacceptable risks of harm” and that “hospital-induced trauma” prevented patients at the facility from getting the mental health treatment they needed, as the Chicago Tribune reported.
The findings of this report prompted the Illinois Department of Children & Family Services to stop sending wards of the state to the facility, the Chicago Tribune reported. Yet more allegations of abuse would continue to come out in the years that followed.
A lawsuit alleging abuse at Hartgrove Hospital made headlines in October 2011. This lawsuit arose out of “physical abuse and negligent care” a patient sustained at the facility back in October 2009. According to the UHS Behind Closed Doors article, the complaint listed Hartgrove Hospital’s failure to hire competent staff, train staff, and supervise staff as the causes of the abuse. The lawsuit referenced the plaintiff’s “severe and permanent injuries” and subsequent need for “extensive psychotherapeutic care and treatment.”
In addition to other violations involving restraint orders, patients’ medical records, and citations for deficiencies related to safety code standards, Hartgrove Hospital would see further allegations of abuse. The plaintiff in a lawsuit filed in March 2015 alleged that the facility allowed her to be sexually assaulted by an older roommate during a 10-day state in March 2014, according to the Chicago Tribune. Another complaint filed in June 2017 alleged that Hartgrove Hospital failed to prevent sexual assault perpetrated by a staff member, according to the Cook County Record. This lawsuit stated that the plaintiff “sustained serious physical injuries” as a result of the assault.
Despite “being fearful for their safety” in the facility (as NBC News reported), patients weren’t permitted to leave Hartgrove Hospital. In fact, patients who were sent to the facility as state wards were sometimes held there against their will for months longer than the planned end of their stay in the psychiatric facility, CBS News reported in 2020. It’s no wonder patients locked up in the hospital “felt like a prisoner,” as Chicago news source WTTW reported in 2018.
Know your legal options.
If these stories of abuse, assaults, and fearing for your safety at Hartgrove Hospital sound familiar, you should know that you can hold the facility accountable for what you’ve been through.
Many survivors of abuse at facilities like Hartgrove Hospital don’t realize they could pursue a claim. The perpetrators of the abuse (whether staff or fellow residents) are certainly to blame for their actions, but a facility that fails to provide a safe environment for its residential patients also shares responsibility for the abuse.
Filing a lawsuit against Hartgrove Hospital can help you hold the facility and its employees and management responsible for its failures while securing you financial compensation. For many survivors of abuse, this compensation is critical to getting the care needed to treat the physical injuries and the mental and emotional trauma caused by abuse.
If you’re going to sue Hartgrove Hospital for abuse, you’re going to need help.
Our experienced hospital abuse lawsuit attorneys have a long history of helping people hold accountable the facilities that caused them harm. We handle claims like yours with the utmost compassion and professionalism, so you can feel safe talking about your experience and count on us to be your advocate throughout the legal process.
We handle claims on a no-win, no-fee basis, so there’s no risk in moving forward with a claim. When you hire us to represent you, we handle every aspect of the claim for you.
For a free, confidential case review, call (866) 778-5500 or contact us online today.
