Former patient sues Olathe youth health facility, claiming negligence led to rape

Editors note: This story includes allegations of rape and sexual violence. If you or someone you know are in need of resources or support after experiencing sexual violence, the Metropolitan Organization to Counter Sexual Assault (MOCSA) has a 24-hour crisis hotline at 816-531-0233 in Missouri or 913-642-0233 in Kansas.

A Johnson County woman is suing a local residential treatment facility in federal court, alleging that its failure to appropriately train staff, supervise residents and uphold state regulations allowed her to be raped and sexually assaulted by male patients while receiving care there when she was a minor.

“Vulnerable children in residential care depend entirely on the adults around them to keep them safe,” Catherine Michael, an attorney for the woman’s family, said in a written statement. “When facilities fail to follow basic safety protocols and state regulations, or worse, work to obscure those failures, it is the residents who suffer the consequences. Accountability is the only path to meaningful change.”

KidsTLC Inc. is a mental health nonprofit organization in Olathe that runs a psychiatric residential facility for Kansas children and teens ages 6 to 18. The patient, referred to as Jane Doe in the lawsuit, was admitted to KidsTLC’s care when she was 15 in March 2022. Her multiple diagnoses made her more susceptible to sexual victimization, according to the lawsuit.

In addition to a lack of needed safety measures, Doe alleges that KidsTLC CEO Erin Dugan, Chief Clinical Program Officer John Laffoon, Advanced Practice Registered Nurse Lucinda Whitney and Director of Facility Operations Devin Burgan attempted to cover up or dismiss Doe’s reports of sexual assault, abuse and rape. She said in the filing that the clinic’s leaders did the same for other patients too.

“This case is not about a single isolated incident,” said Tammy Meyer, another attorney for the family. “This case represents KidsTLC’s systemic negligence.”

Attorneys representing KidsTLC could not be reached for comment before publication. KidsTLC could not be immediately reached for comment.

The allegations

According to the lawsuit, Doe needed clinical care for post traumatic stress disorder, major depressive disorder, generalized anxiety disorder, social anxiety disorder, attention deficit/hyperactivity disorder, and suspected borderline personality disorder.

These diagnoses should have led to heightened supervision and structured support to keep her safe from sexual exploitation, according to the lawsuit. However, it alleges that Doe was left alone multiple times.

In April 2022, just a month after she arrived, a male resident who has at least six battery charges against him raped Doe while she was alone in a bathroom, according to the lawsuit.

“After the staff member walked away, Male Resident 1 left his bathroom and entered Jane’s bathroom at 8:15 p.m.,” the lawsuit states.

While the facility later on put a safety plan in place for Doe, “it immediately proved to be ineffective.”

A few months later, in August, a different male resident sexually assaulted Doe when she was sitting next to him during a movie night activity, despite a rule that peers remain 6 feet away from her due to a medical order following the assault in April.

The next day, Doe was hospitalized after she was found “huddled in the corner of the bathroom’” following a separate “incident” with the second male resident, according to the lawsuit.

Covering incidents up

In every named instance, the lawsuit states that clinic staff did not contact Doe’s parents immediately, and in some cases leadership instructed staff not to contact them at all.

After the incident in April, KidsTLC waited over an hour to contact police, and Doe’s parents didn’t hear that their daughter was raped until the next day, when officers contacted them to conduct a forensic examination.

Following the second incident in August, Doe’s mother received a call from KidsTLC saying that their daughter was hospitalized but staff didn’t know what happened.

Her parents didn’t receive any updates from KidsTLC for 12 hours. Staff later emailed them to request a phone call — during which the staff “immediately placed the blame on Jane, stating that ‘[Jane] did it again.’”

“She called Jane a ‘predator’ and opined that Jane had ‘set it up,’” the lawsuit states.

Prior to the alleged rape and sexual assault, multiple licensed KidsTLC psychiatric medical providers raised repeated concerns to leadership about unsafe supervision practices, including residents being left unsupervised in bathrooms and hallways. Leadership failed to implement policies and dismissed prior incidents as “normal adolescent behavior,” according to the lawsuit.

Facility leadership also discouraged staff from documenting safety concerns in writing and dismissed any concerns rather than implementing corrective action, according to the lawsuit.

“The most heartbreaking aspect of this is that the residents of this facility represent an extraordinarily vulnerable population who are often unable to advocate for themselves,” said Kara Stubbs, another attorney for the family. “Our hope is that this lawsuit will shed light on the egregious violations taking place at KidsTLC and that as a result, reform will be achieved.”