As General Assembly manages $1.4B budget deficit, abuse cases against DJS loom

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John Doe was about 10 years old, playing with paintball guns with his friends, when he accidentally hit a car with a paintball.

He was adjudicated a juvenile delinquent, and may have also faced delinquency charges for marijuana, breaking a town curfew and destruction of property, according to a lawsuit he filed, all of which were “non-violent misdemeanors for which no period of detention should have been imposed.”

He was taken into the custody of the Maryland Department of Juvenile Services (which then had a different name) in the late 1990s, and spent most of the rest of his childhood at six facilities. Two of them were run by DJS, two were run by the Maryland Department of Health, and two were private.

At each facility, older kids and staff members took advantage of him because he was smaller than everyone else. At four of those six facilities, he was raped nearly every night by fellow juvenile detainees.

At one of the DJS facilities, where he spent about three months when he was 15 in the early 2000s, staff did not protect him after he was forced into a sexual act. Instead, another detainee stood up for him.

“The other detainee physically fought the abuser, ultimately scaring him away from abusing Mr. Doe again,” Doe’s lawsuit states. “No (DJS) staff did anything to investigate or discipline Mr. Doe’s abuser.”

Doe’s story is not unique — he is one of more than 10,000 of people suing the Department of Juvenile Services under the Child Victims Act, the 2023 state law that ended the statute of limitations on lawsuits against the institutions that employed alleged abusers. DJS is facing more abuse lawsuits than any other state agency. (Doe’s lawsuit also names MDH and the two private institutions as defendants.)

“The conditions in the vast majority of juvenile detention facilities were appalling for decades. The state knew they were appalling for decades,” said his lawyer, Andy Freeman, of the Baltimore law firm Brown, Goldstein & Levy.

Gov. Wes Moore and the Maryland General Assembly last year managed to plug a $3.3 billion budget hole through a combination of tax increases and cuts to staff and programming. But, early in the session, the Department of Legislative Services warned lawmakers of “enormous liability” — potentially billions of dollars — from these lawsuits.

More from Eye on Annapolis: The Daily Record is publishing a series of stories previewing key topics, including the following, that are expected to be tackled by the General Assembly in the weeks leading up to the 2026 session. Energy DJS abuse lawsuits Juvenile Justice Attorney General’s Office Health Care Immigration Budget State Leadership

The DLS staffer last January said the state was negotiating a settlement with plaintiffs’ lawyers, according to Maryland Matters. Those talks did not yield a solution. Instead, the legislature amended the Child Victims Act, cutting by more than half the damages that both private and governmental defendants would have to pay survivors.

The law forced a flood of lawsuits in the month between its passage and the deadline after which damages were reduced.

This session, lawmakers are facing a $1.4 billion deficit and have vowed not to increase taxes.

Most sources expect a DJS settlement eventually, because the cost to the state of paying each victim after a jury trial — not to mention the cost of litigation — is likely to be much more than the state would pay in a global settlement. But that is likely at least a year away. While a nine- or ten-figure bill may be looming, it won’t be the General Assembly’s top focus during the upcoming legislative session.

For now, there are no settlement negotiations, according to plaintiffs’ lawyers.

CVA cases resumed in Baltimore City Circuit Court in October after a five-month pause after Audrey Carrión, administrative judge and chief judge of the court, entered an order dividing the cases into groups. Each group has a three-person committee coordinating discovery and pretrial motions, among other things. But the cases may proceed slowly at first; a contractor for the state is digitizing millions of DJS records, a process that may take most of a year.

“We’re preparing to litigate these cases,” said Frank Natale, senior litigation counsel at Slater Slater Schulman in Timonium, whose firm represents more than 7,300 victims of sexual abuse, many of whom are suing DJS.

“That’s our sole focus right now, and we are committing everything to that process.”

Freeman, who represents John Doe and two dozen other survivors suing DJS, said settlement talks may become more serious after the first few “bellwether” cases go to trial and juries determine the state’s liability.

He said there are a handful of these cases, each with five or more plaintiffs that have a lot in common, due to being abused by the same person, at the same location and/or during the same time period. Big jury verdicts — and Freeman expects Baltimore juries to be generous — would put more pressure on the state.

“The idea is to have a handful of cases that are representative of what the others will look like,” Freeman said. “It gives both sides an idea of what those cases are worth.”

A spokesman for DJS declined to comment on the lawsuits, but said the department investigates every accusation.

“All the claims brought under the Maryland Child Victims Act involve allegations from decades ago,” the spokesman stated in an email.

“DJS investigates any accusation of sexual assault and takes those investigations seriously. DJS operates under federal and state laws and provides multiple avenues for youth to report incidents of abuse. Additionally, DJS has several internal and external monitors to ensure safety, transparency, and accountability.”

The Maryland Attorney General’s Office declined to comment.

The Daily Record also reached out to Del. C.T. Wilson, D-Charles, who sponsored the Child Victims Act and the amendment cutting the damages available to plaintiffs; Sen. Will Smith, D-Montgomery; Del. Luke Clippinger, D-Baltimore City; and William “Skip” White, a partner at Kiernan Trebach, a firm representing the state in CVA cases. None responded.

State Sen. Justin Ready, R-Carroll, who voted against the Child Victims Act, referred to the cost of the litigation as “a ticking time bomb.”

“I’ve been concerned about it since we passed it,” he said. He said the bill should have been designed to limit the state’s exposure, whether through a hard deadline for CVA lawsuits or a higher standard of proof.

“In their zeal to go after certain bad actors,” Ready said, “they exposed the state to significant financial liability.”

John Doe sued in Baltimore City Circuit Court on May 30, the second-last day before the damages available under the Child Victims Act were cut.

As an adult, Doe has dealt with PTSD, anxiety, schizophrenia, depression and addiction. He has relied on therapy and mental health medications for years.

“Extreme trust issues and paranoia” prevent him from developing relationships, his complaint stated, “such that he feels he will never be able to marry or have children.”

“Though Mr. Doe has been sober for five years and is able to take care of himself, the memories of his abuse continue to haunt him.”