Young Georgians who say they were sexually assaulted at Atlanta-area behavioral health facilities are accusing the operators of systemic neglect through the prioritization of profit over patient safety.
Three lawsuits were filed Thursday against the companies behind the Riverwoods and Peachford residential treatment facilities in Clayton and DeKalb counties, respectively, by former patients. The plaintiffs allege they were sexually assaulted by staff and other patients at Riverwoods and Peachford during short stays there several years ago when they were teenagers.
Riverwoods is part of the Acadia Healthcare network and Peachford is a Universal Health Services facility. Those organizations are among the largest players in their field, each with hundreds of behavioral health facilities nationwide.
The lawsuits allege Acadia and UHS have for years created a culture of abuse and neglect by focusing on profit and turning a blind eye to the harm being done to the vulnerable children in their care.
A Riverwoods spokesperson declined to comment on the litigation but said the well-being and quality of care for patients are its highest priorities.
“We do not tolerate assault or abuse of any kind, and have established protocols in place to review and address such matters,” the spokesperson said.
A representative for UHS did not immediately comment on the allegations.
Credit: Natrice Miller / Natrice.Miller@ajc.com
Credit: Natrice Miller / Natrice.Miller@ajc.com
Amble Johnson, an attorney for the plaintiffs, said he plans to file several more of these cases in coming weeks.
“Our clients want to change the culture of profits over patients at these providers’ facilities, protect children from future abuse, take control of their experiences of abuse and encourage other survivors of childhood sexual abuse to do the same,” Johnson told The Atlanta Journal-Constitution.
The claims are backed up by a scathing U.S. Senate committee report released in June 2024 following a two-year investigation of Acadia, UHS and two other providers of residential treatment facilities for youth.
That committee concluded that the children in those facilities were subjected to physical, sexual and emotional abuse, among other harms.
The committee “found that these harms are not isolated exceptions, but inherent to a model that incentivizes maximizing profits at the expense of providing high-quality care to children — and often paid for with taxpayer dollars, including Medicaid and child welfare funding,” noted the report.
Credit: Natrice Miller / Natrice.Miller@ajc.com
Credit: Natrice Miller / Natrice.Miller@ajc.com
Acadia and UHS were also implicated in an AJC investigation that revealed in 2022 how Georgia’s mental health system is failing children. The findings included serious shortcomings at Acadia’s facilities in metro Atlanta and incidents of employees sexually assaulting teenage patients at a UHS facility in Augusta.
In one of Thursday’s lawsuits, filed in Clayton County Superior Court, a 22-year-old Georgia man alleged he was raped by two male patients at Riverwoods during a weeklong stay when he was 15 or 16 years old. He said he was too scared at the time to report the abuse, in part because there was a homophobic and hostile culture among Riverwoods staff.
In a separate lawsuit, filed in DeKalb County Superior Court, a 20-year-old Georgia woman alleged she was sexually assaulted by a female employee when she was admitted to Peachford in 2022, when she was 17. The plaintiff said the employee threatened to lengthen her stay at the facility if she reported the assault, which happened during a strip search.
The third complaint was also filed in DeKalb by a different 22-year-old Georgia man who alleged he was sexually assaulted by a roommate and a male employee while at Peachford in 2018, when he was 16. The plaintiff said he was threatened into silence by the employee, who ordered him to take a shower then assaulted him while he showered.
“The pervasive and persistent abuse at UHS facilities has been publicly reported for years,” the plaintiff said in his complaint.
Acadia is headquartered in Tennessee. UHS has a corporate base in Pennsylvania.
Both organizations have paid millions of dollars to the federal government and states, including Georgia, to end civil claims of billing fraud and failure to adequately hire, train and supervise staff, among other things.
In September 2024, Acadia agreed to pay the federal government $16.6 million and four states, including Georgia, just over $3 million. Georgia also got part of a $122 million settlement in 2020 with UHS.
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