By DAMIEN FISHER, InDepthNH.org

A move that’s seemed inevitable since the state first began trying to evade David Meehan’s $38 million jury award, lawyers for the sexual abuse survivor are now asking the New Hampshire Supreme Court to weigh in.

Meehan’s legal team, led by attorneys Rus Rilee and David Vicinanzo, are asking the Supreme Court justices to review Rockingham Superior Court Judge Andrew Schulman’s latest order that caps the award at $475,000. The team seeks answers to several legal questions.

Meehan testified to being raped and beaten hundred of times by staff while he was incarcerated as a child in the Sununu Youth Services Center, then called the Youth Development Center in Manchester. The statutory damages cap allows a maximum $475,000 per incident of abuse.

Within moments of the jury announcing the record-setting $38 million verdict in Meehan’s favor in June, the New Hampshire Attorney General’s Office began disputing the decision. According to the Attorney General, the $475,000 cap applies since the jury only found one instance of abuse for which the state is liable.

But jurors expressed dismay upon learning about the cap after the trial. The jury form indicated they found the state was liable for one overall instance of “wanton, malicious, and oppressive” conduct that facilitated all of the rapes and beatings Meehan suffered. 

While Schulman states that applying the cap in Meehan’s case represents a miscarriage of justice, he has no other option since the damages cap is constitutional, the jury form indicates one instance of abuse for which the state is liable, and he is unable to change the verdict without a whole new trial.

But Vicinanzo and Rilee want the Supreme Court’s opinion on whether or not the damages cap is constitutional in Meehan’s case. They also want the Supreme Court to consider if Schulman does have the authority to enter a partial verdict to correct the jury form, or if he has the ability to hold a trial just to determine the true number of incidents for which the state is liable.

Meehan is the first of more than 1,000 adult survivors of YDC abuse who are now suing the state. In the face of the massive YDC scandal,  and the potential jury awards, New Hampshire has been trying to encourage survivors to settle their cases without trial. 

So far, the state has paid out more than $102 million on 206 YDC settlement claims, with currently 448 more claims pending. The estimated payout for the currently pending claims is as high as $469 million.

If the survivors opt to go to trial, they will be opposed by lawyers with the New Hampshire Attorney General’s Office, the same agency that is supposed to be prosecuting the alleged YDC abusers.

Despite hundreds of alleged abusers being named in the civil lawsuits, the Attorney General’s YDC Task Force indicted 11 former YDC staffers. The last of the indictments were handed up in 2021, and the task force is reportedly no longer focused on investigating more alleged abusers, but busy working on the upcoming trials.

But many of the survivors are galled by conflict of interest represented by the Attorney General’s Office both defending the state against the abuse claims in civil court, and prosecuting the abusers in criminal courts. They say the state is trying to limit civil liability by not pushing the criminal investigation. More criminal cases would mean more evidence for the survivors and their civil claims.