Foster Care Abuse Lawsuits: Suing the State or Agency for Abuse in Foster Care

Foster care abuse lawsuits argue that the government, and often a private agency working for it, failed children it had taken into custody. The abuse itself is usually committed by a foster parent, a foster parent's older child or relative, another youth in the home, or staff at a group home or shelter. The lawsuit focuses on what the agency did or did not do: whether it screened and licensed the home properly, visited as its own rules required, investigated reports, and removed children when warning signs appeared.

Common allegations include licensing a home despite red flags, placing too many children in one home, placing a child with a known sex offender or a youth with a history of abuse, skipping monthly caseworker visits, and closing reports without investigating. The legal claims are usually negligence against the agency and its caseworkers, civil rights claims under federal law, and assault claims against the abuser.

State child welfare agencies

States run or oversee foster care and are frequent defendants. Recent cases have been brought against agencies in New Jersey, Washington, and Oregon, among others.

Private foster family agencies

Many states contract with private agencies that recruit, train, certify, and monitor foster parents. These agencies can be sued directly, and they are not protected by the same government immunity rules.

County facilities and shelters

Counties run shelters and group placements. Los Angeles County's roughly $4.8 billion in abuse settlements include claims from MacLaren Children's Center, a county shelter that held children awaiting foster placement. See juvenile detention abuse lawsuits for details on that settlement.

There is no national foster care abuse settlement. Instead, individual cases have been resolved state by state:

New Jersey

On May 23, 2025, a brother and sister identified as A.H. and D.C. settled with the State of New Jersey for $19.5 million, or $9.75 million each, after mediation. The New Jersey Department of Children and Families had placed them in an Atlantic County foster home in 1969, where the foster father sexually abused them for about three years. The same attorneys secured a $6.75 million settlement in 2024 for another child from that home and a $25 million jury verdict in March 2024 for a different former foster child.

Washington

In July 2024, Washington State agreed to pay $15 million to three sisters who were sexually abused between 1990 and 2000 in a Centralia foster home, avoiding a trial set for July 22, 2024 in Thurston County Superior Court. The sisters were abused starting at ages four, five, and six by two teenage sons of the foster parents. According to their attorneys, the evidence showed the state did not conduct a single home safety visit with the children from 1992 to 1995, even though its own policies called for monthly face-to-face visits. In 1995 the state endorsed the foster parents' petition to adopt the girls and told the court the home was safe, despite having had little contact with the children for years and despite concerns raised by mental health providers. Cases like this show why caseworker visit logs and licensing files are often the most important evidence.

California

In C.F. v. Alternative Family Services, a Sonoma County jury apportioned 60 percent of the fault to a private foster family agency and 40 percent to the foster parents after two young children placed in the home in 2018 were sexually abused there. The foster father pleaded guilty to two counts of sexual abuse. On June 4, 2026, the California Court of Appeal affirmed the nearly $25 million judgment.

Oregon

Oregon's Department of Human Services agreed to pay $40 million to settle a federal lawsuit in Eugene brought by four former foster children who were sexually and physically abused in a foster home in Keizer. The children's lawyers called it the largest settlement in an Oregon state foster care lawsuit. The lawsuit alleged caseworkers ignored signs of abuse and tried to cover it up; the foster father received a 30-year prison sentence in 2017.

You may have a claim if you were in the legal custody or supervision of a child welfare agency and were abused in the placement. It does not matter whether you were later adopted, returned home, or aged out. Many successful plaintiffs are now adults in their 30s to 60s.

• Placements covered: licensed foster homes, relative or kinship placements supervised by the agency, therapeutic foster care, group homes, and shelters.
• Who abused you: a foster parent, the foster parent's partner, older children or relatives in the home, other foster youth, or staff.
• Agency failures: ignored reports, missed visits, bad licensing decisions, placing you with a known risk, or failing to remove you after warning signs.
• Harm: lasting emotional injury such as PTSD, depression, or anxiety, as well as physical injuries.

In C.F. v. Alternative Family Services, the Court of Appeal held that foster family agencies have a duty to protect foster children from sexual abuse where the agency knew or should have known a foster parent presented a risk. That standard does not require proof the agency actually knew.

Claims are harder when the abuse happened after an adoption was finalized and the agency was no longer involved, when the abuser was a biological parent after reunification, or when nothing suggested a risk the agency could have caught. A lawsuit against the abuser alone may still be possible in those cases, though collecting a judgment can be difficult.

Foster care abuse recoveries vary widely. The results below come from public reports, and none of them predicts what any other case is worth.

Damages in these cases can include pain and suffering, the cost of past and future therapy, lost earning capacity, and in some cases punitive damages against individuals. Claims against state and local governments may be limited by state tort claims acts and damage caps. New Jersey amended its Tort Claims Act in February 2025 so sexual abuse survivors no longer need to show permanent physical injury or more than $3,600 in medical expenses to recover pain and suffering damages from a public entity.

Large verdicts are not the norm, and many claims settle for much less or are dismissed on immunity or deadline grounds. A settlement can also affect benefits; see whether a settlement affects SSI or Medicaid.

Federal civil rights claims. The Civil Rights Act, 42 U.S.C. 1983, lets people sue anyone who, acting under state authority, deprives them of constitutional rights. In DeShaney v. Winnebago County (1989), the Supreme Court held that the state generally has no constitutional duty to protect a child from a parent, but noted that if the state had removed the child and placed him in a foster home operated by its agents, the situation might be analogous to incarceration and give rise to a duty to protect. Federal appeals courts have relied on that reasoning in foster care cases, and plaintiffs typically must show officials were deliberately indifferent to a known risk, which is a higher bar than ordinary carelessness.

State negligence claims. Most foster care cases also include state-law claims that the agency and its workers failed to use reasonable care in licensing, placement, supervision, and investigation. Private foster agencies can be sued under these rules like any other business.

Claims against the abuser. Survivors can sue the person who abused them for assault and battery and for emotional distress, although that person often has few assets.

Immunity. States often cannot be sued for money in federal court under Section 1983, so federal claims usually name individual caseworkers or counties, while state tort claims are brought under each state's tort claims act. These rules differ a great deal across states, which is one reason survivors usually need a lawyer familiar with local practice.

The statute of limitations depends on your state and on when the abuse happened. Many states have extended deadlines for childhood sexual abuse, and some revived expired claims for a period of time:

• California: For abuse before 2024, generally until age 40 or five years after discovering the injury was caused by the abuse, whichever is later. No deadline for childhood sexual assault on or after January 1, 2024.
• New York: Childhood sexual abuse claims can be filed until age 55. The Child Victims Act revival window closed in 2021.
• New Jersey: A Middlesex County Superior Court judge ruled the A.H. and D.C. claims, about abuse that began in 1969, were within the statute of limitations, which cleared the way for their settlement.
• Maryland: No civil deadline for child sexual abuse since October 1, 2023, with damage caps for claims against the state.

Federal Section 1983 claims do not have their own deadline; courts generally borrow the state's personal injury deadline, which can be as short as a few years after the survivor turns 18 unless a discovery or tolling rule applies. That makes the state-law claim more important for older abuse. Claims against public agencies may also require a written notice of claim within a short time, so get advice early.

1. Request your records. Former foster youth can usually request their own case file from the state or county child welfare agency. An attorney can help if records are sealed or incomplete.
2. List every placement. Include the foster parents' names, other people in the home, the town, and the years.
3. Gather reports. Any hotline call, school report, medical visit, or police report made while you were in care is important.
4. Document the harm. Therapy and medical records help show the effects of abuse, and treatment matters for its own sake.
5. Do not sign releases from an agency or insurer without independent advice.

You can read about related claims in institutional sexual abuse lawsuits, juvenile detention abuse lawsuits, and human trafficking lawsuits. For how these individual claims differ from class actions, see class action vs. individual lawsuit.

Best Class Actions is not a law firm. A free case review takes about two minutes and can connect you with independent attorneys who handle foster care abuse cases in your state.