Plaintiffs in this case were five teenage boys who delivered newspapers for a rural northern California newspaper company. The boys were sexually molested by an employee of the newspaper company who was in charge of meeting the boys early in the morning and giving them the newspapers for their routes.
The newspaper company claimed that it should not be held responsible for their employee’s misconduct because it occurred outside of the scope of his employment; that the molestations were relatively minor and that any psychological damages which the boys suffered were due to poor upbringing rather than the molestation.
By conducting a thorough investigation, the law offices of Winer, Burritt & Scott, LLP, was able to establish evidence that tended to indicate that the newspaper company did not take adequate steps to protect its young employees; that the perpetrator had a history of molesting children and the company should have checked up on this before hiring him; and by hiring a preeminent child psychiatrist, the law firm was able to establish that the boys suffered substantial damages as a result of the molestations.
RESULT: $1,500,000 settlement on behalf of the plaintiffs