$123 Million Settlement for Victims of Serial Child Abuser Earl Bradley

Earl B. Bradley, a pediatrician who practiced in coastal Delaware, was convicted in 2011 of sexually abusing young patients over a period spanning roughly 15 years. He received 14 consecutive life sentences. Criminal investigators found that he had videotaped many of the attacks. The full scope of harm extended to hundreds of children, with ultimately more than 900 individuals coming forward as claimants.

The civil litigation focused not on Bradley himself but on the institutions that had opportunities to stop him. Plaintiffs sued Beebe Medical Center in Lewes, Delaware, along with the Medical Society of Delaware and several physicians, arguing that warning signs had surfaced as far back as the 1990s and that those with authority to investigate or revoke Bradley's privileges failed to act. The hospital had employed Bradley until 2002 and continued to extend him staff privileges after that.

Schochor, Federico and Staton, P.A., a Baltimore firm, represented the largest bloc of plaintiffs among the more than a dozen law firms involved in the coordinated litigation. Philip C. Federico and Jonathan Schochor were among the firm's attorneys in the case. After more than 16 months of litigation and mediation, the parties reached a settlement of $123 million, consisting of $119 million from six insurance carriers covering Beebe Medical Center, $3 million from the Medical Society of Delaware, and $1 million in free medical and mental health services from the hospital.

Delaware Superior Court Judge Joseph R. Slights III approved the settlement on November 19, 2012, in a 54-page opinion finding it 'fair, reasonable and adequate.' He appointed Philadelphia attorney Thomas Rutter, who had administered compensation funds in the Catholic Diocese of Wilmington bankruptcy, to categorize claimants into five tiers based on the nature and severity of abuse suffered. Attorney fees and costs amounted to approximately $29.8 million, leaving roughly $93 million for distribution to victims.

Jonathan Schochor described the case as 'the worst, most tragic case involving a single perpetrator in our nation's history.' The settlement prevented Beebe Medical Center from declaring bankruptcy, preserving the only hospital serving a large stretch of Delaware's southern coast. The class comprised more than 900 families of children Bradley had abused.