Concord
The 26-page lawsuit was filed on Monday by attorney Rus Rilee on behalf of Christopher Willott, the father of Sadence “Sadee” Willott, who died almost three years ago from fatal head injuries at her Belmont Street home in Manchester. The case will move forward in Hillsborough County Superior Court in Manchester.
Sadee’s mother, Kaitlin Paquette, 23, is serving a 21- to 42-year state prison sentence after pleading guilty to second-degree murder in connection with the child’s death on Sept. 7, 2015.
Paquette confessed to pushing her daughter in the bath, causing Sadee’s head to smack against the cast-iron tub.
The girl was found unresponsive at her home and later died at Dartmouth-Hitchcock Medical Center. An autopsy revealed Sadee had six other partially healed or healed broken bones at the time of her death, in addition to her head injuries.
Willott, who is the administrator of his daughter’s estate, is seeking a jury trial and unspecified damages in his lawsuit against the state and the Division for Children, Youth and Families. Through his attorney, Willott has brought seven different claims, including wrongful death, negligence, negligent training and supervision, and breach of fiduciary duty.
Child protection case workers visited the family on multiple occasions, beginning just days after Sadee was born. Their first visit was to the hospital, where the newborn had tested positive for marijuana.
The next report came two months later when DCYF was told that Sadee was “being left in dirty diapers, causing blisters on her skin,” and that her parents were still using drugs.
Both reports were deemed “unfounded” — but the allegations of abuse were just beginning.
Child protection case workers met with Sadee’s family some 30 times over the course of the toddler’s life to check on whether she was being physically abused and neglected, according to agency records obtained by the Monitor. However, every report was dismissed, except for the last one — but by then Sadee had already been dead for more than a year.
Despite repeated warnings, DCYF failed to take appropriate action, the lawsuit alleges.
“DCYF failed to fully and vigorously follow-up on reports expressing serious concerns about Sadee’s safety and well-being while in the care of her mother, preferring instead to accept at face value the excuses and explanations provided by her mother for the many hospital visits and injuries,” Rilee wrote.
Christopher Willott’s lawsuit comes in the wake of a $6.75 million verdict against the state in another high-profile child abuse case brought by the grandparents of two young girls who were sexually abused by their parents while under DCYF supervision.
The girls’ parents pleaded guilty in 2014 to felony sexual assault charges and to manufacturing child pornography. Each was sentenced to 25 years to life in prison.
A spokesman for the Department of Health and Human Services did not respond to a request for comment.