California Facility Wrongful Death Lawyer

When a facility is responsible for a death

A facility that accepts a resident or patient takes on a legal duty of care. It must assess each person's risks, staff adequately, supervise, follow its own policies and state licensing rules, and get the person to a higher level of care when needed. When a facility falls short and someone dies, California law lets the family bring a wrongful death claim and lets the estate bring a survival claim.

These cases are different from ordinary injury cases. The evidence sits in the facility's own charts, staffing records, incident reports, and video, and facilities and their insurers defend them hard. They need a lawyer who knows how facilities operate and is prepared to try the case.

Types of facilities

• Nursing homes and skilled nursing facilities. Neglect, understaffing, pressure injuries, falls, dehydration, and missed changes in condition. See nursing home elder neglect.
• Assisted living and memory care (residential care facilities for the elderly). Wandering and elopement, falls, medication errors, and failure to call for medical help. See nursing home and facility deaths.
• Drug and alcohol rehab and detox facilities. Unsafe detox, inadequate monitoring, and failure to act on known suicide risk. See the $11 million Cunningham verdict.
• Psychiatric hospitals and behavioral health units. Inadequate suicide-risk assessment, observation lapses, ligature hazards, and premature discharge. See suicide in a care facility.
• Hospitals. Falls, failure to monitor, and delayed response to a patient in decline.
• Residential treatment facilities and group homes for dependent adults and people with disabilities.
• Jails and detention facilities. Suicide, medical neglect, and violence in custody, where special deadlines and federal civil rights law often apply.

How preventable facility deaths happen

• Inadequate supervision and observation, including skipped safety checks
• Failure to protect a person known to be at risk of suicide or self-harm
• Medication errors and unsafe detox or withdrawal management
• Falls and fractures from ignored fall-risk plans
• Pressure injuries (bed sores) that progress to infection and sepsis
• Dehydration, malnutrition, and choking
• Abuse and neglect by staff or other residents
• Dangerous conditions, such as ligature points or unsecured exits
• Delay in calling a doctor or transferring a person to the hospital

Common liability theories

Negligence and the standard of care

A facility must act as a reasonably careful facility of its type would. State licensing regulations, the facility's own policies, and the resident's care plan are often the best evidence of what it should have done.

Elder and dependent adult abuse

For residents 65 and older and dependent adults, California's Elder Abuse and Dependent Adult Civil Protection Act (Welf. & Inst. Code § 15600 et seq.) allows added remedies, including the person's pre-death pain and suffering and attorney's fees, when neglect is proven by clear and convincing evidence of recklessness, oppression, fraud, or malice. The California Supreme Court has held that reckless neglect by a health care provider can be elder abuse rather than mere professional negligence (Delaney v. Baker (1999) 20 Cal.4th 23).

Understaffing and corporate decisions

Many facility deaths trace back to decisions made above the bedside: staffing levels, training, and budgets. Those decisions can make the operator and its owners responsible.

Government facilities

When the facility is public, such as a county jail or public hospital, a written government claim usually must be presented within six months (Gov. Code § 911.2), and a death in custody may also support a federal civil rights claim (42 U.S.C. § 1983).

Why suicide cases are legally difficult

Facilities almost always argue that a suicide was the person's own act and could not have been foreseen. California law does not automatically accept that. When a facility knows or should know someone is at risk, it must take reasonable precautions, and when the very harm it was supposed to prevent happens, the suicide does not necessarily break the chain of responsibility. These cases are still among the hardest wrongful death cases to win, which is why the lawyer's trial record matters.

Case study: Cunningham v. New Life Recovery

John Cunningham, 58, died by suicide while in the care of a detox facility and a residential rehab facility. The family had told the facilities about his history. Before trial, the facilities offered $350,000 and $100,000. After a 12-day trial in Santa Cruz County, the jury returned $11,000,000, the largest facility suicide verdict in California history.

Read the full Cunningham case study

What families should do now

1. Request the records. Ask in writing for the complete chart, medication records, and care plan. The legal representative of the person's estate generally has the right to them.
2. Preserve evidence. Photograph injuries and the room if you can, and keep every message and document. Video, call logs, and staffing records can be overwritten quickly.
3. Don't sign anything from the facility or its insurer, including releases or arbitration agreements, without talking to a lawyer.
4. Report it. Complaints go to the California Department of Public Health (nursing homes and hospitals), the Department of Social Services Community Care Licensing (assisted living), or the Department of Health Care Services (licensed drug and alcohol treatment).
5. Watch the deadlines. Two years for most claims, and six months when a public entity is involved.

Frequently asked questions

Learn more about Harrison Gavin Long and why he is known as a wrongful death trial lawyer.

This page is general information about California law, not legal advice. Past results do not guarantee future outcomes.