Kansas Hospital Beats Patient’s Suit Over Alleged Sexual Assault

The University of Kansas Hospital Authority has prevailed in a patient’s suit claiming it negligently failed to supervise an employee she accused of sexual assaulting her.

Tamatha Hennessey didn’t establish that the hospital had reason to believe its employee presented an undue risk of harming others, the US Court of Appeals for the Tenth Circuit said Jan. 2. Hennessey hadn’t introduced any evidence of the employee’s allegedly dangerous propensities or that it was reasonably foreseeable he would sexually assault a patient on hospital premises, the court said in an unpublished opinion affirming summary judgment for the hospital.

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