A federal lawsuit alleges 10 former San Bernardino Juvenile Hall detainees were sexually abused by staff more than 20 years ago and accuses the county of institutional negligence and failure to protect minors in custody.
The lawsuit, first filed in San Bernardino Superior Court in March and then refiled in U.S. District Court in Riverside on May 4, names San Bernardino County as a defendant, as well as up to 100 “Doe” defendants, including adult guards, counselors and supervisors at the juvenile detention facility.
The suit claims county officials ignored warning signs for years and allowed a culture of sexual abuse to occur, permitting a “safe haven environment” for staff members to sexually abuse detainees at the county’s central juvenile hall on Gilbert Street. It alleges sexual assault, sexual battery and negligence, as well as intentional infliction of emotional distress, for crimes alleged to have occurred from 1998 to 2005.
Because the lawsuit includes federal civil rights violations under the U.S. Constitution, the county requested that the case be moved from San Bernardino County Superior Court to federal court, according to court filings.
The lawsuit adds to mounting scrutiny of juvenile detention systems nationwide, where former detainees have increasingly alleged staff sexual abuse, institutional coverups and failures to protect minors in custody — allegations that have triggered sweeping lawsuits, federal investigations and multibillion-dollar settlements in California and beyond.
Alleged abuse
The former detainees allege staff members carried out sexual assaults in cells, the shower area, staff-only rooms and other secluded areas where minors could be controlled without witnesses. They claim they felt powerless to stop the abuse because staff members controlled virtually every aspect of their confinement, including housing assignments, privileges and discipline.
The plaintiffs, represented by Michigan-based Stinar Lannen PLLC, claim the alleged sexual assaults occurred when they were 12 to 17 years old. One of the plaintiffs alleges he was sexually abused more than 120 times over a six-month period. He claims staff members sodomized him and forced him to perform oral sex and masturbate, according to the lawsuit.
County spokesperson Jannelle Needham declined to comment, citing the ongoing litigation.
Rebuilt more than 15 years ago at a cost of $62 million and now called the Central Valley Juvenile Detention and Assessment Center, the facility has a rated capacity of 260 and a budgeted capacity of 220. It is staffed by probation officers and supervisors and provides intake orientation covering, among other things, the Prison Rape Elimination Act.
The Prison Rape Elimination Act is a federal law creating a zero-tolerance policy for sexual abuse in custody, requiring prevention standards, reporting and accountability in correctional facilities.
Plaintiff claims
One plaintiff alleges that while a detainee at the facility in 1998 and 1999, when he was 15 and 16 years old, a staff member sexually abused him on at least 16 occasions by isolating him and groping his genitals. Another plaintiff alleges he was in custody in 2001 and about 15 years old when a staff member fondled and groped his genitals, masturbated him and digitally penetrated him in his cell at night, according to the lawsuit.
Similar allegations were lodged by other plaintiffs in the case.
One of the plaintiffs claimed there were approximately 10 occasions when a female guard forced him to perform and receive masturbation, performed oral sex on him, and forced him to engage in sexual intercourse with her. When the plaintiff tried reporting the alleged abuse to a male counselor, he laughed at the disclosure, according to the lawsuit.
“Defendant knew or should have known that these staff members posed a risk of sexual misconduct to youth in custody based on previously exhibited red flag behaviors,” the lawsuit said. “Plaintiffs allege that despite this, the Defendant failed to take reasonable steps to investigate, monitor, supervise, or restrict the staff members from isolating minors or abusing their position of authority.”
Negligence alleged
The lawsuit also accuses the county of engaging in negligent hiring and training practices, and lacking a safe system for detainees to report abuse.
“This case arises from a systemic failure to protect vulnerable minors in our juvenile detention system from egregious patterns of foreseeable sexual misconduct and abuse by the same predator officers and county officials who swore an oath to serve and protect,” the lawsuit said. “Plaintiffs were frightened and (were) typically told that if they complained, it would fall on ‘deaf ears’ at best, and/or they would be punished at worst.”
The complaint also pointed out the facility’s longstanding concerns about detainee conditions and safety, namely overcrowding and understaffing, with juveniles having insufficient access to basic hygiene and safety. It noted an incident in 2013 in which the facility was investigated after a corrections officer was arrested for sexually abusing a minor.
In the October 2013 case, corrections officer Latavia Davis, 30, of Menifee was arrested at the Central Juvenile Detention and Assessment Center on suspicion of forcible sexual penetration with someone under the age of 18. She pleaded no contest in January 2015 and was sentenced to 180 days in county jail under “converted confinement,” court records show. Converted confinement is less restrictive confinement, and can be home confinement and/or electronic monitoring, among other things.
More recently, in 2023, a 28-year-old unnamed man told KNBC Channel 4 he was sexually abused “by a San Bernardino County probation officer while in a county juvenile facility when he was only 10 years old.”
Mounting scrutiny
The lawsuit emerges amid mounting scrutiny of Southern California juvenile detention facilities over allegations of widespread sexual abuse by staff. Most of the allegations surfaced after a change in state law in 2020 that dramatically expanded rights for child sex abuse victims to sue.
California law now allows survivors to file civil suits until age 40, or within five years of discovering that the abuse caused psychological harm. It now also allows plaintiffs to sue any institution that failed to prevent the abuse.
In 2025, Los Angeles County agreed to a historic $4 billion settlement involving thousands of claims of sexual abuse in juvenile halls and foster care facilities dating back decades.
State officials also have investigated conditions inside Los Angeles County juvenile halls, citing chronic staffing shortages, violence and safety failures, prompting California Attorney General Rob Bonta last year to seek to place Los Angeles County’s juvenile facilities into receivership over repeated failures to improve conditions and comply with years of court-ordered reforms.
Similar lawsuits have surfaced in San Diego County, with former detainees alleging sexual misconduct by staff and systemic failures to protect minors in custody.
In February 2025, the San Diego Union-Tribune reported that at least two dozen former detainees alleged they were sexually abused by probation officers in San Diego County juvenile facilities over several decades. Plaintiffs accused county officials of ignoring complaints, failing to discipline staff and allowing abuse to be “swept under the rug,” while survivors described threats, intimidation and lasting psychological trauma.
‘Pervasive and systemic’
Doug Rochen, an L.A.-based attorney for the national law firm DiCello Levitt who specializes in sexual abuse cases and represented the man interviewed by KNBC in 2023, said in a telephone interview on Tuesday that sexual abuse at juvenile detention facilities has been “pervasive and systemic” for decades.
“It’s an institutional and systemic issue — a version of a pandemic,” Rochen said. “It’s been years that this conduct has gone without any redress. It will likely continue for decades.”
Rochen said he represents thousands of clients nationwide who claim they were sexually abused while detained in juvenile detention centers. Roughly 300 of those clients claim they were abused in San Bernardino County juvenile detention facilities, and about 50 more allege they were abused in Riverside County facilities.
Rochen said he already has filed a lawsuit in Riverside County, and plans to file another in San Bernardino Superior Court next week on behalf of about 150 of 300 clients alleging they were sexually abused by staff at the San Bernardino facility and the High Desert Juvenile Detention and Assessment Center in Apple Valley over the past 20 years.
He said his list of San Bernardino County clients alleging they were sexually abused in San Bernardino County juvenile detention facilities has been growing steadily in recent years.
“After Los Angeles County, they’re my next largest group of clients in a geographic region (in California),” he said. “And where there’s smoke there’s fire.”