An attorney defending the state of New Hampshire on Friday sought to undermine the character and credibility of the plaintiff in thelandmark child abuse lawsuit concerning the former Youth Development Center (YDC).
“You were an angry and violent young man, weren’t you?” asked attorney Martha Gaythwaite, who is representing the Department of Health and Human Services in the lawsuit.
“I was not,” replied David Meehan, whose lawsuit alleges the state enabled rampant sexual, physical, and psychological child abuse at the juvenile detention facility – and whose testimony will likely be relied upon by criminal prosecutors who have charged Meehan’s alleged abusers with sexual assault.
Gaythwaite’s cross examination of Meehan began Friday afternoon in Rockingham Superior Court. She focused the jury’s attention on multiple incidents of alleged misdeeds by Meehan as a juvenile, in an apparent attempt to erode any trust or sympathy the jury might have in him.
“Isn’t it true, sir, that the reason you were at the YDC is that the judge had found that you had committed 14 offenses that would have been felonies if you had been an adult?” asked Gaythwaite.
“Yes. I’m not sure of the number, but I believe you are correct,” said Meehan.
Gaythwaite also highlighted a DCYF investigation into Meehan’s parents in 1995, before he was sent to YDC. Gaythwaite told Meehan the investigation found his allegations of abuse against his parents unfounded, and also “that you have a history of making allegations against your teachers and against your parents because you don’t like the rules that they’re trying to enforce, correct?”
Gaythwaite attacked an anecdote shared by Meehan during direct examination where Meehan claimed he stole a gun in order to sell it to feed himself as a teen living on the streets.
“The truth is that you had stolen a loaded gun, you brought it home, and you hid it in your house where you lived. You were being housed by your parents, fed by your parents. You did not need to have a loaded gun. You had no reason to have a loaded gun to sell it to eat.”
Meehan’s alleged membership as a teen in a gang known as the East Side Boys and his participation in an escape attempt from YDSU were also topics of focus during the cross-examination.
“Before you had even gotten to YDC, before anything had happened to you, you had been one of the ring leaders in a plot to stage this hostage situation where you threatened to murder a female guard at the detention center, correct?”
“I did not threaten anybody,” replied Meehan, who in earlier testimony said he had participated in the escape attempt because of a warning about abuse at YDC from another detained child.
The state also began to undermine some of thespecific abuse allegations Meehan has made in his lawsuit, including an incident where Meehan claims staff held him in solitary confinement for nearly two months so that injuries he sustained during the abuse could heal undetected.
But Gaythwaite presented a report showing Meehan had been interviewed by the then-ombudsman Wayne Eigabroadt approximately one week after the alleged assault.
“He found no physical evidence that you had been beaten up and had the black eye that you claim that Mr. Buskey gave you,” said Gaythwaite, referring to one of Meehan’s alleged abusers, Jeffrey Buskey. Buskey has pled not guilty to criminal charges stemming from Meehan’s accusations.
Eigabroadt, the former ombudsman, testified earlier in the trial as a witness called by Meehan’s attorneys. During his testimony, Eigabroadt described staff and management who were resistant to training, and that he was told by then-supervisor Ron Adams to “never take a resident's word over a staff person’s.”
Earlier in the day, Meehan concluded his testimony on direct examination by his attorney, Rus Rilee. He detailed additional accusations of sexual and physical assault by YDC staff in the 1990s.
Meehan said at one point during the months of alleged abuse at YDC, Buskey began to tell him they were in a relationship.
“I begin to accept what he’s saying to me, which is that he loves me,” said Meehan. “So I eventually start to become submissive. I’m not enjoying it, but I also think I am at the same time.”
As an adult, Meehan said he became addicted to heroin as a way to mask his pain and trauma.
He testified on multiple occasions he seriously considered harming his abusers, going so far in one instance as to find where Buskey lived, and purchasing a firearm. Meehan testified he changed his mind and threw the gun in a river.
“I’m not going to be what they thought they could turn me into,” said Meehan. “I’m not going to take another life because of what they did.”
The state’s cross-examination of Meehan is expected to continue on Monday.
