A New Hampshire jury has awarded $16 million to a woman who was repeatedly raped as a teenager while living in a Deerfield group home that the state had chosen for her, and it found that the New Hampshire Department of Health and Human Services shared responsibility for what happened to her. The verdict, returned on Tuesday, June 30, lands squarely on a question that has haunted state government for years: what does New Hampshire owe the children it removes from their homes and then places in the care of others?

The jury concluded that Kristy Geese suffered 106 separate incidents of abuse while she was housed at Saddleback Mountain Retreat, a small group home for girls aged 6 to 18 that has since closed. According to NHPR, jurors assigned 70 percent of the fault to the home’s directors, Peter Tsetsilas, who is now deceased, and his wife Beverly Tsetsilas, and 25 percent to the Department of Health and Human Services. That allocation means the state is on the hook for roughly a quarter of the award, or about $4 million.

How a Teenager Ended Up at Saddleback

The Division for Children, Youth and Families placed Geese at the Deerfield facility in 1993, after she failed to register for school and was deemed a runaway. She was 16 years old. Acting on a tip, Concord police located her at a hotel where she had been kept for roughly a week, enduring repeated rapes by the director of the group home. The state then removed Geese and the other girls it had placed at the home and temporarily shut the facility down.

Peter Tsetsilas pleaded guilty in 1994 to child endangerment and interference with custody. He was never charged with rape or sexual assault, according to court records. That gap between what the state later acknowledged had occurred and what was ever prosecuted sits at the center of the civil case decided this week. Geese has said she did not report the physical and sexual abuse at the time because Tsetsilas warned her that if she did, she would be sent to the Youth Detention Center, the same threat that has surfaced repeatedly in accounts from young people held in New Hampshire’s juvenile system.

The verdict form, which the jury completed after a trial in Rockingham County, spells out the split in responsibility that will now drive the next phase of litigation. Geese’s attorney, David Vicinanzo, said she intends to appeal the 25 percent finding and ask the New Hampshire Supreme Court to hold the state fully liable, on the theory that a child in state custody is owed a duty the state cannot hand off to a private operator. “When the state takes on a fiduciary duty they have a non-delegable duty to take care of the kid,” Vicinanzo said.

Why the Fault Split Matters

The distinction between 25 percent and 100 percent is not academic. Under New Hampshire’s approach to shared fault, a defendant generally pays only its assigned share of the damages, so the difference in Geese’s case is the gap between roughly $4 million and the full $16 million. With Peter Tsetsilas deceased and the group home long closed, the practical question of who can actually pay any judgment tilts heavily toward the state. An appeal that reframes the state’s obligation as non-delegable would test whether New Hampshire can limit its exposure by pointing to the private operators it hired, or whether the act of taking a child into custody carries a responsibility that follows the child wherever the state sends her.

The Attorney General’s office, which defended the state, said it respected the jury’s verdict and was weighing its next steps, and it did not say whether it will appeal. “It is significant that the jury recognized that the individual who committed the criminal acts bears most of the liability for the plaintiff’s damages,” the office said in a statement. It added that its “commitment to protecting vulnerable children and serving the people of New Hampshire remains unwavering,” and it extended sympathy to Geese for what she endured in bringing the case.

A Case That Sits Just Outside the Settlement Fund

Geese sued the state in 2023. She was not eligible for New Hampshire’s Youth Development Settlement Fund, the mechanism the state created to resolve claims from former residents of the Youth Detention Center, because she was held at a different state-sanctioned facility rather than the detention center itself. That technical boundary turned out to matter a great deal, because it meant her only path to accountability ran through a public jury trial rather than a negotiated payout.

Her case has already rippled into the debate over that fund. Earlier this month, the fund’s administrator, retired circuit court judge Gerard Boyle, cited the risk of large jury awards when he asked lawmakers to invest another $55 million into the settlement fund for former detention center residents. The average settlement payment runs between $500,000 and $600,000, and Boyle told legislators that risking a lawsuit and a much higher jury verdict was “very very scary.” Lawmakers gave Boyle $20 million and signaled he could receive more for the roughly 1,700 pending claims if state revenues improve. The Geese verdict, arriving days later, reads almost as a real time illustration of the exposure Boyle described: a single case that a jury valued at $16 million, several times the typical settlement.

New Hampshire has spent years grappling with the fallout from its handling of children in state care, from the state’s own investigation that found it failed young people at the Sununu Youth Services Center to the political fights over oversight, such as the dispute over child advocate funding that erupted between Cinde Warmington and Governor Kelly Ayotte. Lawmakers have also moved on adjacent policy, including a bill penalizing false DCYF reports that cleared the Senate this session. The Geese verdict adds a courtroom data point to a story that has mostly played out in hearings and investigative reports.

What Geese Said

In a statement after the verdict, Geese framed the outcome as a measure of accountability rather than repair. “Nothing can give me back what was lost, but knowing they are being held accountable feels like a heavy weight lifted,” she said. “It took a long time to finally be heard, but that changed today. What happened to me should have never happened. And it should never happen to anyone ever again.”

For New Hampshire taxpayers and policymakers, the case now becomes a legal test with a price tag attached. If the Supreme Court agrees that the state’s duty to a child in its custody cannot be delegated, the ceiling on the state’s liability in cases like this could rise substantially, with consequences for how New Hampshire budgets for past failures and how it structures the settlement fund going forward.

How much did the jury award and how much does the state owe?

The jury awarded Kristy Geese $16 million in total. Because it assigned New Hampshire's Department of Health and Human Services 25 percent of the fault, the state is currently responsible for roughly a quarter of that amount, about $4 million. The home's directors were assigned 70 percent of the fault.

Why is Geese appealing if she won?

Her attorney plans to ask the New Hampshire Supreme Court to hold the state liable for the full $16 million. The argument is that when the state takes a child into its custody, it assumes a non-delegable duty of care that it cannot shift onto a private group home operator, so the state should bear the entire judgment.

Was anyone criminally prosecuted for the abuse?

Peter Tsetsilas, a co-director of the group home, pleaded guilty in 1994 to child endangerment and interference with custody. He was never charged with rape or sexual assault, according to court records, and he is now deceased.

Why was Geese not eligible for the state settlement fund?

New Hampshire's Youth Development Settlement Fund covers former residents of the Youth Detention Center. Geese was placed at a separate state-sanctioned group home, Saddleback Mountain Retreat in Deerfield, so she fell outside the fund's eligibility and had to pursue a civil jury trial instead.

How does this verdict affect the settlement fund debate?

The fund's administrator recently asked lawmakers for another $55 million and warned that jury awards could far exceed the fund's typical $500,000 to $600,000 payments. The $16 million Geese verdict illustrates that risk, and it may strengthen arguments for adequately funding the program to resolve the roughly 1,700 pending claims.

This article discusses child sexual abuse. If you or someone you know is affected, support is available through the National Sexual Assault Hotline at 1-800-656-4673.

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