South Carolina § 43-35-80 - Action by Attorney General against person or facility for failure to exercise reasonable care; fine.

§ 43-35-80. Action by Attorney General against person or facility for failure to exercise reasonable care; fine.

(A) Notwithstanding any regulatory or administrative penalty that may be assessed and in addition to a private civil cause of action that may be brought against a person or facility based on an action or failure to act that otherwise constitutes abuse, neglect, or exploitation under this chapter, the Attorney General, upon referral from the Long Term Care Ombudsman Program or the Vulnerable Adults Investigations Unit, may bring an action against a person who fails through pattern or practice to exercise reasonable care in hiring, training, or supervising facility personnel or in staffing or operating a facility, and this failure results in the commission of abuse, neglect, exploitation, or any other crime against a vulnerable adult in a facility. A person or facility which verifies good standing of the employee with the appropriate licensure or accrediting entity is rebuttably presumed to have acted reasonably regarding the hiring.

(B) In granting relief under this section, the court may assess a civil fine of not more than thirty thousand dollars or order injunctive relief, or both, and may order other relief as the court considers appropriate.

(C) Nothing in this section may be construed to create a private cause of action against one who fails through pattern or practice to exercise reasonable care as provided for in subsection (A).

(D) For the purposes of this section 'person' means any natural person, corporation, joint venture, partnership, unincorporated association, or other business entity.

(E) To the extent fines collected pursuant to this section exceed the cost of litigation, these fines must be credited to the Adult Protective Services Emergency Fund and may be carried forward from one fiscal year to the next.

HISTORY: 1993 Act No. 110, SECTION 1, eff three months after June 11, 1993; 2006 Act No. 301, SECTION 8, eff May 23, 2006.