Silver Hill Hospital Lawsuit: Civitillo, Kervick, and Pilgrim Cases

Silver Hill Hospital, the private psychiatric facility in New Canaan, Connecticut, has faced several major lawsuits over the past two decades. The most consequential is a multimillion-dollar 2024 wrongful death settlement with the family of Morgan Stanley executive Leo J. Civitillo, who died by suicide as an inpatient in 2018. The hospital also litigated an earlier patient-suicide case that reached the Connecticut Supreme Court, settled a federal disability-rights complaint with the U.S. Department of Justice in 2002, and is currently defending a Title VII employment discrimination suit filed in 2025.

The Civitillo Wrongful Death Settlement

Leo J. Civitillo, 43, was the global head of fixed-income capital markets at Morgan Stanley. He was admitted to Silver Hill’s transitional living program on January 22, 2018, after a prior suicide attempt, carrying diagnoses of anxiety, depression, and psychosis with delusional thinking. He died on February 17, 2018, from acute chloroquine intoxication after ingesting an overdose of anti-malaria pills.¹

The lawsuit filed by his family alleged that Civitillo had ordered the medication online and that a Morgan Stanley employee, not on his approved visitor list, delivered the pills and a pill crusher to him during an unsupervised visit that staff allowed. His wife, Christa Civitillo, had reportedly warned the hospital that her husband was planning suicide and had bought a pill crusher.²³

Two days before his death, staff discovered Civitillo had used a hospital iPad to research suicide methods and write his own obituary. The complaint alleged that doctors then failed to re-evaluate him as planned, did not increase bed checks, and did not move him to a more secure unit. It further alleged that staff let him keep a cellphone and iPad in violation of hospital rules. The family’s attorneys also claimed that mandated two-hour bed checks were not performed on the morning of his death and that medical records were falsified to indicate a 7:00 a.m. check that never occurred; he was found unresponsive at 8:30 a.m.²

A Connecticut Department of Public Health review found that the hospital failed to meet federal standards, citing the absence of performance measures for patient safety in the transitional living program and a failure to evaluate safety interventions for patients at high suicide risk.²

Silver Hill settled on November 8, 2024, just before trial was to begin in Connecticut Superior Court in Bridgeport. The exact amount is confidential. Reporting described a multimillion-dollar figure, and court documents showed the family’s attorney, Joel Faxon, had previously offered to settle for $14 million. The hospital was represented by Sally Hagerty of Danaher Lagnese, PC.³

Kervick v. Silver Hill Hospital

An earlier patient-suicide lawsuit set a lasting Connecticut jury procedure. Ruth Farrell, 41, was admitted to Silver Hill for major depression and a personality disorder and hanged herself from a bathroom door on January 28, 2002, roughly a week into her stay. She had previously attempted suicide by hanging in her hospital bathroom, and the door had initially been ordered locked. On January 22, her treating psychiatrist, Dr. Ellyn Shander, ordered it unlocked and reduced supervision from constant monitoring to 15-minute checks.⁴

A jury returned a verdict for the hospital and Dr. Shander. Farrell’s estate appealed after the New York Times published an article during trial titled “Lawsuit Over a Suicide At a Hospital For the Elite.” The trial judge had declined to poll the jury and instead instructed jurors to disregard media coverage. The Appellate Court called the article inflammatory and ordered a new trial.⁵

On August 13, 2013, the Connecticut Supreme Court reversed and reinstated the defense verdict, holding that the trial judge had not abused his discretion and that no evidence showed jurors had disobeyed the instruction. The court used its supervisory authority to require that in all future Connecticut jury trials, jurors be instructed immediately after selection to decide the case solely on trial evidence, avoid all publicity about it, and report any accidental exposure in writing.⁴

2002 Federal ADA Settlement

In June 2002, Silver Hill settled with the U.S. Department of Justice over allegations it violated the Americans with Disabilities Act by failing to accommodate a hard-of-hearing patient. The patient, who sought treatment for an eating disorder and trauma, alleged the hospital denied her repeated requests for a sign language interpreter over five months, leaving her unable to participate in counseling or understand her treatment.⁶

The hospital denied wrongdoing but agreed to pay the patient $25,000 and to implement remedial measures. Those included an Effective Communications Program with 24/7 access to qualified sign language interpreters (with a response-time requirement of one hour or less for 80 percent of unscheduled requests), TTY telephones and visual alarms, staff training on communicating with deaf and hard-of-hearing patients, and a formal complaint resolution process. The agreement also barred the hospital from pressing family or friends into service as interpreters.⁷

Pilgrim v. Silver Hill Hospital: Pending Employment Discrimination Suit

In April 2025, Petra Pilgrim filed a federal civil rights lawsuit against Silver Hill in the U.S. District Court for the District of Connecticut. Classified as a Title VII job discrimination case, it alleges that the hospital’s failure to promote her to a newly created Executive Director position was discriminatory. Available court records do not identify the specific protected class alleged.⁸

The case has moved through discovery into summary judgment. In May 2026, Magistrate Judge Robert A. Richardson denied Pilgrim’s motions to extend the discovery deadline as untimely, having been filed on the final day of discovery, and ruled she had not established the relevance of certain documents she sought about the creation and staffing of the Executive Director role. Silver Hill filed for summary judgment, and Pilgrim’s opposition was due by June 22, 2026.⁸

Patient Escapes and Community Legal Pressure

Beyond the filed lawsuits, Silver Hill has drawn regulatory scrutiny and community demands for enforcement following a run of patient escapes. The most serious involved Darren Yu Huang, 25, who had been arrested in February 2023 after allegedly smashing windows at the hospital’s admissions building with a baseball bat and pouring gasoline on the premises. Police recovered three baseball bats, multiple gasoline containers, and diesel exhaust fluid from his vehicle. He was later re-admitted to Silver Hill for court-mandated treatment.⁹

In February 2025, Huang escaped, triggering a shelter-in-place order at nearby East School. He was apprehended on March 10, 2025, at JFK International Airport carrying a hatchet, a sledgehammer, and a handwritten note detailing a plan to shoot two named individuals. A state judge revoked his bond. As of July 2025, he faced charges including criminal attempt at first-degree arson, first-degree criminal mischief, second-degree criminal trespass, and illegal possession of a weapon in a motor vehicle from the 2023 incident, along with a first-degree failure to appear charge from the 2025 escape. Prosecutors offered two plea deals: 12 years in prison followed by eight years of special parole, or 15 years followed by five years of probation. His next court date was set for September 4, 2025.¹⁰

Other incidents added to the pressure. In May 2024, a patient left the hospital in an Uber, exited half a mile away, and entered a neighbor’s home. In early 2025, another patient walked to a neighbor’s house to ask to use a phone, and a residential patient wandered onto a Wilton neighbor’s property.¹¹

At a March 26, 2025, community meeting, some neighbors called for the hospital to be shut down, and a resident-led Change.org petition demanding enhanced security and transparency gathered more than 300 signatures. President and Medical Director Dr. Andrew Gerber announced a five-point security plan that included raising security staffing from 11 to 15 full-time officers, ending admission of patients with pending violent criminal charges or documented dangerous behavior, installing non-climbable fencing and additional cameras, restricting patients on heightened observation to their units, and launching a neighborhood alert system.¹²

New Canaan First Selectman Dionna Carlson told attendees that Silver Hill is in compliance with its town permits and that the town cannot legally revoke them. Some residents disputed that, arguing the hospital is in violation of its operating permit and that the town has enforcement authority.¹¹

1
Westfair Communications. Silver Hill Hospital Sued Over 2018 Suicide of Investment Banker
2
Hartford Courant. Lawsuit Filed Against Celebrity Rehab Hospital in New Canaan Alleges Investment Banker Died From Overdose After Researching Suicide on iPad
3
Connecticut Post. Silver Hill Hospital Settles Multimillion-Dollar Lawsuit Over Investment Banker’s Suicide
4
FindLaw. Kervick v. Silver Hill Hospital
5
Connecticut Judicial Branch. Kervick v. Silver Hill Hospital, SC 18805/18806
6
U.S. Department of Justice. Silver Hill Hospital Settlement
7
U.S. Department of Justice. Silver Hill Hospital ADA Settlement Agreement
8
PACER Monitor. Pilgrim v. Silver Hill Hospital, Inc.
9
CT Insider. Silver Hill Arson Suspect Arrested at JFK
10
CT Insider. Darren Huang Plea Offers in Silver Hill Escape Case
11
NewCanaanite. Facing Frustrated Neighbors, Silver Hill Lays Out New Security Measures
12
New Canaan Sentinel. Silver Hill Hospital Commits to Major Security Reforms Following Recent Patient Incident