Pleasantville Cottage School (JCCA) Sex Abuse Lawsuit
The Pleasantville Cottage Campus is a residential foster care facility for children with emotional, behavioral, and educational challenges in the New York City suburbs. Run by the Jewish Child Care Association, or JCCA, the facility has long been plagued by allegations of physical and sexual abuse of minor residents.
In 2023, Westchester County officials called for the facility’s closure after police responded to hundreds of calls about unsafe conditions. Officials assert that the JCCA lacks the staff or resources to properly care for residents with severe behavioral and psychological issues.
Have you experienced sexual assault or abuse?
Helping Survivors can connect you with an attorney if you may have a case. While we cannot report a crime on your behalf, your safety is important. Please contact your local authorities for further assistance.
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Author: Kathryn Kosmides
Survivor Advocate
- The Pleasantville Cottage School is one of several facilities run by the Jewish Child Care Association, or JCCA, in New York, offering residential treatment for foster children with behavioral and educational problems.
- Over the past several years, JCCA has faced multiple lawsuits over the alleged sexual abuse of minor residents, including accusations dating back as far as the 1960s.
- If you or a loved one suffered sexual abuse at a JCCA facility, such as the Pleasantville Cottage School or another school, Helping Survivors can help inform you of your rights and options.
What is the JCCA’s Pleasantville Cottage School?
Located in Pleasantville, New York, less than 20 miles north of New York City, the Pleasantville Cottage Campus is the JCCA’s flagship residential program. It hosts about 160 foster children with mental, behavioral, and educational concerns, aged 7 to 16.
Each year, the JCCA cares for more than 17,000 children and families in foster care across its numerous facilities, which include the Pleasantville Cottage Campus, the Edenwald Center, and Gateways, among other institutions and programs. The Edenwald Center is a residential program for children with dual diagnoses of emotional disturbances and intellectual or developmental disabilities. Gateways is an intensive treatment program for girls who were victims of commercial sexual exploitation and domestic trafficking.
Since 1912, Pleasantville Cottage School has admitted thousands of children, including many with prior histories of commercial sexual exploitation and abuse before admission.
- What is the JCCA’s Pleasantville Cottage School?
- Allegations Against Pleasantville Cottage School and JCCA
- Survivors Come Forward Under the New York Child Victims Act
- Legal Rights and Options for Survivors of Residential Facility Abuse
- Why Choose an Experienced Sex Abuse Lawyer
- Speak With a Sexual Abuse Attorney Today
Allegations Against Pleasantville Cottage School and JCCA
According to local authorities, the JCCA’s Pleasantville campus is plagued by runaways, near-daily police calls, use of unlawful restraints, and widespread violence. Such conditions are a phenomenon occurring across New York’s foster care programs. In fact, one investigation found that government child welfare authorities are placing children with acute mental health challenges on campuses ill-equipped to handle them simply because there’s nowhere else for them to go.
Since 2014, New York has eliminated one-third of its beds for youth in state-run psychiatric hospitals to cut costs. The state has also failed to deliver on promises to expand community-based mental health services for youth. This manufactured shortage of mental health care creates chaos at places such as Pleasantville, where understaffing and overcrowding produce cracks in the system that enable abuse.
Dating back to 2021, at least eight lawsuits were filed against the JCCA for alleged physical and sexual abuse of residents at its facilities, including the Pleasantville Cottage School and the Edenwald Center. The lawsuits allege an institutional failure on the JCCA’s part to adequately address and prevent child sexual abuse from occurring.
Survivors Come Forward Under the New York Child Victims Act
In July 2025, seven former residents of the Pleasantville Cottage School and the Edenwald Center filed separate lawsuits in the Manhattan Supreme Court over purported child sex abuse they experienced at the JCCA facilities. Survivors allege they were abused by staff and other residents between 2015 and 2023, and at ages as young as 10. One lawsuit described the facility as a “breeding ground” for sexual abuse, violence, and trauma.
Recent abuse allegations against JCCA facilities, such as the Pleasantville Cottage School, date back to the mid-2010s, but some lawsuits say covert abuse at the facility has occurred since the early 1960s. For example, a former Pleasantville school resident who resided at the facility between 1963 and 1966 alleged in 2021 that multiple staff members sexually assaulted her.
Most of the sexual abuse and assault lawsuits filed against the facility and the JCCA assert claims of negligence and negligent hiring, training, supervision, and retention of staff.
Legal Rights and Options for Survivors of Residential Facility Abuse
Survivors of child sexual abuse at residential facilities such as the Pleasantville Cottage School and other JCCA facilities have multiple options for holding individuals and institutions accountable, even if the abuse occurred years ago. In 2019, New York passed the Child Victims Act, significantly expanding the amount of time child sexual abuse survivors have to file civil lawsuits. Survivors now have until their 55th birthday to file a civil lawsuit against people or entities who contributed to sexual abuse against them.
Survivors also may report abuse to law enforcement, which may result in criminal charges. After receiving a report, police will investigate, and prosecutors will ultimately decide whether to file charges.
Why Choose an Experienced Sex Abuse Lawyer
As a sexual abuse survivor, you may be able to file a lawsuit even if the abuse occurred years or decades ago, regardless of whether your abuser was criminally charged or convicted. You can also still file suit if the abuser is deceased. If you decide to pursue legal action, working with an attorney experienced in institutional abuse is critical.
A trauma-informed legal team can make all the difference in your sexual abuse case’s outcome. An experienced attorney can help gather evidence, consult expert witnesses, file your lawsuit in time, negotiate with defendants, or litigate your case at trial if settlement negotiations fail.
Speak With a Sexual Abuse Attorney Today
If you or a loved one has endured sexual abuse at a Jewish Child Care Association facility such as the Pleasantville Cottage School or the Edenwald Center, you have rights and legal options for holding the responsible parties accountable.
At Helping Survivors, we work to connect victims of sexual abuse with resources and experienced sexual abuse lawyers who can help them file lawsuits against the individuals and institutions that perpetrated and enabled the abuse.
Contact us today to learn more about your options.
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