An organization is considered a charity when the purpose is to give private donations or gifts to those in need.
If they end up doing other items with this, then it isn’t a charitable donation and could be grounds for legal action.
About Charitable Immunity
Typically, charities are immune to liability, since the funds help those in need, so the courts believe that they should be supported regardless, and typically won’t’ have their funds taken away from lawsuits as well. However, most courts have thus abandoned this.
Some places may have limited immunity depending on the circumstances and the bad actors in place. other states may protect this from judgment too, as in the case of trust funds, and there are some that do still hold the rule of being completely immune regardless of the situation.
Exceptions to Charitable Immunity
It can be held liable if there is a liability that happens during activities that aren’t charitable.
If the charity has a profit-making space, then it could be liable to injury when running this, since that isn’t part of the charitable activity either.
The immunity may not apply either if intentional actions to harm others do occur, as in the case of charity fraud.
What to Sue For
Typically, there are a few ways that you can sue a charity.
If there is breach of contract claims, then they may not be immune. While they are immune to tort liability, typically the breach of contract actions do make them liable. Some may have no immunity, which will then allow actions that breach contracts.
What about employees? In some states, the trustees and the employees are immune to suits depending on the charity. The charity is only actually held liable if the person is directly at fault.
In a similar vein, the liability of employees and volunteers is also applied to where they are at fault. Where the employee is held liable, the person might be, but not the charity. Some states don’t make employers responsible for the actions of the employees either, especially if it’s a charity.
You can typically sue them however for personal injuries due to negligence, fraud, nuisances created by this, along with libel and slander as well.
Another way to sue them is as well for intentional injuries. While they aren’t immune to torts, they are of course, held liable if there is an employee that did directly harm the other person, since it can ultimately affect the state of the charity as well and affect the overall outlook of the people towards the charity.
How to Sue a Charity
The best way to sue a charity is not on your own. They do have a larger amount of funds and resources available, so you need something that’ll directly sue them so that you can get the help that you need.
The first thing that you should do, talks to a personal injury attorney to help you see if you can sue the charity. If you do decide to sue against them, you will indeed need the lawyer for this one. That’s not just because it could be a much larger group to be suing against, but there is also the fact as well that the legal system is complicated, especially when dealing with charity laws which are much messier than of course, your typical navigation of personal injury as well.
If that’s the case, the best thing for you to do at this point is, of course, to see someone who can help you, and someone who can help you start.