NH Attorney General's Office Won't Say If He Has Vetoed Any Awards To YDC Victims As Now Allowed

By Nancy West, InDepth NH

CONCORD, NH — Attorney General John Formella won't say whether he has vetoed any YDC Settlement Fund monetary awards — as is now allowed — for people who were sexually and physically abused as children incarcerated by the state claiming that information is confidential.

InDepthNH.org specifically asked in a right-to-know request under RSA 91a “how many of the 30 decisions issued in July [2025] as a result of June hearings Diane Nicolosi and John Broderick conducted have now been vetoed by John Formella or his office.”

June was the last month Nicolosi, a retired Superior Court judge, and Broderick, a former chief justice of the state Supreme Court, heard and finalized awards through the independent YDC Settlement Fund set up by the legislature in 2022. So if Formella vetoed any of the June awards, he would have been applying a revised law to awards already promised to victims who had no way of knowing that was a possibility when they told their stories of abuse at settlement hearings.

"We have completed our search for and review of records regarding your request under New Hampshire RSA 91-A. We are unable to respond to your request pursuant to RSA 91-A:5, XIII, which states that '[r]ecords of the youth development center claims administration and the YDC settlement fund' are exempt from disclosure," Assistant Attorney General Laura Raymond said responding to InDepthNH.org's request.

"See also RSA 21-M:11-a, VII(g) (“Claims and all documents and information created in connection with claims shall be confidential, except that matter which was not previously confidential shall not become
so by virtue of being submitted in connection with a claim, or except as otherwise provided in this section or in RSA 91-A.”), Raymond wrote.

InDepthNH.org didn't ask for any documents, just the number of awards that had been settled in June that may have later been vetoed by Formella because of a revised law that went into effect July 1. It shifts authority to appoint the fund administrator from the state Supreme Court to Gov. Kelly Ayotte. The change also gives Attorney General Formella veto power over any settlement fund award with no explanation needed.

With 1,500 more victims waiting their turn to be heard through the YDC Settlement Fund, there have been no new hearings since the end of June and no reason to suspect there will be any hearings soon because Ayotte has not appointed a new administrator. Also, some of the contracts involved in the fund may have to be put out to bid under the revised law so it will likely be months before the process can resume.

Some YDC victims sought a preliminary injunction in court as part of their lawsuit against the changes, but Judge Daniel St. Hilaire ruled against the victims last week after a hearing last month.

Formella's spokesman said after St. Hilaire's ruling: “The Department of Justice is pleased that the Court agreed with our arguments. The changes made to the YDC settlement fund by the Legislature rightfully bring this process in line with the way the justice system best operates," calling it the most transparent, qualified, and neutral way of ensuring justice for victims and the sustainability of the fund in the long term...

Many of the victims were lured away from filing in Superior Court to the settlement fund in a deal that included the state increasing some payouts in some categories. The state has always encouraged victims to go through the settlement fund because the amounts jurors would likely award would be much higher.

Critics call this latest change nothing more than a "bait and switch," but lawmakers were clear during hearings on the state budget that they were looking to save money.

“There is no language within the [Settlement Fund] Act that expressly forbids amendments to the claims process or to the management of the administrator’s position,” St. Hilaire wrote.

The survivors said the changes to the Settlement Fund law were enacted after they were encouraged to drop their civil lawsuits and opt-in to the settlement process.

Broderick testified at the court hearing last month that taking away the administrator’s independence obliterates any trust the survivors might have had in the process.

“The minute you start to wonder, ‘will I keep my job if I do this, will the Attorney General be unhappy if I do that,’ you don’t have a neutral and independent process,” Broderick testified. “The defendant State gets to decide how much you get. The defendant state gets to say to the judge halfway through the trial ‘we don’t like the job you’re doing and we’re going to replace you.’”

This article first appeared on InDepthNH.org and is republished here under a Creative Commons license.