HOUSTON – Texas Children’s Hospital formally responded to a local woman’s defamation lawsuit.
Earlier this month, the nonprofit pediatric hospital filed an original answer into Ajshay James’s suit, challenging her allegations it made false statements resulting in Harris County Child Protective Services taking her 3-year-old daughter away.
As previously reported in The Southeast Texas Record, James asserts that the statements additionally inflicted “personal and economic” injuries upon her. She is reportedly prevented from seeing her daughter “except under supervision and for only an hour per week.”
The defendant argues that James failed “to specifically notify (it) of the allegations against it and (the suit) is therefore insufficient.”
“The plaintiff’s petition further fails to delineate who engaged in the allegedly tortuous acts and when these tortuous acts occurred,” the hospital’s 6-page response says. “Accordingly, the plaintiff’s petition prevents the defendant Texas Children’s Hospital from obtaining reasonably certainty about the allegations being made against it, and, therefore, hinders its ability to adequately defend itself against the plaintiff’s allegations.”
The law firm Serpe Jones Andrews Callender & Bell, PLLC in Houston is representing the respondent.
Harris County 80th District Court Case No. 2018-72490