DSS to pay SC mom of five murdered children $1.5 million. She alleged ‘gross negligence’

Two South Carolina child welfare agencies are paying a total of $1.5 million to Amber Jones, the mother of five children murdered in 2014 by her husband, Tim Jones.

The payment settles a long-running lawsuit between Amber Jones and the S.C. Department of Social Services and the Lexington County Department of Social Services. The settlement was finalized in late July, according to an order on file in state court in Lexington County.

The money will come from the state Insurance Reserve Fund, which handles claims against many public agencies in wrongful death cases, according to an order in the case signed by state Judge Debra McCaslin.

Neither DSS agency had an immediate comment.

Amber Jones’ lawsuit, filed in 2016, alleged that despite numerous urgent complaints, the state and Lexington County DSS agencies were “grossly negligent” in failing to properly investigate or take necessary action for years while the five Jones children were tortured, beaten and starved by Tim Jones, Amber Jones’ ex-husband who had custody of the children.

Repeated complaints to social agencies came from babysitters hired by Tim Jones, as well as teachers and the school nurse at Saxe Gotha Elementary School, where three of the children attended school, Amber Jones’ lawsuit said.

Actions taken by the two DSS agencies — which included drafting ineffective “Safety Plans” but leaving the children in Jones’s custody — fell far short of what the agencies could have done, Amber Jones’s complaint said.

“Certainly, it is not enough money,” said Jones’s attorney, state Sen. Dick Harpootlian, who added that the settlement puts an end to an emotional case. “Their mother is glad to put this behind them.” Harpootlian’s co-counsel on the case attorney Hyman Rubin.

Neither DSS agency admitted any fault in the settlement.

Tim Jones, 42, who is on South Carolina’s death row, will receive none of the money. He has been in prison since 2019 after being convicted that year of killing his five children — Merah, 8; Elias, 7; Nahtahn, 6; Gabriel, 2; and Abigail Elaine, 1 — in 2019. A Lexington County jury took less than two hours to recommend death. He was formally sentenced by state Judge Eugene “Bubba” Griffith.

Jones and his ex-wife had an informal joint custody agreement, with Jones being the children’s primary caretaker, according to evidence in his court case.

On the night of Aug. 28, 2014, after taking drugs and killing his five children by strangling and torturing them, Jones loaded their bodies in his Cadillac Esplanade SUV, left his mobile home in Red Bank in rural Lexington County and drove around the Southeast for days before dumping them in a woods in Alabama.

Jones was stopped at a random police checkpoint in Mississippi, where officers became suspicious of odors of marijuana and garbage. Officers soon became aware of an all-points bulletin out for Jones and his vehicle, and began questioning him. After several days, he confessed and led officers including South Carolina Law Enforcement Division agents to the children’s bodies.

Jones did not appear to be someone who would commit one of the most bizarre and demented killings in S.C. history. He quoted the Bible, had an $82,000 a year job as a software engineer at Intel, and was the father of five children everyone loved. But evidence at his trial showed he came from a troubled family, had untreated mental health problems and was a drug-abusing ex-convict who controlled and mistreated his wife so much she divorced him in 2013.

The $1.5 million represents a compromise between the maximum of $2.4 million Amber Jones could have been awarded had the case gone to trial before a jury, Harpootlian said. State law limits the amount plaintiffs can be awarded in negligence cases, depending on variables such as the number of victims and the number of incidents.

Harpootlian and his co-counsel, Rubin, will receive $600,000 of the settlement, plus $50,970 for their expenses in the case.

Private attorney Will Davidson of Columbia represented the Insurance Reserve Fund.

Tim Jones’s conviction and sentence for five murders were upheld last year in a unanimous decision by the S.C. Supreme Court, which called the killings one of the most shocking murder cases in state history.

“Frankly, the horrific murders perpetrated by Jones are incapable of comparison in this state,” justices wrote.

Harpootlian said, “Hopefully, this litigation and its results sends a strong message to DSS that they need to take action when they get complaints and they see a pattern.”

This story was originally published August 19, 2024 at 10:54 AM.