One lawsuit alleges a patient died of infection — dehydrated and malnourished — due to inadequate staffing at a Santa Fe nursing home.
Another alleges a patient suffered a femur fracture, pneumonia, sepsis and life-threatening complications from diabetes during a yearlong stay at an Albuquerque nursing home.
A third claims a patient entered hospice care after numerous urinary tract infections, diabetic emergencies, rashes and falls — including one that fractured her right hip — in a Las Cruces nursing home.
Those are just a few of the pending lawsuits accusing Genesis HealthCare of wrongful death and negligence before the company filed for financial restructuring bankruptcy in Texas in July. The Pennsylvania-based company operates about two dozen skilled nursing and senior living facilities in New Mexico, including Santa Fe’s Casa Real.
But many of the plaintiffs alleging patient harm at Genesis facilities in New Mexico will never receive just compensation for the injuries, said attorneys Dusti Harvey, Jennifer Foote and Caela Baker, partners in an Albuquerque-based law firm that specializes in nursing home abuse litigation and has brought dozens of cases against Genesis since its founding 2005.
While bankruptcy proceedings are still underway — and unlikely to conclude for months — the attorneys said their clients could end up with just a fraction of the financial compensation they might otherwise receive.
“What we keep hearing from our clients is: ‘How can they do this? How can they get away with this? … Why does the system let this happen? This doesn’t seem fair.’ ” Foote said.
Genesis is in the process of closing its court-approved sale to another company, and then will be subject to a plan to address and administer “potential recoveries” for people with pending claims, spokesperson Nerida Brennan wrote in an email to The New Mexican.
“Genesis remains focused on improving the lives we touch through the delivery of high-quality healthcare and everyday compassion, which is the cornerstone of the organization Genesis has consistently and carefully built over the years,” Brennan wrote.
Effect on pending cases
A search for personal injury and wrongful death claims filed against Genesis HealthCare in New Mexico courts yields hundreds of results.
When Genesis filed for bankruptcy in July 2025, Harvey, Foote and Baker’s firm represented six clients who already had reached settlement agreements with the company and eight more with litigation pending, Baker said.
Neither group of clients is likely to see much in the way of financial compensation, the attorneys said.
Upon filing for bankruptcy, the company estimated its total liability for settled and pending lawsuits at $259 million, while it spent $8 million per month defending and settling lawsuits.
Brennan said Genesis HealthCare is in the process of closing its sale to 101 W State Street Holdings LLC — a private equity-backed firm — after that plan garnered court approval in January.
Official closure of the sale is expected in summer or fall, said Ian Norris, a Pennsylvania-based attorney specializing in nursing home abuse cases.
Plaintiffs with settlement agreements that predate Genesis’ bankruptcy filing will have to wait until closing is finalized to learn how much of their settlement amount they may still be able to recover.
“They’re essentially waiting to find out what the dollar amount that’s going to be in the estate [is] and where they’re in line to collect on that,” Norris said.
They’re unlikely to receive the full amount.
“They may receive pennies on the dollar for those settlements; they may not,” Foote said. “It really depends on sort of what amount of money is allocated to the tort claims.”
Plaintiffs with lawsuits pending before Genesis filed for bankruptcy may never see any financial compensation from the company. Personal injury and wrongful death cases against Genesis were halted in bankruptcy court in October 2025, Reuters reported.
A large pool of plaintiffs likely will be vying for whatever money is leftover after Genesis has satisfied its debts with other creditors, Baker said. They’re essentially near the back of the line in terms of collecting on any remaining funds.
“We’re fighting, we’re hoping, we’re trying — but the reality is, they may not see any recovery whatsoever,” Foote said.
“There’s nothing that shows that they’re going to be made whole,” Norris said “There’s no circumstance that we’re aware of where they would be getting 100% recovery for what they were owed.”
Patients alleging harm at Genesis facilities after the company declared bankruptcy — that is, after July 9 — can still pursue their cases through what are called post-petition administrative claims, Baker said. Her firm is already representing three such clients.
‘Serious quality issues’
The reorganization is the latest in a string of challenges for Genesis HealthCare and its facilities in New Mexico.
A December 2025 investigation by KFF Health News found Genesis facilities trail national averages in the U.S. Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services’ five-star rating system, in which five stars represents the best quality of care and one star the worst. More than a third of Genesis facilities received a one-star rating, compared to a nationwide average of 20%.
Those quality issues extend to Santa Fe’s Casa Real. During the 118-bed facility’s latest inspection by the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services in July 2024, inspectors found 32 health citations — more than triple the national average of 9.5. A 44-page inspection report cited Casa Real for failing to provide residents enough food and fluids, insufficient staffing and lacking infection and food-borne illness prevention protocols, among other issues.
The federal agency no longer gives Casa Real a star rating “due to a history of serious quality issues.”
But for some patients — including many in Santa Fe — Genesis facilities may be among the only accessible options: Casa Real is one of only two skilled nursing homes in Santa Fe that accepts Medicare, according to the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services.
The company’s facilities are similarly ubiquitous for patients with Medicare and Medicaid in Albuquerque, Roswell, Las Cruces, Clovis, Silver City and Gallup.
That creates an impossible choice for patients and regulators, Norris said: “Do we shut down all the homes that are habitual offenders, or do we accept this poor care because it’s the only care we have access to?”
He added, “As an attorney that practices in seven states, I struggle with that in every state.”
Foote said Genesis’ bankruptcy is part of a “larger picture” of a growing crisis in elder and nursing home care in the U.S. — a system that’s likely to experience further strain as the population grows older.
“We’re seeing firsthand in New Mexico how that looks — and it’s scary,” Foote said.
“It’s frightening and it’s upsetting because so much money — federal money, state money — flows to these facilities,” she added, “and there does not seem to be an adequate level of care provided in response to those funds.”