UPenn, Amazon Settle Lawsuit Relating to Student’s Suicide
The lawsuit accused the university and the online retailer of negligence.
Arya Singh died in 2013 after ingesting cyanide in her University of Pennsylvania dorm room.
The University of Pennsylvania and online retailer Amazon Inc. settled a lawsuit with the family of a former student who committed suicide in 2013.
The settlement, which was reached on Jan. 30, ends a two-year long case relating to the suicide death of former University of Pennsylvania nursing student Arya Singh.
Singh was declared dead after ingesting the poison cyanide in her dorm room in UPenn’s Rodin College House in February 2013.
Singh’s family filed a lawsuit against Amazon for allowing the student to purchase the poison and against UPenn for negligence after Singh reported being sexually assaulted in a dorm in 2011.
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Singh’s family accused Amazon of allowing GMO Internet Inc. (based in Thailand) to sell cyanide products that resulted in 11 deaths. When Singh died Amazon had no policy against making sales of the poison.
The lawsuit also accused the school of being “unsympathetic, hostile and at times vindictive” to Singh after she reported a sexual assault.
According to the complaint, Singh scheduled a therapy session with the university’s Counseling and Psychological Services, but the center did not allow Singh to schedule a follow up and did not attempt to schedule a second appointment despite therapists’ findings that the student was depressed, anxious and unable to sleep following the sexual assault.
Singh’s attacker was removed from her dorm but still allowed access to her building, reports thedp.com.
After the assault, Singh began drinking heavily and was placed on academic probation in addition to facing numerous other student misconduct infractions.
Singh was found dead on the same day the university sent her a letter asking her to vacate student housing due to under-enrollment.
The settlement’s terms are confidential.
CORRECTION: A previous version of this article incorrectly stated that Arya Singh attended Penn State University instead of the University of Pennsylvania.
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