Warning: This story contains details on sexual abuse allegations, including allegations of crimes involving children. If you or someone you know may be a victim of sexual abuse, confidential support, information and advice are available at the National Sexual Assault Hotline by calling 800-656-4673. Text chat is also available online.

Three of the four defendants who were sued for nearly $1 billion over a former West Linn doctor’s alleged sexual abuse of his patients have settled just days before a civil trial in a lawsuit brought by 180 women and girls, court records show.

With the multi-month trial set to begin Monday, Feb. 2, court records indicate David Farley, the West Linn Family Health Center and Legacy Meridian Park Hospital have entered settlements with the patients.

The fourth defendant, Providence Willamette Falls Medical Center, continues to fight the lawsuit so the trial will go forward as scheduled.

The lawsuit, which seeks $970 million in damages, alleges Farley for three decades used his position as a doctor to sexually abuse women and girls who came to him for medical care.

In a separate criminal case, Farley has pleaded not guilty to 16 charges stemming from the alleged sexual abuse of his patients. More charges in that case could be filed before its trial begins in April 2027.

The allegations first came to light when four women filed a lawsuit in October 2020 alleging Farley sexually abused them. They sought $40 million. Roughly 180 other women and girls joined them in the years that followed.

Farley opened the West Linn Family Health Center in 1989 as his own practice. He also gained permission to treat patients at two nearby hospitals: Legacy’s Meridian Park Hospital in Tualatin and Providence’s Willamette Falls Medical Center in Oregon City, where he mostly delivered babies and worked as a gynecologist.

The longtime doctor quietly retired in August of 2020, shortly after the Oregon Medical Board launched an investigation into allegations he took nude photos of his underage patients. He surrendered his license to the board later that year.

No settlements for the case have been publicly announced. Attorneys for the parties either did not respond to OPB or declined to comment. In December, a judge issued a gag order for all parties in the case. However a recent filing from Providence states that the other defendants have settled.

“Plaintiffs have settled their claims against Farley, WLFHC, and Legacy,” the filing states.

The court records do not disclose the timing or amount of the settlements.

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Clinic in trouble with insurance, closing

News of the settlement comes shortly after West Linn Family Health told its patients it plans to close in March.

“We are writing to inform you that we have made the difficult decision to close West Linn Family Health Center, effective March 19, 2026,” the clinic wrote in a letter to patients dated Dec. 31, 2025 and obtained by OPB. The letter was signed by the clinic’s three remaining doctors, Joyce Endo, Ryan Scott and Mindi Robinson.

Prior to announcing the closure, the clinic was in hot water with several of its insurance providers. West Linn Family Health faces court actions from American Economy Insurance Company, Twin City Fire Insurance Company and Allmerica Financial Benefit Insurance Company.

Among other remedies, Allmerica has requested that a federal court rescind its policy with West Linn Family Health dating back to 2021. The insurer argued, in part, that the clinic failed to disclose that it was being sued for Farley’s sexual abuse at the time it applied for insurance through Allmerica and did not inform insurers of the suit at all until 2025. The other insurers asked the court to declare that they are not responsible for covering the clinic in the suit brought by Farley’s patients.

According to the lawsuit, at least some staff at the clinic were aware of Farley’s abuse for years. While Farley made sure to be alone with patients and unchaperoned during much of the alleged abuse, there were numerous instances where his abuse was witnessed by other clinic staff, the lawsuit alleges.

In one instance in 2007, one of Farley’s patients at the clinic requested the presence of a female nurse after Farley fondled the patient’s breasts and attempted to sexually stimulate her.

When a nurse joined near the end of the pelvic exam, the nurse allegedly instructed the patient to “close her eyes and go to her happy place.”

Though the lawsuit does not specify this patient’s age, it describes Farley telling her “if this were the 1700s, (she) would be of normal childbearing age and it would be perfectly normal for her to be married, having sex and making babies.”

The lawsuit notes several other instances where clinic staff were present for alleged abuse. One patient mentioned the time she, as a teenager, complained to clinic nurses that Farley was conducting breast and pelvic exams on her at least once every three months. According to the suit, clinic nurses told her they “didn’t make the rules.”

Records from the West Linn Police Department, which investigated Farley between 2020 and 2022, also revealed multiple clinic staff knew of Farley’s plans to photograph the breasts and genitals of children for what he claimed was a “study on puberty.”

The lawsuit alleges that the hospitals, as well as the clinic, ignored complaints about Farley, failed “to disclose information from abuse victims, and contributed to a sexually hostile environment.” The suit also asserts the clinic and hospitals should have reported Farley to the medical board and law enforcement but failed to do so.

The clinic has argued that Farley allegedly committed the abuse outside the scope of his role at the clinic.

“Specifically, it was outside the scope of any employment or agency for Farley to sexually abuse or assault patients or to intentionally inflict emotional distress upon patients,” attorneys for the clinic wrote in response to the lawsuit.

The one defendant still fighting the lawsuit has used a similar argument. Providence has said the patients’ “injuries and damages, if any, were caused in whole or part by the negligent acts or omissions of others over whom (Providence) has no responsibility, or control.”

In its own court filings, Legacy denied knowledge of Farley’s misconduct and refuted that its patients had lodged complaints against Farley with the hospital.

Farley has not presented his own arguments against the allegations, instead citing his constitutional rights against self-incrimination.

Barring a last-minute settlement between the plaintiffs and Providence, trial will begin on Monday. Because the other defendants have settled, the proceedings will largely focus on whether Providence was culpable in Farley’s alleged abuse.

News Source : https://www.opb.org/article/2026/01/28/west-linn-doctor-sexual-abuse-settlement/