U.S. Health-Care Provider Beats Suit Over Veteran’s Suicide

A veteran’s widow lost a suit accusing a Veterans Affairs health-care center of failing to prevent her husband’s suicide because there was no evidence the facility had a duty to provide him with such treatment, a federal court in Illinois said.

Thomas Young spoke to a social worker at the Jesse Brown Veterans Affairs Medical Center in Chicago just days before his death, but the call didn’t establish a treatment relationship, as Young never sought a physician’s services, the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Illinois said.

The court granted the U.S. summary judgment in the case ...