Prison sentence for neglect death

The Democrat and Chronicle in Rochester, New York, reports the sentencing of Amber Zuke to 2 1/3 years in prison after being found guilty last month of causing the death of her 6-year-old son Jacob by neglecting his nutritional and medical needs. Her husband, Timothy Zuke, whom the judge felt was less responsible for Jacob's death than Ms Zuke, took a plea deal and will serve one to three years in prsion. Jacob, who had cerebral palsy, weighed only 25 pounds when police found him dead in the family apartment on January 1, 2008.

The full story is here.

Settlement agreement in case involving treatment of disabled man in prison

Port Orchard, Washington (June 15, 2009) - According to the Seattle Times, Kitscap County has agreed to pay $4.7 million dollars to a man with developmental disabilities for his treatment during his stay in the Kitsap County Jail. According to the article, before he entered jail, William Trask was healthy and led an active life. But when he left prison he was severely dehydrated with gangrene and failing organs. From the article:

William Trask's relatives say he suffered brain damage after refusing to eat or drink in the jail. His lawyer Tim Rolland Tesh of Seattle says Trask became disoriented in jail and was not taken to Harrison Medical Center for 21 days.

Trask's family told KING5-TV that the man suffered from a developmental disability before he entered the jail, but was healthy and active. Relatives say he left jail with dehydration and organ failure.

In a statement released to the press, Sheriff Steve Boyer said that "Mr Trask's situation is very serious, however it is an aberration."

"The Kitsap County Jail is an excellent facility with professional staff. The experts cannot specifically identify the cause of his physical deterioration. However we are pleased that, through this settlement, Mr. Trask's present and future care and health needs will be met."

To read the story in full, see here and here.

Home care worker neglect charges

Saint Paul, Minnesota (June 3, 2009) - According to Pioneer Press/Twin Cities, a home care worker has been shown on videotape neglecting to feed two adolescent teens with disabilities in her care. The tape also shows her "sleeping on the job," and in one case, having sex with a male friend in the children's living area. From the article:

Concerns about the home care worker surfaced in late October after the parents took the brothers to an emergency room because of their alarming weight loss.

The children receive 24-hour nursing care due to their myotubular myopathy, a condition that severely diminishes their ability to move, eat and breathe on their own. After a doctor suggested that the family's overnight nursing aide might not be conducting their tube feedings, the family reviewed videotape from their home.

While the aide was recording regular feedings in medical records, a week's worth of tape showed that she wasn't conducting all of the scheduled feedings and was turning off the boys' feeding pumps for short periods.

The tape also showed the worker sleeping on the job and leaving for prolonged smoking breaks, and in one case she "had sexual intercourse with a male friend in the children's living quarters," according to the May 21 state report, which was released Tuesday.

The worker, who has been fired, was employed by Divine HealthCare Network, which serves eight counties and has been operating for eight years. According to the report, no penalties have been issued by the state against the agency, and there have been other substantiated cases of abuse or neglect against the agency since 2005.

A nurse from the agency said she had noticed that the aide was writing the exact same medical reports every night and was leaving out key information. The nurse also told investigators she had noticed from daily reports that the children had been losing weight.

See also this report in the Star Tribune.

Minna Mettinen-Kekalainen

Minna Mettinen-Kekalainen is a 42-year-old woman with Asperger's syndrome and ALS in Ontario, Canada who has been on hunger stike because she is allegedly being refused the home care services she needs. The Sudbury Star has an article about her here, and Amanda Baggs over at Ballastexistenze has a post here. Tomorrow (Friday), social work students at Laurentian University will stage a day-long protest Friday to raise awareness about her situation. They will demonstrate in front of Sudbury MPP Rick Bartolucci's office from 8 a. m. to noon, then march to the North East Community Care Access Centre in the Rainbow Centre for a demonstration until 4 p.m. There are additional details and an update on Minna's condition in this morning's Sudbury Star. Here is an excerpt:

A friend of Mettinen- Kekalainen, who is also her legal power of attorney, said she has begun accepting her food supplement again, ending her hunger strike.

Jason Bushie said Mettinen- Kekalainen has also experienced a positive mood swing in the last few days. She has been deemed a palliative patient by her family physician, but that is not stopping her from getting out, in her motorized wheelchair and via Handi-Transit, for outings such as one she took to a Sudbury bookstore Wednesday.

Bushie said Mettinen- Kekalainen still is not receiving personal support or nursing care from the access centre, although there have been attempts to try to set up appointments. Her voice has been so affected by ALS, also known as Lou Gehrig's disease, that she can no longer use the telephone and must rely on e-mail for communication. That is making it more difficult to set up appointments for treatment.

Bushie said last week the access centre told him it does not have nurses available to care for his friend, since the nursing agency that complained about Mettinen- Kekalainen refused to treat her.

Mettinen-Kekalainen suffers from asperger syndrome, an autism spectrum disorder characterized by autistic-like behaviour and deficiencies in social and communication skills.

Murray said social work students hope their protest will get more people in the community talking about Mettinen-Kekalainen's situation. They also hope it will cause the access centre to reconsider its position on her care and prompt Bartolucci to get more active in her case.

Update on the investigation into the death of Jean Lemire

Barre, Vermont - The state body investigating the agency that hired Julie Davis, the caregiver accused of neglect in connection with the death by dehydration on August 9, 2008, of 47-year-old Jean Lemire, who was developmentally disabled, says it did nothing wrong in the incident, the Times Argus reports. According to Joan Senecal, the commissioner of the Vermont Department of Disability, Aging and Independent Living (DAIL), the agency, Lincoln Street, took all the necessary steps to vet Davis when they hired her, including five background checks and three reference checks, and has not been found negligent.

As reported here by the press on November 1, Julie Davis is charged with abuse and neglect to a vulnerable adult by a caregiver for failing to provide Jean Lemire with medical attention, food, drink and shelter for six days, resulting in Ms Lemire death from hyerthermia soon afterwards. She faces up to 15 years in prison.

The Times Argus also notes that Ms Lemire was the second person with developmental disabilities to die while in Julie Davis' care. According to court records and Joan Senecal, Doug Lafrance died of pneumonia on Davis' watch, but that incident didn't prevent her from continuing to be a caregiver. As Ms Senecal explains:

"We take on lots of people with compromised medical and health conditions," said Senecal. "Many of these people are very frail and have lots of medical problems. It does happen once in awhile."

Yes, but two deaths while under the watch of the same caregiver?

Siblings accused of making their sister live in a shed will go to trial

Redwood City, California - The siblings of a 58-year-old woman with developmental disabilities who are accused of making her live in a shed in their home's back yard will go to trial, the San Mateo Times reports:

Bertha Lozano, 46, and her 53-year-old brother, Jesus Ramirez, kept their mildly mentally disabled sister in an 8-by-12-foot metal shed while stealing her disability checks and neglecting to provide her with adequate care, prosecutors say.

Their sister, 58, who is diagnosed with mild mental retardation and a psychotic disorder, initially told police she had been living in the shed since 1980 but later said she had been there since 2001.

Among the items found in the shed were a mattress with a thin blanket, a portable toilet unattached to running water and a space heater, a San Mateo County Sheriff's deputy testified during a preliminary hearing held for Lozano and Ramirez on Wednesday.

A Barbie doll and a coloring book were also present in the shed, which is described as being "relatively well-kept."

As reported in an earlier FRIDA post, the woman told police that she lived in the shed because their was no room for her inside the house, which housed her brother, her sister and apprently, seven pit bull terriers. Lozano and Ramirez are expected to return to court on Dec. 18. They are each charged with one count of neglect of a developmentally disabled person and one count of embezzling funds from someone under their care.

Nurse's unsympathetic comments about a patient may have contributed to her subsequent suicide

From this report in the Sydney Morning Herald (via Charlottesvillle Prejudice and Civil Rights Watch):

ALLEGED comments by a senior nurse that a patient’s attempt at suicide was “attention-seeking” may have contributed to the patient’s subsequent death, an
inquest has heard.

Emily Chapman, 20, took her life in February 2006 while being treated at the Cumberland Hospital psychiatric unit for a serious mental disorder.

It is alleged that following Ms Chapman’s earlier suicide attempt, a senior night nurse, Margot Gattenby, said she was “just an attention-seeker”.

“If she was serious she would not have pressed the [emergency] button,” Ms Gattenby is alleged to have told another nurse within Ms Chapman’s earshot.

Ms Gattenby denies the allegation, as well as the claim that she had told Ms Chapman she had “run out of compassion” for her and that she was not really ill.

Dr Phillip Brown, an independent psychiatrist who examined Ms Chapman’s case, yesterday told Glebe Coroner’s Court that if the allegations were true, Ms Chapman would have developed the perception that her nursing staff believed she was attention-seeking and she would shy away from interacting with them.

Under questioning, Dr Brown accepted that Ms Chapman had interacted on several occasions with some nurses after the alleged comments. However, he said she may have had particular trouble coping at night, shying away from certain nurses.

The court heard that Ms Chapman, who had frequent suicidal thoughts, had told a nurse that she would not warn staff members if she had the opportunity to take her own life.

She had written a letter complaining about Ms Gattenby, but did not send it for fear of retribution.

Parents sue school over suicide of student with disabilities

From the Atlanta Journal-Constitution:

Jonathan King told teachers at his north Georgia alternate public school that he couldn’t stand being locked within the four concrete walls of a small seclusion room.

In 2004, just weeks after threatening suicide, the 13-year-old eighth-grader hanged himself in the room, using a cord a teacher provided him to hold up his pants, court records show.

Now, four years later, as the Alpine Program in Gainesville starts its new school year, Jonathan’s parents are suing the program and the agency that oversees it. Don and Tina King of Murrayville, just outside Gainesville, say the treatment their son received at the school was unconstitutional and the school failed to protect him from self-harm. A north Georgia judge is expected to decide soon whether the King’s case should be dismissed or sent to a jury trial.

full story is here ...

Family of Rebecca Mullins file a wrongful death lawsuit

The Bay City Times (Michigan) reports that the family of Rebecca Mullins, whose body was found dead in an abandoned house three months after she left a Bay City group home, is suing a social services agency, the group home and a worker for wrongful death, pain, and suffering and loss of companionship of their family member. Accoding to the lawsuit filed in the Bay County Circuit Court, Ms Mullins, who was 57 and developmentally disabled, had a history of running away from the home, and that a "behavior treatment plan" drafted for her prescribed that staff should remain in the same room with her. Ms Mullins died of dehydration after falling through a rotted floor in the home and becoming entangled in a rafter.

more here...

Nine people have been charged in the death of Danieal Kelly

The Associated Press reports that nine people have been charged in the death of Danieal Kelly, a 14-year old girl with cerebral palsy who was only 42 pounds when she died from starvation in August, 2006.

Danieal Kelly's mother has been charged with murder, and her father has been charged with child endangerment. Seven other people have also been charged.

These include two social workers from the Department of Human Services, who have been charged with child endangerment for failing to act upon reports that Danieal was not receiving medical care, social services or schooling, and two social workers who worked for a company hired by the DHS to provide services to Daniel; they have been charged with involuntary manslaughter and for falsifying records to cover up the fact that they rarely checked on her, it is reported.

Three friends of Danieal's mother were also arrested and charged with perjury for telling grand jurors on the day before Danieal's body was discovered that she was doing fine.

District Attorney Lyne Abraham is quoted as calling the DHS's handling of the case "callous, indifferent, unconscionable" and all too familiar. According to Abraham:

Daniel did not fall through the cracks ... It was a failure of institutional inclination. Saving Danieal was just too much trouble.

Excerpts from the 258-page grand jury report recommending the charges include:

In the final weeks of her life, Danieal's brother - himself only a child - kept telling his mother that something was wrong, but she dismissed him. Shortly before his sister died, he begged his mother to call an ambulance. She refused. Only the next day, with flies buzzing all over her body, was 911 contacted.

During this investigation we found a tall, filthy cardboard box in [DHS social worker Dana] Poindexter's cubicle, big enough to hold a file cabinet. The box was filled to the top with random case files, food wrappers, and unopened business envelopes (some with four-year-old postmarks). At the bottom of the pile was Danieal's file.

Even when she personally visited the Kelly apartment, [DHS social worker Laura] Sommerer failed to check on Danieal; on the last occasion, five weeks before the child's death, when she had already lost 50% of her weight and at times was left sitting in her own urine and feces, Sommerer noticed nothing amiss at all.

At least one [DHS] administrator herself back-dated reports about Danieal, some by more than a year, with false dates and determinations to make it look like they had been properly completed. She said this was a common practice at DHS.

On the afternoon and evening of Danieal's death, [part-owner/director of MultiEthnic Behavior Health Mickal] Kamuvaka convened what in essence was a forgery fest in her office. She directed [employees] to concoct almost a year's worth of false progress reports, to substitute for all the work that had never actually been done.

For more excerpts, see the Philadelphia Inquirer.