DuPage County Establishing Team to Investigate Allegations of Elder Abuse of Seniors in Local Nursing Homes, Private Residences, and Retirement Facilities
In Illinois’s DuPage County, Attorney Joseph Birkett is asking the Illinois Department of Aging to establish an Elder Abuse Fatality Review Team to investigate claims involving nursing home residents 60 years of age and older that may be the victims of physical abuse in local long-term care facilities or in home health-care environments. If the state approves the program, members would be allowed access to nursing home records that are normally kept private. The team would be made up of people from the state attorney’s office, the DuPage County coronor, the sheriff, nursing home groups, and state and county senior citizens groups.
Earlier this month, 23-year-old Heidi Leon, a DuPage County nursing home worker, was charged with criminal neglect of a nursing home patient, criminal neglect of an elderly person, and obstruction of justice. Leon is the nursing home worker who is accused of failing to check on 89-year-old Sarah Wentworth, an Itasca nursing home resident, after she triggered a door alarm while exiting the facility. Wentworth, an Alzheimer’s patient, was found frozen to death outside the nursing home. Leon is also accused of lying to police to cover up the incident. Her family is suing the Arbor of Itasca nursing home for her wrongful death.
Birkett says claims that would be under review include a case in which an elderly person in a domestic living situation may have been overdosed with medication. In Kane County, a similar fatality review team has already been set up to examine cases involving seniors that died while receiving care in home situations and retirement homes. The team was established after a woman was found in a private home living on soiled sheets. She was also malnourished. Her two daughters were charged with criminally neglecting an elderly person.
Nursing workers and caregivers at Illinois nursing homes, retirement homes, and in private residents are supposed to treat their residents with respect and provide them with the care that they need. Abuse or neglect of an elderly person can be grounds for a nursing home abuse or neglect lawsuit, as well as criminal charges.
Abuse of DuPage elderly to get closer scrutiny, Chicago Tribune, March 6, 2009
Illinois nurse’s assistant charged in freezing death of elderly woman, NYDailyNews.com, March 3, 2009
Related Web Resources:
Caregiver Watching TV Left Patient to Freeze Outside, NBC Chicago, February 20, 2009
Please contact Chicago Nursing Home Abuse Attorney Steve Malman to schedule a free case evaluation.
