Examples of Abuse and Neglect Cases

ABUSE

• A 92-year-old resident of a small town nursing home was raped by a male certified nursing assistant. This aide was employed at the facility even though he had a criminal history.
  
• Using a bar of soap that was placed in a sock, an aide repeatedly beat a mentally retarded resident of a human development center because the aide wanted to sit in the reclining chair that the resident was sitting in. After this incident, the facility supervisor violated the law by not reporting the abuse because he simply did not want to fill out the required paperwork.
  
• A convicted felon working at a facility struck a 99-year-old resident in the jaw because the resident was combative.
  
• A 21-year-old male nursing aide was convicted of raping an 89-year-old resident. This female resident had no physical ability to protect herself from this sexually abusive caregiver.
  
• A mentally retarded resident of a human development center was choked by a male aide because the resident would not eat all of his meal.
  
• A female employee of a facility for developmentally disabled children forced a small child to eat his own vomit after the child vomited during his feeding.
  
• On Christmas Day, a nursing home resident was abused by a nurse when the nurse literally jumped on the resident because he failed to comply with the nurse’s orders.
  
• A female nursing aide slapped one resident and spit in the face of another resident because the residents acted in a combative manner.
  
• A male employee of a facility for the mentally retarded forcibly performed oral sex on a mentally retarded male resident.
  
• While angry at a combative resident, a female nursing aide choked a different resident in an effort to take out her frustrations against the combative resident.

NEGLECT

• A nurse failed to give tube feedings and medication to an elderly resident as ordered by a physician. The resident had no other way to receive any sustenance.
  
• A nurse gave two residents ten times the amount of insulin ordered by the physician. This massive overdose resulted in the death of one of the residents and the hospitalization of the other resident.
  
• A female resident was forced to lie in her own feces after an aide refused to help the resident from the bed into a "potty chair." The aide even ridiculed the resident after she soiled herself.
  
• A mentally retarded resident of a human development center was left in his own feces after a male aide refused to clean the resident. The aide then hid this fact from other employees. The feces, which was spread all over the back, legs, and head of the resident, was allowed to dry before the resident was cleaned.
  
• A female nursing aide was captured on videotape dumping out trays of food meant for residents because she did not want to take up any of her time feeding the residents.
  
• Many residents of a nursing home went for weeks without their vital signs and blood pressure taken because an aide did not want to properly do her job. She stated that the vital signs did not have be taken because the residents were eventually going to die, whether she took the vital signs or not.