Louisiana Charges Negligent Homicide in 34 Nursing Home Deaths (aftermath of Katrina)

Woodmonkey · 09-13-2005, 19:42

This is a breaking story on Fox News. Apparently some nursing home staff abandoned their patients. Judge Nepolitano was interviewed and stated that staff cannot leave their patients to save their own lives when that means the patients will die. (This is different from a story a Brit newspaper is reporting and using anonymous sources that say some patients were euthanized during the aftermath of Katrina).

What do you think about this? Should staff be required to stay even it it means they might die? Should this be a legal issue?

Quote:

Louisiana Charges Negligent Homicide in 34 Nursing Home Deaths

Quote:

BATON ROUGE, La. (AP) - The owners of a nursing home where 34 patients died in Hurricane Katrina's floodwaters were charged with negligent homicide Tuesday.

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Woodmonkey · 09-13-2005, 20:07

The other patients were evacuated but could move on their own. These 34 elderly could not and drowned when the waters rose.

BrianK · 09-13-2005, 20:18

[The owners of a nursing home where 34 patients died.]

For me that is the defining point. Over and above any emergency plan a state may have the "for pay" facility has the responsibilty to act.

To where, or how to get them there. Both questions that should have been spelled out as part of granting a license to operate the home. If that wasn't part of the licensing process why wasn't it?

It still goes back to the facility operators though. They are the 1st. line of the decision making process. They had time to act well ahead of time. I suspect the decision to stay was based on economics. They would have to foot the bill to save the lives of the people they were being paid to care for.

This too might be another notch in the discovery of how graft & corruption were rampant in Louisana.

Now to the question. Yes I think this is a legal matter and the operators should be charged with murder by indifferance to human life. Negligent homicide may be the more severe charge. Whichever is the most severe should be how the justice system deals with killing innocents.

Woodmonkey · 09-13-2005, 20:25

They just posted a complete story.

Quote:

New Orleans Nursing Home Owners Charged With Negligent Homicide

Quote:

The husband-and-wife owners of a nursing home near New Orleans were charged Tuesday with negligent homicide in the deaths of 34 people during the flooding unleashed by Hurricane Katrina.

The case represents the first major prosecution to come out of the disaster.

The owners of St. Rita's Nursing Home in Chalmette "were asked if they wanted to move (the patients). They did not. They were warned repeatedly that this storm was coming," Louisiana Attorney General Charles Foti said.

"In effect, their inaction resulted in the deaths of these patients," Foti said.

Salvador A. Mangano and his wife, Mable, surrendered and were jailed on 34 counts of negligent homicide. Each count carries up to five years in prison.

The attorney general said he is also investigating the discovery of more than 40 corpses at flooded-out Memorial Medical Center), in New Orleans' Uptown section.

The victims at St. Rita's died Aug. 29, the day the hurricane hit, and on Sept. 6, at least 14 unrecognizable bodies were still inside the nursing home, the New York Times reported last week.

St. Bernard Parish Councilman Ricky Melerine said the water rose 3 feet in 15 minutes that morning and then even faster, the Times said.

Several men tried to rescue the nursing home's residents by floating them out on mattresses, and others were able to walk to a school, the Times said. In all, the home had about 60 residents.

There were apparent efforts to fight the incoming water inside St. Rita's. A table was nailed against a window and a couch was pushed up against a door, the Times said. There was also evidence that water had reached the roof.

The owners had an evacuation plan as required under state law and a contract with an ambulance service to evacuate the patients, but they did not call the company, Foti said.

They also turned down an offer from St. Bernard Parish officials who asked if the nursing home wanted help evacuating, he said. The home is about 10 miles southeast of New Orleans in an area of heavy devastation.

Foti said the bodies have not all been identified and he was not sure how many of the victims were patients or staff.

"They had a duty and a standard of care to people who could not care for themselves," Foti said of the owners. "If you or I decided we are going to stay, we do it of our own free will. ... The people at the nursing home don't have that choice."

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carnivore · 09-13-2005, 20:40

Sweet Jesus,what a horror story.
To abandon the infirm,the helpless, in a situation like that is bloody inconceivable.

conlor · 09-13-2005, 20:45

If there was a way to move the patients to safety and time to do it, then every effort should be made to move them. However, if the waters were rising and the owners knew they couldn't get them out, euthanizing them was actually a humane thing to do, rather than have them die from drowning. If they spent time to euthanize them, they could have been putting themselves in danger of drowning too. Of course, I wasn't there and I don't know the full story, but it's possible the owners did everything they could for their patients.