|
E-mail this page to a friend!
More Nursing Home Bodies Being Found After Hurricane
Sept. 16, 2005 The headlines about nursing home
deaths after hurricane Katrina have focused on the deaths at St. Ritas
Nursing Home, where the owners have been charged with 34 counts of
negligent homicide. More bodies, however, are turning up in other homes
for the elderly including Lafon Nursing Home and Bethany Assisted
Living.
Investigators are looking into the deaths of 14
patients at the LaFon Nursing Home in eastern New Orleans, according to
Kris Wartelle, spokeswoman for Louisiana Attorney General Charles Foti.
Reports are pouring into the office from all over
the region, Wartelle said. "Every report that we are getting of people
who died in a nursing home, we're checking into it,' she said.
According to the Associated Press, one side of
entrance to Lafon was spray-painted with the date "9-2" and the words
"59 live" and "16 dead"; the other side was spray-painted "9-9" and "14
dead."
Inside the nursing home, the pale-brown water mark
on the first floor came up about two and a half feet. Three
hospital-size beds had been pushed into the small lobby. On the second
floor, spray-paint markings in a hall indicated where bodies had been
found, the AP reported.
According to the Atlanta Constitution, the body of
one resident, 79-year-old Lorraine Duvernay, rested in a bag on the pew
of a chapel at Lafon. Her son, Victor J. Duvernay Jr., said Tuesday he
was told his mother lived for five days with no food and water after
breached levees unleashed a fetid blend of water, sewage and oil that
submerged the city and crept into the nursing home, forcing residents to
the second floor.
"My mama should have been evacuated," Duvernay said
in an interview. "I want to know how she died."
A recovery team also found eight bodies inside
Bethany Home, an assisted-living center near City Park, on Saturday,
according to the Associated Press.
|
Nursing Home Abuse, Medical Malpractice? Contact a lawyer.
click here
|
|
