Nursing Facility Surveillance Growing

Driven by a mistrust of nursing homes, more families are taking advantage of advances in surveillance technology and using video cameras to help protect loved ones they suspect are being abused or mistreated by caregivers.

Even some facility managers and law enforcement officials are now using hidden cameras to catch workers who mistreat elderly or vulnerable residents. No figures are available, but specialists in the long-term care industry say the use of so-called “granny cams” is spreading, though the technology is also raising a host of legal and privacy issues.

Just this spring, an Ohio man placed a hidden camera in a desk fan to catch two nursing home workers abusing and hitting his 78-year-old mother, who suffers from Alzheimer’s disease. In New Jersey, workers were caught abusing an 87-year-old woman, prompting a wrongful-death lawsuit in June. In New York, authorities arrested 22 workers last year after hidden cameras revealed maltreatment of residents in two facilities.

Georgia Anetzberger, president-elect of the National Committee for the Prevention of Elder Abuse, said the spread of cameras in nursing homes is part of a broader proliferation of video surveillance in society to catch anything from traffic violations to shoplifting.

“Cameras are used to catch people more than ever before, not just because the technology is there but because it’s more widely accepted,” she said.

For years, however, the long-term care industry has fought legislative efforts across the United States to legalize the use of cameras, citing insurance costs and resident and employee privacy issues. Critics said cameras would make it more difficult to hire staff and that they also could misrepresent an incident.

The push to install video cameras in long-term care facilities started to gain momentum a decade ago. Legislation was introduced in more than 15 states, but only three — Texas, New Mexico and Maryland — adopted laws addressing the use of cameras in nursing homes, according to a 2007 article in the Baylor Law Review.

Full Article and Source:
Families Using Video Cameras in Nursing Homes to Protect Loved Ones

Women’s Group File Complaint Against Judge

Two organizations that foster women’s legal rights filed a complaint Thursday with a panel that disciplines the judiciary, asking it to investigate a Baltimore County judge who performed a wedding ceremony between a woman and the man accused of beating her, and then acquitted him.

The House Of Ruth Maryland and the Women’s Law Center of Maryland called the behavior of District Judge G. Darrell Russell Jr. “grossly inappropriate.”

On March 10, when a 29-year-old Middle River man, Frederick D. Wood, appeared in an Essex courtroom on a charge that he had beaten his fiancee, Russell acquiesced to Wood’s lawyer’s suggestion that his client leave to obtain a marriage license. The judge volunteered to perform the wedding ceremony himself, and did so later that day in his chambers.

The newly married Shelly Pearl Say, 27, then invoked marital privilege so that she would not have to testify against Wood about allegations that he beat her on Nov. 29. Russell found Wood not guilty.

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Women’s Groups File Complaint Against Judge

7 1/2 Years and Resitution For Bilking Elderly Man

A Hagerstown man has been given 7 1/2 years in prison for bilking an elderly Boonsboro man out of more than a quarter-million dollars.

Forty-year-old Daniel Meldron was sentenced for obtaining the property of a vulnerable adult with dementia. The victim had given Meldron power of attorney.

Meldron also must make restitution of about $279,00 he drained from one of the victim’s accounts.

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Western MD Man Gets 7 1/2 Years for Bilking Elderly

Maryland’s Discipline Record for the Past 6 Months

Nineteen lawyers were disbarred in Maryland in the second half of 2009, according to a report by the Maryland Attorney Grievance Commission.

Of the 19, two were convicted of crimes, and another took a plea deal after being indicted for theft.

By accepting disbarment, one of the lawyers, Harold Joseph Tulley of Harford County, avoided prosecution for theft and conspiracy to commit theft.

Four other lawyers were suspended, and 11 were reprimanded in the six-month period, according to a summary supplied by the grievance commission.

In all, 34 lawyers were sanctioned. Their offenses included lying, incompetence, unauthorized practice, misappropriating and misusing clients’ funds, and failing to adhere to required accounting, reporting and management procedures.

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Nineteen Lawyers Disbarred in State in Past Six Months

Lawyer Moves to Dismiss Lawsuit Against Facility

A lawyer representing AAA Warmcare, a Potomac assisted living facility shut down by the state after allegations of resident abuse, has moved to dismiss a lawsuit against the facility.

Among other points of contention, at issue is whether former AAA Warmcare resident and plaintiff Elizabeth Tully — who has been described by her lawyer as someone in the advanced stages of dementia — is competent to sue.

The lawyer, Alexander Vincent of the Potomac firm Shulman Rogers, appeared in Montgomery County Circuit Court for a scheduling hearing. William Askinazi of Germantown, who is representing Tully and her husband Raymond, who both alleged to have been abused while living at the facility, also appeared at [the] hearing. In court, Judge David Boynton set a hearing date of Jan. 19 to address the motion to dismiss the Tullys’ claims.

Askinazi filed the $10 million suit for the Potomac residents, both in their 80s, Sept. 25. The move followed the August closure of the Gainsborough Road facility by the state Department of Health and Mental Hygiene after an unannounced investigation. Residents were removed from the eight-bed facility and Montgomery County police launched an elder abuse investigation.

The lawsuit was filed for Raymond and Elizabeth Tully along with Tully’s daughter, Mary Ann Shanesy. The lawsuit alleged that Elizabeth Tully had tape and a rag tied over her mouth and was tied to her wheelchair numerous times; she was belted and gagged “with food on her plate at the dinner table but was not allowed to eat,” was “often allowed to wallow in her fecal waste” and was “slapped and pummeled” by a caregiver. The lawsuit also alleged that Raymond Tully was “scorned and ridiculed” by staff and forced to urinate in his pants on several occasions.

The suit alleges that the abuse came from a caregiver who was hired after being improperly screened by the facility’s owner, Sreedevi Datla. The lawsuit claims the caregiver was illiterate, gave medication to the couple without knowing the prescription and had “a violent background.” The suit also alleges that the caregiver called for decreasing food rations to residents.

Datla, according to the suit, knew about cases of physical and emotional abuse but didn’t move to correct or better the circumstances. Some of the alleged violations were captured in photographs by concerned staff members who reported the situation, Askinazi said.

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Lawyer Moves to Dismiss Lawsuit Against Potomac Closed Assisted Living Facility

Editorial: Silver Alert Has Proven Its Value

As a child, I can remember joining my family watching our favorite television shows at night while constantly being interrupted with commercials that asked, “It’s 10 p.m. Do you know where your child is?”

Now that I am a parent, I can appreciate that question a little better. However, today we are faced with another question that is just as challenging – “Do you know where your aging parents are?”

As the senior population continues to grow with the Baby Boomers entering retirement, we must be proactive in supporting them and their loved ones. In today’s society, many of us know of or have parents suffering from Alzheimer’ disease, dementia and other disorders.

The Silver Alert program provides a communication network to quickly disseminate information about a missing vulnerable adult in an effort to return them to their residence and/or caretaker. It is very similar to the Amber Alert program for missing children.

Timing is everything, because the survival rate of the missing person is much higher when the adult is located within the first 24 to 48 hours.

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Guest Column: Silver Alert Already Has Proven its Value

When Solo Lawyers Get Sick

Herb Dubin never thought he’d get sick.

The Rockville solo practitioner had always been in great health and had a strict no-doctors policy. But when he’d had the same painful cough for three months in March 2008, his wife diagnosed a cracked rib and made him go to the hospital for an X-ray.

Her insistence saved his life. He had double pneumonia and a nasty bacterial infection, which landed him in the hospital for 12 days and kept him out of the office for more than a month after that.

Dubin had no plan for what would happen to his practice if he were incapacitated.

“Does the shoemaker ever take care of his own shoes?” said Dubin, whose practice includes personal injury, legal malpractice and attorney discipline defense, criminal defense and commercial litigation.The other solos with whom he shares an office swooped in and kept things running until he got back, but he can’t imagine what would have happened had they not been there.

“The bottom line was, I just happened to be sharing space with a good bunch of guys,” he said. “Suppose I was practicing the way a lot of new, young lawyers are: from my house, by myself.”

Experts say too few solo and small-firm lawyers have made plans for what will happen to their practice if they suddenly get sick. Not planning can leave attorneys open to malpractice claims or the loss of money and clients.

“We’re trying to get attorneys to think about this more often so that they plan for retirement and plan for absences due to illness or the like, because these things happen,” said Maryland Bar Counsel Melvin Hirshman, whose office sometimes has to pick up the pieces of a practice when a lawyer fails to plan.

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When Solo Lawyers Get Sick

>25-Year-Old Lawsuit Settlement

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The stories were horrifying and heart-wrenching: a boy beaten bloody while in foster care; a 15-year-old girl tortured and starved to death by a mentally ill guardian; a 5-year-old fatally scalded by his mother after state officials removed him from a safe foster home.

It’s no wonder such egregious cases of abuse and neglect have helped drive a 25-year-old lawsuit over how the Maryland Department of Human Resources and the Baltimore Department of Social Services care for the state’s most vulnerable children and adolescents.

That’s why the settlement announced this week between advocates for Baltimore’s children and the city’s foster care system represents a potentially tremendous step forward for the health and well-being of children in Maryland.

Some of the requirements:
1. The state must make sure children in its care have case plans and that they actually receive the health care, educational support and other services identified in those plans.

2. The agreement would allow the state to free itself from federal court supervision for the first time since 1988 if it meets dozens of specific goals and maintains that performance for an 18-month period.

3. Each caseworker will be responsible for no more than 15 children, and a single supervisor will be responsible for no more than six caseworkers.

4. The system has agreed to hire an outside expert with broad credibility in the field to monitor its progress and make periodic reports.

Full Article and Source:
A milestone for youths – Our view: Maryland now has a unique opportunity to fix its long-broken child welfare system; for the sake of future generations, it can’t let that chance go to waste

25-Year-Old Lawsuit Settlement

The stories were horrifying and heart-wrenching: a boy beaten bloody while in foster care; a 15-year-old girl tortured and starved to death by a mentally ill guardian; a 5-year-old fatally scalded by his mother after state officials removed him from a safe foster home.

It’s no wonder such egregious cases of abuse and neglect have helped drive a 25-year-old lawsuit over how the Maryland Department of Human Resources and the Baltimore Department of Social Services care for the state’s most vulnerable children and adolescents.

That’s why the settlement announced this week between advocates for Baltimore’s children and the city’s foster care system represents a potentially tremendous step forward for the health and well-being of children in Maryland.

Some of the requirements:
1. The state must make sure children in its care have case plans and that they actually receive the health care, educational support and other services identified in those plans.

2. The agreement would allow the state to free itself from federal court supervision for the first time since 1988 if it meets dozens of specific goals and maintains that performance for an 18-month period.

3. Each caseworker will be responsible for no more than 15 children, and a single supervisor will be responsible for no more than six caseworkers.

4. The system has agreed to hire an outside expert with broad credibility in the field to monitor its progress and make periodic reports.

Full Article and Source:
A milestone for youths – Our view: Maryland now has a unique opportunity to fix its long-broken child welfare system; for the sake of future generations, it can’t let that chance go to waste

>Judge Appoints Guardian Ad Litem

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A federal district judge appointed a guardian ad litem to represent the interests of a Maryland architect who has battled her own lawyer for seven years in a copyright suit against a rival architectural firm and the United Arab Emirates.

Elena Sturdza’s suit, filed in 1998 in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia, has stalled since 2002 when her lawyer, Nathan Lewin, called into question his client’s competency to make rational decisions regarding her case. Lewin moved then for an appointment of a guardian, and U.S. District Judge Henry Kennedy Jr. granted the request.

But the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit this year reversed Kennedy saying Sturdza had not been given ample notice about the proceedings. The appeals court said Sturdza should be given a shot to be heard on Lewin’s motion. That hearing was held earlier this month, at which time there was little doubt that Kennedy would re-appoint a guardian for Sturdza.

Kennedy wrote in an order: “Having provided Sturdza notice and an opportunity to be heard, this court again concludes that the motion for appointment of a guardian ad litem should be granted.” Kennedy earlier this month also ordered Sturdza to undergo a psychiatric evaluation.

Full Article and Source:
Judge Appoints Guardian for Plaintiff Who Has Been in Dispute With Lawyer for 7 Years

More information:
Court of Appeals – Reversed Decision

District Court – Order