No justice for the disabled

[conchita]

This is a blog entry I read on the site I blog on...I'm reposting it here to share it with all of you. It's just sad and sick.

No Justice For The Disabled
I watched Nancy Grace tonight. they aired an episode about the beating of a 30 year old disabled man, who has the mentality of 2 year old toddler.

He was beaten by his "caregiver".

The whole thing was video taped on cell phone. The cell phone was later sold. The person that purchased the cell phone saw the video still stored, and reported it to the authorities.

This "caregiver" has not been processed by law for this crime. This hurts me because I have a child who is disabled.

Abuse and neglect by many caregiver's in nursing homes and institutions go unnoticed and unpunished. In this particular case with video taped evidence, the person responsible should have already been arrested and prosecuted.

I feel that the delay is due to the reason that the victim is non-verbal. I say this for many reasons, one being there are still several uncorrected flaws in the law that leave disabled persons as vulnerable victims. I can cite many instances to the delay of prosecution in future blogs.

One that stands out right now in my mind is the delayed prosecution of a woman from Illinois who adopted an 6 year old Autistic child. She subsequently beat this child to death. It took 3 years to even sentance her. When she finally was sentenced to serve time in prison. She only has to serve 12 years. Why ?

Because, the judge calculated that the child would be 18 in twelve years and would be of age anyway so they found this time to be sufficient.

How ridiculous.

I will be watching the abuse case carefully and will have more to tell you next time.

[sg4ever]

this is really sad! and it makes me mad that this is happening and the people who are doing the abusing aren't getting what they deserve. the disabled can't defend themselves when crap like this happens to them. i just wish there were more supervision in those places and more screening of the poeple they hire. and hide cameras in the places so they can check up on them.

[Carina]

When I was in college, I worked in a habilitation home for the mentally disabled. Although I never witnessed out-and-out abuse, the short-staffing, unskilled care (of which I was one), and a lack of compassion was the order of the day.

There was a physical therapist on staff, but we had clients that were permanently atrophied to the shape of their wheelchairs. The QMRPs (Qualified Mental Retardation Professionals) were clueless...they sat in their little offices, coming up with habilitation plans that the staff had to carry out, and they would trot out when guests of the clients would visit or during meals, but we (well, a handful of us, anyway) were too busy attending to the clients hygiene to implement the habilitation plans.

Nursing homes and in-home caregiving (specifically when unskilled labor is hired) are one level away from the pit of hell.

[illumination70]

That is just sad!!!

[nooks1]

That is bloody awful and why when they have video evidence do they need to speak to the victim, isn't the video enough for them.

I expect as this is in the US, she'll eventually be prosecuted and imprisoned whereas if it was in the UK, it probably wouldn't even get to court as our prisons are full and judges are being told to let criminals walk free, even peadophiles.

[taylorsmom]

Shakes head...

Sad Sad Sad..

[pia]

That is just plain sick that nothing is being done to help that person. There is no excuse whatsoever for that to happen to anyone and not be dealt with. How many people here can say they'd intervene if they saw something like that happen? If everyone who comes into contact with someone who needs the help said something and kept pushing it, then maybe there'd be fewer cases like this one.

That being said, I have to say something here...

Not all of us who work/have worked in nursing homes/skilled nursing facilities are like this. Many of us do go to work because we love our jobs. I loved being a CNA in a nursing home. Absolutely loved it. What I hated was working with upper management/Head :s who didn't give a rat's ass what happened to the patients as long as they could collect a paycheck. But by the same token, I've worked with fantastic Head :s too.

Unfortunenately they always quit. So did the good CNA's. I've seen so many cases of abuse it isn't even funny. All of us that reported them, were ignored or met with "Oh no, not so and so. They'd never do that." It wasn't until someone outside of the facility reported it that anything was taken care of. Otherwise, Upper management swept or attempted to sweep it all under the carpet. They are only interested in how they look to visitors and on paper.

Give those workers some credit. They do a trememdous amount of work in a very short time with nothing that they need to do the job. In short, they do the best they can with what little they have to work with. Granted, some are just pure evil who shouldn't be allowed anywhere near a patient, but not all are. I hate it when they get the blanket statements put on them.

[Carina]

@pia....your post just justifies why I feel that nursing homes are one level away from the pit of hell...abuse that isn't addressed, head :s that don't give a rat's ass, good ones that quit, etc.

[RioDuranie]

this is sad, the video alone should be enough evidance.

What would happen if a two year old child was abused and couldnt really tell you what happened? If its on video its proof

[damisa]

This makes me sick to my stomach...

My mom was in a nursing home the last few months of her life. We actually removed her from one and put her in another because the care at the first one was awful. I racked up a lot of frequent flyer miles going between Florida and Pittsburgh to put out fires. My aunt, uncle, and cousins did their best, but I ended up having to be queen beeaatch all of the time and getting things done.

And I have to say, the CNAs were awesome in both places -- just in the first place they were woefully understaffed -- which meant that patient care suffered.