BRISTOL, Va. – Reports of sexually abused nursing-home patients were both ignored and discouraged by supervisors at the National Health Care-Bristol facility, a Virginia medical licensing board has charged.
The accusations against two current NHC-Bristol staff members and a former nursing director detail a series of assaults already attributed in court documents to ex-nursing aide James Wright.
Instead of naming an attacker, however, the licensing board anonymously lists the assailant as Certified Nurse Aide I.
Wright is now awaiting a May 14 sentencing for the aggravated sexual battery of four former NHC patients. In January, he entered an Alford plea to four counts of aggravated sexual battery, which each carry a maximum sentence of 20 years in prison. The plea acknowledges that prosecutors’ evidence is sufficient to convict him without admitting guilt – though it is treated as a guilty plea by the court.
In mid-March, the Department of Health Professions mailed complaints to NHC-Bristol Administrator Charlotte Wilson, Nursing Supervisor Helen Roberts and former Nursing Supervisor Elizabeth Anne Franklin, documents show.
The staffers can contest the misconduct charges through public informal hearings, scheduled for next month, or automatically face probation or fines against their professional licenses.
The Murfreesboro, Tenn.-based NHC did not immediately answer Bristol Herald Courier questions Monday. Instead, corporate spokesman Gerald Coggin wrote in an e-mail that the local facility will respond today.
Franklin, through attorney Tim Hudson, denied any wrongdoing Monday. Since Wright’s August arrest, Franklin has maintained that she referred all abuse complaints for investigation.
Wilson, who has an informal hearing slated with the Board of Long-Term Care Administrators on April 20, is accused of failing to investigate reports of sexual assault on 12 patients from 2000 until 2008. She also is accused of neglecting to pass the reports on to the patients’ doctors, or to Adult Protective Services.
Wilson also is accused of setting up a chain of command that led to a dead end for reports of abuse, while also circumventing state law.
“Until 2007, you enforced a policy that employees could report allegations of abuse only to their next superior, rather than to the administrator and any state or local official as required by law,” states the complaint against Wilson.
The Herald Courier has documented former NHC worker complaints that the chain of command stifled abuse reports.
Roberts and Franklin have a joint hearing with the Board of Nursing on April 12. As with Wilson, both are accused of failing to pass along abuse reports. Both are also accused of trying to discourage a patient’s daughter from passing on a complaint.
“In or about 2000, when Resident E’s daughter told you that the resident had told her that C.N.A. I had ‘fingered’ and hurt her during incontinence care, you discouraged the daughter from pursuing the matter and you failed to investigate the allegation or report it to the proper authorities or to the resident’s physician,” states the allegations against Roberts and Franklin.
Roberts “did, however, instruct C.N.A. I not to go into Resident E’s room,” the allegation continues.
mowens@bristolnews.com | (276) 645-2549
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