DECEMBER 1997 · VOLUME 18 · NUMBER 12
N A M E S I N T H E N E W S
DECEMBER 1997 · VOLUME 18 · NUMBER 12
N A M E S I N T H E N E W S
A JURY IN HENDERSON, TEXAS in November found Beverly Enterprises Inc., the largest U.S. nursing home corporation, responsible for negligence, gross negligence and fraud in connection with the death of an elderly woman who lived at the company's Borger Health Care Center.
The jury awarded the family of Ruth Waites $13 million in actual damages and $70 million in punitive damages.
Former employees and nursing center officials testified that the administration had been repeatedly asked to address the shortage of qualified nurse's aides and the staff's inability to care for existing patients.
Waites died of dehydration and infection of neglected bedsores. Waites' attorney, David Marks, said that despite the fact that eight patients with the same conditions were admitted to the hospital within six weeks, the nursing home administration "exhibited indifference to the health concerns of the patients and indicated a greater concern was income deficiency and the need to get more patients admitted in order to increase revenues."
"This is not about money," says Elma Holder, founding director of the National Coalition for Nursing Home Reform. "This is a victory for justice and every person who ever has had, or ever will have, a loved one in a nursing home. This verdict sends a message to the huge corporations that own the nursing homes that the public will not tolerate this kind of atrocity."
In 1994, Beverly Enterprises operated 727 nursing homes in 33 states. The company disposed of its Texas facilities shortly after the death of Waites.
During the trial, Beverly denied any wrongdoing, claiming that Waites had consistently received good care and died because of complicating chronic health conditions and advanced age.
Beverly spokesperson Jeff Amann says the company plans to appeal the verdict. "We don't believe the facts warrant this judgment," Amann says.
A QUALITY CONTROL OFFICER for a U.S. Army contractor was charged in November with second degree murder in connection with the death of a worker at a southern California scrap yard.
In Riverside, California, the San Bernadino District Attorney's Office alleged that Timothy Collister, a safety and quality control officer with Allied Technology Group, allowed a live military shell to be taken from Ft. Irwin to a scrap yard, where it blew up, killing a worker and injuring three others.
Collister was charged with the March 18, 1997 murder of Martin Mendoza and the injury of three other employees at Dick's Auto Wrecking in Fontana, California.
Mendoza, 22, was killed while dismantling what was supposed to be an inert 105-millimeter military shell delivered to Dick's Auto Wrecking from the Allied Technology Group located on the Army's National Training Center in Ft. Irwin.
In California, for a second degree murder charge, when a killing is the direct result of an act that was deliberately performed with conscious disregard for human life, it is not necessary to prove that the defendant intended that the act would result in the death of a human being.
Collister's attorney, James Blatt, says Collister pled not guilty. He declined to comment further.
State officials alleged that Collister failed to perform numerous safety screenings to ensure that live military ordnance was not sold to civilian scrap dealers, such as Dick's Auto Wrecking. State officials also alleged that Collister falsely certified that he had inspected the demilitarized scrap and that it did not contain explosive material.
The investigation revealed that there were at least three instances where live ordnance was found at the Ft. Irwin site. After each instance, Collister had responsibility to check and inspect the entire stockpile of scrap at the location. Such inspections never occurred, state officials alleged.
Investigators ultimately located over 54 live pieces of military ordnance at Dick's Auto Wrecking that could explode. Of the 54 live pieces, 30 were considered life threatening had they exploded.
Prosecutor Charles Umeda says "we are not focusing on" Allied Technology Group, but that his office's investigation is ongoing.
TEN BUSINESS ORGANIZATIONS rank among the 25 most influential lobbying groups in Washington, D.C., according to a November report in Fortune magazine.
Fortune asked nearly 2,200 insiders, including members of Congress, their staffs and senior White House officials, to rank the mightiest lobbying groups.
The top 25 was headed by the American Association of Retired Persons. Ten business groups came in the top 25 -- National Federation of Independent Business (4), National Association of Realtors (11), American Bankers Association (12), National Association of Manufacturers (13), Chamber of Commerce (15), Motion Picture Federation (18), National Association of Home Builders (19), National Association of Broadcasters (20), American Hospital Association (21), National Restaurant Association (24).
Public interest groups ranked way down the list, with Sierra Club coming in 37th, Common Cause coming in 91st, Public Citizen at 111, and the Center for Science in the Public Interest dead last at 120. -- Russell Mokhiber