Jury Awards Family $30M in California Nursing Home Wrongful Death Lawsuit
Published: May 13th, 2010 • No Comments
A jury hit an Auburn nursing home with $28 million in punitive damages, in addition to $1.1 million in compensatory damages, in a nursing home wrongful death lawsuit brought by the family of a former resident.
The lawsuit was filed over the death of 79-year-old Frances Tanner by her daughter, Elizabeth Pao. Tanner died after being a resident of Colonial Healthcare for seven months in 2005. Tanner suffered a nursing home fall, broke her hip and died due to an infected bedsore. The lawsuit alleged that the nursing home suffered from understaffing and poor documentation procedures which contributed to Tanner’s death.
The Sacramento Superior Court jury found the nursing home and its parent company, Horizon West, guilty of elder abuse. The $1.1 million was for pain and suffering and for loss of companionship. An additional $28 million was leveled against the defendants for what jurors determined was malicious, oppressive or fraudulent conduct. The nursing home has promised to appeal the verdict.
Colonial Healthcare is a 205-bed, for-profit facility. It has received the lowest rating possible from the U.S. Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMMS), with health inspections and quality ratings given much below average ratings, and nursing home staffing rated average. Tanner’s death was the fourth in recent years where the nursing home was cited for the death of an elderly patient, according to a story in the Sacramento Bee.
