Published:Tuesday, December 30, 2008 11:17 AM PST
Serving the South Coast of Oregon

Lawsuit filed against Portland nursing home
Tuesday, December 30, 2008 11:17 AM PST

PORTLAND (AP) — A $2 million lawsuit has been filed against a Portland nursing home, accusing its staff of failing to protect a 61-year-old woman with dementia from another resident.

Marko Chandler, 68, was charged with sexual abuse and unlawful sexual penetration for allegedly molesting the woman in April. A judge committed him to a hospital’s mental health unit after finding him unfit for trial.

At the time of the incident, Chandler, who has a criminal history, was suffering from a lesser degree of dementia than the woman, the lawsuit states.

The attorney representing the alleged victim said staff members at the nursing home — Healthcare at Foster Creek — had seen her client standing in a room half-naked with Chandler five days before a worker caught him in the act.

Attorney Erin Olson said staff didn’t contact police or the woman’s family. “All they did was put her pants back on,” Olson said.

Healthcare at Foster Creek is one of 51 nursing homes, or 37 percent, in Oregon that the federal government rated below average or worse in its annual performance reviews.

Nursing home administrator Bill Swanson, who started three months before the alleged assault, told The Oregonian newspaper said he had not seen the lawsuit and could not comment on it. But he acknowledged past problems at the home.

“We’ve been working to try to improve the care that is provided here, and I think we’ve done that,” he said.

The lawsuit claims the home was the subject of 38 substantiated complaints of abuse or neglect from the time the woman arrived in 2004 until the alleged assault four years later.

Government inspectors recently finished their annual review of the home, but the results have yet to be made available.


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