DAYTONA BEACH, Fla. – The Agency for Health Care Administration tells Local 6 they are investigating a local nursing home after Daytona Beach police say a woman may have been raped there in July.
[RELATED: Volusia County nursing home license downgraded]
The agency said it is investigating Daytona Beach Health and Rehabilitation Center for failure to prevent abuse and neglect after a 75-year-old woman terminally ill woman with dementia tested positive for a STD.
The woman's daughter filed a report and police said after two weeks of asking for the nursing home's cooperation they received only a list of 69 employees and visitors, but were told they weren't allowed to speak to any of them.
"Their failure to cooperate with us is putting other patients in that facility in danger," says Daytona Beach Police Chief Mike Chitwood. "We've been asking for 14 days for cooperation and for the ability to interview employees and patients and they have rebuffed us."
But Andre Butler has lived at the nursing home for a year and as president of resident counsel, he makes sure that patients are safe, including the alleged victim.
"When it comes to the Daytona Beach Health and Rehabilitation Center, he (Chief Chitwood) is making a real bad call," says Butler. "She never had a male CNA on her because her daughter made sure of that. She was taken care of by a female CNA."
The nursing home has been fined four times by the AHCA since 2005, according to records. Just this year, they were fined $16,000 for failure to give adequate and appropriate health care.
In 2007, they were fined $2,500 for failure to follow physicians orders. A nurse made a medication error and gave a resident medication meant for another patient.
But Butler says everyone gets treated well.
"I wish Mr. Chitwood would stop making false allegations saying we aren't safe, we are." he said.
Police say it's up to the nursing home to prove they are safe.
"It's absolutely disgusting and shocks the senses that in this day and age, a 75-year-old woman entrusted in their care ends up with a STD and that they won't cooperate to find out how this happened," Chitwood said.
The State Attorney's Office tells Local 6 they are investigating along with the Daytona Beach Police Department, but won't comment further because it's an active investigation.