Family of nursing home resident files wrongful death lawsuit

FORT WAYNE, Ind. (WANE) - The family of a former nursing home resident has filed a wrongful death lawsuit against the nursing home. The lawsuit alleges that Health & Hospital Corporation (HHC) of Marion County and American Senior Communities, LLC (ASC) were negligent in causing the death of Betty Riley.

Riley lived at Summit City Nursing & Rehabilitation on N. Clinton St. in Fort Wayne, which is owned by HHC and leased to ASC to operate.

According to the Allen County Coroner's Office, Riley died from failure to thrive due to subdural and subarachnoid hematomas due to blunt force trauma because of a fall during an altercation with another resident.

After her death, the Indiana State Department of Health conducted its own investigation.  Click here to read its findings.

Betty was a resident in the Alzheimer's unit of Summit City. Her relatives said she also suffered from dementia.

According to Riley's lawyers, the family's compensation would be capped at $300,000 under Indiana law. Of that amount, HHC and ASC would be responsible for only the first $187,001, with the balance paid by the Indiana Patient Compensation Fund.

"If they would have offered to pay the bills, like [my lawyer] said, she had about $30,000 in hospital bills," Mark Riley, Betty's son, said Tuesday. "If they would have shown some kind of consideration towards what happened to my mother that would have made everything a lot better."

Family members said they've tried to talk to the nursing home to find out from administrators what happened, but leaders there refused to talk with them.

"No sympathy whatsoever towards the family or anything," said Riley.  "That's what really grabbed us as being pretty difficult to handle. They didn't want to act like they did anything, but yet, they didn't want to say sorry or anything."

NewsChannel 15 received the following statement from Health and Hospital Corporation and American Senior Communities Inc. late Tuesday night:

Health and Hospital Corporation and American Senior Communities Inc. are unbendingly committed to quality care for each of our residents in our long-term care centers.  We have been advised that legal action may be undertaken related to the death of one of our patients in an Alzheimer’s unit more than one year ago.  As we did at the time of this incident, we offer our continued sympathies to this family, and we share with them their sense of loss.

This incident was thoroughly investigated by local and state officials, and we cooperated fully in that investigation.

Due to the nature of these allegations, we are unable to comment further.