CERTIFIED NURSING ASSISTANT PLEADS GUILTY TO ASSAULT OF ALZHEIMER'S PATIENT IN NURSING HOME

July 30, 2001

JULY 30, 2001

CONTACT: Kerry O'brien, Assistant Attorney General 207-626-8800

Attorney General Steven Rowe announced that Ned Broussard, 46, of Exeter, New Hampshire, pled guilty last Thursday in York District Court to one count of assault against a resident at Sentry Hill Assisted Living Facility in York, Maine. In August of 1999 while Broussard worked as a C.N.A. at Sentry Hill, two co-workers witnessed him slapping an elderly resident in the head; Sentry Hill immediately terminated Broussard.

Judge Jon D. Levy of the Maine District Court accepted the plea agreement reached by the parties and sentenced Broussard to a sixty-day term of imprisonment, with all but two days suspended, with one year of probation and a $250 fine. The assault is Broussard's first offense. As special conditions of probation, Broussard may not work in any job with direct patient contact and he must disclose to any present or future health care employers his conviction for assault of a patient. Federal law will also bar Broussard from working in the vast majority of health care facilities for five years. At Thursday's hearing, Broussard indicated that he would not work in heath care again.

Attorney General Rowe said, "It is unacceptable for any nursing home resident to suffer at the hands of a caretaker. This office will continue to actively prosecute individuals who abuse the most vulnerable Mainers."

Detective Scott Michaud of the Medicaid Fraud Control Unit (MFCU) in the Maine Attorney General's Office investigated the case and MFCU Director Kerry O'Brien prosecuted it. The MFCU is a state and federally funded entity with statewide jurisdiction to prosecute fraud by Medicaid providers and patient abuse in Medicaid facilities. Forty-eight states and the District of Columbia have MFCUs.