Auditors Find Health, Financial Problems At Veterans Home

WSMV.com
July 11, 2006


Murfreesboro, Tenn. -- The Channel 4 I-team broke the story of a Tennessee Bureau of Investigation of the state Veterans home in Murfreesboro.

The veteran at the center of that criminal probe has now died and the man's family wants the public to know about what they claim is going on behind closed doors.

Dave Lawson was proud to be a U.S. Marine. So when he ended up in a wheelchair and needed a nursing home, he chose the Tennessee State Veterans Home in Murfreesboro.

But last year his family realized something was terribly wrong.


“At the beginning of '05 I noticed a terrible smell on Dad's clothes. As I do his laundry I could not figure out where this was coming from,” said Karla Henry, daughter of Dave Lawson.

Karla soon discovered it was coming from a bed sore that was so deep you could put your fist into it.

For months, Dave Lawson was shuttled between the Tennessee Veterans Home and the hospital. He was back in the nursing home when his daughter got another devastating call.

"They informed me that maggots were found in one of his wounds,” said Henry. “This shows that they obviously had not been changing Dad's wound dressing daily as they had been directed to do because it takes 24 to 48 hours for eggs to hatch into maggots.”

Last month, with her father near death, Karla Henry finally took her complaints to the state legislature.

One Senator was moved to tears after seeing Dave Lawson's wounds. His daughter says the wounds were ignored by someone at the Veterans Home, even though her father had been there 12 years.

"After acquiring Dad's medical chart I saw that the very first notation of this wound was when it was already stage 4. Now I ask you, how does a man who cannot bathe himself, who has bladder and bowel functions taken care of daily, who has no control over his body, how does a wound not get noticed?" asked Henry.

And the I-Team has learned an arrest is possible because T.B.I. has opened a criminal probe into possible abuse or neglect. Channel 4’s cameras were the only ones there when T.B.I. agents arrived at the Murfreesboro facility to demand patient records. That probe turned into a death investigation when Dave Lawson died in early July.

"Certainly when the alleged victim has died, those charges could be a lot more serious at the end of the investigation. What we do is take all of our information in the case file to a District Attorney, we let them look at that because they will be the ones to have to prosecute it,” said Jennifer Johnson, T.B.I. Spokesperson.

The Executive Director of the Tennessee Veterans Homes, Rod Wolfe, acknowledges that Dave Lawson's bed sores were not properly addressed.

"Once again without going into specifics a wound should never progress to a stage IV without it being recognized. When something like that happens there is a system breakdown,” said Wolfe.

Wolfe says the home has launched its own investigation. But he points out that most of the people who work at the nursing home provide good care to their patients.

"They're very dedicated, they're very caring people. Despite that sometimes you'll have an individual who is not as good as they should be on a given day,” said Wolfe.

Meanwhile, state lawmakers are promising to do their own investigation

"I'm ashamed of what I've seen and heard here, and we have to fix it. We just have to do it,” said Sen. Mark Norris.