Care-Home Owner Testifies of Breaking Law to Do Moral Thing

The owners of two El Toro board and care homes for the elderly willfully violated state law by transferring a patient from one of the facilities to the other, one of the owners testified Thursday.

But, said Ingrid Henshall, it was the only moral thing to do.

Henshall, 52, took the stand on the second day of defense testimony during hearings to determine whether Love Haven I, owned by Henshall, and Love Haven II, owned by her son and daughter-in-law Mike and Karen Cabael, will remain closed. The state Department of Social Services shut down the Bark Street homes April 6 after accusing the owners of abuse, neglect and mismanagement.

The transfer involved a man known in the hearings as Resident Milton R., who was admitted to Love Haven II on May 2, 1986, with a gaping bedsore that exposed his hipbone. State licensing agents ordered Mike Cabael to relocate Milton to a skilled nursing facility because board and care homes are not licensed to treat residents with bedsores. Cabael testified Wednesday that he sought state permission to keep Milton, but the request was denied and Cabael was ordered to move the resident or close down.

Was Aware of Violation

Instead, according to Paula Mazuski, staff attorney for the Department of Social Services, Henshall and Cabael sent Milton across the street to Love Haven I and lied to the state about his whereabouts.

Henshall testified Thursday that she was aware that a seventh resident at Love Haven I violated her license, but she said that under her care Milton’s sore was healing, his skin ailments were improving and he was gaining weight.

“He was diminished like an Ethiopian case,” she said. “No human being . . . should be allowed to suffer that way.”

She said that when Milton’s doctor, Henry Bruce, asked her to care for his patient after his release from Saddleback Community Hospital, she asked licensing agents to go with her to the hospital, but they declined.

“If I had been told in the hospital (that Milton was an inappropriate patient), Milton would have never come to my house,” she testified. “But once he was in the home, this is a human life. I can’t throw him on the street.”

Bruce and licensing agent Fran Guest testified last week that under Henshall’s care, Milton’s condition improved. After a month in Love Haven I, during which Henshall said she waived the $1,600 monthly fee, the bedsore healed and the resident was transferred back to Love Haven II, where he died July 10. He was 88.

Other Allegations Answered

Addressing other allegations, Henshall said cases of physical abuse and force-feeding alleged by former employees were simply misinterpretations of medical procedure.

Former employee Ann Thacker testified earlier that in one episode, Henshall dragged a resident named Lucy to a Love Haven II bathroom, forced her onto the toilet, pulled her hair and threatened to punish her if she did not have a bowel movement. Henshall said Thursday that Thacker was witnessing a manual bowel evacuation, necessitated by severe constipation. She was not pulling the woman’s hair, Henshall said, but holding her neck for support and pressing her stomach and back to facilitate the movement.

Another employee, Patty Hernandez, charged last week that Henshall routinely force-fed resident Ruth R. In answer, Henshall said the resident had a habit of clamping her teeth on a spoon being used to feed her and refusing to let go. To free the spoon, Henshall said she had to “joke with her,” tickle her neck, and push her chin forward to keep her from choking.

“I don’t call that force-feeding,” she said.

Henshall also said she did not use a shoe to repeatedly slap a resident who could not walk but coaxed her along as she scooted across the floor with friendly pats, or playfully tapped her on the shoulder with a slipper, while imploring her to go to sleep. Verbal abuse alluded to last week was really light-hearted therapy, she said.

‘Way With Old People’

Herbert Gilbert, who placed his 92-year-old mother, Molly R., in Love Haven I on July 24, 1984, spoke under oath Thursday of Henshall’s “way with old people” that brought out the best of their abilities.

The state has charged that Henshall slapped Gilbert’s mother across the face, leaving scratches on her cheeks. During his unannounced, weekly visits, Gilbert testified, he never saw marks on Molly R. and he was “absolutely positive” she would have told him if she had been abused.

The hearings, which began June 15, were supposed to wind up today in Harbor District Municipal Court in Newport Beach but could spill into next week. Administrative Law Judge John A. Willd said he will send a recommendation to the Department of Social Services within 20 days after hearings conclude. A final decision should be delivered in five weeks.

Henshall, during a recess, told reporters that she was confident of the hearings’ outcome, vowing that “they’re going to eat it because I’ve never done anything wrong.”