Patient Found Dead at Home for Disabled

A 33-year-old mentally disabled woman died in a Highland Park board and care facility where her body went unnoticed for four days, officials said Friday.

The body of Teri Lee was found Monday in a bedroom occupied by another resident of the Sunnyville Guest Home. The home, a facility for the mentally disabled, was closed Thursday by state investigators.

Investigators and police were called to the home about 2 p.m. Monday, said Los Angeles Police Detective Gil Garcia of the Northeast Division homicide team.

Lee had not been seen since Feb. 15, and a strong odor had finally led staff members to a tiny, second-floor room at the end of a hallway occupied by a 70-year-old senile and mentally disabled resident, Garcia said. There, they discovered Lee’s clothed, decomposing body on the room’s twin bed.

“He didn’t know she was dead,” Garcia said. “She would go to his room because he didn’t bother her. Other people teased her, from what the old man said.”

The woman’s body showed no evidence of assault, Garcia said. The results of an autopsy on Lee, who was also diabetic, will determine whether criminal charges will be sought against the home’s operators, said Charisse Anderson, coordinator of the city of Los Angeles’ Ombudsman Program. The program investigates complaints against adult boarding homes.

The home’s 19 residents, 6 women and 13 men, ranging in age from 24 to 81, were moved to other boarding homes after the home’s license was suspended by the state Department of Social Services.

The state cited operators Imelda, Edwin and Rosario Olivarez for 33 separate health, safety and operational violations. The suspension is the first step in revoking the home’s license. The operators have 15 days to appeal the suspension.

“This place just had numerous, numerous violations,” Anderson said of the two-story, run-down Victorian-style home that had been licensed since 1986 to care for 26 adults.

Anderson said the home had remedied past violations. “But this time, everything was wrong all at once,” she said.

The operators were cited for allegedly failing to have enough food on hand to feed the residents. Investigators found no fresh or canned fruits or vegetables and only milk, 10 hamburger patties, a few pieces of freezer-burned chicken and frozen bread for the 20 residents.

In addition, the home was cited for health and safety violations. Residents’ bedrooms were dirty with soiled linen and bedding. No hangers or laundry soap were available for the residents, the state alleged. Several smoke detectors were broken and detached from the ceilings, and one door of the home was missing, allowing free entry, according to investigators.

“The home had a history of problems,” said Kathleen Norris, a spokeswoman for the state Department of Social Services in Sacramento. “It was previously cited for lack of supervision, food service problems and physical plant violations.”

The operators’ whereabouts are unknown, Anderson said, adding that they may be out of the country. Only four people were staffing the home when investigators visited. Such levels of staffing resulted in previous citations for inadequate supervision, Anderson said.

Investigators could not immediately determine Lee’s next of kin because records kept in the house were incomplete, Anderson said. But Lee had been at the home since November.

The state also alleged that medications were improperly stored and patients’ medical records were incomplete.

Specifically, the state charged, the home failed to keep Lee’s insulin properly refrigerated. The home was also cited for failure to properly assess Lee’s condition, in light of her history of diabetes, acute psychiatric problems, tendency to wander for extended periods of time and failure to take prescribed medications.

A diabetic who fails to take insulin can lapse into a coma and die, said Dr. Mary McCormick, coordinator of the Los Angeles County Medical Assn. Poison Center.

But, she added, such deaths are rare because most diabetics who develop symptoms of insulin shock or lapse into a coma are taken to a hospital, where they recover.