Agency May Appeal Fines Over 2 Deaths

The state Department of Veterans Affairs said Wednesday it is studying whether to appeal an unprecedented $62,500 in fines related to the controversial deaths of two elderly patients at the California Veterans Home in Barstow.

“We are not clear as to what we will do yet,” said department spokesman Jerry Jones.

He said that an appeal to the courts may be an option, or that further steps within the administrative structure might be in order.

The fines against the embattled state-run home were imposed June 16 after an investigation by another state agency, the Department of Health Services, which licenses nursing homes.

The fines were the biggest ever against a private or public nursing facility in California, and put the 5-year-old Barstow facility’s license in jeopardy of revocation.

In all, the health department levied six citations and fines totaling $64,500 against the controversy-plagued Barstow home. The veterans department accepted a single $1,000 fine without dispute but appealed the other five to an administrative hearing, four of which it lost outright. The fifth was put on hold.

On appeal, state administrative hearing officer William Uhrig, an employee of the health department, upheld $62,500 of the fines in decisions signed Nov. 3 but not made public until this week.

The fines climaxed an investigation by the health department last spring into the deaths of two military veterans, Paul Stevens, 76, and a 78-year-old patient whose name has not been released.

Stevens, who suffered many serious diseases, choked to death on a piece of broccoli during lunch in his room on Feb. 11, according to a staff doctor and the county coroner. Administrators of the home said Stevens apparently suffered a heart attack.

But the health department charged the home with failing to provide proper care for Stevens while he was eating and issued a maximum $25,000 fine.

The second patient died in a diabetic coma March 30. The health department said his blood sugar level had exceeded normal levels for several weeks but this was not reported to his doctor.

Again, the fine was $25,000.

The hearing officer also upheld the health department’s fine of $1,000 against the home because officials retaliated against a staff doctor, Liem C. Vu, by firing him. Vue had cooperated with the coroner in finding that Stevens died of choking.