Horwath calls for police investigation of Rosslyn
NDP leader asks police chief to look into ‘house of horrors’
Ontario NDP Leader Andrea Horwath is calling for a full police investigation of the Rosslyn Retirement Residence, site of Hamilton’s worst COVID-19 outbreak.
Horwath, the MPP for Hamilton Centre, has sent a letter to Chief Eric Girt asking him to expand an earlier police investigation that was initiated after a resident of the Rosslyn was left behind when the home was evacuated on May 15.
Fourteen residents of the Rosslyn have died from the outbreak, 22 staff members became infected and more than 60 residents ended up in hospital when the home was emptied.
“The families of loved ones deserve to know that every possible avenue is being reviewed to get justice for the people who lost their lives,” Horwath said in an interview with The Spectator.
On Monday, the regulatory agency that governs Ontario retirement homes revoked the licence of the Rosslyn residence.
“As documented in (The Spectator), the Rosslyn facility was a ‘house of horrors’ where seniors were left in filth, rodent excrement and bug infestations,” Horwath wrote in her letter to the chief.
“With these new revelations of
how terribly bad the neglect of our loved ones has been, I believe the Rosslyn retirement home warrants further investigation,” Horwath wrote.
A spokesperson for Hamilton police said an investigation into the Rosslyn has not been initiated but police have reached out to the agency that governs retirement homes about its own “investigation into allegations of abuse and neglect” at the Rosslyn home.
“If during their investigation these allegations reach the threshold of criminality then the appropriate criminal charges will be laid,” the spokesperson stated.
The Rosslyn is owned and operated by members of the Martino families, which also operate seven other retirement homes and residential care facilities in Hamilton, along with the Greycliff Manor retirement home in Niagara Falls.
Brothers Aldo Martino and the late John Martino previously owned the Royal Crest Lifecare chain of care homes until it collapsed into bankruptcy in 2003, leaving Ontario taxpayers on the hook for $18 million.
Members of the Martino famdid not respond to a request for comment. They have not responded to numerous requests for comment since the May 15 outbreak.
A Spectator investigation last week revealed horrifying conditions and alleged mismanagement at the home on King Street East near Gage Park.
Former staff members and families of former residents of the Rosslyn made shocking allegations of chronic problems with rodent and bedbug infestations, understaffing, poor living conditions, and a lack of proper care for residents with dementia.
In her letter to Girt, Horwath notes “one incredibly jarring report” in the Spectator investigative story of a nurse who formerly worked at the Rosslyn. The nurse said “she was asked to commit ‘possibly illegal acts’ related to the dispersal of medications and charting.”
The nurse told The Spectator an administrator of the home who did not have any certification dispensed medications to residents.
The nurse also said she was asked to lie to family members of residents and to not keep accurate charts.
The former Rosslyn nurse said she quit because she feared she would lose her nursing liilies cence.
The Rosslyn remains closed and won’t be allowed to readmit residents or accept new residents during the revocation process.
All eight of the Martinos’ Hamilton homes are either now subject to orders to comply by the Retirement Homes Regulatory Authority (RHRA) or the city’s public health department, have been cited for rules violations by the RHRA or public health in the past six months, or both.