DISABLED MAN FOUND DEAD
Police say caretaker apparently committed suicide
A wheelchair-bound severely disabled man was found dead in a Dedham hotel room, and the woman who cared for him for much of his life apparently committed suicide in another hotel Monday, according to authorities who called the deaths related.
Venture Community Services on Lantern Lane contacted Dedham police about 7 p.m. Monday to report that one of its employees, Mary E. MacKinnon, had failed to return with Jeffrey N. Goldstein, a 41-year-old resident with whom she had worked for many years, prosecutors said.
MacKinnon, 74, of Norwood had left the facility early in the morning with Goldstein for a medical appointment in one of the organization’s vans, according to Norfolk District Attorney Michael W. Morrissey’s Office.
Police found the van in the parking lot of the Holiday Inn on Ariadne Road in Dedham, prosecutors said. They found Goldstein’s body in a hotel room, with no obvious signs of trauma or injury, Morrissey’s office said.
Norwood police later found MacKinnon’s own vehicle parked in front of the Holiday Inn Express on Norwood Park South, where they found MacKinnon in a hotel room, dead of a probable suicide, prosecutors said.
The Office of the Chief Medical Examiner will conduct autopsies to determine the exact cause and manner of each death.
“While the circumstances of these deaths are clearly disturbing, we do not believe that there is any ongoing threat to the public or others related to this case,” Morrissey said in a statement.
Reached by phone yesterday, Goldstein’s family declined to comment.
The state Department of Developmental Services, which contracts with Venture Community Services to care for disabled adults, “is collaborating with law enforcement and has reached out to support the family in response to this horrible tragedy,” said Elissa Snook, a DDS spokeswoman.
A recent inspection of Venture found no licensing or certification violations, department officials said.
In a statement yesterday, Mike Hyland, the nonprofit’s president and CEO, called the deaths “an extraordinarily tragic situation” and said Venture was cooperating with authorities and “doing everything possible to support family members.”
“There were no known issues between the staff person and the individual, whom she had known since he was a child,” Hyland said. All of the organization’s employees undergo background checks, he added, but declined to comment further, citing confidentiality laws.
Stan Eichner, director of litigation at the Disability Law Center, which investigates abuse and neglect of the disabled, called the case “very unusual.”
“We’re just hearing about this,” Eichner said. “We would look at the full range of circumstances to decide whether an investigation of this incident would be warranted to assess whether there were systemic failures that need to be remedied.”