Nursing home still in focus a year later

Inquiry remains active, after 12 died in heat during Irma

A year after Hurricane Irma rolled through South Florida, Hollywood detectives are still trying to determine whether anyone should face criminal charges for not preventing a dozen people from dying from sweltering heat in a nursing home.

The Hollywood Police Department has not given a timeline for when the agency will finish its investigation, city spokeswoman Raelin Storey said Friday.

“These types of investigations take a long time,” Storey said. “There is a lot of material to go through. We are being extremely careful and extremely thorough.”

Most nursing homes have yet to install permanent backup power systems now required by the state to prevent a similar tragedy in the future.

Hurricane Irma knocked out power to the nursing home on Sept. 10, 2017, and the medical examiner ruled 12 people died because of the sweltering conditions inside the nursing home. Temperatures reached as high as 99 degrees during the three-day power outage.

Albert Levin, a Miami lawyer who is representing the family of Miguel and Cecilia Franco, said the nursing home’s administration should be held accountable for not doing enough to save the lives of the Francos and the other 10 people who died.

Family members are awaiting the investigation’s completion, Levin said.

“They want justice to be done there,” he said. “They are still mourning the loss of their loved ones. They look forward to the day they can put this ugly nightmare behind them."

Once the investigation is completed, it will be turned over to the State Attorney’s Office, which will determine whether to pursue criminal charges, Storey said.

The nursing home is no longer in operation, and an administrative law judge is reviewing the state’s request to revoke the operator’s license, said Mallory McManus, a spokeswoman for the Florida Agency for Health Care Administration.

Numerous civil cases also have been brought against the nursing home.

Nursing home officials deny wrongdoing, saying calls for help went unanswered by Gov. Rick Scott.

He gave his personal cellphone number for nursing home administrators to call in the event of an emergency.

The governor’s office countered that the nursing home staff didn’t follow instructions to call 911 if conditions worsened.

The nursing home is across the street from a hospital that never lost power.

Scott issued emergency rules shortly after the deaths at Hollywood Hills requiring backup power at assisted-living facilities and nursing homes.

Only about a quarter of the state’s 684 licensed nursing homes are in full compliance with the state’s June 1 deadline to implement a permanent emergency-power plan, according to the Agency for Health Care Administration.

The rest received a sevenmonth extension, but state rules require they have temporary measures available to keep residents cool.

Just under half of the state’s 3,075 licensed assisted-living facilities were in full compliance.