Georgia airplane crash begins nursing home’s trip into bankruptcy

Jimmy Mitchell knew what he wanted when he had to find a nursing home for his 88-year-old mother.

“Honesty, integrity with the patient’s concerns in heart and not just for financial gain,” the St. Matthews resident said.

He said he is satisfied with the care she has received at Orangeburg Nursing Home, and the S.C. Department of Health and Environmental Control reports no major quality-of-care problems at the home.

But Mitchell said he was surprised when told that the home had filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection. He and at least three other residents’ families had not heard of the bankruptcy at least three weeks after its March 6 filing.

The 88-bed home’s financial difficulties appear to have started when its owners died in a plane crash in August 2000. During the following six years, court records and interviews show a tumultuous financial history including:



Multiple lawsuits in federal courts and courts in two states, with millions of dollars at stake. Cases have been argued in a Georgia probate court, two bankruptcy courts, Orangeburg County court, the Georgia Supreme Court and a federal appeals court.


Claims that the man who controlled the estate of the company’s late owner misspent hundreds of thousands of dollars.

Orangeburg Nursing Home Inc.’s Chapter 11 bankruptcy filing has drawn the attention of state and federal officials, who want to make sure that patients receive proper treatment and that the area has nursing home beds available for low-income Medicaid patients.

“Our level of concern is high to see that we make sure the level of care doesn’t change,” said Dale Watson, long-term care ombudsman of the Lt. Governor’s Office on Aging.

Aging spokesman David Lucas said it’s also important the Orangeburg area have enough nursing home beds available for low-income Medicaid patients.

“There’s sort of a generalized shortage of beds statewide,” he said.

A federal bankruptcy judge this month appointed Watson to oversee medical conditions at the nursing home. She must file reports with the court every 60 days.


Crash

On the morning of Aug. 8, 2000, the tarmac at Augusta’s Daniel Field was filled with smoke and torn metal from the plane crash that killed Thelma Allgood; her husband, former Georgia Senate Majority Leader Thomas Allgood, and the pilot.

The crash set off a series of battles over the couple’s holdings that included Orangeburg Nursing Home, a nursing home management company and five nursing homes in Georgia.

By December 2001, after a dispute among survivors, a judge in Richmond County, Ga., placed Clyde Ray in charge of the estate of his late sister.

After nearly three years in charge of the Allgood estate, an October 2004 decision by the probate court in Richmond County, Ga., removed Ray as the administrator. The court found that Ray had:


Transferred Orangeburg Nursing Home to his ownership.


Paid himself $42,000 over two months from the estate.


Loaned $375,000 from the estate to Orangeburg Nursing Home.


Paid himself and his sister more than $360,000 from the sale of a portion of the estate’s property.

The probate court ordered Ray to repay the money with interest, a decision upheld by the Georgia Supreme Court. Richmond County Probate Court records show that Ray has met his obligations.

In an interview, Ray said his time as administrator was “a nightmare,” and he was not aware that his actions were wrong. He refused further comment.


Battles with lenders

While Ray was running the estate, its Georgia nursing homes and its nursing home management company, Allgood Health Care Inc., landed in bankruptcy. Court records show that the companies’ largest creditor, National Health Investors Inc., decided in December 2002 to collect more than $20 million in loans. By January 2003, the Allgood companies filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection, in which debtors seek to reorganize their debts and stay in business. But by February 2006, the case had been converted to Chapter 7 bankruptcy, which liquidates the business.

Following the deaths of the Allgoods, National Health Investors took another look at the loans it had made between 1992 and 1998.

“NHI thought all this money would be in the estates, and they tried to force it into bankruptcy,” said Allgood Health Care’s former accountant, George Clark.

According to Clark and the debtors’ bankruptcy attorneys, James McCallar and James Wilson, the estate was making its payments to National Health and its other creditors when National Health demanded full repayment. Each reflected a degree of uncertainty as to why National Health decided to push Allgood into bankruptcy by claiming a default on its loan.

“It was like it was something personal going on,” Clark said.

However, McCallar said that the end of the three-year bankruptcy reflected the intentions of National Health.

“They just wanted possession of the nursing homes; it’s what they wanted from the beginning,” he said. “Obviously, look at the end result. Their (NHI) desire was to take control of the nursing homes, and ultimately they did.”

National Health, a publicly traded company based in Tennessee, would not comment.

Wilson repeated Clark’s assertions and said the move by National Health was unexpected.

“There were a lot of personality differences between the Allgoods and the lender,” Wilson said. “A lot of the personality differences were directed at Clyde Ray.”

National Health and the Allgood companies disagreed over issues involving collateral for the loans. Initially, McCallar said National Health claimed a default on its $22.75 million in loans because of a $100,000 credit that it could not account for. National Health used the dispute to start foreclosure proceedings against Allgood’s Georgia assets, which led to the bankruptcy filing.

The $100,000 was “extremely insignificant” compared to the size of the loan, McCallar said. “Defending the companies, it’s a diverting and expensive proposition.”

Wilson said that during the 3-1/2-year bankruptcy, National Health was unwilling to negotiate with Allgood over its plans to reorganize and repay its creditors. National Health “never made an offer,” Wilson said, and court records show that National Health opposed several of Allgood’s reorganization plans.

“So it was thought best to convert it to Chapter 7,” McCallar said.

By August 2006, National Health, the estate and the Ray family settled their claims and parceled what was left of Thelma Allgood’s once-prominent nursing home group. Court records show that the settlement included:


Transfer of Orangeburg Nursing Home to National Health.


Payment of $411,926 to the estate by Clyde Ray.


Payment of 96 percent of the estate’s remaining cash to National Health.


A quick sale

Four days after National Health received ownership of Orangeburg Nursing Home, the company sold it to a single investor, Calvin Alexander II, of Escondido , Calif. Efforts to find documents showing the sale price were unsuccessful.

More legal issues started a short time later, when mortgage company Capmark Finance Inc. claimed that the nursing home defaulted on a $3.6 million loan.

According to foreclosure documents filed by Capmark in December 2006 in Orangeburg County, the company claimed that Orangeburg Nursing Home, which grossed $4 million last year, had not made mortgage payments since June.

Capmark also claimed in court records that it paid $42,000 in city and county taxes last November to keep the home from government seizure.

Capmark said in October it told Orangeburg Nursing Home that it was in default.

Capmark filed foreclosure proceedings in January, and Orangeburg Nursing Home filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy on March 6, court records show.

Efforts to reach Alexander were unsuccessful. A call to the phone number he filed with the Department of Health and Environmental Control was answered by an individual claiming to represent Alexander. The man would not identify himself.

“I can summarize Mr. Alexander’s position in two words: ’No comment,’” he said before hanging up.

The chief administrator of Orangeburg Nursing Home and its lawyers have refused to comment on its bankruptcy.


’A mess’

Despite more than six years of lawsuits, Jimmy Mitchell is only concerned with the outcome of one company. He said he hopes that Orangeburg Nursing Home will make necessary changes and continue what he said has been the quality service his mother has received there.

However, he said the government is “failing people” in its lack of regulations on the nursing home industry.

Mitchell was not the only one surprised by the bankruptcy. So were state regulators.

“Expected? Not for us. I know the local ombudsman was certainly surprised also,” said Watson, ombudsman of the state’s Office on Aging. “From what I understand, the care has been good there.”

Watson said she was aware of “the big mess down in Georgia.”

“People could possibly have seen it” headed toward Orangeburg, she said. “But a lot of times you see something coming, but you hope it will right side before it makes its way.”

She said no agency regularly inspects the finances of a nursing home, so the only warning about a home’s financial difficulties would come through complaints by residents, family or staff.

“It’s pretty much like a business,” she said. “As long as they’re meeting payroll and things of that nature, and no one alerts DHEC to the fact that something is wrong, then they’re going to assume as long as patients are being fed, as long as they’re meeting payroll, that everything is OK.”

State records show no major quality-of-care issues involving Orangeburg Nursing Home, and federal Medicare and Medicaid laws require weekly inspections of medical facilities operating under bankruptcy protection.

“We’ve seen facilities in the past stumble through some difficulties, then they move forward and become strong facilities again,” Watson said. “I’m not sure if one instance is going to make people say, ‘You’re weak and something’s wrong.’ All businesses have an ebb and a flow kind of thing.”


From The Carolina Reporter, a publication by senior-semester students at The University of South Carolina’s School of Journalism and Mass Communications. This story was edited by John Murray.

Nurse found guilty of hacking up hubby

SHE wanted her husband dead so that she could be with her boss and lover.

So Melanie McGuire (right), a 34-year-old nurse, killed her husband MrWilliam McGuire, hacked up his body and dumped the parts into Chesapeake Bay using three matching suitcases.

Yesterday, she was convicted of murder, desecration of a corpse, perjury and a weapons offence and faces 30 years in jail.


During the six-week trial, prosecutors said McGuire, 34, organised the 2004 murder using her expertise as a nurse.

They said that Internet searches on topics such as 'undetectable poisons' and 'ways to kill people' were made in the couple's home.

Assistant attorney general Patricia Prezioso told jurors McGuire forged a prescription for a powerful sedative, chloral hydrate, using the name of a patient from her clinic on 28Apr 2004, the day her husband disappeared.

Two days before her husband was last seen alive, McGuire bought a gun and bullets that matched those in her husband's body.

The verdict from the jury of nine women and three men came after about 13 hours of deliberations over four days.

McGuire's attorney, Mr Joseph Tacopina, had argued that the petite nurse was physically incapable of killing her 190cm-tall, 95kg husband and it would have been impossible to do so without neighbours hearing something or leaving behind some physical evidence.

The prosecutor acknowledged that there were some unanswered questions, but said there was still 'overwhelming' evidence to convict the mother of two.

The defence portrayed Mr McGuire as a man with gambling debts who might have been killed by a creditor.

The guilty nurse, who sobbed as she heard the verdict, was acquitted on two counts of hindering prosecution and falsifying evidence.

The defence said that they will be appealing the decision.

Nurse is discriminated against on grounds of race in St James's job

The largest hospital in the country, St James’s, discriminated against an employee on the grounds of race, the Equality Tribunal has found.
The equality officer awarded the complainant €20,000 compensation for the discrimination and €5,000 for loss of earnings because she was not appointed to the position, which would have been a promotion.

The case against was brought by a Ms Mey. The Tribunal’s case report, which was issued recently, explained the complainant “is from South Africa and is non-white”.

The equality officer decision found: “St James’s Hospital did discriminate against Ms Mey on the grounds of race within the meaning of Sections 6(1) and 6(2) (h) of the Employment Equality Acts, 1998-2004, and contrary to the provisions of Section 8 of that Act when they did not appoint her to the position of Rheumatology Clinical Nurse Manager II even though she was better qualified and had more experience than the successful candidate”.

Ms Mey began work with the hospital in February 2001 and applied for the new post after it was advertised in September 2004. The hospital denied the allegations from Ms Mey, who was represented by the Irish Nurses Organisation (INO).

In its conclusion, the Tribunal explained: “The Equality Officer found that the respondent had failed to implement fair, open and transparent procedures in the interview process for the position of Rheumatology Clinical Nurse Manager II position. The Equality Officer noted that the respondent had found that the complainant was both better qualified and had more experience than the successful candidate. The Equality Officer held that in these circumstances the respondent has failed to adequately discharge the burden of proof.”

Nurse Charged In Deadly Fire

Texas - A 33-year-old licensed vocational nurse has been charged with three counts of murder and one count of first-degree arson in connection with the March 28 fire in a North Loop office building that killed three people and injured six others.
Misty Ann Weaver, an employee of cosmetic surgeon Dr. Robert Capriotti, "has confessed" to starting the four-alarm fire at 9343 North Loop East, according to officials with the Houston Fire Department and U.S. Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives.
HFD Chief Arson Investigator Roy Paul said Weaver wanted to cover up the fact that she had failed to complete paperwork for an important audit for Capriotti. The audit had to do with the doctor's state accreditation or recertification, Paul said.
The office was on the fifth floor of the six-story, atrium-style building.
Weaver was interviewed by HFD and ATF agents at the fire department's arson division Saturday afternoon, when they say she confessed.
Senior Arson Investigator James Snowden said that Weaver "did admit that she was remorseful for the injuries and the fatalities."
Weaver was in charge of the audit, which was due March 29, "and for one reason or another, she failed to get that audit together in a timely manner, and she was fearful of being discharged by the doctor," Snowden said.
"She thought by starting a small fire it would postpone the audit," Snowden said.
Killed in the fire were Jeanette Hargrove, Shanna Ellis and Marvin Wells Sr. Hargrove and Ellis worked for the Texas Department of Assistive and Rehabilitative Services on the fifth floor, and Wells was the boss of a trucking company on the sixth floor.
Hargrove's funeral was held Saturday afternoon.
Weaver, who had been interviewed earlier by ATF agents, was asked to return to the arson office Saturday afternoon to clear up "discrepancies" in earlier accounts of her activities on the day of the fire.
"When she was confronted with those discrepanices, she made an admission," said Rob Elder, the ATF agent who headed the multistate team of investigators who assisted the fire department.
Elder said that as ATF agents looked at the fire scene, the investigation started to shift to the doctor's office on the fifth floor.
"The doctor, we interviewed him and he answered our questions, and he was helpful," Elder said.
Paul said he does not think Weaver intended to injure or kill others.
"I think she was concerned that she would lose her job," Paul said. "She never dreamed that something like this was going to happen. There were no winners here. The whole situation is tragic."
In an interview with the Houston Chronicle on the day after the fire, the doctor, Capriotti, said that he and his staff had left work about five minutes before the fire.
"Everything is destroyed. My office is completely gone. Even all the medical records were destroyed," Capriotti said. "I don't know what I'll do. I really have not had time to think about it."
Capriotti said there were oxygen tanks in his office. "But they had been there for years. If the tanks did explode, it was probably the result of the fire that had already started," Capriotti said.
He could not be reached for comment Saturday evening.
The rush-hour blaze was whipped up by high winds and, possibly, fed by some of the oxygen tanks in the doctor's office, fire officials said. Several cylinders of oxygen in the doctor's office were intact, but others were not, Paul said.
Franceska Perot, an ATF special agent and public information officer for the bureau, said, "The oxygen possibly gave fuel to the fire."
The fire so badly damaged the upper floors that recovery efforts during the fire were suspended due to concerns about the building's safety.
The three victims were portrayed by family and friends as people who lived their lives helping others.
Hargrove, 52, was a vocational rehabilitation counselor.
She is survived by her husband of 14 years, Willie Hargrove, and a 16-year old stepdaughter.
Ellis, 38, also was a vocational rehabilitation counselor at the state agency.
She was a divorced single mother of a 16-year-old boy and an 8-year-old girl.
Wells, 46, was the father of a 20-year-old daughter, an 18-year-old son and an 11-year-old son.