The 62-year-old director of a social and health facility in Catania, SB, was arrested by the police for mistreating elderly or disabled guests. The agents carried out a precautionary custody order issued by the investigating judge at the request of the Etna prosecutor.
The investigation stems from the complaint presented by the family member of a patient who was diagnosed with a fracture of a vertebra. According to investigators, the suspect, in addition to having mistreated this victim, would have behaved similarly towards other elderly people housed in her facility. The director allegedly hit “guests with slaps and shoves, also resorting to insults, gratuitous humiliations and physical violence”.
If any guest did not respect the rules, they would be punished with a ban on dining with others or would be required to stay in bed without breakfast. On one occasion, when an old woman had entered the kitchen to go and drink some water, the suspect would have poured water on her head, shouting: “You were born rude, you say you are a lady, but you were never a lady … never! “,” I have seen rude females, but not like you … the Lord is thinking about it. Maybe the Lord would think about it! , but not like you … you have all the shapes of an animal you … all precise, you have all the shapes of an animal “.
The reactions of the trade unions
“The umpteenth story of mistreatment to the detriment of guests of a nursing home for the elderly in the province of Catania and the continuous increase in the opening of pseudo-structures such as nursing homes and family homes reaffirms the need for the municipal council of the capital to approve as soon as possible, the regulation on the reception facilities for the elderly “, the provincial secretariats of Cgil and Cisl with the respective federations of pensioners Spi and Fnp affirm in a note.
“We appeal to the president of the municipal council Giuseppe Castiglione and Sebastiano Anastasi, president of the eighth council commission for social policies – say the provincial secretaries general Carmelo De Caudo (Cgil) and Giuseppina Rotella (Spi), Maurizio Attanasio (Cisl) and Franco Anello ( Fnp) – because in the period of vacatio determined by the resignation of the mayor Pogliese, politics does not abandon the most fragile of society and frustrate the work done by the confederal trade unions with the Department of Social Policies “.
“This is a regulation – underline the trade unionists – which for the first time aims on the one hand to ensure greater transparency and quality of assistance, which must be connected with the social services of the territory, and on the other to define contracts, roles and dignity of the workers who carry out their delicate work in accommodation facilities for the elderly. Its approval in this part of the council would allow the civic forum to conclude its activity with an act of attentive attention to the weaker sections of the city “.
The Codacons civil party
The Codacons and Article 32 – Aidma associations, the Italian Association for the Rights of the Sick, announce that they will be a civil party in any criminal proceedings against the suspect for ill-treatment of the elderly.
“The mistreatment of the elderly and disabled – says the manager of the legal office of Codacons, Carmelo Sardella – unfortunately does not represent an isolated case. More and more often, on the occasion of checks in hospital facilities for the elderly and disabled, serious irregularities if not real torture to the detriment of fragile patients. For this it is necessary to increase controls and video surveillance in nursing homes and verify the state in which the elderly are kept, often unable to defend themselves and report abuse and violence who are forced to suffer “.