NEW ORLEANS – Some of the elderly residents of seven Louisiana nursing homes who were sent in 2021 to ride out Hurricane Ida in a crowded, ill-equipped warehouse are being offered shares of a nearly $9 million settlement after they sued.
Retired state judge William “Rusty” Knight told The Times-Picayune of New Orleans that all the 427 former residents who filed legal claims are being sent letters outlining the proposed settlement. Knight said amounts differ based on patients' individual circumstances.
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People who don't contest the amount offered can expect to receive money within a few weeks. A hearing for those who want to fight the settlement will be held in January.
“It’s been a longer road getting here than we wanted it to be,” Knight said. “Nobody’s getting what they should. quite frankly, because there’s not enough money.”
Bob Dean Jr., 70, owned seven nursing homes in New Orleans and southeast Louisiana. As Ida approached, Dean moved hundreds of residents into a building in the town of Independence, roughly 70 miles (110 kilometers) northwest of New Orleans.
Authorities said conditions at the warehouse deteriorated rapidly after the powerful storm hit on Aug. 29, 2021. They found ill and elderly bedridden people on mattresses on the wet floor, some crying for help, some lying in their own waste. Civil suits against Dean’s corporation said the ceiling leaked and toilets overflowed at the sweltering warehouse, and there was too little food and water.
Within days after the storm hit, the state reported the deaths of seven of the evacuees, five of them classified as storm-related.
By the time Dean was arrested on state charges in June 2022, he had lost state licenses and federal funding for his nursing homes. Dean pleaded no contest to 15 criminal counts in July and was sentenced to three years of probation, paying $258,000 in restitution and more than $1 million as a penalty.
Last month, Dean agreed to pay $8.2 million to the federal government to settle allegations that he misused assets and income from four nursing homes whose loans were insured by the Federal Housing Administration. Prosecutors say he funneled nursing home money to his personal bank accounts, using the money to buy antiques, guns and cars.
But Dean also faced civil lawsuits or legal claims from 427 of the 843 patients who were taken to Independence, or their surviving relatives. Many of the plaintiffs and their lawyers have suggested Dean was hiding other assets.
“There’s no true justice after what my clients endured,” attorney Matthew Hemmer, who represents hundreds of nursing home victims, told WVUE-TV.
Knight said he knows of 165 of Dean's former residents who have died since the evacuation, and he said he expects to learn more people have died as responses to the settlement offer are returned.