Elder abuse suspect Herminigilda Manuel’s Valley Manor care home in Castro Valley, California. SFGATE PHOTO
SAN FRANCIS CO — The Filipina owner and the administrator of a Castro Valley assisted-living facility were each charged March 19 with 14 felony counts of elder abuse, which could send them to prison if they’re found guilty.
The charges were filed in Alameda County Superior Court against Herminigilda “Hilda” Manuel, 58, who owned the failed Valley Manor care home, and administrator Edgar Babael, reported SFGate.com/San Francisco Chronicle.
Manuel had been in trouble with authorities for the way she ran her assisted living facilities.
If convicted, Manuel and Babael face up to 17 years in prison and fines of up to $6,000 per count. The charges were the result of a joint investigation by the state Department of Justice, the Bureau of Medi-Cal Fraud and Elder Abuse and the sheriff’s office.
In 2013 the San Francisco Bay Area was shocked when 14 sick and elderly residents were abandoned in the care home, and a few workers volunteered to take care of the patients without pay. The case led lawmakers to tighten California’s oversight of residential care homes.
Manuel and Babael are accused of walking out of the home on Apricot Way on October 24, 2013, after the state ordered it closed. Inside, authorities found indigent patients, many of them bedridden, attended by a few volunteer staff members.
The staffers who stayed, including a cook and a janitor, “stayed because they felt bad for the patients,” Sgt. J.D. Nelson Nelson of the sheriff’s office told the press. “They weren’t getting paid or anything.”
The cook, Maurice Rowland, had been hired three months earlier. “I didn’t know what was going on, but I couldn’t just leave them there,” he told The San Francisco Chronicle.
Manuel was arrested Monday at San Francisco International Airport, while Babael was being sought on a warrant. Efforts to reach representatives for the defendants were unsuccessful.