An incident report said a resident at a troubled center for people with developmental disabilities in Enid fell in the shower. But a staff member thought it looked like the man had been kicked in the face.
The resident at the Robert M. Greer Center appeared to have the imprint of a shoe on his face after the April 2023 incident. But because the man also said he fell, the employee didn’t report their suspicions and no staff were suspended or relocated, state investigators found. The man’s family took him to the hospital about a week later because of severe headaches, telling emergency room staff they were concerned the man hadn’t fallen, state records show. The man could communicate, but didn’t speak very much, according to hospital records reviewed by inspectors.
It took almost two weeks for someone to refer the incident as suspected abuse or mistreatment to the Oklahoma Human Services’ office that investigates abuse of vulnerable adults. An internal investigative report finished by Greer Center staff concluded there was no evidence of abuse or neglect.
State investigators later noted that the Greer Center’s investigation did not include an explanation of the grid shoe pattern on the client’s face or clarification on conflicting employee statements about the incident.
State investigating reports of systemic abuse at Greer Center in Enid
The review of the incident was part of an Oklahoma State Department of Health investigation after reports of systemic abuse at the Greer Center emerged in 2023 that included allegations that staff beat and choked clients. Eight former caregivers are facing criminal charges. The Health Department cited the center for 16 deficiencies for failing to report abuse correctly and not properly training staff. The agency also gave the facility one of the most serious deficiencies available because the violations had or were likely to cause serious injury or death to residents, putting Greer at risk of losing federal funding.
Delayed reporting can make it more difficult to gather evidence or open the door for abuse to continue, said RoseAnn Duplan, a policy specialist with the Oklahoma Disability Law Center.
After the scandal erupted last fall, court testimony and state inspectors said that some allegations of abuse were not reported for days or weeks after the incidents occurred, and some weren’t reported at all.
“One of our big concerns is this repeated pattern of delaying the reporting, which then delays the response,” Duplan said.
After the abuse allegations became public, the Greer Center created new reporting policies. Greer Center officials told the state they were keeping accused staff away from residents while waiting for investigations to be completed, and they implemented new meetings to go over any reports of abuse, according to investigative reports. The facility also hired a new full-time abuse investigator.
But the state cited Greer six more times in the first two months of 2024 for continuing to miss reporting deadlines for suspected abuse or neglect. The Health Department also cited the Greer Center twice for failing to protect clients from verbal abuse and failing to immediately suspend an employee after they were accused of abuse.
Oklahoma Human Services referred questions about continued problems at the Greer Center to the Health Department and Liberty of Oklahoma, the for-profit company the state contracts with to run the Greer Center. Liberty of Oklahoma did not respond to requests for comment.
State policies require Greer Center staff to immediately report any allegations of abuse or suspicious injuries to supervisors. Greer Center staff are required to notify state officials within 24 hours of an incident and provide initial investigative results within five days. Staff members suspected of abuse are supposed to be suspended or relocated.
Allegations of abuse reported through February 2024
Greer Center officials received a steady stream of new allegations of abuse between late November 2023 and early February 2024, according to daily reports that Oklahoma Human Services began requiring the company to start sending last year.
The Health Department surveyed the facility at least six times between January and February in response to allegations of abuse. The agency said it has continued to investigate incidents at Greer throughout the spring, but the reports aren’t complete yet.
In one instance, a resident told a Greer staffer that other clients and a staff member were having sex. The staffer wrote down a note in a log book but didn’t directly report the accusation of sexual abuse to anyone because they “knew the client was making up the allegation,” a state report from early January shows. Another employee told investigators that they had not interviewed other clients to make sure there were no additional allegations of sexual abuse because they “didn’t have the time.”
A client was taken to the hospital in January for pain and reported to hospital staff that other residents were beating him up, according to an investigative report. The same client called 911 two days later saying another resident kicked him. The first investigation wasn’t finished for nine working days after it happened, and Greer’s investigator told state inspectors that investigative results for the second incident still weren’t available a week after it happened.
Also in January, two other clients got into a physical fight, but the facility didn’t report it to the state because one of the residents didn’t want to file a police report. At the end of the month, a client reported that a staffer slammed their finger in a door after they called the worker “childish.” When state investigators asked for a copy of the final report on the incident in February, it was not available.
If the facility continues to be noncompliant, it could lose its license or face other penalties, said LaTrina Frazier, deputy commissioner of quality assurance and regulations for the Health Department.
Oklahoma Human Services said it has completed its own investigations into the allegations of systemic abuse at the Greer Center but no details can be shared publicly because of client confidentiality rules. Criminal charges are still pending against eight former staff members in connection with allegations of abuse. Hearings in some of their cases are scheduled for this month.
Enid police said they have no new active investigations at Greer Center for abuse but are waiting for a medical examiner’s report on the death of a resident in May.
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