Nurse charged in patient death agrees to suspend practice and trial is delayed

Marvin 'Pete' Jacobs died Feb. 19 at the Fonda Care Center in northwest Iowa. According to state inspectors, he died after the care facility staff failed to suction his airway. (Facility photo via Google Earth; inset photo courtesy of the Jacobs family)

A nurse who has been criminally charged with wanton neglect for a patient’s death has agreed to halt her practice amid delays in her case going to trial.

Becky Sue Manning, 70, of Lake View, was charged in March with felony wanton neglect of a health care facility resident. According to prosecutors, Manning, a licensed practical nurse, refused repeated requests to provide physician-ordered care for a resident of the Fonda Specialty Care nursing home while working there in 2023 as an employee of the GrapeTree Medical Staffing temp agency.

Manning has pleaded not guilty to the charge. A trial, originally scheduled for this month, has been postponed to Aug. 27.  Court records indicate the continuance was requested to allow the defense more time to collect information and pursue plea negotiations with prosecutors.

The Pocahontas County Attorney’s Office recently subpoenaed Rebecca Colby, a nursing home inspector employed by the Iowa Department of Inspections, Appeals and Licensing, to testify in the case.

In late April, Manning entered into an agreement with the Iowa Board of Nursing in which she agreed to indefinitely suspend her practice of nursing.

According to state inspection records, Marvin “Pete” Jacobs, 87, died Feb. 19, 2023, while sitting in his room at Fonda Specialty Care. Jacobs had undergone a tracheostomy, and because his airway tended to become clogged, the staff kept a suctioning machine by his bedside.

On that afternoon, an aide later told inspectors, Jacobs was sitting in his recliner when another worker said Jacobs appeared to be “in trouble” and instructed her to get a nurse right away. Jacobs was pointing at his neck, gasping for air, and mouthing that he could not breathe, the aide told inspectors.

The aide said she left the room to get the only nurse on duty — alleged by prosecutors to be Manning — and was absent for a few minutes. The worker who remained in the room later told inspectors Jacobs grew “really pale” and was gasping, so she, too, left the room and approached Manning and said, “Would you please suction him? He needs to be suctioned.”

When Manning entered the room, Jacobs was pale, but soon turned purple and then blue, the aide later reported. Manning allegedly took his vital signs and told the aide Jacobs was having a heart attack. The aide explained to Manning that Jacobs had been signaling he couldn’t breathe, at which point Manning allegedly said, “Just a minute,” and left the room. The suctioning machine sat idle on Jacobs’ nearby dresser.

According to inspectors, the nurse alleged by prosecutors to be Manning told inspectors the “staff wanted me to suction him (and) I told the staff no. I was told that I would not have to do anything with the tracheostomy.”

Pocahontas County prosecutors allege that no fewer than four workers asked Manning to suction Jacobs’ airway and that the staff had alerted Manning to the fact that Jacobs was asking to be suctioned and that, in their professional opinion, he needed to be suctioned right away.

Prosecutors also allege Manning prevented the staff from calling 911 when it became apparent Jacobs couldn’t breathe.

The Iowa Department of Inspections and Appeals fined Fonda Specialty Care $10,000 for the death, then reduced that penalty 35%, to $6,500, due to the lack of an appeal in the case.