John Jefferson
Left: Beatrice Taylor (Polk County Sheriff’s Office). Edward Anderson (Steele’s Family Funeral Services).
A Florida home health care aide is behind bars after she allegedly left an 86-year-old man who had fallen out of bed on the floor. Instead of helping the man back up, she went to sleep, cops say. The man ended up dying, according to cops.
According to the Polk County Sheriff’s Office, Beatrice Taylor worked for Assisting Hands Home Health Care. She arrived for her overnight shift around 9 p.m. on Aug. 15 at the Winter Haven home of Edward Anderson, who was in hospice after being in the hospital for heart issues, deputies say. The dayshift aide reportedly told Taylor the man and his wife were in bed but not asleep.
Taylor fell asleep on the couch — which is against company policy — when she heard a “thump” from Anderson’s bedroom around 1 a.m., according to deputies.
“She went into the bedroom and observed him lying on his right side, on the floor, with his head wedged in between the nightstand and the bed,” Sheriff spokeswoman Carrie Horstman wrote in a press release. “She told detectives that she attempted to assist him back into the bed but that he told her not to touch him, so she left him on the floor and did not call anyone, including 9-1-1 or her employer (against company policy).”
Instead, she just went back to sleep, deputies allege. Taylor allegedly didn’t wake up until sometime between 3:45 a.m. and 4:53 a.m. Deputies say she did not initially check on the man but talked with her parents on the phone for nearly 40 minutes. While on the phone she finally went to check on the man, who was still on the floor but now unconscious.
Her parents told her to call 911 but she allegedly called the Assisting Hands company portal first. She didn’t call 911 until 5:37 a.m., deputies said. Paramedics arrived and pronounced him dead. An autopsy determined the cause of death to be positional asphyxia with a contributory cause of preexisting health issues. The man also had a pacemaker which recorded cardiac data. It reportedly showed he was still alive when he first fell at 1 a.m.
“According to the Medical Examiner, had Taylor called 9-1-1 when she first found the victim, as required by her own company’s policy, the victim would not have died,” Horstman wrote.
Taylor insisted to detectives that she didn’t do anything wrong, saying she “didn’t kill that man.” A paramedic allegedly heard her on the phone saying “He was old anyway so what does it matter?”
Deputies say Taylor had been working for the company for about eight months and was fired after she stopped showing up for work following the incident. Assisting Hands said they are working on providing a statement in response to this incident. Taylor’s lawyer could not immediately be reached for comment. She was placed in the Polk County Jail on Thursday on a charge of aggravated manslaughter on an elderly person. She remains in jail without bond.
“The complete disregard for Mr. Anderson’s life by the person who was employed by his family is completely outrageous, and egregious,” Sheriff Grady Judd said in a press release. “I believe someone who was not even being paid to look after this elderly man would have immediately dialed 9-1-1 under these circumstances. Her behavior and attitude are simply deplorable.”
According to his obituary, Anderson had been married to his wife Janet for over 60 years. They were “inseparable.”
“Their time together was always eventful as everyone who had dinner with them could attest. They were admired by all for their enduring love for one another. To the end, Ed honored and stayed committed to the vows he took of caring for Jan in sickness and in health,” the obituary said.
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