John Jefferson
Inset left to right: Frederick Groves and Carmen Groves (Vanderburgh County Sheriff’s Office). Background: A house where the couple allegedly let the wife’s father slowly perish in Evansville, Ind. (Google Maps).
An Indiana couple are behind bars after they allowed a septuagenarian man to slowly die in his own excrement on a couch in a seldom-visited room of their house, authorities in the Hoosier State allege.
The wife in the case is the victim’s daughter; the husband, the victim’s son-in-law — and police claim the elderly man’s filthy, protracted death was enabled, in part, to purloin his Social Security checks.
Frederick Groves, 60, stands accused of neglect of a dependent resulting in death, altering the scene of a death, failure to report human remains, and exploiting an endangered adult. Carmen Groves, 49, stands accused of neglect of a dependent resulting in death, altering the scene of a death, and failure to report human remains, according to Vanderburgh County Sheriff’s Office records.
On June 23, Frederick Groves called 911 to report that his father-in-law Kenneth Rickenbaugh, 73, had passed away inside his bedroom at the couple’s house on Fourth Avenue in Evansville, according to an affidavit obtained by Evansville-based NBC affiliate WFIE. When speaking with first responders, the husband allegedly ventured to guess Rickenbaugh died sometime that morning or the night before.
Inside the bedroom, the smell of feces was prevalent, police said.
The deceased man was found on his back on a couch, his knees bent toward his chest in a fetal position, according to law enforcement. Rigor mortis had already set in by the time emergency crews arrived. The couch itself was soaked with a combination of feces, urine, and blood, police said. Flies were buzzing around Rickenbaugh’s corpse.
And, when the man’s body was removed from the couch, some of the stuffing came up because he had “sunken into it,” police said.
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Police say the Groves explained that Rickenbaugh had come to stay with them roughly a year ago before his health deteriorated to the point that he could not leave the couch one month before he died.
“When I went in there and seen him in my own home, it frightened me,” Carmen Groves told WFIE before her arrest. “Friday, he was sitting up, he was talking, he was eating, he was drinking. Then all of a sudden I went in there Sunday, and he was deceased.”
The man’s daughter allegedly had at least some narrative variation when she spoke to law enforcement. Police say her story about when, exactly, she discovered her father’s body shifted over time. And, law enforcement claim, she gave the impression that she did not really believe her father had actually been sick — but was, instead, faking his illness because he craved her attention and care.
What care Rickenbaugh did receive, however, was extremely wanting.
The victim was clearly emaciated, police said. His body was riddled with pressure sores — the presumed source of the blood on the couch.
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Frederick Groves, for his part, was allegedly forthcoming about the role he did — or rather, did not — play in the care of his wife’s ailing father.
“I couldn’t go in that room because of the smell,” he told WFIE before his arrest. “I don’t know how you put it, it’s just like death.”
The husband allegedly told police he often heard the older man saying “Help. Help.”
“I asked Frederick who helps Rickenbaugh use the restroom, and he said he assumes Rickenbaugh just defecated and urinates on himself while lying on the couch,” Evansville Police Detective Nicholas Hackworth wrote in the affidavit obtained by the Courier & Press.
The dead man’s daughter was supposed to have been his caregiver, the husband allegedly told law enforcement. But, police say, there was scant indication he was able to eat, drink, or even use the bathroom.
Investigators allege Rickenbaugh, whose illness essentially confined him to the couch where he died, could not have possibly used the nearest bathroom in the house because the sheer amount of clutter would have precluded his wheelchair from even getting inside.
“He would never go to the bathroom,” Carmen Groves told WFIE. “He would either use in his pants or it got to the point that I went and got him Pull-Ups. He’d take them off and throw them everywhere.”
The detective noticed the floor inside Rickenbaugh’s bedroom was wet — and then took note of “a mop bucket with dirty, soapy water and cleaning supplies in the hallway near the door.”
And there, stories diverged, police say.
Frederick Groves allegedly said the couple had cleaned up the room to get rid of dog feces so that first responders would not step in the mess. Carmen Groves, on the other hand, allegedly told police they had mopped up a spilled bottle of cold medicine.
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An ensuing investigation determined Rickenbaugh’s bank account where he received his monthly $800 Social Security payments had been emptied. Surveillance footage allegedly showed the husband regularly withdrawing hundreds of dollars in cash from that same account. Financial statements showed recent purchases from that account at Rent One, Walmart and Family Dollar — with transactions that did not appear likely to be for Rickenbaugh’s benefit.
A medical review determined the deceased man was, in fact, unable to move from the couch and would have required constant palliative care, according to law enforcement.
“Carmen and Frederick Groves did not care for nor seek help for Rickenbaugh despite having voluntarily assumed care of him,” the affidavit goes on. “Instead, they allowed Rickenbaugh to lay in his own urine and feces without accessible food or water for the days — and likely weeks — preceding his death.”
Rickenbaugh died from a litany of complications — including two kinds of heart disease, emphysema, failure to thrive, dehydration and pressure sores, according to the Vanderburgh County Coroner.
Both husband and wife are being detained in the Vanderburgh County Jail on $100,000 cash-only bonds.
They are slated to appear in court on Sept. 30.
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