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http://www.nydailynews.com/news/ny_...case_shows_health_aide_screening_flaws-1.html
Case shows health aide screening flaws
Monday, January 14th 2008
Clara Migden, 84, had been home from the hospital for about five weeks when
she got out of bed and found her apartment ransacked and her bank card
missing.
It was bad enough when police arrested her home health aide, Tracy Uzzell,
for the theft. Once in custody, authorities discovered Tracy Uzzell was
really Jonathan Uzzell, a transvestite prostitute with a crack habit and rap
sheet that included the 1991 stabbing of a teenager.
How a convicted felon posing as a woman could have been hired by Long
Island-based All Metro Health Care, a well-established company whose slogan
is "The Name You Can Trust in Home Health Care," will be the focus of a
negligence trial opening today in an Albany courtroom.
"For all anyone knows, 'Tracy' is back working in someone's home," said Hedy
Migden, who brought the suit against All Metro and Uzzell. "Would you want
your mother left alone with a person like this?"
The case brings renewed attention to New York lawmakers' failure to protect
the elderly and properly scrutinize the multibillion-dollar home care
industry and its mushrooming workforce.
New York has long needed stricter oversight and background checks for the
exploding number of home health workers, many of whom are poorly educated,
poorly paid and change jobs often. It was not until 2006 that a mandatory
fingerprint law was enacted, but even that program has been hobbled by
delays revealed recently in a Daily News probe.
Last fall, Attorney General Andrew Cuomo announced with great fanfare
"Operation Home Alone" - his investigation into the troubled industry along
with a proposed statewide computer registry of health aides' names,
employment records and criminal histories.
To date, nothing has happened.
Reached by The News on Friday, Cuomo said he was hopeful the registry and
other safeguards would be in place by June, the end of the current
legislative session.
"This [All Metro/Uzzell] case is yet another graphic and painful
illustration of why we need true reform to the system," he said. "The
registry is an important first step. I'm hopeful that the law will become
reality this coming year."
Law enforcement records showed that Uzzell, then 39, underwent a fingerprint
check back in 2001, which should have revealed his true identity and that he
did time for prostitution, drugs and an assault in 1991.
According to the Albany sheriff, the fingerprints were never sent to the
state Division of Criminal Justice Services for processing because All Metro
Health Care did not send the required $50 fee for Uzzell and 18 other new
employees.
Uzzell, who initially appeared to be a model worker, was sentenced to 18
months in Sing Sing for the Migden theft and was released in 2003. He, along
with All Metro Health Care, are back on trial this week in the Albany civil
suit.
Neither Martin Cohen - the chief executive officer for All Metro Health
Care - nor the agency's lawyer returned calls for comment.
Migden's lawyer Sheila Galvin said All Metro had been told by Albany police
about Uzzell's checkered past but hired him nonetheless, claiming to have
done a thorough background check.
Case shows health aide screening flaws
Monday, January 14th 2008
Clara Migden, 84, had been home from the hospital for about five weeks when
she got out of bed and found her apartment ransacked and her bank card
missing.
It was bad enough when police arrested her home health aide, Tracy Uzzell,
for the theft. Once in custody, authorities discovered Tracy Uzzell was
really Jonathan Uzzell, a transvestite prostitute with a crack habit and rap
sheet that included the 1991 stabbing of a teenager.
How a convicted felon posing as a woman could have been hired by Long
Island-based All Metro Health Care, a well-established company whose slogan
is "The Name You Can Trust in Home Health Care," will be the focus of a
negligence trial opening today in an Albany courtroom.
"For all anyone knows, 'Tracy' is back working in someone's home," said Hedy
Migden, who brought the suit against All Metro and Uzzell. "Would you want
your mother left alone with a person like this?"
The case brings renewed attention to New York lawmakers' failure to protect
the elderly and properly scrutinize the multibillion-dollar home care
industry and its mushrooming workforce.
New York has long needed stricter oversight and background checks for the
exploding number of home health workers, many of whom are poorly educated,
poorly paid and change jobs often. It was not until 2006 that a mandatory
fingerprint law was enacted, but even that program has been hobbled by
delays revealed recently in a Daily News probe.
Last fall, Attorney General Andrew Cuomo announced with great fanfare
"Operation Home Alone" - his investigation into the troubled industry along
with a proposed statewide computer registry of health aides' names,
employment records and criminal histories.
To date, nothing has happened.
Reached by The News on Friday, Cuomo said he was hopeful the registry and
other safeguards would be in place by June, the end of the current
legislative session.
"This [All Metro/Uzzell] case is yet another graphic and painful
illustration of why we need true reform to the system," he said. "The
registry is an important first step. I'm hopeful that the law will become
reality this coming year."
Law enforcement records showed that Uzzell, then 39, underwent a fingerprint
check back in 2001, which should have revealed his true identity and that he
did time for prostitution, drugs and an assault in 1991.
According to the Albany sheriff, the fingerprints were never sent to the
state Division of Criminal Justice Services for processing because All Metro
Health Care did not send the required $50 fee for Uzzell and 18 other new
employees.
Uzzell, who initially appeared to be a model worker, was sentenced to 18
months in Sing Sing for the Migden theft and was released in 2003. He, along
with All Metro Health Care, are back on trial this week in the Albany civil
suit.
Neither Martin Cohen - the chief executive officer for All Metro Health
Care - nor the agency's lawyer returned calls for comment.
Migden's lawyer Sheila Galvin said All Metro had been told by Albany police
about Uzzell's checkered past but hired him nonetheless, claiming to have
done a thorough background check.