A Colorado family is suing an assisted living facility alleging their 97-year-old loved one “froze to death” outside their building last year despite being seen on surveillance footage “pounding the glass panels of the French doors located directly next to the nurses’ station for help.”
The wrongful death lawsuit filed on behalf of the family of Mary Jo Staub says the “dear mother and grandmother” was trapped outside the Balfour facility at Lavender Farms in Louisville in freezing temperatures around 12:40 a.m. on May 26. February 2022, but no one working there found her body until more than five hours later.
“Assisted living facilities are supposed to provide protective supervision for our elderly loved ones,” Elizabeth Hart, an attorney representing Staub’s family, told Fox News Digital in a statement. “The Staub family wants to make sure this doesn’t happen to any other members of this vulnerable population.”
Balfour Senior Living did not respond to a request for comment from Fox News Digital. The lawsuit is seeking a jury trial.
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Mary Jo Staub’s care needs in Balfour at Lavender Farms increased over time, her family’s lawyers said in a lawsuit.
(Courtesy Photo/Google Maps)
The filing states that in 2019, Staub became “unable to live independently” and that his care needs in Balfour at Lavender Farms, located near Boulder, increased over time.
The day before her death, a staff member observed that Staub was “confused and hallucinating” and needed reassurance to make sure no one was inside her apartment, where she had claimed she had seen people “hissing” at her, according to the lawsuit.
“Sometime before 12:40 a.m. on February 26, 2022, Mary Jo exited the Lavender Farms premises with the aid of her walker and was immediately locked out,” the lawsuit states. “The temperature was well below freezing. She was locked outside wearing only pajamas, a robe, boots and gloves.
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The Balfour facility at Lavender Farms in Louisville, Colorado, where Mary Jo Staub died outside the building, the lawsuit says.
(Google Maps)
“Once locked in, Mary Jo tried to walk around the northwest side of the building towards the nurses station for help. Using her walker, she walked through the snow and scaled a snowdrift,” the lawsuit adds. “At some point, she abandoned her walker and injured her ankle. She continued, crawling on her hands and knees 75 feet to the exit immediately adjacent to the nurses’ station. She left a trail of blood in the snow that marked her route of travel .”
The lawsuit alleges that Staub “could have been seen by anyone walking within the facility near or past the glass-paneled French doors adjacent to the empty nurses’ station,” but no one was in that area “between 12:18 a.m. and 5:51 pm am” and “no one at Lavender Farms was monitoring the security cameras that night.”
The filing says that Staub collapsed onto the icy concrete around 1:40 a.m. and that his body moved “slightly as he lay on it for the next four hours” until he “was immobile.”
Temperatures in Louisville during that time were noted to be around 15 degrees.
After the death, the Colorado Department of Public Health and Environment investigated the property and issued eight citations, according to CBS News Colorado.
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“We are deeply saddened by this tragic event that should never have happened. As soon as we were notified, we sent experts to the facility to investigate what happened and ensure the safety of other residents,” Elaine McManis, director of Ella Health Facilities. and the Division of Emergency Medical Services, he told the station. “Where we found deficiencies, we required the facility to make changes quickly and closely monitored the facility until all corrective actions were completed.”
The department, when asked this week by Fox News Digital what those “corrective actions” were, did not respond.
