An Orem adult care center scrutinized in a scathing report from the state’s Disability Law Center last month has filed a lawsuit alleging Utah health officials illegally bowed to outside pressure when they shuttered the facility a week later, more than a year after the center had already been disciplined.
Hidden Hollow Care Center states in the lawsuit filed July 10 that staff were already in talks with the state about voluntarily shutting down when regulators closed their doors. The alleged premature closure cost the facility about $300,000 — money they argue could have been gained by selling their Medicaid bed licenses through a state grant program.
“The only reason that [the Utah Department of Health and Human Services] is now revoking the license is due to public and political pressure from the Disability Law Center,” attorneys for the care center wrote in the 4th District Court complaint, “not because there is an imminent threat to the public.”
The law center’s report outlined the April 2022 suicide of Hidden Hollow resident Chien Nguyen, who the report states was not receiving proper medication or supervision and had been transferred to the facility after his previous care center was shut down for egregious health and safety concerns.
The report noted that even before Nguyen’s death, licensing officials cited Hidden Hollow for “persistent and ongoing abuse and neglect of residents including serious physical harm to residents, a lack of care planning, and a failure to implement care plans.”
The facility was fined last year, and their license was placed on conditional status, but the state never shut down Hidden Hollow after Nguyen’s death, according to the report, which called for increased oversight. It stated that Utah regulators “seem to operate in a culture of protecting businesses rather than protecting people from harm when they levy insubstantial fines and prioritize keeping troubled facilities open.”
The Department of Health and Human Services, which houses the Office of Licensing, said in a July 5 notice that it revoked the facility’s license because of charges filed June 22 against Hidden Hollow’s former administrator and director of nursing, alleging that the care center “aided, abetted, or permitted the commission of an illegal act,” which is a violation of Utah law. Residents must be discharged by Aug. 5.
Heath department representatives said in an email this week that the agency doesn’t comment on pending litigation. When asked why officials shut down the facility amid talks of a voluntary surrender, the agency said DHHS “issued the [notice of agency action], referred to in the lawsuit, documenting the noncompliance concerns.”
An attorney for the care center did not respond to The Salt Lake Tribune’s request for comment.
The Disability Law Center said in a statement that it was encouraged that state regulators recently shut down both Hidden Hollow and Diamond Ranch Academy, a southern Utah youth residential treatment center where a girl died in December, noting that “these actions should have happened long ago.”
“We urge state leaders to take a hard look at our system and make any necessary reforms to ensure facilities are held accountable before needless tragedies occur,” the law center’s statement read. “We look forward to seeing the Department demonstrate a sustained commitment to taking necessary action and to working with them to protect vulnerable Utahns from abuse and neglect.”
Flurry of oversight
Even before the law center’s report published on June 26, the state began to act against Hidden Hollow and other care centers.
On June 21, the Utah attorney general’s office filed charges against the owners of Midvale care center Evergreen Place, implicated in the law center report for a raw sewage leak, a bed bug infestation and other sanitation and safety issues. Nguyen lived at this facility, which wasn’t licensed, until it was shuttered in January 2022. He was then moved to Hidden Hollow.
(Disability Law Center) A closed to occupancy notice is posted on the door to Evergreen Place, a Midvale care facility that closed in January 2022 because of unsafe and unsanitary conditions.
Evergreen Place owners Jorge Gustavo Gonzales, Sr., 54, and his son, Ignacio Gonzalez-Villarruel, 24, face multiple counts of intentional financial exploitation of a vulnerable adult and intentional abuse or neglect of a vulnerable adult.
The next day, on June 22, the attorney general’s office filed charges against Hidden Hollow administrator Laetitia Odunze, 70, and director of nursing Amy Lauritzen, 53. They are accused of reckless aggravated abuse of a vulnerable adult in relation to Nguyen’s death.
State health officials in a June 27 statement called the law center report “hard to read,” saying it paints a picture of “mistreatment of various individuals at the hands of people who were supposed to care for them and keep them safe,” along with “government partners unable to protect people from abuse.”
“This is a harsh criticism,” the statement continued. “But we will own the challenge before us.”
It then outlined how the agency planned to respond, beginning with some background. Prior to July 2022, state regulators were divided into two agencies: the Utah Department of Health and the Utah Department of Health and Human Services.
“Licensing divisions in each department were underfunded and understaffed,” the statement read. “Their licensing roles sometimes overlapped and were sometimes avoided.”
After July 1, 2022, those departments merged and the licensing teams “took off on a sprint” to implement reforms, hold providers accountable and increase transparency.
They’ve since developed a new noncompliance process and implemented a fine schedule to cite providers who don’t comply. Money acquired through these fines can be used to train employees and providers and help find new housing for clients if a facility is shut down.
They’ve also updated their website to include a searchable database of licensed child care and human services providers’ compliance history. Licensed health care providers’ compliance history isn’t currently available online, but will be, according to the statement.
Since the report was released, licensing officials have revoked licenses from at least three facilities: Hidden Hollow Care Center, Diamond Ranch Academy and a South Jordan-based child foster care agency called Nine’s Foster Agency, according to the DHHS database.
After regulators revoked Diamond Ranch Academy’s license, the department issued a statement saying they are “serious about owning the challenge” of correcting issues presented in the law center’s report.
“DHHS will continue to evaluate the compliance history of any facility before granting a license or making any decision that may affect any provider overseen by DHHS,” the statement read.
Allegations against state regulators
Hidden Hollow’s lawsuit accuses state regulators of violating state code, arguing that they revoked the facility’s license because employees had been charged, not convicted; shut down the facility without a formal adjudicative proceeding; and cannot prove that residents’ health, safety or welfare was in jeopardy.
“Nothing else related to [Nguyen’s death] has occurred, and the individuals involved have not worked in the facility since,” the complaint states.
The two employees charged, Odunze and Lauritzen, no longer work at the facility, according to the lawsuit.
Hidden Hollow is asking for the at least $300,000 that they argue they could have been made had the facility not been shut down, as well as legal fees. Court dates have not yet been scheduled.
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