Counseling center, employee plea no
contest in death of Angie Arndt
December 15, 2006
A Barron County judge found a Rice
Lake counseling center and one of its employees guilty of negligence
in connection with the death last May of 7-year-old Angellika
“Angie” Arndt, a foster child from Ladysmith.
At an initial appearance Dec. 6
Barron County Judge Edward Brunner accepted the “no contest” plea
entered by Northwest Counseling and Guidance Clinic to a charge of
negligent abuse of a resident and the “no contest” plea entered by
Bradley Ridout, 29, to negligently abusing a patient, causing bodily
harm.
Angie died May 26 at Children’s
Hospital & Clinics of Minnesota of chest compression asphyxia
suffered during a retraining hold placed on her by Ridout the
previous day at the Rice Lake Day Treatment Center, where she was a
patient. She had been at the center five days a week for a month
before her death to deal with behavioral problems and had been
restrained on nine or more occasions.
The treatment facility, which was
ordered closed by the state pending a review, has permanently closed
its doors.
Sentencing is set for Wednesday,
Dec. 27, in Barron County Court. Ridout is free on $1,000 signature
bond.
The counseling center faces a fine
of $100,000 for the Class D felony, and Ridout could receive up to
90 days in jail, a $10,000 fine or both for the Class A misdemeanor.
Ridout, in a statement read after
last Wednesday’s hearing, said, “My entire family and I wish to
express our deep sadness over the loss of Angie. I regret that any
of my actions to help protect this girl may have actually caused her
harm. I understand the demand for personal responsibility. I hope
that my decision not to contest the charge is the first step in
allowing everyone involved with this tragedy to begin to heal and to
move forward.”
Present in the courtroom were Dan
and Donna Pavlik of Ladysmith, who had been foster parents of Angie
since early 2005. The child, born in Milwaukee, had been in several
foster homes after her parents relinquished rights to her.
The ‘no contest’ pleas were part of
a plea agreement the defendants had reached with state and county
prosecutors.
Speaking to the plea agreement
reached with the Rice Lake clinic, Assistant Attorney General
William Hanrahan said the state would recommend the maximum sentence
—a $100,000 fine — be lodged against the company.
Additionally, a corporate integrity
agreement was incorporated into the deal, which requires the company
to come up with a detailed, written policy regarding when and how
physical holds should be used on its patients.
According to the agreement, for the
next two years, the company agrees to:
• Use restraints “only under
emergency circumstances, as the last resort and solely for the
prevention of likely great bodily harm or death.”
• Establish criteria for staff
members to use in evaluating the appropriateness of restraint.
• Pay for the retraining of all
direct care staff in the use of safe restraint techniques.
• Have, at a minimum, “direct care
staff, a social worker, a day treatment program administrator, a
registered nurse” and/or a physician reviewing each instance of
physical restraint soon after it has been used on an individual.
• Comprehensively document all the
reasons why a restraint was used in each instance and to forward
this information to the subject’s doctor.
Northwest Counseling and Guidance
Clinic, Inc., also agreed to “not neglect or abuse” any of its
patients, to stop doing business in Barron County and to “comply
with all lawful orders” from various regulatory agencies, according
to the agreement.
Defense attorney Lew Wasserman said
his client, the clinic, agreed to the terms of the plea agreement,
and he signed the corresponding document on its behalf.
Immediately following Northwest
Counseling and Guidance Clinic, Inc.’s initial appearance, the court
had the initial appearance for Ridout, who was seated at the
defense’s table.
Brunner asked Ridout if he
understood he was giving up his constitutional rights, including the
right to a jury trial and to have guilt proven beyond a reasonable
doubt.
The defendant acknowledged that he
knew what he was giving up.
Brunner then found Ridout guilty
and set a sentencing date for Dec. 27.
District Attorney Angela Holmstrom,
who is prosecuting the case against Ridout, requested a $1,000
signature bond be set for the defendant, which the judge granted.
The affidavit filed with the
criminal information against the clinic states that from the time of
Angie’s admission until her death, there had been numerous acts and
omissions by employees of the facility that had compromised her
safety. These omissions included staff failing to adequately consult
records containing Angie’s medical history and failing to consult
the treatment plan prior to providing services to her.
Despite having a physician and
registered nurse on staff, evidence of a pattern of defiance and
aggressive behavior by Angie was not addressed by medical
professionals or a multidisciplinary team in a timely fashion,
result in the ‘defacto’ use of restraint as a disciplinary measure.
The staff member responsible for the training of all staff in proper
restraint techniques had, himself, never actually received any
appropriate training, according to the complaint.
While being treated at the clinic
on May 25, Angie was restrained by two adult staff members while
laying face down on a thinly-carpeted cement floor. One staff member
held Angie’s legs while another (Ridout) covered her upper torso
with his own, initially supporting the majority of his weight by his
elbows. Angie was resisting the efforts to retrain her by crying,
screaming and thrashing about.
Ridout reached over to attempt to
control her head, which was thrashing about. After approximately 30
minutes Angie became calm and listless. Believing she had fallen
asleep, Ridout rolled Angie over and observed she had turned a
bluish color and was non-responsive. Attempted to revive Angie were
unsuccessful.
Rick Pelishek is the regional
director for Disability Rights Wisconsin, a federally mandated
advocacy group that investigated the circumstances surrounding
7-year-old Angellika “Angie” Arndt’s death. He said his organization
is pleased with the ‘no contest’ pleas that have been entered.
“I think the DA and DOJ did a good
job in getting a conviction on the negligent homicide on Northwest
Counseling and Guidance,” Pelishek said. “I think the fine does not
fit the crime, but that is the maximum under Wisconsin law, and a
corporation cannot be put into jail.
“This is probably the first
organization that actually had negligent homicide charges stick. I
know there will be civil cases that will get more to the monetary
damages and making sure this will never ever happen again in
Wisconsin.”
He also noted that having a
criminal offense on the company’s record will disqualify it from
receiving a main source of income—Medicaid funding.
Even though this case might have
its end in sight, Pelishek said Disability Rights Wisconsin still
has objectives it wants to accomplish relating to Arndt’s death.
“One of the things we want to
change legislatively is to get prone restraint banned in the state,”
he said. “Some are calling it ‘Angie’s law.’ It is a horrible,
dehumanizing act.
“Try laying face down on the floor
and clasp your hands behind your back, or as close as you can get
them, and try counting to 20 slowly. May take about a minute. Now
think of having someone weighing as much as you or five times as
much as you laying across your back while you are doing this. Now,
imagine this going on for over an hour!”
A report by Randall Cullen, a
physician who reviewed the Rice Lake clinic’s practices, found at
least 10 documented instances in a 32-day period preceding Arndt’s
death where she had been physically restrained by staff at the
facility—once for as little as 17 minutes and twice for more than 95
minutes.
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