The Washington Post - 28.08.2019

WEDNESDAY, AUGUST 28 , 2019. THE WASHINGTON POST EZ RE K A

NEW YORK

Prison guards prevail

in dispute over beards

Two Muslim correctional
officers in New York were
reinstated Tuesday after being
suspended for refusing to shave
their beards because of religious
reasons, the state prisons agency
said.
Brian Sughrim and David
Feliciano, correctional officers at
Fishkill prison in Dutchess
County, had filed a federal
lawsuit against the Department
of Corrections and Community
Supervision.
The lawsuit, which argued the
agency discriminated against the
two men, is the “sole reason that
they’re getting their jobs back,”
said their attorney, Joshua
Moskovitz.
The employees will receive full
back pay, prisons agency
spokesman Thomas Mailey said
in an emailed statement. The
agency, he wrote, will be
“reviewing its rules regarding
facial hair immediately in light of
the new law.”
Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo (D)
signed legislation this month
banning employment
discrimination because of
religious attire or facial hair.
The two men are longtime
department employees, and the
agency years ago gave them
“medical accommodations” to
wear beards because of a skin
condition, according to the
lawsuit.
This year, the department
asked the two men for new
documentation of their medical
conditions and decided not to
continue the medical
accommodation.
The suit says the men also put
in requests for religious
accommodation, but those were
rejected by the agency.
— Associated Press

PENNSYLVANIA

No more prison time

for rapper under deal

Rapper Meek Mill pleaded
guilty to a misdemeanor gun

charge Tuesday and won’t serve

more time in prison after

reaching a plea agreement in a

case that has kept him on

probation for most of his adult

life.

The negotiated plea comes

after an appeals court threw out

the 2007 conviction of the 32-

year-old rapper, born Robert

Williams, last month.

He had served about two years

in prison in the case, and a judge

decided he won’t have to spend

additional time behind bars or on

probation.

Williams has called the 12-year

ordeal “mentally and emotionally

challenging” but said millions of

people face the same issues. He

has become an activist for criminal

justice policy changes since he was

sent back to prison in 2017 for

technical violations he blamed on

his erratic travel schedule as his

career soared. He spent five

months locked up before an

appeals court granted him bail.

Last month, a Pennsylvania

appeals court overturned the

conviction, saying new evidence

undermined the credibility of the

officer who testified against the

rapper at his trial and made it

likely he would be acquitted if the

case were retried.

— Associated Press

OKLAHOMA

Tornado knocks out

power for thousands

A storm spawned a weak

tornado in central Oklahoma, left

thousands without power from

that state into Arkansas, and led

to about a dozen high-water

rescues.

National Weather Service

meteorologist Phil Ware said

Tuesday that a tornado damaged

a home, downed trees and

destroyed a barn Monday night

in Logan County, about 20 miles

north of downtown Oklahoma

City.

No injuries were reported.

Oklahoma City Fire Capt.

David Macy said firefighters

rescued about a dozen motorists

from high water and a fisherman

who was trapped by rising water

on a lake.

Some Oklahoma schools that

lost power closed Tuesday.

Oklahoma Gas & Electric

reported about 34,000 outages

Tuesday afternoon. More than

66,000 customers from that

utility and Public Service

Company of Oklahoma were

without electricity.

— Associated Press

DIGEST

JESSICA GRIFFIN/PHILADELPHIA INQUIRER/ASSOCIATED PRESS

Rapper Meek Mill, center, pleaded guilty to a misdemeanor gun charge

Tuesday after he reached a plea agreement in a case that has kept him

on probation for most of his adult life. He was incarcerated for two

years, and a judge said he wouldn’t have to spend more time behind

bars. Mill has taken up the cause of a criminal justice overhaul.

Politics & the Nation

BY MARK BERMAN

Four employees of a South Flor-

ida nursing home where a dozen

people died amid sweltering heat

in September 2017 were arrested

and charged with manslaughter

and tampering with evidence, po-

lice said Tuesday.

In announcing the charges, po-

lice officials assailed the four em-

ployees — the facility’s adminis-

trator and three nurses — and said

the deaths were all avoidable.

“This was a terrible tragedy that

never should have happened,” said

Chris O’Brien, chief of police in

Hollywood, Fla.

The charges came nearly two

years after the deaths at the Reha-

bilitation Center at Hollywood

Hills, a nursing home not far from

Fort Lauderdale, which overheat-

ed after Hurricane Irma swept

through the region with powerful

rain and wind.

The deaths of the patients —

who ranged in age from 57 to 99,

with the oldest victim a few weeks

away from turning 100 — sparked

intense outrage as well as a round

of finger-pointing over who was

responsible and what happened.

During hurricanes and other dis-

asters, power outages are an acute

threat to the elderly, who tend to

be more susceptible to heat-relat-

ed illnesses.

Days after Irma battered South

Florida, the nursing home’s air

conditioning began to fail, and

temperatures began to climb.

Emergency personnel began re-

sponding to the nursing home ear-

ly on Sept. 13, 2017, and eventually

evacuated the entire facility.

A dozen patients died — some

days and weeks later — and the

medical examiner concluded that

all of the deaths were homicides

caused by heat exposure. Authori-

ties have said some patients had

body temperatures as high as

109.9 degrees.

O’Brien said during a news

briefing announcing the criminal

charges that the relatives of the

victims “placed their faith and

trust in the Rehabilitation Center

of Hollywood Hills... and that

trust was betrayed. They have

been living an absolute night-

mare.”

Among those charged were

Jorge Carballo, 61, the administra-

tor, and Sergo Colin, 45, the night

shift’s nursing supervisor. Each

man was charged with 12 counts of

aggravated manslaughter, one for

each of the victims.

Tamika Tory Miller, 31, and Al-

thia Kenesha Meggie, 36, both

nurses, were charged with man-

slaughter as well as tampering

with evidence in the case, accord-

ing to the arrest warrants. Miller

was charged with six counts of

aggravated manslaughter and

three counts of tampering with or

fabricating evidence in connec-

tion with patient medical records.

Meggie was charged with two

counts of aggravated manslaugh-

ter and two counts of tampering or

fabricating medical record evi-

dence.

James A. Cobb Jr., an attorney

for Carballo, described his reac-

tion to the charges as “complete

shock and horror.” Cobb pointed

to the manslaughter counts and

said Carballo was particularly dis-

tressed by “the notion that he

didn’t care for these people,” not-

ing that the administrator had

family members — his wife’s fa-

ther and uncle — residing in the

facility at the time.

Cobb said he felt Carballo and

the others were charged as scape-

goats by the government for “their

own mistakes, which are legion,

and to place the blame as far down

the food chain as they can possibly

go.”

Other attorneys did not im-

mediately respond to requests for

comment Tuesday.

All of the crimes are felonies,

police said. They did not elaborate

in the warrants or the news con-

ference about the evidence tam-

pering charges, but state officials

have said that nursing home offi-

cials added entries to medical rec-

ords later to give a false depiction

of what happened.

Hollywood Police Maj. Steven

Bolger said the investigation is

ongoing and more arrests are ex-

pected, although he did not speci-

fy who else might face charges.

Nursing home executives have

said they contacted Rick Scott, the

state’s then-governor, and Florida

Power and Light, the utility giant,

pleading for help. State and local

authorities, though, disputed

parts of those accounts and criti-

cized what they called “egregious”

failures at the facility. The Agency

for Health Care Administration in

Florida said the nursing home

waited too long to call 911 and then

was too slow in evacuating pa-

tients.

Scott, now a Republican sena-

tor representing Florida, said in a

statement that he was “glad these

individuals are being held ac-

countable.” In a statement Tues-

day, Florida Power and Light said

that part of the nursing home still

had power, adding that “there was

a hospital with power across the

parking lot from this facility, and

the nursing home was required to

have a permanently installed, op-

erational generator.”

An administrative law judge

who recommended revoking the

nursing home’s license noted sev-

eral issues combined to cause the

conditions in September 2017. But

the judge concluded that “ulti-

mately the patients were depend-

ent on Hollywood Hills to recog-

nize the danger and to keep them

safe.”

[email protected]

Florida nursing home workers

charged in 2017 heat deaths

“[The relatives] placed

their faith and trust in

the Rehabilitation

Center of Hollywood

Hills ... and that trust

was betrayed.”

Chris O’Brien, Hollywood police chief

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