Rubenstein

WITHIN A month or two, The New York Department of Investigation (NYDI) is expected to make public a report on its findings with regard to the death of 49-year-old Jamaican Esmin Green at the Kings County Hospital. last June.

The report is expected to clear the way for the dead woman's family to move ahead with legal proceedings against the hospital, the attorney representing the family tells The Sunday Gleaner.

The NYDI is the entity charged with the responsibility of investigating wrongdoing in any city agency.

Green, who had been diagnosed as being a paranoid schizophrenic, died while waiting in a room in the hospital's G Building, a psychiatric ward. A videotape showed Green falling from her seat and lying face down on the floor while hospital security officers and a doctor walked by her body doing nothing to help.

videotape

There have also been questions surrounding the validity of the entries made regarding Green's stay. According to initial reports, the time-stamped videotape showed that Green was already face down on the floor and perhaps dead when the logs say otherwise.

A report from the New York City Coroner's Office also totally contradicts the entries made with regard to Green's status.

Sanford Rubenstein, the attorney representing Green's children in a civil action against the hospital, met with them at The Jamaica Pegasus Hotel in Kingston on Wednesday, telling them that the investigation by the NYDI was about to bear fruit.

"They are on the verge of issuing a report with regard to criminal charges which would involve first, the actual occurrence and second, the attempt to cover it up by hospital personnel and then the prosecutor Jim Hinds will have to make a decision based on the report whether he moves forward with the Grand Jury to hear testimony and possibly indict those responsible for the death and cover-up," Rubenstein said.

He also revealed that the children have granted permission for him to release Green's medical records to investigators.

false impression

Rubenstein debunked theories that Green's children were taking legal action for money and never really cared for their mother while she was alive.

"That's not true at all. That unfortunately, is a false impression. They spoke to their mother on a regular basis. They were constantly in touch with her. In fact, she was sending them money to help support them from whatever money she made while she was in New York. They were devastated by her death and devastated particularly by seeing the Youtube broadcast of what actually happened," he said.

"What the family cares about is more than the damages, and they are entitled to damages, for what happened to their mom, but what they are interested in more than anything else is that this does not happen to anyone else."

The 176-year-old hospital that operates under the umbrella of the New York City Health and Hospitals Corporation (HHC) is located in Brooklyn, New York.

Following Green's death the HHC issued a statement saying it was making improvements including "adding more staff, improving crisis-management training to care for patients in distress and expanding space to address the overcrow-ding." They also said they were putting into place additional and significant reforms to help ensure the care and safety of psychiatric patients was not compromised.

Rubenstein believes that the situation at the G building borders on being a civil-rights issue as it relates to the delivery of proper health care in communities of colour.

The body of Esmin Green on the floor of Kings County Hospital in New York where she died. - file