Police Fail to Catch Serial Rapist Working at Nursing Home
An investigation by the Bristol Herald Courier in Bristol, Virginia has revealed that police failed to question a serial rapist in a nursing home sexual assault case three years despite strong evidence that he was a suspect. The newspaper's ongoing investigation has revealed that failures by both the nursing home staff and law enforcement allowed the rapist to remain free and sexually assault at least a dozen residents at two different long-term care facilities over a period of 10 years.
A few weeks ago, we wrote about the first part of the Herald Courier's investigation, which found that administrators at the nursing home National Healthcare-Bristol ignored suspicions about nursing aid James Wright for seven years. Now, in a follow up report, the newspaper is reporting that police investigating a case in 2007 failed to even interview Wright despite the fact that he was the prime suspect and that Wright had been suspected by staff members of molesting residents since 2000.
Police files say that Wright became a suspect only after a private investigator hired by an attorney began making inquiries. Despite the evidence the private investigator uncovered that implicated Wright not only in the 2007 case but in other instances of sexual assault at the nursing home, police decided not to interview him and the case remained unsolved.
Wright left National Healthcare-Bristol in 2007 with good recommendations from his supervisors, despite the suspicions many of his coworkers had about him. He took a job at an assisted living facility, where he is accused of assaulting a resident as well.
The failures of the local police and nursing home administrators finally came to light in 2009, when state investigators connected Wright to the several unsolved sexual assaults at National Healthcare and the other facility. Wright was convicted for four of the assaults and is currently in jail.
This investigation by the Herald Courier is a harrowing wakeup call that illustrates that authorities who are supposed to protect our elderly -- police and nursing home staff -- often fail in their duty. If you have a loved one in a nursing home, you should always watch for signs of sexual abuse and pursue your suspicions vigorously. For more information on sexual assaults, visit the
