Four care home workers arrested over secret footage of sickening attacks on elderly residents.
Four care home workers arrested over secret footage of sickening attacks on elderly residents.
Four people were arrested for abusing and beating elderly people at the I nonnini di Enza retirement home in Palermo, Italy.
The video footage shows the female caretakers hitting and abusing the elderly people at the ‘I nonnini di Enza’, a non-profit organization, that provides residential care to elderly citizens in Palermo, Sicily, Italy.
Guardia di Finanza police officials reached as soon as the complaint was filed by the elderly woman. “Once again the financiers of Palermo have ascertained inhumane behavior in a retirement home against the elderly. The investigations concerned the non-profit organization ‘I nonnini di Enza’, a real concentration camp for guests,” said the police official.
It is believed that the caretakers were unaware of the fact that they were being recorded. In the footage, the elderly people are being forced aggressively to take their medication. Caretakers can be seen abusing them several times.
After their seemingly cruel actions were brought to light and exposed through security camera footage, four people were arrested for ill-treatment of the elderly. Maria Grazia, Carmelina, Mariano Ingrassia along with the owner were taken into custody.
An investigation later revealed that the elderly residents were facing constant harassment and oppression at the retirement home since long, and were forced to live in fear.
Countless threats, swear words and physical violence were thrown at the elderly people daily from an organization that claims to offer a “safe and controlled environment for the elderly.”
The investigation revealed that an elderly woman living in the retirement home filed a complaint secretly and asked for help from an employee of another nursing home. “I am being treated worse than a dog and the owner is a terrible person, a liar,” said the elderly woman (name yet to be disclosed).
“Once they hit me with a bottle, and I ended up in the emergency room where I was detected with a fracture and several traumas,” she further added.
“They threatened me. If I had told the truth they would have beaten me to death,” said another elderly victim at the residential care.
The data showed the old-age-dependency ratio in Italy has increased from 32 percent to 36.2 percent from 2012 to 2020.
In 2020, 23.2 percent of the total population in Italy was 65 years and older. The share of elderly people in Italian society has been growing constantly in recent years. Meanwhile, the rate of the young population is decreasing. However, the average age of Italians has risen.
With an increase in the elderly population, the percentage of elderly people treated with integrated homecare assistance has also increased.
(Edited by Pallavi Mehra and Vaibhav Vishwanath Pawar)
