STRANGLED IN A TOILET

STRANGLED IN A TOILET (WOMAN, 90, UNATTENDED FOR HOURS)

(Sunday Telegraph 3^rd April 2011) By: Caroline Marcus (HEALTH WRITER).

The Coroner may inquire into how a woman was found strangled in a toilet in a western Sydney nursing home.

Eugenia Bengowska, 90, was found in the bathroom of the Holy Family Services Nursing Home in Marrayong, with her neck tangled in a shower cord on the morning of December 12.

The woman’s daughter, Maria Marcynaski, told The Sunday Telegraph the matter was allegedly a case of negligence and claimed her mother, a Parkinson’s patient, was left on the toilet by herself for up to six hours that night.

The nursing home could not comment on the particulars of this case because it was still under investigation by the coroner.

A spokesman for the NSW Attorney-general’s department said the coroner was awaiting a brief of evidence from police before considering whether to hold an inquest into Ms Bengowska’s death.

Quakers Hill police took statements from staff after Ms Bacynski said she was presented with two conflicting records of events within three days of the death, one saying that her mother was last seen alive at 2am and another saying a staff member had seen her sitting on the toilet at 6:30am.

She said that the cause of death had later been determined as compression on the neck, and that her mother – who says she had Parkinson’s Disease and could not turn herself in bed without assistance – had been left sitting on the toilet for hours nearly every night.

Leaving an old lady with Parkinson’s disease for hours on the toilet without checking on her and without any safety measures preventing her from falls can be described as a negligent behaviour, Ms Bacynski alleged.

The home’s chief executive Kevin Rocks, said Police were called to the home the day of the death and took statements from staff, the details of which he was not privy to. He said he could not comment on the particulars of the case because it was still under investigation by police for the coroner.

We have co-operated with the police and we have sent all the information that has been required to the coroner’s office, Mr Rocks said.

We called the police in immediately and what the coroner required in terms of the paperwork has been forwarded in for them to look at.

It is a very sad case and it is up to the coroner to come up with the cause of death.