Ex-workers convicted in patient assault
Witnesses: Hospital staffers tried to cover up the beating.
GOLDSBORO Two temporary workers testified Tuesday that Cherry Hospital employees tried to cover up a beating by intimidating them in an attempt to keep them quiet and ignore the battered patient's complaints.
The revelations in a Wayne County courtroom came a week after the release of security camera footage from the state mental hospital proved that staffers lied to investigators and falsified records after the death of a neglected patient.
On Tuesday, two former health care technicians at the Goldsboro hospital were convicted of punching and kicking a patient with bipolar disorder.
District Court Judge David Brantley sentenced Taniko Dominique Upton and William Kenneth Johnson to four weekends in jail for assault on a handicapped person, a misdemeanor. The judge also ordered supervised probation and 50 hours each of community service for the men.
Before the sentencing, a special prosecutor with the N.C. Attorney General's Office said Cherry employees who report patient abuse or neglect face retaliation... Read More
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