Sunday, September 16, 2012

Nurse accused of stealing elderly dementia patient's credit card

A home health care nurse is accused of stealing his elderly patient's credit card and racking up more than $400 worth of fraudulent purchases. According to the Hernando Sheriff's Office, the elderly woman may not be the only victim.

"We don’t stand for taking advantage of elderly people like that,” HCSO Detective Dustin Mormando said. "We definitely try to focus on putting full effort into those types of investigations."

Deputies said an 88-year-old female patient of Titus Houston, 41, suffers from dementia and Alzheimer's. He traveled from his Spring Hill home to the woman's Tampa home to take care of her, according to a report.

Mormando said the victim contacted authorities in April after discovering her credit card was used in 27 fraudulent transactions. Many of those purchases were captured on surveillance video.

But the big break in the case happened when detectives said Houston used the stolen credit card to pay for his cable bill, leading deputies straight to his home. "He admitted to being the one in the surveillance videos," Mormando said, "and he eventually wound up confessing to using the credit card and to making the transactions in question."

Houston was arrested Wednesday on one count of exploitation of an elderly disabled adult. He was released from jail on $2,000 bond.

Full Article and Source:
Nurse accused of stealing elderly dementia patient's credit card

2 comments:

Thelma said...

Is there no family member available to take over asset management, to avoid home-care theft?

StandUp said...

Nurses who do this kind of thing should have their license taken away forever.