New law bars trafficking of vulnerable adults

As they pored over the laws that go into effect Sunday to further protect vulnerable adults, Rickey Coates and William Loomer of the local personal care home task force found themselves nodding along in acknowledgement and agreement.

The big asset is the new law prohibiting the trafficking of a disabled or elderly adult.

“It’s going to be awesome,” said Loomer, an investigator with the Augusta Judicial Circuit’s district attorney’s office. District Attorney Natalie Paine chose to lead the Crimes Against the Vulnerable and Elderly unit that she created last year, which has made a number of local arrests.

The Georgia Legislature followed Paine’s and a few other prosecutors’ lead when it wrote a bill, now law, calling for the formation of multidisciplinary teams to investigate suspected abuse, neglect and exploitation of elderly and disabled adults. It requires that all reports to Adult Protective Services also be copied to the district attorney, something that didn’t necessary happen before now.

The new law waives any repercussions for sharing information about a possible victim with members of the investigative teams, such as CAVE in Richmond, Columbia and Burke counties, Loomer said. It also enables employees of banks and other financial institutions to share information if they suspect someone is exploiting a vulnerable adult.

The new law also allows someone who reports suspicions of abuse, neglect or exploitation to ask whether the report was received, if an investigation was opened and if the investigation is still open or closed. The new law doesn’t allow for much sharing, but before, a reporter couldn’t learn if anything was done with a report.

What Loomer and Coates, a prosecutor and CAVE team member, are really looking forward to is the new law prohibiting the trafficking of vulnerable adults. For example, the new law spells out what coercion means – not only causing or threatening physical harm, but also restraining, threatening to or actually exposing embarrassing or personal information, or threatening to or actually destroying or confiscating personal identity, medical and public assistance documents.

CAVE members have seen victims afraid to leave a bad personal care home because the owner has taken their driver’s licenses and benefit cards, Coates said. If the owners took those documents and kept them in a file with all the other information about patients, that’s fine, Loomer said. But every time they have gone in to investigate a bad home they have had to chase down all of the patients’ personal identity documents, which is time-consuming and difficult enough when you know what to do, he said. For some patients, it is overwhelming, Loomer said.

The new law also contains the element of “deception” and spells out what it means.

Someone cannot promise to provide care when they have no intention of providing any services, Coates said. That is now criminal. The law also spells out “isolation,” another tactic CAVE members have seen employed to control victims. It means preventing a vulnerable adult from having contact with family, friends, a welfare agency, police or health provider.

“The law isn’t asking (personal care owners or caregivers) to do anything they shouldn’t already be doing,” Coates aid.

The basic elements of the new trafficking law involve promising to care for a vulnerable adult with no intention of doing so for the purpose of collecting their asset for personal use while controlling the victim through exploitation, deception or isolation.

If there are two or more victims, it is a crime punishable by five to 20 years. If there are three to 10 victims, the punishment range is 10 to 20 years, and if there are 10 or more victims, the punishment is 15 to 25 years with a mandatory 15 years in prison without parole. Each violation is also punishable by a fine of up to $100,000.

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New law bars trafficking of vulnerable adults