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| Rebecca Fierle |
Amid
a criminal investigation into former professional guardian Rebecca
Fierle, a judge has ordered the release to law enforcement of
confidential information concerning the client whose death sparked the
scandal that has embroiled the state’s guardianship program.
The Florida Department of Law Enforcement confirmed last week it had launched a criminal probe into Rebecca Fierle, the Orlando-based guardian who has resigned from all cases statewide in which she was the court-appointed decision maker for incapacitated people, known as wards.
Court
records show Circuit Judge Janet C. Thorpe on Thursday ordered the
release to authorities of information regarding the case of Steven Stryker,
75, who died at a Tampa hospital after staff could not perform
life-saving procedures because of a DNR filed against his wishes by
Fierle, his guardian.
Thorpe’s
July 29 order came after a court monitor in the Ninth Judicial Circuit
brought up concerns to the court regarding “possible criminal activity”
by Fierle in Stryker’s case, the judge’s one-page order indicates. It
directs the court monitor to turn the information over to “the proper
law enforcement agency.”
“The
Court finds that it is necessary to release confidential information in
the possession of the guardian monitor in order to facilitate a
criminal investigation," Thorpe wrote, according to court records.
It’s
unclear if the judge’s latest ruling was confined to Stryker’s case.
One-page orders were also filed in the cases of other former Fierle
wards on Thursday, but were sealed from public view.
An
earlier state investigation conducted by the Okaloosa County Clerk of
Circuit Court and Comptroller found Fierle refused to remove the DNR
despite Stryker’s desire for life-saving actions, and that her claims
about his final wishes contradicted his daughter, friend and a
psychiatrist.
“The
ward had never previously expressed a desire to die, and it seems
unlikely that, as soon as he was appointed a guardian, he would suddenly
be unwilling to tolerate a condition that he had been dealing with for
many years,” wrote Andrew Thurman, an auditor and investigator under the
Okaloosa Clerk’s inspector general department, in the investigative
report.
Fierle
told investigators she filed a DNR on Stryker because it was “an issue
of quality of life rather than quantity,” and said she regularly filed
DNRs for her wards, Thurman wrote.
Investigators
alleged in the report that Fierle’s decision amounted to “the removal
of care necessary to maintain the ward’s physical health” and cited
criminal statues.
“The
removal of this necessary care directly resulted in the ward’s death,”
Thurman wrote in the report. “Fla. Stat. states ‘A person who causes the
death of any elderly person or disabled adult by culpable negligence
... commits aggravated manslaughter of an elderly person or disabled
adult, a felony of the first degree.’”
Fierle is not currently facing any criminal charges.
Thorpe
sought to remove Fierle from 95 Orange County cases after finding the
guardian had “abused her powers” by requesting that incapacitated
clients not receive medical treatment if their heart or breathing
stopped, without permission from the court or the wards’ families.
State Elder Affairs Secretary Richard Prudom on Friday announced “immediate” changes
to improve the agency’s response time for complaints, though his office
has not yet given specifics. The news came hours after the Orlando
Sentinel reported that a 2016 complaint against Fierle had sat ignored for more than two years.
Full Article & Source:
Judge releases confidential information to authorities investigating former Orlando guardian Rebecca Fierle
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