By Matt Heilman
WICHITA, Kan. (KWCH) - A two-and-a-half year investigation by the Pawnee County Sheriff’s Office led to charges against a Larned couple, accused of financial mistreatment and elder abuse in a case involving crimes possibly going back a little more than a decade.
Unraveling what happened in the case, Jeffrey S. Bates, 64 and 62-year-old Sandi Bates are each charged with “one count of conspiracy to commit financial mistreatment of a dependent adult/elder person with an aggregate value of at least $100,000 but less than $250,000.”
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The office of Pawnee County Attorney Doug McNett explained the financial mistreatment charge in the context of the case against Jeffrey and Sandi Bates, defining it as, “the intent to knowingly take the personal property or financial resources of a dependent adult or an elder person for the benefit of the defendant by taking control of the personal property or financial resources of said dependent adult or elder person through undue influence, coercion, harassment, duress, deception, false representation, false pretense or without adequate consideration to such dependent adult or elder person.”
The Pawnee County Attorney’s Office said this mistreatment occurred between July 15, 2015, and December 31, 2022.
Jeffrey Bates faces an additional count of physical mistreatment of a dependent adult/elder person. He’s accused of “knowingly inflicting physical injury, unreasonable confinement or unreasonable punishment upon a dependent adult or an elder person.”
The physical abuse allegedly happened “on or about Nov. 26, 2022,” and, “in the alternative, [Bates] is charged with Criminal Restraint, a Class A Person Misdemeanor,” the county attorney’s office clarified.
The physical mistreatment charge is listed as a “severity level 5 person felony” and the financial mistreatment charge, the Pawnee County Attorney’s Office explained, is “a severity level 6 person felony.”
The Pawnee County Sheriff’s Office arrested Jeffrey and Sandi Bates on Dec. 1, reportedly “without incident at their Larned residence.”
The county attorney’s office said that the couple remains free on bond and that a preliminary hearing in the case is set for Jan. 21.
“Under the Kansas sentencing guidelines, the conspiracy charge carries a sentence between 17 months and 46 months (nearly four years) in the Department of Corrections, depending on criminal history,” the Pawnee County Attorney’s Office explained.
In the video above, you can find prior coverage from an elder abuse case in Ness County in which a couple faces three years of probation. This case involved the abuse and neglect of a 90-year-old woman who was also an Air Force veteran.
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Larned couple charged with elder abuse, financial mistreatment following 2.5-year investigation
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