MASON, Ohio
(AP) -- She raises her hands to her snow-white hair in a gesture of
frustrated bewilderment, then slowly lowers them to cover eyes filling
with tears. The woman, in her 70s, is trying to explain how she wound up
in a shelter that could well be where she spends the rest of her life.
While
the woman was living with a close family member, officials at the
Shalom Center say, her money was being drained away by people
overcharging for her grocery shopping, while her body and spirit were
sapped by physical neglect and emotional torment. She says she was
usually ordered to "go to bed," where she lay in a dark room, upset,
unable to sleep.
"She just yelled at me all
the time. Screamed at me, cussed me out," the woman says of a family
member. "I don't know what happened. She just got tired of me, I guess."
The
Shalom Center offers shelter, along with medical, psychological and
legal help, to elderly abuse victims in this northern Cincinnati suburb.
It is among a handful in the country that provide sanctuary from such
treatment, a problem experts say is growing along with the age of the
nation's population.
The number of Americans
65 and over is projected to nearly double by 2030 because of the 74
million baby boomers born in 1946-64, and the number of people 85 and
over is increasing at an even faster rate. The number of seniors being
abused, exploited or neglected every year is often estimated at about 2
million, judging by available statistics and surveys, but experts say
the number could be much higher. Some research indicates that 1 in 10
seniors have suffered some form of abuse at least once.
"That's
a big number," said Sharon Merriman-Nai, project director of the
Clearinghouse on Abuse and Neglect of the Elderly, based at the
University of Delaware. "It's a huge issue, and it's just going to get
bigger."
Recognition of and mechanisms for
dealing with elder abuse are many years behind strides that have been
made in child abuse awareness and protection, experts say.
Getting
comprehensive numbers of the abused is complicated, experts say,
because the vast majority of cases go unreported out of embarrassment,
fear of being cut off from family - most abuse is at the hands of
relatives - or confusion about what has happened.
Abuse
sometimes comes to light only by chance. County-level adult protective
services caseworkers can get anonymous tips. In one recent Ohio case, a
hair stylist noticed her elderly client was wincing in pain and got her
to acknowledge she had been hit in the ribs by a relative. Another
Shalom Center patient was referred by sheriff's detectives who said his
son beat him.
"Are these older people going to
be allowed to live their lives the way they deserve to?" said Carol
Silver Elliott, CEO of the Cedar Village retirement community, of which
the Shalom Center is a part. "We really are not addressing it as a
society the way we should."
The Obama
administration has said it has increased its focus on protecting
American seniors by establishing a national resource center and a
consumer protection office, among other steps. But needs are growing at a
time when government spending on social services is being cut on many
levels or not keeping up with demand.
In Ohio,
slowly recovering from the recession, budgets have been slashed in such
areas as staffs that investigate elderly abuse cases.
Staff
at the Job and Family Services agency in Hamilton County in Cincinnati
is about half the size it was in 2009, spokesman Brian Gregg said. Even
as national statistics indicate elder abuse is increasing, the number of
elder abuse cases the agency can probe is lower, down from 574 cases in
2009 to 477 last year, he said.
There are no
longer enough adult protective services investigators to routinely check
on older adults unless there is a specific report of abuse or neglect.
"We
do the best we can down here," Gregg said, noting that the agency has a
hotline to take anonymous reports and that it is seeing more financial
scams targeting elderly people.
The price for
not getting ahead of the problem and preventing abuse of people who
would otherwise be healthy and financially stable will be high, warned
Joy Solomon, a former Manhattan assistant prosecutor who helped pioneer
elder abuse shelters with the Weinberg Center for Elder Abuse
Prevention, which opened in 2005 at the Hebrew Home community in New
York City.
"My argument always is, if all you
do is come in when the crisis has occurred, it is much more costly than
preventative care," said Solomon, director of the shelter, which takes
in about 15 people a year. "We're going to have to pay for it anyway."
She
and others in the field say the first steps are to raise public
awareness and train police, lawyers, criminal justice officials and
others to recognize and respond to signs of abuse.
Prosecutors
often have been reluctant to purse elder abuse cases, which can be
complex because of medical and financial complications, the witness'
ability to testify or reluctance to testify against relatives, according
to research for the National Institute of Justice.
In
suburban Los Angeles, Orange County started an Elder Abuse Forensic
Center nearly 10 years ago; it helps police, geriatrics specialists,
lawyers and social services workers coordinate efforts to identify,
investigate and prosecute abuse cases.
New
York City started its Elder Abuse Center to 2009 to bring a
multi-organization approach to the problem, saying nearly 100,000 older
people are abused in their homes in the city alone. While he was Ohio's
attorney general, Richard Cordray, now director of the federal Consumer
Financial Protection Bureau, initiated in 2009 the state Elder Abuse
Commission, something current Attorney General Mike DeWine has
continued.
The commission has focused on
training and education and hopes to launch a public awareness campaign
this year, said Ursel McElroy, the longtime adult protection services
investigator who leads it. The commission also has been pushing for
legislation to improve legal protection and abuse prevention, expand
training, and improve statistical data.
In New
York, part of the Weinberg Center's mission is to help other
communities replicate it. It has assisted shelter startups in upstate
New York, Connecticut, Rhode Island and Minnesota along with the Shalom
Center in Ohio.
The center marked its
anniversary in January. While more than 40 people have been referred to
the nonprofit, faith-based center, only three have gone through with
admittance, signs of the reluctance of people who fear losing family
relationships - even if they are bad - or the feeling of being at home.
Set
up as a "virtual shelter" because victims are integrated into the full
Cedar Village retirement community, it is meant to provide 60- to 90-day
emergency stays while caseworkers provide help and seek out the best
alternative, such as with a different caregiver or relative.
In
the case of the woman who complained of abuse in a relative's home, a
call to adult protective services by someone familiar with her led to an
investigation and her referral to the shelter.
She
has little money, health problems and few alternatives, and after a
while, she asked if she could stay at Cedar Village permanently.
Caseworkers and officials at the nonprofit, faith-based home agreed that
was the best place for her.
The center asked
that her identity be protected for this story because the close
relatives who allegedly abused her don't know where she is.
She
paints, plays in a residents' bell choir, plays bingo with others
regularly, and has her own room and TV to watch favorites such as
"Ellen" and reruns of "I Love Lucy."
The
healthy diet the center keeps her on means she misses some of her
favorite foods - beans and corn bread, fried pork chops. But she loves
the tuna salad, the group activities and having a life with people who
care about her.
"I've got quite a few friends," she says. "They're just nice people here. I have somebody to talk to, and I appreciate it."
Copyright 2013 by The Associated Press. All rights reserved.
