$26 Million Verdict for Blind Nursing Home Resident Who Aspirated, Then Waited 42 Minutes for Ambulance

Stephen Tate had lived with the consequences of a single moment for most of his life. At 19, he was shot in the head. Shotgun pellets entered his brain and severed his optic nerves, leaving him blind and with a traumatic brain injury that required around-the-clock care. The injury also affected his impulse control when he ate, so his meals were supposed to be supervised. By 2019 he was a resident of Signature HealthCARE of Warren, a nursing home in Trumbull County, Ohio, and a man in his sixties.

In November 2019, Tate was left to eat lunch alone in his room. He aspirated. According to trial evidence and news accounts, staff found him in distress, lethargic and covered in vomit, and then waited about 42 minutes before calling for an ambulance. He was hospitalized with aspiration pneumonia, sepsis and multi-organ failure, and he did not survive.

His estate sued the facility in the Trumbull County Court of Common Pleas. The case was not framed as one aide's mistake. The lawsuit alleged that systemic understaffing and mismanagement at Signature HealthCARE of Warren meant residents like Tate simply were not watched the way their care plans required. Michael A. Hill tried the case for the family. At the time, his firm was Eadie Hill Trial Lawyers of Cleveland; he has since founded Michael Hill Trial Law, which continues the same nursing home neglect practice. Signature was defended by Paul McCartney and Jane Warner of Bonezzi Switzer Polito & Hupp.

The trial was heard by Judge Cynthia Rice. On May 9, 2023, the jury returned its compensatory verdict: $20 million for wrongful death, $500,000 for violations of Ohio's nursing home residents' rights law, and $500,000 for Tate's pain and suffering. On May 26, 2023, the jury added $5 million in punitive damages, bringing the total to $26 million. Hill told reporters it was the largest verdict ever returned against a nursing home in Ohio, and local coverage in the Tribune Chronicle and Mahoning Matters reported it the same way.

News accounts differ on one detail. Some outlets reported Tate's age as 64 and others as 69, so this account says only that he was in his sixties when he died.

As of this writing, no appellate decision in the case appears in Ohio's published court opinions, and neither side has publicly announced a settlement or a reversal. The verdict stands as reported: $21 million in compensatory damages and $5 million in punitive damages for a man who needed someone to sit with him while he ate.