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Last Update: 7/13/2020
A certified nursing assistant at the Griffith Park Health Care Center has been arrested for allegedly raping a patient at the facility for dependent adults in Glendale.
Officers with the Glendale Police Department arrested 25-year-old Luis Silverio on February 18 on suspicion of raping a person incapable of giving legal consent because of a mental, developmental, or physical disability. Police say the victim was a female patient in her 50s at Griffith Park Health Care Center, located at 201 Allen Ave.
According to the authorities, the woman told a doctor at the facility that she was having a problem with her “private parts.” The doctor contacted the police after this interaction.
Silverio told the police that the woman consented to the encounter. However, because of her status as a dependent adult, police say that she was not capable of giving consent.
Silverio has been released on $50,000 bail and the investigation is ongoing.
Over the past five years, there have been seven complaints of patient sexual abuse at Griffith Park. However, only two of these complaints were determined to have sufficient evidence of abuse. Both of these complaints were filed in June 2017.
Attorney contributor Jason Amala is a sexual abuse victim attorney who represents survivors of sexual crimes in civil lawsuits. We’ve asked him to share some of his thoughts on how survivors of healthcare facility sexual abuse can find justice through the legal system:
“We should all feel like we can trust the healthcare employees in our communities, but that’s often not the case. While most are trustworthy, there is always that small percent that abuses their position of power, and that’s when sexual abuse cases are revealed. When a patient is sexually abused by a healthcare employee, it’s important to both prosecute the abuser and to investigate the facility to determine if they failed to keep their patients safe through negligence,” Mr. Amala concluded.
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