It’s been more than a year since Santa Clara nursing home patient Connie Delucca allegedly bludgeoned her 98-year-old roommate, Vera Plares, ultimately causing Plares’ death, and we’re now learning why the nursing home’s staff put the two in a room together. According to court documents, Mission Skilled Nursing and Subacute Care staff placed Plares in Delucca’s room because they figured Plares would not “annoy” Delucca.
Plares died from her injuries in December 2023 after a 20 hour delay by the nursing home. Mission wants the case to be forced into arbitration because there was an arbitration clause in the agreement Plares signed when she was admitted. They assert that Plares was competent to sign the contract and signed it of her own free will. Mission says medical malpractice and negligence can be contractually arbitrated.
The nursing home has appealed a judge’s ruling denying arbitration in the case, and the case is unlikely to be heard for months. The family filed its lawsuit in April 2024, naming three interlocking LLCs: Mission Skilled Nursing, Covenant Care and Suncrest. (We refer to the three as “Mission.”)
Judge: Arbitration Agreement “Unconscionable”
Superior Court Judge Roberta S. Hayashi wasn’t persuaded by Mission’s arguments for forcing arbitration, ruling in March that the arbitration agreement was “unconscionable” — a contract so one-sided and unfair that it’s considered unenforceable.
Much of the legal back and forth over the last year has been over the question of whether the bedridden 98-year-old was competent.
Vera’s first language was Spanish; she had a fourth-grade education and some degree of dementia. Mission’s admissions coordinator said in a deposition that she didn’t know this, and testified that the document was “lengthy,” and the typical amount of time spent reviewing it was half an hour.
Mission said that it was “irrelevant and speculative as to whether Vera Plares understood the Arbitration Agreement at the time of its execution,” and “calls for speculation and lacks foundation as to whether she needed the Arbitration Agreement read and explained to her.”
Judge Hayashi wasn’t persuaded. “This is not an arbitration clause contained in a negotiated contract between parties with comparable bargaining power,” she wrote. “The decedent was 97 or 98 years old … and lying in a bed at Defendant’s facility, while an employee of Defendant summarized for her several pages of documents, including the arbitration agreement.”
“The agreement is 60 pages long, highly technical,” said the Plares’ attorney Paul Goyette. “It would take us [lawyers] hours to go through it carefully and understand it thoroughly. They went through with Vera over the course of about 20 minutes; she nodded her approval on each page. It was ridiculous. She had no idea what she was signing, or why she did not have any of the family members with her.”
Police Report: “Staff Believed it was Highly Unlikely Delucca Would Attack Plares”
Mission also asserts that putting Delucca in Plares’ room was a medical decision, covered by the arbitration agreement.
Judge Hayashi was also skeptical of this argument. “Defendant provides the Court with no legal authority for enforcing an arbitration agreement provided by a SNF [Skilled Nursing Facility] to an elderly patient at admission, under the circumstances presented here.
“There is no evidence that the decision to room Decedent, a 97 or 98 year old woman who is physically weak and suffering from dementia,” she continued, “with communication skills limited by disability and language, in adjacent beds to a younger resident who was known to have physically attacked others is a ‘medical care’ decision or even a decision made at or under the direction of a medical provider.”
The Santa Clara PD report suggests Delucca’s placement in Vera’s room was far from a medical decision.
The Santa Clara PD police report said Delucca had a prior history against a previous roommate who “talked too much” and “annoyed” Delucca. According to the redacted source in the police report, staff moved Delucca into a room with Plares because “… Plares was almost silent a majority of the time.” Staff reportedly believed it would have been “highly unlikely” that Delucca would have assaulted Plares.
Judge Hayashi also noted that Mission had presented “no legal authority” for enforcing an arbitration agreement “against a non-signatory to require that they lose the right to have their individual claims for wrongful death be determined by a jury,” and in the case “where the underlying death is the result of a criminal attack by a third party who was not employed by or under the direction of the medical care provider.”
Nursing Home: No Negligence; But if There Was, it Was the Plares Family’s Fault
Beyond the arbitration demand, in their kitchen sink of 32 “affirmative defenses,” Mission’s lawyers argued that the family lacked standing to sue, was barred by the statute of limitations from suing, and that any negligence was on the family’s part.
“Plaintiffs were comparatively negligent, and Plaintiffs’ negligence grossly exceeded any negligence on the part of these answering Defendants,” wrote the nursing home’s attorneys. “Injuries were caused by the failure of the Plaintiffs to exercise reasonable care of their own safety and that such failure was the proximate cause of said injuries.
“In giving informed consent, Plaintiffs assumed all risks involved therein,” they continued, asserting that, “Any injuries … were caused by risk of which Plaintiffs were well aware and to which Plaintiffs voluntarily consented and voluntarily assumed unto themselves.”
Plares’ attorney, Goyette, dryly dismissed this.
“Getting murdered in your care facility is not one of the events that is contemplated when you consent to arbitration,” said Goyette.
“It’s classic victim blaming,” said Attorney Victoria Gutierrez. “Vera and the family had no idea Connie was a violent offender; they were never told or warned. Covenant, however, knew Connie’s history and made the calculated decision to place Vera with her.”
The pain continues for the Plares family.
“It’s like the first day it happened,” said Vera’s son Adam Plares Sr. “It feels like the first day it happened.”
“She never hurt anyone in her life,” said Vera’s grandson, Adam Plares Jr. “She was a very kind woman, and the fact that she died in such a violent way is just an absolutely horrible thought. I don’t think anyone in our family can really wrap our heads around it. It’s just insane that that’s the last chapter in the book.”
Last year, Delucca was indicted and committed to a state mental hospital. The criminal case against her has been suspended, according to Santa Clara County court records. Mission’s attorney, Peacock & Bartlett, did not answer a request for comment. The case is 24CV440133, and documents can be found at portal.scscourt.org.
DO NOT put your loved one in this nursing home! My elderly grandfather was there when he broke his clavicle, and one of the male attendants pulled on his injured arm/shoulder to move him in bed. My grandfather was pleading with him to stop, telling him his clavicle was broken. The attendant didn’t stop. We had my grandfather out of there the next day!