Background: The Des Moines County Correctional Center in Burlington, Iowa (Google Maps). Inset: Audrey Engler (Des Moines County Jail).
An Iowa hospice worker has confessed to her role in the neglect of an elderly woman who was discovered living in deplorable conditions, with severe bed sores, prior to her death.
Audrey Engler, aged 25, has entered a guilty plea to charges of intentional dependent adult abuse that resulted in serious injury, according to court documents. Engler was arrested and placed in the Des Moines County Correctional Center in Burlington, Iowa, last December.
The incident came to light on the morning of August 15, when the Burlington Police Department was notified of the woman’s death the previous evening. The victim, an elderly woman who had contracted Vibrance Homecare for in-home assistance, had been under Engler’s care, as detailed in a criminal complaint obtained by Law & Crime.
Engler had been residing with the victim—whose identity has not been disclosed in court records—until July 21. This was when the woman was hospitalized following a mattress fire, as she was unable to move independently from her bed.
According to reports from Law & Crime, a police investigation into the victim’s circumstances revealed appalling conditions. The elderly woman was found with burns on her back, bed sores, ulcers on her buttocks, and was surrounded by soiled linens. Her catheter was visibly full of urine, and she was left sitting in her own feces, as stated in the complaint.
Additionally, Engler allegedly failed to administer necessary medication to the woman. The home was described as being in complete disarray, cluttered with items to the extent that it was difficult to find a place to sit or stand.
When investigators spoke with the victim’s case manager, the manager said the victim asked the company to buy her clothing items because “all her money was going to Engler,” the complaint added. The victim also had a nurse, who told investigators she was visiting frequently to deal with the woman’s pain, but that Engler encouraged her to reduce the number of times she visited because the woman was “adequately” taken care of.
Also troubling was that the woman appeared to be getting “skinnier and skinnier,” according to the complaint. She would communicate with Engler via text when she needed something, but detectives reviewed their message history and found multiple occurrences where Engler “wouldn’t respond for hours.”
When detectives spoke with Engler, they learned that the patient had been paying for the rent and electric bills in the apartment. According to the complaint, the defendant also admitted that she only moved the woman “one time a day” and that she “could have taken care of the dependent adult better and could have checked on her more and could have had more compassion for her.”
Engler is set to be sentenced on March 23. By Iowa law, she could be sent to prison for up to 10 years.
