Reuters, June 8, Washington The US Supreme Court rejected a request to bar the family of an Indiana nursing home patient from suing over his care at a government-run facility on Thursday, maintaining the freedom of people to file lawsuits for civil rights abuses under an 1871 statute.
In a 7-2 decision, the justices upheld a lower court’s decision allowing the wife of Gorgi Talevski, a resident of a nursing home diagnosed with dementia, to file a lawsuit against the Indiana municipal corporation Health and Hospital Corp. of Marion County on the grounds that it had violated his rights.
The Ku Klux Klan Act of 1871, a legislation issued during the post-Civil War Reconstruction Era to safeguard the rights of Black Americans, had a provision known as Section 1983, which is what led to the filing of the case.
People have the option to file a lawsuit in federal court under Section 1983 when state officials infringe on their constitutional or statutory rights.
The ruling was disagreed with by conservative justices Clarence Thomas and Samuel Alito.
The case started when Talevski’s family decided that his dementia required specialized care in 2016 and he was admitted to Valparaiso Care and Rehabilitation, a nursing facility run by the Health and Hospital Corp.
His wife, Ivanka Talevski, claimed in a 2019 complaint that Talevski was wrongfully relocated to an all-male institution and treated to hazardous psychotropic medicines.
He passed away in 2021, during the course of the lawsuit.
The Federal Nursing Home Reform Act establishes restrictions on patient transfers and the use of chemical or physical restraints.
The wife of Talevski claimed that it breached her husband’s rights under it.
The administration of President Joe Biden has pleaded with the justices to forgo a stringent restriction on Section 1983 claims.
However, it had also contended that the federal nursing home Act offered thorough administrative procedures and remedies, negating the need for a lawsuit by subjecting nursing facilities that violate residents’ rights to financial penalties and the cessation of their Medicaid funding.
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