MANCHESTER, N.H. (AP) – A Goffstown woman was sentenced to one year in the county jail after pleading guilty to neglect in the death of her 91-year-old mother nearly two years ago.
State officials said the case is the first conviction under a state elder neglect law that took effect in 2002.
Danna Folden also was sentenced to two years of probation and 200 hours of community service in the January 2005 death of her mother, Mary.
Judge Philip Mangones ordered her to take a tour of the state prison and complete any counseling or treatment ordered by her probation or parole officers. He also banned her from working as a caregiver for the elderly or disabled for at least a decade.
Mary Folden weighed 78 pounds when her daughter called 911 to report that the elderly woman was having trouble breathing. Emergency responders found Mary Folden unconscious and wearing a filthy diaper in a dirty house where the temperature was 50 degrees, prosecutors said.
She died four hours after she was hospitalized from a leptomeningitis infection that entered a long, untreated wound on her lower back, authorities said. Folden could have survived had the infection been treated with antibiotics, the attorney general’s office said.
“Danna Folder was responsible for all of her mother’s daily needs, to include food, medicine and personal hygiene,” said Assistant Attorney General Tracy Culberson.
“As Mary’s sole caregiver, Danna Folden had certain responsibilities that she failed to meet,” Culberson said in a statement. “As a a result, her mother died from a condition that was preventable and treatable had she received the degree of care that a reasonable person would have provided in the same situation.”
AP-ES-12-14-06 1514EST
Send questions/comments to the editors.
