A 36-year-old former care home operator is going to jail for a year for her role in the death of one of her elderly clients.
A state judge sentenced Jennifer Polintan to 10 years of probation Wednesday for manslaughter. As a condition of the probation, Circuit Judge Richard Perkins ordered Polintan to spend a year behind bars.
Polintan has until Jan. 25 to turn herself in.
She pleaded guilty last September in a deal with the state attorney general.
Polintan could have been sentenced instead to 20 years in prison. And because her victim was older than 60, she could have also been required to spend at least six years and eight months of that sentence behind bars before being eligible for parole.
As part of her deal with the state, Polintan agreed to serve the one-year jail term and to pay $8,980 restitution to the victim’s family, $4,888 to the state Medicaid program and a $600 fine.
Nona Mosman, 88, died May 14, 2013. The Honolulu Medical Examiner says the cause of death was a failure to thrive complicated by pneumonia and a joint infection associated with a bedsore.
Polintan’s lawyer, Victor Bakke, said Mosman had been living in Polintan’s Waipahu care home for several years and that Mosman’s family was pleased with the care she provided.
About a month before Mosman died, she was designated for end-of-life care.
Bakke said that triggered home visits by a hospice nurse, who reported seeing bedsores on Mosman that got worse even after the nurse had given instructions on how to treat them.
Deputy Attorney General Michael Parrish said Mosman’s case management team had seen possible but minor signs of neglect even before the hospice nurse was assigned.
The restitution amounts were what the state and Mosman’s family paid Polintan from Jan. 25 to May 10, 2013, when the state moved Mosman into Nuuanu Hale, where she died four days later.
The state says Polintan did not provide the care she was paid to do because she had a full-time job at Schofield Barracks that took her away from the care home 10 hours each day on Mondays through Fridays. During her absences, the state says, Polintan left Mosman in the care of unqualified caregivers, including her father and aunt.
Francisco Polintan and Lolita Schimmel are charged with misdemeanor endangering the welfare of an incompetent person. Their trial is scheduled for next week.
