24 August 2021: Federal Probe of COVID Deaths at NJ Nursing Homes Progresses

Federal investigation into NJ veterans homes moves ahead with family interviews

This report was first published on 13 August 2021. It provides an update on the status of the federal government's continuing probe into the COVID-related deaths at state government operated veterans homes.

Families of residents who died from COVID-19 at the Menlo Park and Paramus veterans homes have begun to be interviewed by federal prosecutors as part of the Justice Department's investigation into the high death toll at the state-run facilities, sources said.

The interviews come as the Justice Department confirmed in a July 23 letter that the probe into the two homes was still active despite the agency's decision to drop a wider investigation launched under the Trump administration into public nursing home deaths in New York, Pennsylvania and Michigan.

Families have also been interviewed in a separate investigation by the state Attorney General's Office.

Few nursing homes in the nation were as devastated by COVID-19 as those in Paramus and Menlo Park, with 192 resident deaths along with two staff members during the height of the pandemic in spring 2020. A third state veterans home in Vineland has had only 11 resident deaths. Poor decisions and questionable policies may have contributed to the high death toll.

The report describes examples of exceptionally deficient care at the state government-operated nursing home facilities for veterans, including the deliberate mixing of COVID patients with non-infected patients, which contributed to the spread of infections and deaths at them.

This federal investigation is one to watch because of the general position of the DOJ under the Biden-Harris administration. The department has demonstrated a strong desire to drop civil rights probes involving COVID deaths at nursing homes started by the DOJ under the Trump administration in the four states that adopted similar policies as New York's deadly 25 March 2020 directive.

Under the Biden-Harris administration, the DOJ dropped its probe in New York, Michigan and Pennsylvania, but not New Jersey, which indicates it has a level of official misconduct and deficient care that could not be swept under the rug, even though President Biden has repeatedly signaled his willingness to look the other way at excess COVID nursing home deaths in these states.

13 August 2021 also saw a request by Republican members of the U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee to hold hearings into the civil rights of senior citizens in Michigan, New York, New Jersey, and Pennsylvania who lost their lives to COVID during the periods their state governors sustained policies forcing nursing homes to admit COVID patients during the pandemic. Independent analysis indicates the Cuomo administration's deadly 25 March 2020 directive in New York contributed to hundreds, and possibly more than a thousand excess COVID deaths in the state's nursing homes.