Recent Litigation Exposes Questionable Tactics By “Bankrupt” California Nursing Home Chain, Windsor Terrace Healthcare
February 4, 2025
Originally published by
dudensinglaw.com
LOS ANGELES, California – Last Fall, Windsor Terrace Healthcare, a nursing home chain operating 35 facilities across California, obtained Chapter 11 Bankruptcy protection from numerous lawsuits alleging serious injury and wrongful death as a result of elder abuse and neglect. However, legal filings opposing the bankruptcy revealed questionable practices by Windsor, raising concerns that the company is manipulating bankruptcy laws to evade accountability and obstruct justice for victims and their families.
Ed Dudensing of Dudensing Law is representing multiple families in suits against Windsor facilities, where residents have suffered falls, neglect, and poor living conditions, and, in some cases, resulted in death.
“For-profit nursing home companies are increasingly abusing and manipulating the bankruptcy laws as a tactic to delay and avoid accountability for the serious harm inflicted on vulnerable residents,” said Dudensing.
“Questionable practices were uncovered during the course of Windsor’s bankruptcy which reveal the level manipulation and two-facedness that can occur,” said Dudensing. Before declaring bankruptcy, for example, Windsor affirmed in formal discovery responses that its facilities maintained adequate general and professional liability insurance to cover injury claims from residents. However, when it suited their effort to use bankruptcy to evade and delay justice for elder abuse victims, Windsor reversed course, claiming to be “self-insured”’ and lacking the financial assets to fairly compensate victims. Documents filed in connection with Windsor’s Plan of Reorganization revealed that Windsor paid for “insurance policies” that provide no actual funds to cover claims brought by victims and their families.
Without proper insurance, or what Dudensing calls “fake insurance,” Windsor succeeded in obtaining a Plan of Reorganization in bankruptcy that will only pay pennies on the dollar to compensate victims in the pending suits against the company.
One such victim was a resident at Windsor Vallejo in 2019 who developed a severe sacral wound due to neglect. Facility staff failed to assess the severity of the wound, and it wasn’t until she left the facility that her loved ones discovered the life-threatening sore, which required emergency medical intervention.
The Windsor bankruptcy raises serious questions about the increasing use of corporate bankruptcy protections by for-profit nursing home operators to sidestep legal and financial responsibility while continuing reap huge profits for their owners.