Witnesses: Denver Hospital Dumps Homeless Woman

Eyewitnesses have accused a major Denver area hospital of dumping a homeless woman in an apartment parking lot.

"They brought him over here and just dumped him in our parking lot," said Mike Medina in a call to 911. "He's hollering and crying saying they wouldn't take him because he's homeless. He can't walk."

Medina and his neighbor Joanne Maynard live across the street from St. Anthony's Central and Medina thought the person on the gurney was a man.

"I watched them wheel her to the dumpster and flip her right off the gurney, said Maynard. "I was shocked. Total shock."

Both filed police reports, objecting to what they witnessed from their windows.

"They didn't even help her off the gurney. They took it and flipped it and then just walked back laughing," said Maynard.

"I told (911 dispatch) that the paramedics, or nurse just dumped a lady out here in the parking lot, the back parking lot of our apartment building," said Medina.

Denver police responded to the 911 calls and interviewed hospital security and staff. Officers sent a report on the incident to the district attorney.

"One guy grabbed both my legs and the other two grabbed my arms. They picked me up and just --," said patient Sandra Fredrick. Fredrick showed with hand gestures how they dumped her.

Frederick said she was on the gurney and was discharged from the emergency room and dumped in a parking lot across the street.

"It seemed like they were making a mockery of it like it was a joke to them, like it was funny," said Fredrick.

Frederick was homeless, found under a bush, and taken by ambulance to St. Anthony's hospital. Medical records show care takers were well aware she was homeless.

"I wanted them to examine me to see if I was sick. I felt like I was," said Frederick.

She wanted treatment for abdominal pain and told nurses she had nothing to eat for three days. She said the doctor and the hospital provided only minimal care.

"He told them 'give her a sandwich and discharge her' and I told him 'look I'm really really sick. I need your help. That's why I'm here,'" said Fredrick. "He told them 'well if she doesn't leave, have her escorted off the property.'"

St. Anthony's did test her blood and found a blood alcohol reading of .135, legally drunk. Hospital reports also said Fredrick was threatening and combative.

"I never threatened anybody. I may have yelled because I was upset that I was not examined and I was in a lot of pain," said Frederick. "They refused to examine me. They just wanted to throw me out."

After obtaining the hospital records, 7NEWS returned to question Fredrick and asked her again if she threatened anyone at the hospital.

"I'm sure that they would've pressed charges on me, and that I would have been arrested if I had done something like that," said Fredrick.

Hospital administrators at St. Anthony's declined 7NEWS' request to explain what happened that evening.

In a statement, the hospital said it has conducted an internal investigation and taken appropriate action.

"She's not garbage. No one is garbage. I don't care what kind of problems they have. Nobody's garbage and nobody deserves to be treated that way," said Maynard. "I'm angry, now I'm very angry cause nobody's said a word since that happened, the hospital's been real quiet out here."

"Regardless of what she did in there, in the hospital, who she is, what she did, what she is,that was not right to dump her like that," said Medina.

Frederick is now out of the hospital and living in city sponsored housing. She said she is grateful for the people who called 911. After two separate reviews, the Denver District Attorney did not file charges against hospital staff.

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