A Brooklyn woman who died unnoticed on a floor of a psychiatric emergency room floor last June became the poster child for “murder by neglect” when rallyers marked the first anniversary of her death with a vigil outside Kings County Hospital Center.
Carrying placards and uniting in voice, protestors from We the People, MindFreedom International and International Coalition on Abuse and Disability helped commemorate the tragic fate of Esmin Elizabeth Green, a 49−year−old Jamaica native, whose death was disturbingly recorded by security cameras at the city−owned facility, 451 Clarkson Avenue, where she had been sitting in a waiting room for nearly 24 hours before collapsing from her chair and slowly dying on June 19, 2008.
The woman was captured lying on the floor for an hour before a nurse finally checked her pulse. After weeks of tests and an autopsy, the medical examiner’s office concluded that the Green succumbed to a blood clot in her leg, which had traveled to her lungs.
“We the People are calling attention to the reported horrific inactions and complete neglect that Ms. Green was subjected to while detained at the Kings County Hospital Center’s Psychiatric Emergency Room,” said the group in a prepared statement.
Kings County Hospital later settled a lawsuit brought by Esmin Green’s family for $2 million.
