Janice R. Andrews
Jessie Peterson, a woman from Sacramento, died at a local hospital after having a diabetic episode. But for over a year, her family looked for her without knowing that she had died. The people are now suing the hospital for being careless.
A family in Sacramento is fighting a hospital because they found out that their loved one, Jessie Peterson, had died and her body had been missing for more than a year. This is a very sad and scary situation. The California case says that Dignity Health/Mercy San Juan Medical Center didn’t tell Peterson’s family that she had died and then messed up her body.
The Last Phone Call
On April 6, 2023, Jessie Peterson, who was 31 years old, was rushed to Sacramento’s Mercy San Juan Medical Center after having a very bad diabetic attack. After two days, she called her mother one last time to ask to be picked up from the hospital. It would be her last call. Her family had no idea that this would be the last time they would hear from her.
Three days later, Jessie’s mother, Ginger Congi, called the hospital to find out what was going on with her daughter because she hadn’t heard from her in three days. At first, the hospital said there was no one with that name in their care. The hospital staff told Congi that Jessie had left the hospital against medical advise after being questioned over and over again. The Peterson family began a never-ending search after this comment because they thought Jessie was still out there, lost.
This is the sad end to a year-long search.
There was nothing the Peterson family didn’t do to find Jessie. They told the police that she was missing, put up flyers with her picture all over Sacramento, and even put her name on the website for missing people run by the U.S. Department of Justice. They hoped that someone would have seen her and been able to help them get her home.
But on April 4, 2024, a year after Jessie went missing, the family got a terrible call from a detective with the Sacramento County Sheriff’s Office. Jessie wasn’t lost; she was already dead. Some information about her death was on the death record, but it wasn’t very clear how she died.
A Dead Body Left on a Shelf
When the Peterson family went to the Sacramento County Coroner’s Office to find answers, they hoped to find Jessie’s body. They were told that her body wasn’t there and were told to go back to the hospital. A morgue called Jessie’s mother after weeks of misunderstanding and anger to say that Jessie’s body had been found in one of the hospital’s off-site cold storage facilities.
The claim says that Jessie died just two hours after her last call with her mother. The next day, her body was taken to a nearby morgue and then put in cold storage by the hospital. But for more than a year, her body was forgotten and left on a shelf marked “Shelf Number Red 22 A” because of what looked like a mistake in the paperwork.
The case says that the hospital didn’t try to get in touch with Jessie’s family during this time, even though Ginger Congi was named as her next of kin. Jessie’s body had broken down so much by the time her family heard she had died that an autopsy could not be done. This meant that it was impossible to find out if medical malpractice caused her death.
Battle in Court for Justice
Because of this terrible chain of events, the Peterson family has sued Dignity Health/Mercy San Juan Medical Center for $25 million. The claim says the hospital was careless with a dead body, caused mental distress without reason, and broke the California Health and Safety Code.
“We send our deepest condolences to the family during this sad time,” Dignity Health said in a statement. “We are unable to comment on pending litigation.”
Marc Greenberg, a family lawyer, talked about how hard this whole situation has been on Jessie’s family and friends. Greenberg said, “When they think of her now, they see her on a shelf in a body bag instead of how she was.” “They still don’t have peace of mind about what the hell happened.”
Questions Not Answered*
The case also brings up questions about why Jessie’s death certificate wasn’t sent out sooner. The observing doctor must fill out the appropriate paperwork within 15 hours of a patient’s death, according to the California Health and Safety Code. Still, for Jessie, it was almost a year before the death certificate was made. It was signed by a doctor at the hospital who is not named in the claim.
The Peterson family is still looking for answers and justice. They are determined to hold the hospital responsible for what they call a terrible way they handled their daughter’s death. As the court case goes on, they hope that their story will show how important it is for healthcare institutions to communicate and care for patients properly.
For now, they have to deal with the sad truth that their beloved Jessie died and was also lost in the system that was supposed to take care of her.
