DEERFIELD BEACH, Fla. – A Deerfield Beach woman is facing three felony charges, including attempted murder, after deputies said she tried to choke her 88-year-old father to death while he was under hospice care.
Lori Lee Brucker, 66, was scheduled for a court hearing on Wednesday afternoon as Broward County prosecutors seek to keep her behind bars.
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According to a Broward Sheriff’s Office arrest report, the incident happened at around 4 p.m. Friday at Broward Health North, located at 201 E. Sample Road in Deerfield Beach.
A nurse told BSO detectives that she walked into the man’s hospital room and saw Brucker covering her father’s mouth with one hand “and choking him with the other hand,” the report states.
The nurse, BSO Detective Nelson Mendez wrote, initially believed the man had died and Brucker had been trying to close his mouth, since “most people in hospice care die with their mouth open and it is common behavior for the family to close their mouth.”
The nurse told detectives that she soon realized the man was still alive and that Brucker had been trying to kill him, the report states. She also noted that his bed had been moved up against the wall.
The report states that the nurse told Brucker not to do that, because it may restrict her father’s oxygen and cause him to die, to which Brucker responded: “Oh.”
The nurse “immediately” reported the incident to her supervisor and hospital staff escorted Brucker and her boyfriend, who witnessed the incident, out of the hospital, deputies said. Staff members then called law enforcement.
The arrest report states that the man had vital signs “consistent with agitation.” Those included a significantly elevated blood pressure compared to a set of vitals taken at 10 a.m., deputies said. Authorities also took a DNA sample from the man.
Brucker’s boyfriend told investigators that he saw her “caress” her father’s chin and that she fell asleep at one point, the report states. He told deputies that hospital staff moved the bed to retrieve a jammed remote control and said Brucker couldn’t move the bed because she is wheelchair-bound, deputies said.
He told deputies “he did not believe that Lori would attempt to kill her father because they had a good relationship and Lori loved her father very much,” the report states.
Detectives had previously interviewed another person, whose name and relationship to Brucker were redacted from the report, who didn’t witness the incident but said Brucker and her father had a good relationship, according to the report.
Mendez wrote that in an interview, Brucker’s account contradicted portions of her boyfriend’s recollection of the incident.
Brucker told detectives that she, not a nurse, had moved the bed so her wheelchair could fit on the other side and that she began to caress her father’s head, the report states.
“I asked Lori if she ever touched his chin area and she said she did touch his beard and chin area but never attempted to restrict his airway,” Mendez wrote.
He wrote that Brucker said she “did not commit any actions with ‘malice.’”
Mendez wrote that after informing Brucker of the allegations against her, she said she only touched her father’s head and fell asleep for roughly 30 minutes.
“I asked Lori if there was a possibility that her hand might have slipped off of his head and fell to his mouth when she fell asleep,” Mendez wrote. “Lori advised her hand was always on his head.”
Mendez wrote that Brucker later said “it was possible for one of her hands to have ended up between (her father’s) upper chest and neck and her other hand may have been in (his) chin area,” which “would have caused (the nurse) to believe she saw her trying to harm” him.
When asked to describe the room, Brucker said she did not believe there was a television inside, but then later said she was watching TV when she fell asleep, the report states.
Mendez said that due to the nurse’s identification of Brucker as the suspect in a sworn statement and the inconsistencies in her and her boyfriend’s account of the incident, deputies arrested Brucker on charges of attempted murder, domestic battery by strangulation and battery on a person over 65.
She remained held without bond in the North Broward Bureau jail facility in Pompano Beach as of Wednesday.
Broward prosecutors are seeking to keep her there, according to a motion for pre-trial detention that was scheduled for Wednesday.
“The disparity of force in this case is so great that the probability of intimidation or danger to the victim is very high should she be released,” prosecutors argued in the motion, in part. “There are no conditions of release reasonably sufficient to protect the community from the risk of harm to persons. The Defendant has shown herself unable to follow the laws of society.”
Brucker’s attorneys, however, are asking a judge to grant her bond as part of a concurrent Arthur hearing. She has pleaded not guilty in the case.
“Ms. Brucker is not a flight risk or a danger to the community and is looking forward to her day in court where she will be fighting these pending criminal allegations,” attorney Kenneth Padowitz wrote in a motion.
Padowitz noted that Brucker would agree to any number of “reasonable conditions” placed on her if released, including GPS monitoring and no-contact orders.
Local 10 News has contacted two attorneys listed as representing Brucker, seeking comment on her behalf. We were awaiting a response as of early Wednesday afternoon.