When the family recovered Peterson’s body, it was so badly decomposed that she couldn’t be identified by her tattoos and an open casket funeral was impossible, according to the lawsuit. Mercy San Juan hospital allegedly never apologised.
The lawsuit filed by Congi and two of Peterson’s sisters against Dignity Health, which operates Mercy San Juan, seeks tens of millions of dollars in damages for how the hospital allegedly treated Peterson’s body and failed to notify her family of her death.
“It’s just inexcusable negligence,” Marc Greenberg, an attorney for Congi, told the Washington Post.
Dignity Health spokeswoman Christina Zicklin declined to comment. “We extend our deepest sympathies to the family during this difficult time,” she said.
Peterson was a “loving and energetic” person who grew up in Sacramento and attended Sierra College, according to her family’s lawsuit. She was diagnosed with Type I diabetes at the age of 10.
Congi last heard from her daughter on April 8, 2023, two days after Peterson was admitted to Mercy San Juan, according to the lawsuit. That afternoon, Peterson allegedly called Congi asking to be picked up because she wanted to leave. Peterson sounded to Congi like she was doing better, Greenberg said, and Congi encouraged her to continue recovering at the hospital. She promised her daughter she would visit.
Peterson died at Mercy San Juan about two hours later, the lawsuit states.
Peterson had previously been hospitalised at Mercy San Juan after diabetic episodes. Congi was listed as her next of kin and hospital staff had contact information for Congi, according to the lawsuit. In December 2022, a social worker and case manager at the hospital had called Congi about her daughter’s hospitalisation, the lawsuit alleges.
Despite these facts, Congi alleges the hospital did not call her after Peterson died. The facility also allegedly did not issue a death certificate for Peterson for almost a year, violating a California law that requires a physician to do so within 15 hours of a person’s death.
The day after her death, Mercy San Juan transported Peterson’s body to a morgue and left her on a numbered shelf, according to the lawsuit.
When Congi called Mercy San Juan on April 11, 2023, and asked for Peterson, she was told “there is no one here by that name,” the lawsuit alleges. Congi claims in the lawsuit that hospital staff eventually told her Peterson had left the facility against doctors’ advice.
Congi and the rest of Peterson’s family launched a desperate search, believing their loved one was alive but missing, the lawsuit alleges. Family members handed out fliers to local authorities and were initially relieved to learn the Sacramento County Coroner’s Office had not received Peterson’s remains, the lawsuit states.
The fruitless search ended on April 12 when a detective with the Sacramento County Sheriff’s Office told Congi that Peterson had died, according to the lawsuit. Congi was allegedly contacted three days later by staff at East Lawn Mortuary, who told her that her daughter’s body was in a storage facility.
Congi then spoke by phone with a Mercy San Juan doctor who cared for Peterson on the day of her death and completed her death certificate a year later, according to a report from the hospital obtained by the Post. The doctor wrote that Peterson’s family members “have specific questions about what may have taken this long for hospital to notify the death of their family member as it has been about a year”.
“I did not attempt to answer this question,” the doctor wrote.
Peterson’s death certificate, issued on April 4, states she died of cardiac arrest. The hospital’s delay in reporting Peterson’s death to her family made it impossible for the family to seek an autopsy to rule out medical malpractice, the lawsuit alleges.
Greenberg said the family are still reeling from the ordeal.
“They’re struggling,” he said. “When they now think of Jessie, what comes to mind is [her] laying in a body bag for a year.”
