Broward Injury Lawyer Blog
Late last year, journalism non-profit ProPublica revealed a troubling trend: Nursing home abuse and exploitation in the form of social media posts. The images and video clips are taken by staffers and show elderly and dementia patients captured in degrading and dehumanizing poses, conversations and actions. 
Staffers post these images to various forms of social media, but mostly to Snapchat, a platform in which images are supposed to vanish after a certain period of time. But aside from the fact that such a violation can do damage no matter how long they are posted, the images are not actually impermanent because users can screen-shot and copy them.
ProPublica revealed at least 37 known instances from December 2012 through December 2015. Many more instances likely never came to light. More than half of those documented cases involved Snapchat.
Now, a number of lawmakers are calling for action from the U.S. Department of Health and Human Service’s Civil Rights division, as well as the U.S. Department of Justice. Continue reading
