GRIFFIN, Ga. — A Spalding couple were indicted Thursday for multiple counts of unreasonably confining disabled adults and residents and operating a care home without a license. They were first arrested in February 2022 after medical workers had to crawl into a locked basement through a window and found multiple adults confined inside.
According to the indictment from the Georgia Attorney General’s Office, Curtis Bankston and Sophia Simm-Bankston were both charged with the same counts, accused of abusing vulnerable Georgians entrusted to their care.
“The abuse, neglect, or exploitation of Georgia’s older and at-risk adults is absolutely unacceptable and will not be tolerated,” Attorney General Chris Carr said. “Addressing the issue of unlicensed personal care homes is critical to ensuring the safety of our most vulnerable Georgians. We cannot and will not allow these types of operations to fall under the radar.”
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Bankston and Simm-Bankston were investigated by the Griffin Polie Department, AG’s Medicaid Fraud Division and the Prosecuting Attorney’s Council of Georgia.
A Spalding County Grand Jury officially indicted the two on Thursday, March 21.
According to the indictment, the Bankstons were accused of operating the unlicensed care home “on or about Jan. 13, 2022″ in violation of state law.
The indictment alleges that the Bankstons “willfully and unreasonably confined” seven individuals, six of whom with “a mental incapacity which substantially affected” their abilities to provide necessities and manage their resources by locking them in the basement of a home on Valley Road in Griffin.
As previously reported by Channel 2 Action News, on Feb. 21, 2022, Mr. Bankston, a pastor, and his wife were arrested for running the care home.
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In 2022, emergency medical services were called to the home on Valley Road just before 7 a.m. on Feb. 17, 2022 after getting a call about someone having a seizure. Investigators said when the emergency medical technicians got to the home, they found a door to the basement deadbolted shut and had to enter through a window.
Inside, they found eight people held against their will, according to previous reporting by Channel 2 Action News.
The Griffin Police Department said at the time that the property had been leased for more than a year and that the basement had been in use as an unlicensed care facility for just as long.
“The ‘caretakers’ have been leasing this property for approximately 14 months, using the basement as a personal care home for the individuals, which essentially imprisoned them against their will, which created an extreme hazard as the individuals could not exit the residence if there were an emergency,” the Griffin Police Department said in a news release in 2022.
Investigators told Channel 2 Action News that the home was operated as a group home “under the guise of a church known as One Step of Faith 2nd Chance.”
Police said the Bankstons were in control of the disabled individuals’ finances, medication and public benefits, and that while under the care of the Bankstons had been denied their medicine and in some cases, medical care.
After the arrests, police said the Georgia Division of Aging Services from the Department of Human Services had found housing and care for the individuals who had been kept at the Valley Road home.
According to the attorney general’s office, prosecutors presented evidence to a Spalding County Grand Jury, resulting in the indictments of both Curtis Bankston and Sophia Simm-Bankston. The two now face the following charges.
Curtis Bankston:
- 1 count of Operating an Unlicensed Personal Care Home
- 6 counts of Unreasonable Confinement of a Disabled Adult
- 1 count of Unreasonable Confinement of a Resident
Sophia Simm-Bankston:
- 1 count of Operating an Unlicensed Personal Care Home
- 6 counts of Unreasonable Confinement of a Disabled Adult
- 1 count of Unreasonable Confinement of a Resident
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