Gumbs has no other children and her remaining family members live outside the country.
After some friends who live on the same floor as Gumbs noticed that she hadn’t been answering her door and had missed church services on Sunday, they asked the building’s superintendent to look inside the apartment to see if anything was wrong, but Gumbs was gone.
The management at the Grace Houses never reported her missing or contacted her family, according to Harrison.
A woman who answered the phone at the Grace Houses and identified herself as the building manager, but would not give her name, said that she did not find out about the incident until the following Tuesday, and by that time Harrison had already called the police. Moreover, the woman said that management had not called Harrison because Gumbs had never given her the phone number to put on the emergency call list.
Management did, however, have the phone number of Muriel Williams, a family friend, but never contacted her, according to Harrison.
The woman at the building further stated that they only suspected Gumbs had dementia but it was not confirmed. She explained that as an independent facility where the residents come and go as they please, the responsibility of caring for a person with such an illness falls squarely with the family.
“Her friend kept telling me that one day she might leave the premises and not come back because she was in and out. She loved walking,” Harrison said. “I was concerned, but she was the type that didn’t want help. She was very independent and liked to do things herself. I didn’t have the resources or the power of attorney to put her in a nursing home.”
When Harrison arrived at the building on Monday, Sept. 28 to visit her stepmother, she was told by Williams, who had arrived minutes earlier, that the security guard had informed her Gumbs was missing. “I didn’t know what to think,” Harrison said. “I thought the worst.”
She immediately called the 103rd Precinct to file a missing persons report and the next day brought a picture of her stepmother to aid them in their search.
“I kept going there every day and calling and speaking to different detectives in the missing persons department,” Harrison explained. “They said they didn’t have any information and that they were checking different hospitals.”
Twelve days after Gumbs first arrived at Queens Hospital Center, a social worker asked if she spoke any languages other than English. Gumbs told the individual she spoke Spanish, a language she is more comfortable conversing in, since she is a native of the Dominican Republic.
The social worker then asked Gumbs if she had a purse and she said that she did. Upon looking through the purse, the social worker found Williams’ phone number written on a piece of paper and contacted her. She immediately called Harrison to inform her that her stepmother had been found.
“When I heard she was in the hospital, I was happy because I knew she was safe,” Harrison said.
Three days later — 15 days after Gumbs first arrived at the hospital, a nurse who was stationed on the same floor as the missing woman, saw an article in the Oct. 8 Queens Chronicle asking for Gumbs’ safe return and contacted Harrison as well.
“The patient was lucid and alert and able to communicate clearly with staff when she arrived at the hospital,” Philip Cooke, senior associate director of external affairs, marketing and advertising at Queens Hospital Center, said in an email. “She identified her next of kin. The person that you mentioned to us was not identified to us as a family member or next of kin.”
Asked if and when the hospital called the next of kin identified by Gumbs, Cooke said he didn’t have any further information. Asked what procedure the hospital follows for treating elderly people with dementia who are confused about their identity, Cooke did not respond.
“What I’m really upset about is how the police handled it,” Harrison said. “I filed the missing persons report with them and their officers are the ones who took her to the hospital. How could they have not known she was there?”
According to an NYPD spokeswoman, a Level 1 mobilization and canvas of area hospitals was conducted and Gumbs was not located. All hospital records were searched and nothing was found. The NYPD also has no record of EMS taking her to the hospital.
Gumbs needed surgery while at the hospital due to the medical condition that caused her to pass out. She is very frail and currently recovering in a nursing home.
Harrison does not know whether Gumbs will be well enough to return to the Grace Houses, but if she does go back Harrison wants her to have 24-hour home aide service.
Senior advocates and officials were upset about the incident.
“Obviously the city failed this elderly individual and her daughter,” said Bobbie Sackman, director of public policy for the Council of Senior Centers. “From the moment the senior left that building she became invisible to the local police and hospital. The city needs a plan to help people who suffer from dementia and it has to be more failsafe than this. It is long overdue that we implement a Silver Alert for older adults.”
Silver Alert is a system that has been proposed to locate missing individuals with Alzheimer’s disease and other related dementia. It is modeled after the Amber Alert used to find missing children.
“Generally speaking from previous responses we have seen by the NYPD and EMS, this seems somewhat atypical,” said Jed Levine, executive vice president and director of programs and services for the New York City Chapter of the Alzheimer’s Association. “It’s certainly unfortunate for the family.”
Upon hearing the details of the incident, City Councilman Tom White Jr. (D-South Ozone Park) who represents the area of southeast Queens where Gumbs lives and also supports Silver Alert, said “That is the height of irresponsibility. We have to have more accountability on the part of our hospitals and our police.”
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