The Allegheny County Medical Examiner\u2019s Office is calling the death of an elderly woman who was pushed by a 92-year-old resident with dementia at a Mt. Lebanon senior living facility a homicide, but authorities say no charges will be filed.<\/p>\n
Joan Sterling died July 27 after an \u201can elderly male resident\u201d pushed her to the ground on June 11, causing her to break her hip, Jim Madalinsky, an Allegheny County police spokesman, said.<\/p>\n
The incident happened in a common area with staff present, Madalinsky said.<\/p>\n
Sterling, 80, died from blunt impact injuries to her neck and hip, according to the medical examiner\u2019s office.<\/p>\n
Sterling, who suffered from Alzheimer\u2019s disease, had resided in the Asbury Heights senior living facility\u2019s memory care unit for five years, her niece, Carole Salvato, said Thursday. The man who pushed her lived in the same unit, she said.<\/p>\n
Prosecutors decided against filing charges after consulting with county police, according to Rebecca Spangler, the DA\u2019s chief of staff.<\/p>\n
Spangler said the man who pushed Sterling has dementia and \u201cis not competent. Thus, we would be unable to establish intent, and the actor would not be competent to proceed to trial.\u201d<\/p>\n
Salvato said she did not believe the man had any ill intent, nor does she blame the facility on Bower Hill Road for the incident. <\/p>\n
She said she was surprised when she received a call from the medical examiner\u2019s office Wednesday informing her that her aunt\u2019s death would be listed as a homicide.<\/p>\n
Mt. Lebanon police requested assistance from county detectives after the incident, Madalinsky said. <\/p>\n
Madalinsky has previously explained that a homicide ruling is \u201ca standard manner of death determination indicating the death was caused by the actions of another individual\u201d and \u201cnot a declaration of criminal guilt.\u201d <\/p>\n
Asbury Heights Executive Director Holly Villella declined to comment.<\/p>\n
Sterling grew up in Mt. Lebanon and spent more than three decades in the Pittsburgh Public Schools system, according to her obituary.<\/p>\n
She started as a classroom teacher before becoming the principal of the North Side\u2019s Conroy Education Center, a special education facility for students who require life skills support, autistic support and multiple disability support needs.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The Allegheny County Medical Examiner\u2019s Office is calling the death of an elderly woman who was pushed by…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":302847,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[73,75,74],"class_list":["post-302846","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-pittsburgh","tag-pittsburgh","tag-pittsburgh-headlines","tag-pittsburgh-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/302846","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=302846"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/302846\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/302847"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=302846"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=302846"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=302846"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}