Charges have been dropped against a man who was caught on video brutally beating an elderly veteran in a Detroit nursing home. The disturbing video, which was recorded on May 15, 2020, shows Jaden Hayden, 20, brutally pummeling 75-year-old Norman Bledsoe in the Westwood Nursing Center. Bledsoe died weeks later, though his death was not classified as a homicide.
Hayden told employees that Bledsoe had fallen out his bed. Responding workers said there was “a-lot of blood” and that Bledsoe had a large contusion on his head. The elderly man was reportedly too confused to give a statement on what happened in the immediate aftermath.
Hayden was arrested weeks later after a video of the brutal beating went viral on social media.
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Charges were reportedly dropped because Hayden is mentally incompetent to stand trial. “He shouldn’t be in jail,” Hayden’s father, Marty Hayden, told local outlet WXYZ. “So the system will let him down again. He will not be rehabilitated.”
Jaden Hayden was reportedly in a group home as recently as 2020. He has a history of violent behavior and reportedly told his father that he was hearing voices just months before the brutal elderly home beating.
The elder Hayden blames social workers for placing his son in the nursing home. He was sent to University of Michigan Hospital in Ann Arbor, where he was diagnosed with COVID-19. The 20-year-old was then sent to the nursing home to recover, where he shared a room with the 75-year-old Bledsoe.
The 20-year-old recorded the beating with his own cell phone, according to police. He also shared the video himself on social media, according to police. In addition, he is accused of stealing Bledsoe’s credit cards.
Joely Pointer, an employee at the nursing home, told ClickOnDetroit.com last year that the nursing home had just opened a COVID unit, which is why Hayden was taken in.
Michigan Governor Gretchen Whitmer, along with other blue state governors including Andrew Cuomo in New York and Tom Wolf in Pennsylvania, sent COVID-19 patients to nursing homes in the early stages of the pandemic.
This move has been blamed for excess deaths in the pandemic. In New York, nursing home COVID-19 deaths were 50% higher than Cuomo’s administration initially reported.
Hayden has been confined to a Kalamazoo psychiatric hospital while he was slated to face charges for the elderly home beating.
The Bledsoe family is suing the nursing home and has hired prominent Michigan attorney Jeffrey Fieger, according to the Daily Wire.
