The discovery in Chandler last Friday of a mentally disabled man locked in a room, wearing a diaper and covered in feces made headlines across the state.
Police said Kerry Paul Cotton, 42, could only grunt and was unable to communicate with officers; and it was reported that the moment he was released from the room he ran to the kitchen and tried to eat frozen bacon and a TV dinner through the box.
But APS will continue to work.
APS is a part of the Texas Department of Family and Protective Services, the same agency that runs its much better known counterpart, Child Protective Services (CPS). But whereas everyone seems to know CPS, not everyone is aware of APS.
Doug Humble III is one who is working to change that.
Humble, the administrator of Cedar Lake Nursing Home in Malakoff, is the president of the Henderson County APS Board. He said the board serves as "an advocate for abused, neglected or exploited seniors and disabled adults in and around Henderson County."
Humble said the board also works to "increase the awareness, recognition and overall connection of the Adult Protective Services program around our community."
Humble said the board's primary goal is to help APS through donations and by generating community support.
So what does APS do? According to the state website, the agency's mission statement is: "To protect older adults and persons with disabilities from abuse, neglect and exploitation by investigating and providing or arranging for services as necessary to alleviate or prevent further maltreatment."
The need for APS might come as a surprise. Alice Bethke, an APS supervisor over Henderson and Anderson counties, said the two counties combined for about 800 cases a year, with about 200 cases open at any one time.
Bethke said each county has four staff members to handle the caseload.
"I don't know how they do it," she told a meeting of the Henderson County APS Board Tuesday afternoon.
In fact, in 2004 APS completed nearly 60,000 investigations of abuse, neglect or exploitation and confirmed about 45,000 cases.
As for what happened in Chandler, Bethke said, "The abuse cases get all the attention, but the others can be just as bad."
One big focus for APS is exploitation, which is defined as "misusing the resources of an elderly or disabled person for personal or monetary benefit, including taking Social Security or SSI (Supplemental Security Income) checks, abusing a joint checking account, and taking property and other resources."
"Financial elder abuse is the most underreported abuse," said Mark Birkelbach, an APS official speaking to the board this week.
Bethke agreed, saying exploitation can run into the hundreds of thousands and even millions of dollars.
"And it happens in this county," she said.
As the population gets older, the APS caseload increases. According to the agency, in the last decade the number of in-house abuse investigations by APS has doubled. In 2005, more than 2.2 million Texans were age 65 or older, and nearly one in five people had a disability. The numbers are only going to increase.
If you suspect a senior or a disabled person is being abused, neglected or exploited, call the Texas Abuse Hotline at 1-800-252-5400; or make a report through the agency's website at www.txabusehotline.org.
Reporting is anonymous.
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