Seema Mathur reports for CBS11:
Piles of documents with private information were found out in the open at an abandoned health care facility that was demolished in Fort Worth.
Harry Daughtry lives near the rubble. Until this weekend, Daughtry said the abandoned health care facility had been a nuisance for years.
After the demolition trucks left the area, Daughtry decided to check out what was left. To his surprise, he found credit card numbers and social security numbers.
“I couldn’t tell you how many papers we found with people’s confidential information on it blowing across the street for anyone to come and pick it up,” he said.
People’s medical histories were also found among the paperwork. Many of the information came from elderly patients treated around 1995.
CBS 11 tried to find out how something like this could happen.
The contractor told police he was hired to demolish and clear the facility. The owner of J & J Home Health refused to comment on the situation.
Under current medical privacy laws, it is a violation for health care facilities to not safeguard medical records. Fort Worth police were notified about the violation, and the records were removed from the location.