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In February 2024, a Los Angeles County jury awarded $2.34 million to an 84-year-old nursing home resident named Betsy Jentz, finding that the facility had violated her rights on 132 occasions, at times leading to serious injuries.

Six months later, an Alameda County jury found another facility had violated the rights of 71-year-old James Doherty, Sr. more than 1,400 times. That included seven instances in which staff failed to transport him, causing him to miss chemotherapy treatments, court documents said. Doherty died following the development of a large pressure sore. His family was awarded $7.6 million.

In February, a jury in Shasta County is scheduled to hear a case against a nursing home accused of negligence in the 2020 COVID-19 deaths of 24 patients.

And next spring, trial is scheduled to begin in the case of a 79-year-old dementia patient, referred to as Cheryl Doe, who was allegedly raped twice in another Alameda County facility; a second case against the same facility alleges that excessive sedation of 64-year-old Alando Williams led to his death.

All of these facilities have one thing in common: state records list Shlomo Rechnitz as an owner.

Court documents show Rechnitz and his companies have denied all allegations in all of the cases. Mark Johnson, an attorney representing Rechnitz’ facilities and one of his main companies, Brius LLC, said in an email that facilities cannot comment on active litigation.

“It is accurate that nursing homes are the target of abusive lawsuits that accomplish nothing but depleting resources for patient care,” he said.

Johnson sought to distance his clients from the cases, saying that Rechnitz and his wife, Tamar, “are passive owners of the facilities” and have “absolutely no role in operations or management.” Johnson said “the licensees” contract with a company to manage the facilities, adding that  “each facility has all the necessary resources for patients and staff.”

Rechnitz has been on the state’s radar for years. In 2014, then-Attorney General Kamala Harris attempted to prevent him from purchasing new homes. In 2018, the State Auditor’s Office found his companies had significantly higher rates of federal deficiencies and complaints than the rest of the state’s care facilities.

In 2021, a CalMatters investigation documented that the state Department of Public Health allowed Rechnitz and his companies to operate 18 nursing homes while delaying a decision on granting licenses to them. The state had kept the license applications in a “pending” status for seven years after he acquired the homes. Rechnitz and his companies were allowed to continue operating five additional homes even after the state denied licenses to them.

Gov. Gavin Newsom signed a law meant to address the issue, but state regulators in 2023 granted Rechnitz’ companies the licenses to operate the homes just before the measure took effect.

Now elder care advocates say he is Exhibit A in how regulators at the Department of Public Health are failing some of California’s most vulnerable citizens. They say the state could push for greater accountability, including withholding licenses from owners they deem to be bad actors.

Wendy York, a Sacramento attorney specializing in nursing home abuse, said that watching elderly and disabled residents repeatedly suffer the same types of injuries in these facilities “feels like a broken record. It feels like Groundhog Day.”

York brought the lawsuit in 2021 alleging that one of Rechnitz’ companies’ facilities, Windsor Redding Care Center, was responsible for the COVID-related deaths of some 24 elderly and dependent residents. Johnson, the attorney for Rechnitz’ facilities, previously said the company “vehemently” disagrees with the allegations in the case, which is headed to trial early next year.

There are “government agencies who are responsible for their oversight,” York said, but “at the end of the day, it feels like we’re the ones who are doing the enforcement.”

Johnson called it “crucial to note that California is one of the only states in the country to provide zero liability protection for healthcare providers during the unprecedented pandemic.”

“This is particularly noteworthy since nursing homes were the front line in trying to protect our frail and elderly,” he said.

At least one of the cases against Rechnitz’ facilities includes allegations about his own conduct. A man suing Rechnitz and his companies over a relative’s injuries wrote in a sworn declaration filed in court that Rechnitz attempted to intimidate and bribe him with Lakers tickets during an unexpected phone call on the eve of his scheduled testimony in Los Angeles County Superior Court.

Johnson, the attorney representing Rechnitz’ facilities, called allegations about threats “completely false and defamatory.” A judge ruled the conversation could not be introduced as evidence.

In another case, Rechnitz and his wife Tamar in discovery disclosed their net worth: $786 million.

Tony Chicotel, a senior staff attorney for California Advocates for Nursing Home Reform, said that dollar figure hasn’t been divulged publicly before.

“At least in some of these chains, the money that was meant to go for patient care is being stripped away and sent up top to the ownership,” he said.

Johnson, the attorney for Rechnitz’ facilities, did not comment on the disclosure of the family’s wealth when CalMatters asked him.

‘Heightened monitoring’ for two years

The Department of Public Health has for years refused CalMatters’ requests for an interview about licensing issues related to Rechnitz’ companies’ homes. They again declined requests for an interview for this story. They did not provide a reason.

Instead, spokesman Mark Smith, said in an emailed statement that the department “remains committed to transparency and accountability for all providers, and to the health and safety of all nursing home residents in California.” In response to CalMatters’ questions about facilities in which Rechnitz is listed as an owner, Smith noted that the department had “negotiated for and obtained heightened monitoring authority and additional enforcement powers, beyond those applicable to other skilled nursing facilities, for a period of two years at 24 of this provider’s locations.”

That period has ended.

“This does not mean our department will avoid holding this provider or their facilities accountable,” he said. “We will continue to monitor these locations as appropriate, enforce and cite for regulatory violations if needed, and take further corrective action if necessary.”

A CalMatters analysis of data from both the state health department and the federal Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services found 78 California facilities in which Shlomo Rechnitz or his wife, Tamar, were listed as having an ownership stake. On average the facilities fared poorly on several key quality metrics compared to the state overall.

• In the past three years, the 78 nursing homes received an average of 12.4 citations for facility-reported incidents, compared with 6.1 for all nursing homes statewide.
• A higher proportion of these facilities has received a federal fine in the last three years than the state’s overall rate. Two-thirds of the facilities received at least one federal fine in the last three years, compared to half of all facilities across the state.
• The facilities have been fined an average of $47,897 during the last three years, compared to an average of $29,573 for all California facilities.
• The facilities had comparably low federal quality ratings: Almost 58% of these facilities had recent ratings of one or two stars (out of five), compared with slightly over 37% of facilities statewide.

Johnson, the attorney for Rechnitz’ facilities, noted in his email that a large percentage of these facilities are located in Los Angeles County, which he said issues deficiencies at a higher rate than any county in California, many of which are overturned on appeal.

He also said that “Mr. Rechnitz’ facilities self-report at a significantly higher rate than other comparable facilities,” which, in turn, could lead them to have a higher number of deficiencies.

Kamala Harris’ intervention

Back in 2014, Rechnitz bid on 18 Country Villa nursing homes in federal bankruptcy court. Then Attorney General Harris was so concerned with his track record that she filed an emergency motion to prevent him from purchasing or managing the homes, describing him as “a serial violator of rules within the skilled nursing industry.” At the time, Rechnitz’ attorney characterized the remarks as “defamatory” and “outrageous.”

The purchase went through.

Rechnitz then submitted change-of-ownership applications seeking licenses to run those homes. Rather than approving or denying them, CalMatters found that the state Department of Public Health simply left his applications in “pending” status for years. Despite that, his companies were allowed to continue operating the homes.

In 2015, he applied for licenses for five Windsor nursing homes. The next year, the department denied the change of ownership applications, but again allowed Rechnitz’ companies to operate them.

In her scathing 2018 report, the state auditor Elaine Howle criticized the California Department of Public Health, saying weak oversight and licensing lapses increased risk to nursing home residents.

In an effort to address these issues, the Legislature passed a law in 2022 to close a loophole that had allowed nursing home operators to run facilities without first receiving licenses. The law required the Department of Public Health to look at an applicant’s track record over several years before granting a license.

But before that law took effect the following year, the Department of Public Health suddenly granted Rechnitz and his companies many of the licenses it had previously left pending or outright denied. The group includes nursing homes that were the focus of recent lawsuits, such as Country Villa Wilshire, the Los Angeles-area facility where a jury awarded $2.34 million after a woman allegedly fell repeatedly due to understaffing; Windsor Redding, where the 24 patients died during a COVID outbreak; and Windsor Healthcare Center of Oakland, where complaints filed in Alameda County Superior Court allege a woman was sexually assaulted twice and a man died after being given too much medication.

Ed Dudensing, a Sacramento-based attorney who specializes in elder abuse in nursing homes, is bringing the case in Alameda County Superior Court alleging that neglect and poor staffing allowed a fellow patient to rape 79-year-old Cheryl Doe on multiple occasions while she stayed at Windsor Healthcare Center of Oakland. He is also representing the family of 64-year-old Alando Williams in the lawsuit against the same facility alleging overmedication and wrongful death.

Dudensing has three other active cases against facilities affiliated with Rechnitz and his web of companies alleging neglect, abuse and wrongful death.

In one of them, 78-year-old Barbara Pendley allegedly died after suffering severe dehydration at North Point Healthcare & Wellness Centre in Fresno.

North Point was another facility that the state opted to grant Rechnitz and his companies the license for under the 2023 settlement agreement.

Rechnitz and his companies have filed legal responses denying allegations in all of these cases, several of which are scheduled to go to trial in the coming year.

“We’ve just got to keep fighting,” Dudensing said.

“There was a time when there was a lot of scrutiny and that’s obviously well-documented,” he said. “But he managed to slip through.”

Cassie Dunham, the previous deputy director of the Center for Health Care Quality for the California Department of Public Health, last year became chief executive and president of the California Association of Health Facilities, the industry’s lobbying group. Through a spokesperson, Dunham declined an interview for this story citing her involvement with the development of departmental policy during the time that the state granted Rechnitz the licenses.

Corey Egel, a spokesman for the industry group and himself a former spokesman for the Department of Public Health, said in a statement that the association “supports strong, transparent oversight but believes the system would benefit from clearer timelines, more consistent application of standards, and more efficient resolution of pending cases — so that regulatory goals and resident care priorities can both be met.”

Patient lawsuit at newly licensed nursing home

Among the facilities that Rechnitz’companies received a state license to run in 2023 was Country Villa Wilshire, an 81-bed Los Angeles nursing home.

According to a lawsuit against the facility, 84-year-old Betsy Jentz landed there in November 2020 after she fell and fractured her ribs and hip. Prior to her injuries, the complaint stated that Jentz had been in excellent health; her attorneys said she had run 27 marathons.

But during the next year, according to a plaintiff’s brief, Jentz fell at least 10 times. On some of these occasions, she hit her head, suffered a fractured and dislocated shoulder and a fractured pelvis. The complaint also described malnutrition and severe pressure ulcers. It attributed those injuries to neglect. In court filings, Rechnitz and his companies have denied all responsibility.

On the evening of Jan. 28, 2024, Jentz’ great nephew Derek Skylar Aud was preparing to testify in court the next morning. Then, according to court documents, he received an unexpected phone call.

The man on the other end of the line introduced himself as Shlomo Rechnitz, Aud later wrote in a declaration filed in Los Angeles County Superior Court.

Over the course of more than an hour, Rechnitz allegedly told Aud that “things would get very nasty” for him and Jentz if Aud testified, the declaration said. Rechnitz allegedly said he would prolong the case for years and bring to light damaging information his private investigators had collected about Jentz.

He also said his private investigators had learned that Jentz loved basketball, and said she could receive courtside Lakers tickets “right next to LeBron James” if she agreed to a side deal, Aud told the court.

“Mr. Rechnitz then said ‘listen, I get it, we really fucked up and I’m accepting full responsibility, but I want the remedy or accountability to be on my terms and cut all these outrageous attorney’s fees out of the picture,’” Aud said in the declaration. “He also said ‘we fucked up and I accept responsibility, we were severely understaffed.’”

Rechnitz did not directly respond to these allegations in court, and the judge ultimately did not allow the jury to consider the phone call to Aud in making its decision.

Attorneys from Lanzone Morgan, a Long Beach law firm that specializes in nursing home abuse, represented Jentz and Aud in their case against Country Villa Wilshire. They said that the judge accepted defense attorneys’ argument that the call constituted “confidential settlement discussions” and did not allow the jury to hear testimony about it. Gittler & Berg and Ekpebe Law Group, the law firms that represented Rechnitz and his companies in the case, did not respond to CalMatters’ requests for comment. The jury’s $2.34 million verdict is now being appealed.

Lanzone Morgan also brought the case against Alameda Healthcare & Wellness that ended in the $7.6 million judgment in August. The case is in a post-trial phase in which the judge is determining how to apportion the liability among defendants.

Rockport Healthcare Services, the administrative services company for many of the homes, is also named in some of the lawsuits, including the one against Alameda Healthcare & Wellness. Rockport is owned by Steven Stroll, who has also served as Rechnitz’ accountant. Rockport has filed responses in court denying responsibility for the allegations.

Elizabeth Kim, an attorney with Lanzone Morgan, said she wants to see the Department of Public Health stop issuing licenses to Rechnitz and “other bad actors.”

“It’s shocking to me that he’s able to get licenses after he pretty much runs many of his facilities into the ground,” she said. She referred to an Aug. 22 trial in which Rechnitz acknowledged owning a private plane and having recently sold a home in Los Angeles for $23 million.

Her client, Aud, whose great aunt Jentz died in January 2025 a few months after the jury made its decision, wrote in his declaration to the court:

“I continue to feel uneasy about the calls and threats and I carry the fear of retaliation with me daily…I do live in fear that Mr. Rechnitz is now even more furious and that he will make good on his threats.”

CalMatters Data Reporter Erica Yee contributed to this story.

About the data

Besides court records, the data on Rechnitz-owned facilities in this story is based on state and federal databases. See full methodology and download the data.

This article was originally published on CalMatters and was republished under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives license.