By Lee Williams
Sarasota Herald Tribune
SARASOTA, Fla. — The father of a 27-year-old woman who left Sarasota Memorial Hospital in a highly intoxicated state and was later struck and killed by a car says the hospital wrongly allowed his daughter to leave on her own.
Devon McGann, 27, was taken by ambulance to the hospital Aug. 15, records show. Librarians at the Selby Library called paramedics after they noticed McGann could not stand or dial her cellphone and was passing out in a chair.
She arrived at Sarasota Memorial around 5:20 p.m. Records show her chief complaint was “altered mental state.” The attending physician noted she appeared to be “under the influence of a substance.” Her speech was slurred. McGann admitted taking the prescription pain medication Percocet.
How she left the hospital is in dispute.
Hospital officials say she was properly discharged to the care of her boyfriend. But McGann’s family members and boyfriend say the hospital violated its policy by allowing her to leave alone.
Either way, nearly two hours later, around 8:39 p.m., just north of 18th Street, she walked in front of a 2003 Cadillac STS traveling 40 mph and was killed instantly. There were no skid marks at the scene.
Sarasota Police Officer Travis Forrister, who is assigned to the department’s traffic unit and investigated the accident, said there was nothing the 29-year-old driver could have done. No charges were filed.
As part of his investigation, Forrister viewed security camera footage taken in the emergency room.
Forrister said the footage shows McGann arriving with an EMS crew, and walking out of the hospital later on her own.
SMH spokeswoman Kim Savage said she could not discuss details of the case because of privacy laws. She said SMH officials were willing to discuss the case in detail with McGann’s father, but he refused.
On the advice of their attorney, McGann’s family refused to sign a waiver that would allow SMH officials to discuss the case.
According to SMH policies, McGann should have never been allowed to walk out of the ER alone because of her intoxicated state. She should only have been released to a family member, or involuntarily admitted to a detox center for 72 hours under Florida’s Marchman Act, the policy states.
Hospital records obtained recently indicate McGann was released to her boyfriend.
One record, described both as an “addendum” and a “corrected document,” which was written two days after McGann’s death, states: “The patient is leaving with her boyfriend. Again, we do not feel she meets Marchman Act criteria. The patient did leave prior to Dr. Newman seeing her or even being aware of the patient, and she left prior to her discharge instructions.”
Two other internal hospital documents indicate McGann left with her boyfriend.
But McGann’s boyfriend, Kirk Swanum, said he could not possibly have picked her up from the hospital since he was in the Sarasota County Jail at the time.
Court records show Swanum was arrested a month earlier for felony domestic battery by strangulation in an attack on McGann.
“I wasn’t released until the day after she was killed, when they dropped the charges,” Swanum said. “There’s no way I could have picked her up.”
Devon’s father Kenny McGann does not believe the SMH records or the hospital staff reports.
“It’s definitely a cover-up,” he said. “They’re covering their own butts because she was released to no one.”
Kenny McGann recalls different circumstances the night his daughter was killed."The hospital called my mother, who called me, and said they couldn’t release her to anyone but a family member,” he said. “The hospital called back a few minutes later and said she’d left.”
In an email, SMH spokeswoman Savage said the hospital was “deeply saddened to learn about the death of Ms. McGann.”
“At her father Ken McGann’s request, we provided him copies of her medical records, which we understand he has since shared with the Sarasota Herald-Tribune,” Savage wrote. “Federal privacy laws prohibit us from discussing her case without consent from the family. Mr. McGann refused to provide that consent, which legally prevents us from responding to his allegations or answering questions about the care his daughter received at our hospital.”
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