By Cara Mia DiMassa and Richard Winton
Times Staff Writer
6:53 PM PST, February 9, 2007
Hollywood Presbyterian Medical Center, accused by authorities in at least two incidents of dumping homeless patients, said Friday that its own preliminary investigation into why a hospital-hired van left a paraplegic man on a skid row street this week found that the actions were not in keeping with hospital policy.
The hospital offered its own account of how the patient ended up on Skid Row, but Los Angeles police and a homeless shelter official disputed key portions of the narrative.
Meanwhile, the Los Angeles City Attorney's office said it is expanding its ongoing investigation of the hospital, previously accused of homeless patient dumping, to include the Thursday incident, which was met Friday with widespread disgust and outrage from civic leaders.
"This is obviously shameless," said City Attorney Rocky Delgadillo, whose office criminally charged Kaiser hospitals three months ago for a similar dumping case. "We were thinking the hospitals in this city had gotten the message," he added. "They continue to flout the law."
The hospital said it had no explanation why the van driver ignored the cries of onlookers to help the 41-year-old man and instead proceeded to apply makeup and perfume before driving off, leaving the man in a gutter.
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