Our seniors have contributed to our society and deserve a good life in their retirement years.  There have been hidden deaths in retirement homes that need to be exposed to the public. 

My father, Ho Keun Cho, and my mother Hyun Re Cho, lived in a retirement community called “Origin at Longwood Retirement Community”,  located in Nanaimo, British Columbia.  They lived there for just over a year.   This retirement facility has an indoor swimming pool where they swam every morning at 11:00 a.m. for their daily exercise.  

On a Sunday afternoon, when my mother was visiting her son in Pitt Meadows, I went to visit my father at 2:00 p.m., which was arranged that morning with a telephone call.   When I arrived and walked into his apartment,  he was not there and all the lights were on.  I started walking around asking everyone, “did you see my father”.  None of the staff knew where he was, and I became very worried.  I walked around that whole retirement facility for a long time and became very frantic.  Until finally, I decided to walk into the men’s change room and saw his clothes on the bench and shoes on the floor.  I panicked.  I opened the door into the pool and found his dead body, very still, hunched down, his head bent down in the water, and the noodle around his body.  I screamed and screamed and screamed and felt like I was going to die from the screaming.  They have a live video surveillance camera inside the pool area which is displayed on a screen at the front desk.  This had to be installed due to a prior drowning that happened before.  My father was in that pool for 3 hours when I discovered his body.  

My mother, who depended on my father for her care, as she cannot manage on her own, lost her husband of 57 years   

How can something like this happen?  Especially in a retirement community where seniors pay large fees to live in a healthy and safe environment.   Would you or anyone you know believe that this could actually happen?  A senior left alone for 3 hours in the pool that has live video surveillance?  We need some answers to some serious questions regarding the safety procedures in that facility.    

No family should have to experience such a horrific death which should never have happened.  

Please sign this petition to demand a coroner’s inquest in order to prevent future unnecessary deaths of our seniors.