Inset: Teresa Marie Mills (North Charleston Police). Background: North Kentwood Drive in North Charleston, South Carolina, where Mills allegedly left her 90-year-old husband with dementia alone (Google Maps).
A South Carolina woman allegedly left her 90-year-old husband with dementia home alone while she enjoyed a Saturday night dinner with friends, causing him to fall.
Teresa Marie Mills stands accused of vulnerable adult abuse and vulnerable adult neglect, according to the North Charleston Police Department.
Cops responded around 7:30 p.m. Sunday to a home on North Kentwood Drive for a welfare check. When officers arrived, they saw the victim sitting alone on the porch looking disoriented and unable to communicate. He was also bleeding and had sustained other injuries. Cops called paramedics to the home to check on the man.
Officers walked up to the home where they "detected a strong, overwhelming odor" even before they walked inside.
"Officers described the home's living conditions as deplorable, reporting feces and urine stains throughout the residence and signs of rodent activity, including boxes and other belongings that appeared to have been chewed," cops wrote.
Mills said her husband had fallen the day before when she left him alone in the home so she could have dinner with pals. But she never called 911 or contacted a doctor after she returned home and saw that he was injured, cops said.
She said a caregiver comes once a week to give her husband a bath.
Police placed the victim into emergency protective custody. Paramedics transported him to a hospital for treatment.
Officers arrested Mills and booked her into the Al Cannon Detention Center. She was not listed as an inmate at the jail as of Monday evening. Her next court date was not immediately listed.