Background: The Pensacola, Fla. neighborhood where Pamela Reynolds lived with her father (Google Maps). Inset: Pamela Reynolds (Escambia County Sheriff's Office).
A Florida woman who was arrested after her elderly father was found "decaying" in his recliner will not serve any jail time for neglecting him.
Pamela Reynolds, 55, entered a no-contest plea on Monday, one year after she was charged with neglect of an elderly or disabled adult. As Law&Crime reported at the time, Reynolds was her father's caregiver and was living in her home when he was brought to the hospital with serious injuries and "decaying flesh." Reynolds told police at the time that she never noticed the injuries and regularly bathed her father.
Medical staff told police that the older man had a "necrotic" wound on his hip that was infested with maggots.
According to the arrest report, Reynolds finally called 911 on July 31, 2025, when she noticed her father had a "high heart rate." Police said the older man was able to communicate with them after he was treated, cleaned and placed in the hospital's intensive care unit. In the report, police said they could still smell "decaying flesh" coming from the victim, who was "unable to move himself."
The man told police "he had been lying in the chair for several months."
Reynolds said that she had not taken her father to the doctor since January 2025 and had not moved him from the recliner since early June 2025 "because of transportation issues." She told police that "she did not see or was not aware" of the injuries on her father.
The medical staff who treated Reynolds' father described several gruesome injuries he was suffering from, including one wound "the size of a softball with black and yellow tissue, pus, and fluids coming out." A wound on his right hip had become necrotic and was infested with "maggots and feces."
Police said Reynolds cried during their interview with her.
Reynolds changed her plea on Monday and was sentenced to three years' probation.
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