Nursing Home Administrator Arrested on Three Felony Charges Friday

The former administrator of Paradigm at the Oak nursing home in Schulenburg was arrested on three felony charges last Friday, June 6.

According to the Fayette County Sheriff’s Office, an officer with the Texas Attorney General’s Office arrested 61-year-old Pamela Kay Noell on the following charges:

• Tampering with a witness, • Tampering or fabricating with physical evidence with intent to impair, and

• Obstruction or retaliation.

Bond was set at $1,500 on each charge, and Noell bonded out of jail the same day.

The charges are reportedly related to a criminal activity at the Paradigm facility in Schulenburg. The Record reported in a series of articles earlier this year about a sexual assault that took place at the nursing home last November. Both the alleged attacker and the victim were residents at the nursing home.

Paradigm in Schulenburg is also home to an unusually high number of registered sex offenders. The alleged perpetrator in the sexual assault, 75-year-old Kenneth Buel Williams Jr., was a registered sex offender. He had been convicted of aggravated rape in Randall County in 1981. A Fayette County Grand Jury indicted him for sexual assault back in March.

According to a report we obtained through an open records request from the Texas Health and Human Services Commission (HHSC), Noell allegedly tried covering up the sexual assault. The report said she instructed staff to not report the assault nor to seek medical attention for the victim. Paradigm terminated her employment after HHSC placed the facility under “immediate jeopardy” – a most severe type of sanction.

Somehow, Noell was able to briefly get a job at Care Inn nursing home in La Grange earlier this year. After learning about it, the Record contacted the owners of Care Inn and provided them with the information we obtained from the open records request. The next day they called back and said Noell was no longer employed there.

The Record also learned last Friday that another former Paradigm employee has been indicted in connection with a physical assault that took place at the facility. Look for more on that story in an upcoming issue of the Record.