A Bethesda man has been charged with elder abuse after authorities found his 87-year-old mother in such bad condition that her spine was visible and her socks had to be surgically removed from her feet.
Investigators said James Kirkland, 57, was the primary caretaker of his mother. He was charged with causing abuse that resulted in a serious physical injury, a felony, and causing abuse to his mother in his role as a caregiver, a misdemeanor.
Police said county Fire and Rescue Service units discovered the woman when they responded at 3 a.m. May 1 to a call for a sick patient at a home in the 6000 block of Beech Avenue.
The woman was transported to a local hospital, where medical personnel informed police that she had wounds, which were packed with newspaper and a powder substance, on her back and legs.
Police said that when the newspaper was removed, the victim’s spine was visible and that she also had to have compression socks surgically removed because they had become fused to her feet.
Kirkland was charged May 1 and has been released on bond. His mother remains in the hospital in “very serious condition,” police said.
Police also said the inside of Kirkland’s home was not being maintained. Kirkland made news last year when he ran for the County Council's District 1 seat as a Republican. The Montgomery Republican Party dropped their support for Kirkland after it was discovered he had sent a Washington Post reporter an email containing anti-Semitic slurs.
In the email, Kirkland blamed a Jewish couple in his neighborhood for filing an anonymous complaint against his then-86-year-old mother. Kirkland claimed the county fined his mother $500 based on the complaint for failing to complete work on the roof of her house.
