Michigan man charged with nursing home attack on Army vet

Video of the graphic assault went viral and even President Trump commented on it

May 25, 2020

A Michigan man has been charged in the brutal attack of a 75-year-old nursing home patient that went viral, even drawing the attention of President Donald Trump.

Fox 2 Detroit reported that Jaden Hayden, 20, was charged in the brutal beating of Norman Bledsoe, an Army veteran. In a disturbing video that was uploaded to social media, Bledsoe was assaulted at the Westwood Nursing Center in Detroit. It is alleged that Hayden, who was sharing a room with the elderly man, set up his cell phone and then punched him repeatedly in the face.

https://twitter.com/mgotoo16/status/1263669960821399552

Staff found Bledsoe bleeding from the head but initially believed he had fallen out of the bed. But Hayden is now being accused of the beating and stealing Bledsoe’s credit cards. He was arrested May 21 and is charged with two counts of assault with intent to do great bodily Harm, larceny in a building, and two counts of financial transaction device, steal/retain without consent.

“The alleged actions of this defendant are truly and uniquely disturbing. We must be able to trust our loved ones in specialty care facilities. I truly hope that the facts of this care are one of a kind,” Wayne County prosecutor Kym Worthy said.

Hayden was set to be arraigned Monday at 11 a.m. in the 34th District Court in Romulus in the alleged beating that captured national headlines, especially after President Trump weighed in.

“Is this even possible to believe?” Trump tweeted last Thursday.

The suspect’s father told 7 Action News that his son has mental health issues. He chose not to be identified but told the outlet that Hayden was recently diagnosed with COVID-19 at the University of Michigan Hospital and moved to the nursing home.

“He has issues and for them to put him in a facility like that, nothing good was going to happen,” the suspect’s father said.

The father sent his prayers and well wishes to Bledsoe and added that he’d been trying to get his son help and that Hayden had begun to hear voices.

“He never should have been housed… quarantined with the victim that he eventually assaulted. That should have never happened,” he said. “Someone dropped the ball.”

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