Personal Care Home Owners Kept Mentally Ill Men in Squalor, Filth

MARIETTA, GA — A woman and her daughter have been found guilty to operating an unlicensed Marietta personal care home where three mentally-ill men were locked in a dank, unheated basement and exploited for their government benefits.

A third person, the son and grandson of the other two defendants, pleaded guilty as a first offender earlier this year to one count of exploitation.

On Friday, after a two-week trial, a Cobb jury convicted Sheila Bell Hawkins, 54, of Atlanta, on 16 charges including operating an unlicensed personal care home where people were abused, neglected or exploited; and several counts of neglect and abuse of a disabled person.

Hawkins’ mother, Helen Flournoy Bell, 72, of Marietta, previously pleaded guilty to all 16 charges.

On Nov. 13, 2014, police went to Helen Bell’s residence at 335 Windy Hill Road after a report that the three men were living in deplorable conditions in the basement. From a window in the door to the walk-out basement, officers could see the men inside. They asked the officers, “Are you here to help us?”

Police secured a search warrant for the home, and Helen Bell eventually opened the door at the main level of the home and allowed detectives to enter.

Once in the unfinished, unheated basement, detectives found the three men living in filth. Their clothes were dirty and inappropriate for the freezing basement where investigators could see their breath as they exhaled. The men smelled of urine and had clearly not bathed recently. There was active water on the concrete floor of the basement, black mold on the walls, and bedrooms barely large enough for child-size beds that had no sheets, just a blanket and pillow each.

A single lamp and two windows provided all light in the basement, and a refrigerator containing bread, bologna and juice was padlocked. The bathroom consisted of a toilet on a concrete slab floor, no doors, and a sink and tub that only had cold water. There was also no shower curtain or any kind of privacy, nor any toilet paper.

Each of the three victims’ sole source of income was Social Security benefits, and they received Medicaid and/or Medicare for their medical treatment. They were clients of Sheila Hawkins’ business, Serene Reflections for Holistic Behavior Wellness, in Atlanta.

“No words can capture the horribleness of that house,” said Senior ADA Jason Marbutt, who was called to the scene on Nov. 13, 2014, and saw the conditions for himself. “The investigation quickly went to, Who is responsible for the men being there? The answer is Sheila Hawkins. She runs a licensed mental health facility. She was the source of the clientele at 335 Windy Hill Road.”

Hawkins argued she and her mother were estranged and she was unaware of the conditions of the house. But Hawkins admitted on the stand that she knew her mother was incapable of caring for anyone, much less mentally-disabled men who had the kinds of needs as the men found in the basement.

Hawkins will be sentenced on Sept. 1. Each count carries a maximum penalty of 20 years in prison.

Bell was sentenced to 20 years in July, with five years to serve in prison, and fined her $5,000.

Micah Anthony Bell-Hall, 26, who is Hawkins’ son and Bell’s grandson, pleaded guilty in May to one count of exploitation of a disabled person and was sentenced to five years of probation and fined $500.

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