JEFFERSON PARISH, La. — Prosecutors reportedly refused a criminal charge against a man accused of attacking an intensive care unit nurse in Gretna after his attorneys argued he was not at the hospital at the time of the attack.
Quincy Quinn, 48, was booked in February with battery of a healthcare worker in a Jan. 27 attack. But at a March 7 hearing, The Times-Picayune | New Orleans Advocate reports the Jefferson Parish District's Attorney's Office refused the charge against him citing "further investigation by the Jefferson Parish Sheriff's Office."
"[Quincy] didn't go the hospital at all," defense attorney Eusi Phillips told the newspaper. "I believe that when the state finally discovered that, that led to the ultimate refusal of the charges."
Quinn was accused of attacking a male ICU nurse while visiting a patient at Oschner Medical Center's West Bank Campus in Gretna. The sheriff's office later said the nurse suffered a broken jaw and broken teeth and had to undergo surgery.
Phillips told the newspaper that Quinn's mother and father were both treated at the hospital for COVID-19. His mother had died of the virus and his father was hospitalized on the day of the attack. Phillips said the family was frustrated with the care the couple had received, but Quinn did not go to hospital that day because he did not want to see his father die. The newspaper says Quinn was home asleep when he learned that his dad had died.
"That's why, when he got arrested, everyone was in shock," Phillips told the paper.
The report says deputies who responded to the attack were not able to get information to identify the attacker. The JPSO later released an image of a suspect taken from hospital security cameras and Quinn was later named as the attacker through Crimestoppers tips.
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