Owners of Missouri group home destroyed in deadly fire appeal license revocations

Thursday, January 4th 2007, 12:49 pm

By: News On 6

JEFFERSON CITY, Mo. (AP) _ The owners of a group home where a fire killed 11 people last year have appealed the state revocation of their licenses to run four southwest Missouri facilities for the mentally ill and disabled.

The state health department had given Joplin River of Life Ministries Inc. until Friday to shut down its group homes and relocate the residents. Documents show the organization has since appealed to the state's Administrative Hearing Commission.

Nine residents and one employee were killed in the Nov. 27 blaze that destroyed the Anderson Guest House, and another resident died of his burns a few weeks later.

State regulators subsequently stripped the organization's operating permits, arguing that the business was illegally run by Robert DuPont, who had been barred from operating long-term care facilities and participating in the Medicaid program because of a 2003 federal sentence in a Medicare and Medicaid fraud scheme.

The appeal filed by DuPont's wife, LaVerne, disputes that he was extensively involved in the homes' operation. A handwritten note on her appeal documents states that her husband provided ``input, but not decisions.''

The four facilities _ two in Joplin, one in Carl Junction and the one that burned in Anderson _ are owned jointly by Robert and LaVerne DuPont. She is listed on state licensure documents as the executive director of Joplin River of Life Ministries, which operates the facilities.