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TALLAHASSEE, FL - Attorney General Bill McCollum today announced a former employee of an Okaloosa County group home for disabled individuals has been arrested on charges that she abused a disabled resident of the facility. Latoera O’Neal, a caregiver at Horizon’s, was arrested by the Attorney General’s Medicaid Fraud Control Unit with assistance from the Santa Rosa County Sheriff’s Office.

Investigators with the Medicaid Fraud Control Unit began investigating O’Neal, 34, after receiving information from the Florida Department of Children and Families, Adult Protective Services. Witnesses reported that O’Neal grabbed the victim by his feet and pulled him off the facility's van, causing him to strike his head on the floor of the van, the running board and the pavement. Eye witnesses told investigators they were shocked by what they had observed. O’Neal, of Gulf Breeze, was immediately suspended and soon quit working at the facility.

O’Neal is charged with one count of abuse of a disabled person, a third-degree felony. If convicted, she faces up to five years in prison and a $5,000 fine. The case will be prosecuted by the State Attorney’s Office for the First Judicial Circuit.