Regla “Su” Becquer is charged with murder after a man at one of her health care facilities died. Police are investigating whether there are more murders at the facilities held at homes such as this one. (Mug shot: Tarrant County Jail; Screenshot: WFAA/YouTube)
Police in Texas are investigating whether the 20 people at illegal health care facilities who died under suspicious circumstances in the last two years were murdered.
The owner of the illicit health care company, 49-year-old Regla “Su” Becquer, was charged with murder in the death of 60-year-old Steven Kelly Pankratz, Arlington Police Department spokesman Tim Ciesco said in an email to Law&Crime. Now Arlington police are taking a closer look 19 other deaths of clients who died while at one of Becquer’s five unlicensed facilities, cops said at a press conference on Wednesday.
Investigators filed a murder charge against Becquer in the Jan. 12 death of Pankratz after an autopsy revealed he died of “mixed drug toxicity,” Ciesco said. The drugs were antidepressants and sedatives, detectives told reporters.
“Following a lengthy review of his medical records it became clear that the drugs that were in his system had never been prescribed to him by doctors or used in any medical treatment that he received,” Det. Krystallyne Robinson said.
Pankratz’s family noted how his health seemed to deteriorate from the moment he entered Becquer’s facility, according to investigators. Becquer owns the company Love and Caring for People Inc. The facilities were located throughout the Dallas area.
Cops also said at the press conference they are also having the coroner reexamine the autopsy in the October 2022 death of Karen Walker. Just 19 days before she died, Walker allegedly wrote a will handing over her estate worth over $330,000 — including a $223,000 house and $75,000 in bank accounts — to Becquer. A family member said in an interview with local ABC affiliate WFAA earlier this year that while Walker had diabetes, she was otherwise healthy.
“We were deeply concerned about what we saw in these homes, what we found, and what we had heard up to that point,” said Lt. Kimberly Harris, commander of the behavioral health unit. “Today, I’m here to tell you that’s just the tip of the iceberg.”
Harris alleges Becquer would cut her clients off from the outside world by confiscating phones and would refuse to provide them medical attention. Investigators also believe she stole from her residents.
“We have allegations of abuse, theft and fraud by Ms. Becquer and her company,” said Kelly Land, Arlington Police crisis intervention specialist. “The stories we’ve heard from the clients and their families are disturbing and heartbreaking and unimaginable, and we are committed to delivering justice to the families and the victims.”
Complicating matters is many of the 20 victims have been cremated, buried, or had their bodies donated to science, Ciesco said.
Cops first arrested Becquer on an abandonment and endangerment charge in February after she allegedly abused a wheelchair-bound woman with cerebral palsy.
“I was held against my will,” the woman told WFAA.
Becquer remains at the Tarrant County Jail on a $1.5 million bond.
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