Bedridden woman found with rotting legs crawling with maggots

Catherine Park | WXIA-TV, Atlanta

Show Caption Hide Caption Maggots found feasting on woman's rotting legs A father and son in Georgia were arrested after their bedridden mother was found barely alive in her bed, decomposing with maggots and cockroaches crawling on her.

SUGAR HILL, Ga. — A woman was found alive in her bed, her legs decomposing and covered in maggots and cockroaches.

Now, the caretakers — her husband Terry Sorrell, 54, and son Christian Sorrell, 18 — are facing felony charges of neglect of a disabled or elderly person.

Gwinnett County Fire & Emergency Services workers discovered the woman, whose name has not been released, when they were dispatched Thursday to home in this city of about 22,000 residents 35 miles northeast of Atlanta. When they arrived, they found an obese woman unconscious and near death, according to the incident report.

Her present condition has not been released.

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About a month ago, the same crew had been to the home after transport her from a local hospital. Because of her weight, they used a MegaMover, a lightweight stretcher used for moving larger patients.

EMTs left the patient transport unit, a tarp-like plastic sheet re-enforced with nylon web straps, at the home in February, according to the incident report. When they arrived Thursday, the stretcher, which is normally white, was covered in feces and was discolored brown and black.

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"The patient was still on top of the same MegaMover they used a month ago," the incident report read.

The woman’s legs showed signs of decomposition, including a black color that is an indicator of dead tissue. She was covered in maggots and cockroaches that were eating her flesh, according to the incident report.

Her rescuers "did not believe she would live much longer and felt a moral obligation to report this,” Gwinnett County fire officials said.

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Son Christian Sorrell told Gwinnett County Police, who began an investigation, that he and his father were his mother's sole caretakers. She had been bedridden for nearly two years and had been getting worse.

Garbage surrounded the bed where the woman was lying and trash was strewn elsewhere in the apartment. Every room in the house was crawling with cockroaches.

The husband's room had a 2-foot pile of energy drinks, police said.

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No one in the family had a job and finances were tight, Christian Sorrell told police.

Both men continue to be incarcerated in Gwinnett County Jail in Lawrenceville, Ga., under a $22,200 bond.

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Christian Sorrell, 18, left, and his father, Terry Sorrell, 54, of Sugar Hill, Ga., were charged March 15, 2018, with felony neglect of a disabled or elderly person after the younger man's bedridden mother and older man's wife was found with rotting legs covered in maggots and cockroaches. (Photo: Gwinnett County (Ga.) Sheriff's Office)