A grand jury report is revealing details about an alleged attack on an elderly resident at Gracedale Nursing Home in Northampton County, Pa., where a registered nurse is accused of performing an exorcism on the woman. The report stems from a single incident on June 23, 2025, at the county-run fac ility in Nazareth, which serves medically challenged patients. Northampton County District Attorney Stephen Baratta described the incident as an early morning attack on an elderly woman with significant health issues who lived at Gracedale. Baratta said registered nurse Octavia Robinson assaulted the woman while claiming the resident had “demons” inside of her. Robinson is accused of sticking her fingers down the woman’s mouth and stuffing clothes and towels into her throat, the report says. Robinson also repeatedly hit the woman in the back. According to the grand jury report, the woman’s two elderly roommates tried for more than 30 minutes to get help from Gracedale staff and law enforcement. When officers with the Upper Nazareth Police Department arrived to the patient’s room they had to forcibly interrupt Robinson assaulting the woman and Robinson resisted arrest. Robinson was admitted for psychiatric evaluation and faced criminal charges after she was released from the hospital, the report says. The grand jury report also details broader concerns at Gracedale, including a lack of security, patients being assaulted by staff and other patients and deplorable sanitary conditions. It also describes cases in which residents wandered away from the facility and were later found by police. During the investigation, officials found that Medicare issued three “inspection deficiencies” in 2023, 2 in 2024 and then 14 of these reports in 2025. Among the “inspection deficiencies” in 2025 included instances where residents were not given their medications or not been given the medical attention they needed. On April 16, 2025, the report says that two refrigerators were storing expired foods or had foods in containers that did not have proper labels. Also, a nurse was seen leaving the serving line while wearing gloves, opening doors to other rooms and then coming back to the line to continue serving food to residents. Then, in early October of 2025, there were two assaults between patients that could have been avoided if the facility’s staff had followed proper intervention procedures. In one incident, a reportedly aggressive patient “violently assaulted” a second patient who wandered into his room. The second incident involved a patient going into another patient’s bathroom and “touched his penis,” according to the grand jury report. An officer with the Upper Nazareth Police Department told the grand jury that some of the nursing staff was found sleeping at their desks when officers were present. The officer also said that the nursing home does not have security staffed full-time but a deputy sheriff is stationed in the lobby from 7 a.m. to 11 p.m. Mondays through Fridays and on some weekends. Baratta said Gracedale has faced severe staffing shortages since the COVID-19 pandemic. Northampton County officials said the facility is now under new administration and plans to address its weaknesses, with corrective action already underway. County Executive Tara Zrinski acknowledged that some of Gracedale’s financial challenges were caused by delays in Medicaid reimbursements. Zrinski also said plans are in the works to improve the facility’s long-term future, including evaluating a modernized facility and resources aimed at strengthening care and sustainability. This story was originally reported for broadcast by NBC Philadelphia. AI tools helped convert the story to a digital article, and an NBC Philadelphia journalist edited the article for publication. ...read more read less