Caregiver charged with neglect

DELTONA, Fla. (WOFL FOX 35) - Authorities say a nurse-caretaker left a medically fragile teenage patient alone, resulting in the teen struggling to breathe and experiencing seizures.

David Buchmann, 55, of DeLand, has been charged with neglect of a disabled person.

Deputies said after two hours on the job caring for his bed-ridden patient, who suffers from cerebral palsy and a severe form of epilepsy, Buchman walked out the door, leaving the boy alone in his Deltona home.

The teen's family was out to dinner celebrating a birthday. The teen's mother said, had it not been for her Ring doorbell, this could have been a whole lot worse. 

"My doorbell kept going off, and I looked at the camera to see if someone was breaking-in. Nobody was. The nurse went to his car and he left," she explained. "I didn't know whether to cry, have an anxiety attack, I just wanted to get home."

The teen cannot care for himself and requires a ventilator to breathe, according to authorities.  After the teen's mother observed Bachmann walk out of her home, enter his car and drive away, she said she was unable to reach him, so her husband raced home to check on their son.

"At home, the teen was found to be actively having seizures and struggling to breathe because his ventilator was not connected. In addition, the teen didn’t receive his dose of seizure medication, prompting him to suffer a seizure," said Volusia County Sheriff's Office spokesperson Laura Williams. 

Deputies determined the teen had been left alone for 15 minutes.

Buchmann was arrested Friday and transported to the Volusia County Branch Jail. He was released on $1,500 bail.