Bridgeport Health Care Center shuttering amid owner’s financial misdeeds

Bridgeport Health Care Center, the financially troubled nursing home at 600 Bond St., is closing after efforts to sell it failed.

According to a state Department of Labor document, the judge in the health care center’s bankruptcy case ruled that “inattention to the physical plant infrastructure over decades made operation of the facility, without heavy state subsidies, impossible.”

The statement further noted that federal law requires the facility to provide 60 days”™ notice to workers prior to its closing.

In addition, Chaim Stern, the nursing home”™s former operator, has pleaded guilty in federal court to embezzlement and tax offenses. Stern was also chief financial officer of Bridgeport Manor, an affiliate of the health care center, which closed in 2018 after it was revealed that he had diverted $4 million from Bridgeport Manor employees”™ retirement plan to himself and a religious charity he controlled.