When Charles Klaer wandered from Willow Manor Retirement Living and Memory Support Center in Dania Beach, FL, in early January, officials called his wife to say they wanted him to wear an electronic strap around his ankle, according to published reports. A few days later, the 72-year-old resident with advanced Alzheimer’s disease, walked out of the facility, was struck by a car and killed on a highway a mile-and-a-half away from the facility.

Klaer was not wearing the ankle monitor when he wandered away. Klaer’s family hired a private investigator, Robert Myers, who said he found the monitor next to Klaer’s bed in perfect working order, without any damages or cuts. A sheriff’s office detective is searching to see if anyone was criminally negligent at Willow Manor.

Harold Baldwin, president of Secure Care Products Inc., the company that made the electronic monitoring device, said once the filament strap is wrapped around a person’s ankle and snapped shut, it stays on permanently, even in the bath.