BLOOMINGTON — Asta Care Center of Bloomington has been investigated by the state after a registered sex offender, who was an Asta resident, touched a breast of a female resident.

The Illinois Department of Public Health has recommended to federal authorities that Asta, 1509 N. Calhoun St., Bloomington, be fined $3,500, state health department spokeswoman Melaney Arnold said.

According to a state investigation, a sex offender touched the breast of a female resident with Alzheimer’s disease while they were in the Asta lobby on July 29. The male resident has a history of fondling non-alert females and had been convicted of criminal sexual abuse of a teenager, the state report said.

The facility corrected the deficiency by transferring the offending resident to another facility, Arnold said Tuesday. The report also said other sex offender residents were moved to one part of the nursing home away from cognitively impaired female residents.

Tami Wacker, regional ombudsman with the East Central Illinois Area Agency on Aging, said some nursing homes accept registered sex offenders as residents and that’s not new. The question is whether the facilities have appropriate staffing and training to handle resident-offenders.

Mike Siegel, an Asta lawyer, said the former resident was closely supervised and staff had been trained. The former resident touched the other resident within 30 seconds of being spotted near her by a staff member. He was removed from the area and later transferred to another Asta facility, Siegel said.

“Asta/Bloomington takes very seriously its obligation to closely supervise and monitor any resident who has a background of having been an offender,” Siegel said.