A second company has filed an objection in the sale of Trumbull Regional Medical Center and Hillside Rehabilitation Hospital claiming they have a right to medical equipment inside the now-shutdown buildings. 

Phillips Medical Capital, LLC filed an emergency motion Monday claiming they leased medical equipment in both hospitals in 2019 and that they cannot be sold without Phillips getting it back. 

Steward Health filed for bankruptcy in 2024 and both Trumbull hospitals had been slated for closure prior to the sale to Insight Health near the end of the year. 

However, after making several promises of expanding services, both hospitals shut down in March, blaming the closure on Steward Health not providing financial resources during the transition to Insight. 

Since that shutdown, Phillips claims in its filing that several pieces of equipment have been removed from the buildings and that Insight has not been communicative with them about getting their equipment or even if it is still inside the hospitals. 

Phillips is asking that a judge order Insight to allow Phillips to retrieve their property under the terms of the sale agreement. 

Later in the day on Monday, a judge granted that motion and gave Insight five days to allow Phillips to get their equipment from the hospitals. 

As part of the shutdown, Insight furloughed the local communications contact, meaning any information about the status of the hospitals would have to come from someone with Insight corporate. Founder and Trumbull president Jawad Shah has not made any public statements since the shutdown and some county officials have indicated he may have been sleeping inside Insight Trumbull at one point, although it's not clear what his current status may be. A secretary in the Flint office told a 21 News reporter earlier this month that Shah was not reachable by phone and that they would not provide an email address for his assistant. 

21 News has reached out to Dayne Walling, director of government affairs for Insight, to see if the company plans to comply with the court's order .

Walling, who is the former mayor of Flint, Michigan, gained national attention for being the person who, in 2014,  turned on the pipeline of tainted water that caused disease and lead poisoning in children. According to Politico, Walling has maintained he was innocent of any wrongdoing in that crisis and that then-Governor Larry Snyder had stripped him of his authority prior to the water switch. 

Only Warren Mayor Doug Franklin claims to have spoken to Walling since the shutdown of the Trumbull hospitals, but those discussions have been private. Other local, state and federal officials have said they have been unable to speak to anyone from Insight. 

21 News has tried Walling directly more than eight times since the start of the year and no calls, texts or emails have been returned. 21 News has also reached out to Air Foil Communications, a group that had been doing public relations for Insight at the time they purchased the Trumbull hospitals, although it's unclear if they are still working with them. 

An emergency hearing is already set before a bankruptcy judge for April 30 on a similar claim from another company, Post Road Equipment Finance, which also believes they have a right to the equipment in the buildings.