RE: Security Cutbacks At The Arizona State Hospital. Phoenix Channel 15 (ABC) is not the first source of reporting specific to the fact that the number security staff at The Arizona State Hospital has been markedly reduced since fall, 2011. 

A number of staff at ASH, as well as myself, have been attempting to draw attention to to the issue of Cory Nelson's intent to scale back ASH security staff for many, many months, an issue which I first learned about while I was still hosptialized at ASH in late 2011. This is a republished article that I originally posted on February 11, 2013, and it is based on an August 14, 2012 live interview with Cory "crazycorycorner" Nelson in relation to drastic security cuts at The Arizona State Hospital.  

Deceiving the Public on Prime Time Television: Wherein the director of the Arizona Department of Health, Will Humble, acts in complicity with Cory "crazycorycorner.weebly.com" Nelson in order to misrepresent the truth about the experiences of staff at The Arizona State Hospital. 

    TO SEE THE ACTUAL VIDEO, VISIT: 

   www.azfamily.com  August 14, 2012 

"Security Changes at the State Hospital." 

NOTE: IT IS EASIEST TO SIMPLY GOOGLE THE TITLE OF THIS INTERVIEW ARTICLE, RATHER THAN GOING TO THE AZFAMILY WEBSITE.  

Cory "crazycorycorner.weebly.com" Nelson was interviewed last August 14, 2012, by a reporter from Phoenix based Channel 3/AZFamily.com, in relation to his capacity as supervisor of The Arizona State Hospital, and in response to reports that the station had received about the out of control conditions at ASH, conditions which over the last 9 months or so have directly led to an increase in patient on staff assaults. Specifically, the issue revolves around the fact that Nelson has implemented fairly radical changes to ASH's security staff, most markedly by downsizing the actual number of employed security guards at ASH, and establishing a alternative approach to episodes of violence that has been assigned the happy face title of "Culture of Care." In the minds' of Nelson, and his boss in the Arizona Department of Health Services, director Will Humble, there is no need for security to be involved with most of these sorts of events and incidents at ASH. They contend that it is better for non-security to respond to most episodes of violence, or, as Humble put it in the interview:

      "We weren't really responding to those incidents in a way that's the most effective…. So no longer is their job to step back and call security, their job is to engage."

   

I find it ridiculous for someone like Will Humble, who undoubtedly came to his conclusion of what's most effective in this context via references to spread sheets and related cost/benefit analyses, to state what is or is not most beneficial to the staff persons who directly interact with the ASH patients themselves, because Mr. Humble himself sure as hell doesn't have any personal experience as such. And I furthermore know for a fact that the members of the ASH work force who do spend the most time in direct contact with patients by far than anybody else in that god forsaken place (the nurses and technicians) weren't consulted or otherwise involved in the process by which these these changes actually transpired. I know this because the finalized plan for these changes was introduced in writing before my discharge from ASH, and several ASH staff who I was on very good terms with discussed that basic fact with me, which only serves to illustrate how deep their concerns already were at that time. If Humble were just willing to be honest and forthcoming about the fact that these changes were put into effect due to fiscal concerns, and not much more (this with respect for the drastic cuts to public health funding that Arizona's state government implemented in 2011), these changes might be acceptable, in some sense or another. But no, he has to try and hoodwink the public by asserting that the priority of these changes stems from well intentioned concern for the patients and staff at ASH, and the only reason for that, in my opinion, is because he is unwilling to face the truth in his own right.   

FRIGHTENED  JULY 12, 2012

I FINALLY HAD TO QUIT. MY REG UNIT WAS GOOD BUT THEY KEPT FLOATING ME OVER TO THE BAD CIVIL UNIT. I AND OTHERS KEPT GETTING ATTACKED IT'S LIKE OPEN SEASON ON TECHS THERE NOW AND THEY DO NOTHING. TOO MUCH FLASHBACKS AND TERROR FOR ME TO STAY. SORRY TO ABANDON YOU -THE FRIENDS THAT I LEFT. THERE ISN'T ENOUGH STAFF AND NO MORE SECURITY GUARDS TO HELP.

LAST WEEK ANOTHER AWOL AND DIDN'T HE TRY TO KILL HIS DAD BEFORE GOING TO ASH?? WHERE ARE THE STAFF AND GUARDS?    (END OF PASSAGE)

Meanwhile, since these changes went into effect last fall, staff have increasingly alleged they're being assaulted on a regular basis, as the above report indicates in crystal clear language, posted over six full months ago on:

www.crazycorycorner.weebly.com

I have seen other such reports in several places, including the above site, but this interview and video described herein is the first time the complaints have hit prime time television. And with that in mind, the most disturbing aspect of this interview arose when Nelson was asked to respond to the reporter's direct inquiry about one staff person in particular, who was very severely injured on more than one occasion (nearly blinded), arguably as a consequence of the changes in question. Nelson looked the reporter in the eye, and in a more than slightly argumentative tone, stated: 

"I'm not saying it didn't happen, but we don't have a record of it….

  I am not aware of it." 

It is an astounding thing to see. It does not take a rocket scientist to spot a liar, and Nelson's very body language and facial expressions in this instance state the truth about the man's lack of moral character more clearly than I ever could. "I'm not saying it didn't happen… I am (just) not aware of it." It is like watching a four year old trying to manipulate the facts about a missing candy bar, it really is. Nelson's statement that such an incident may have occurred without him knowing about it is both confounding and infuriating, because if anyone is obligated to be aware of such issues, it is the supervisor. He is not permitted to perform his duties with his head buried in the sand, in other words. The fact is, anytime a person is seriously injured on ASH property, be it staff, patient, or visitor, all administrative staff are required to be apprised, and to further file well documented reports about such events. This need is requisite in the context of the state of Arizona's risk management office and related insurance concerns, as well as with respect for several regulatory agencies at the state and federal level that are assigned the task of recording such events, such as The Joint Commission (on the accreditation of hospitals). 

The reporter also inquired about an issue that relates to fundamental rights in the context of due process and equal protection under the law. Issues arising under constitutional law, in fact, which bolsters my feeling that federal intervention is exactly what the administrators at ASH deserve. Specifically, Nelson was asked to respond to claims about staff having been refused the opportunity to notify police following being violently assaulted, an issue that staff suggests is an attempt to hide how seriously dangerous these working conditions have become. And here again, the man in charge of caring for the needs and interests of Arizona's most seriously mentally ill citizens blatantly ignores the significance of such concerns by blaming the problem on staff, as follows:   

     "I've been very clear with staff. I'm not telling anyone not to call police, what I'm asking staff to do is really step back, take a look at the situation, after the immediate emotion of the situation has settled a little bit, so they can make that decision on what they want to do."

This statement is shocking and grossly disturbing, because Cory Nelson

has absolutely no right to ask any such thing of ASH staff; and in doing so, 

he is grossly abusing his authority, to such a point that I believe he should be criminally charged. Not that these sorts of abuse are unusual at ASH. For on at least three occasions wherein I was physically assaulted during my 13 months of hospitalization at ASH (including one incident wherein an ASH staff assaulted me), I encountered this exact same pattern of resistance to allowing outside authorities access to the things that go on behind the walls and fences of ASH, and I knew exactly what was going on at the time. This is what's so damn insulting to the conscience when it comes to these matters, the audacity of these people in presuming that the citizens of Arizona and the United States haven't the intelligence to recognize bullshit when we see and hear it. In Nelson's case, I think he's the one lacking in intelligence, for in making this statement, he directly affirms his wrongdoing with his very words, and yet he doesn't even seem to know it. But the fact is, by "asking" staff to delay a phone call to authorities so that they can "really step back" until their emotions have "settled", Nelson is effectively directing them to not call police. This is man who runs the entire facility! Will the lunacy of these matters ever end?!? In conducting himself in this way, Cory Nelson, ASH's highest ranking executive officer, is willfully deceiving his staff and the greater public, and knowing as we do that administration and senior staff at ASH have the employees walking on egg shells for fear of losing their jobs, his statements to this effect have the effect of a veiled threat. What do you do, in other words, when a boss like Cory Nelson asks you to do something? What do you risk if you answer him as I would, by asserting that he has no right to interfere on any level with another person's decision to exercise their fundamental privileges under the law? 

I contend that Cory Nelson is a bald faced liar and a bully, and these statements prove it. As a tax paying citizen of Arizona, I am fed up to the gills with Cory Nelson's ineptitude and his bottom feeding dishonesty. It was hard   enough as a patient to have to experience this egregious misconduct while I was hospitalized at ASH, undermining as it did my faith in the very ones whom I had been advised to rely upon, and aggravating my state of mind and emotion as a mentally disabled adult. But to realize today that this man's selfishness extends to every facet of the Hospital's operation greatly troubles me, because I have trusted friends at ASH, staff and patients alike, and I have vested concern for the citizens of Arizona as a whole. Cory Nelson is an overpaid, unqualified bum who came to Arizona after being involved in a scandalous career while employed by South Dakota's public system, and seeing him lie through his teeth like this literally makes me sick. As I have stated before- FACT: If staff at ASH cannot feel reasonably safe and secure in their respective positions, the attendant stress and discontent is going to land squarely on the heads of ASH's mentally disabled patients. But Cory Nelson doesn't give a rat's ass about the experience of ASH' staff, any more than he does that of ASH's mentally disabled patients. His most formal training occurred when he was employed in South Dakota's corrections system, a prison manager, in effect, and the patients at ASH are not prisoners, just as the staff at ASH are not corrections employees. They are medical professionals, sand and every one on them, and for this yokel, Cory "crazycorycorner" Nelson, to be mistreating his trusted staff is utterly unconscionable. End of story.

  

This interview shows Cory Nelson doing all he can to mischaracterize the good faith reports by ASH staff, who out of fear for their physical safety chose to seek meaningful support and resolution. He patently denies the significance of staff concerns in this context, and he never actually offers a straight answer to the interviewers most pointed questions. It is all a game of dodge ball to this man. By attempting to evade the issues most at stake, Nelson effectively demeans the merits of these staff concerns, concerns which were explicitly oriented towards staff safety and related incidents wherein certain staff were gravely injured; and then he goes on to conclude his statements by claiming that the changes in question have led to a reduced need to subject unruly patients to the use of mechanical restraints. Which sounds great, all told, but is still somewhat suspicious. And it has nothing to do with the safety of staff. 

I also know that each and every time security is called upon to directly respond to and control any patients' behavior, the entire event is documented as a "critical incident report", which are designed to become of the documented Hospital record, whereby aforementioned regulatory agencies such as The Joint Commission can utilize such records in considering how well hospitals are doing their jobs. But now that security is not as involved in this context, critical incident reports are not entered into the official record (this could very well be the basis of Nelson's claim that he is "not aware" of such goings on there at ASH). This aspect of these changes is huge, and has enormous implications, 

for it suggests that Will Humble and Cory Nelson may very possibly engaged in a highly unlawful scheme designed to fraudulently mischaracterize the realities  at ASH, including in the case of potentially avoidable assaults and other like events. I am of the learned opinion today, that anytime these people enact changes such as this, the well being of the patients are the last thing they are thinking about; and it's clear, as well, that the lower ranking staff, who just so happen to be the ones who spend the most time directly interacting with ASH patients, are just as likely to be of little to no concern. This is very, very wrong, and it cannot be allowed to continue, because I don't care who you are- nobody deserves to be subject to such nefarious misbehavior and administrative abuse of authority. 

I heard something of the security changes in question while I was still at ASH. The rumor was well in the air that some number of security staff were to be laid off in order to implement a different approach to critical incidents, such as patient on patient violence, patient on staff violence, and other like matters requiring immediate attention. And not long after I discharged from ASH in late February, 2012, the first waves of staff reports began appearing, reports about being attacked and feeling unprotected and at risk of serious physical harm, and these reports included the belief that it's been caused by this changed approach. It's strange, too, sensing today that ASH staff are in a crisis that has been caused by Cory Nelson, because I recall many of them feeling that he was a really good candidate for the job at that point in time when the hiring process for a new ASH supervisor was in effect. Increasingly, I sense that the nurses and technicians at ASH are somewhat in the same boat as the patients, and it is directly due to the ineptitude and immorality of the Hospital's highest ranking authorities. This is of critical concern, for a trickle down effect occurs in situations such as this, an effect that allows for the presence of senior clinical staff (the psychiatric doctors) who grossly fail to meet their responsibilities to patients, which in turn contributes to patients being less stable in there won right, and ultimately creates heightened tensions and related events in the context of ASH's direct care service providers.     

IN CLOSING: I directly communicated with one ASH staff person about this matter in June of 2012, and I encouraged that person to contact media, telling them in no uncertain terms that this issue directly relates to the public interest and welfare; and I also reminded them that ASH staff are protected by many of the same provisions of law and policy that ASH's patients are protected by, but that those protections are worthless if staff don't take it upon themselves to proactively address these matters however they possibly can. Whether that communication led to the interview with Nelson in August, or not, I cannot be sure of (and I don't' really care). What's important is the fact that the interview itself is both enlightening and very revealing in terms of exposing Cory Nelson's willingness to lie through his teeth whenever serious allegations about the substandard conditions at ASH arise. I encourage anybody interested in seeing the video of this interview to visit the website, www.azfamily.com, and view it themselves; it was published on August 14, 2012, and is titled "Security Changes at the State Hospital." (as noted already, the most immediate way to view the video is by simply googling the title of the interview article, rather than visiting the azfamily.com website.)  

paoloreed@gmail.com