No Hospital Should Be A Prison. Wherein, due to appointing individuals who come out of the prison industry into executive positions in state managed mental hospitals, positions which they are not validly qualified for, we discuss one very disturbing aspect of discrimination against the patients in such hospitals.  

"An administration that would, in fact, as recently as only last week, demand that no ASH staff attend any more meetings of the Hospital's Human Rights Committee (HRC), an order that I contend arose on the basis of the knowledge that I am now attending those meetings. Taking close note, as I always have, of all employee statements, particularly those of ASH administrators, persons who have no actual right to privacy so long as they are on the clock, as it were." (From this publication, January 25, 2018.)

"Is it really true that you are not a felon? I can’t believe that.” Dr. Pervaiz Akhter, June, 2011.

Pervais Akhter

Two former South Dakota Officials lose Arizona Jobs. Bob Mercer. June 08, 2015. Rapid City Journal.

“News reports from Arizona show that Cory Nelson and Jeff Bloomberg were placed on leave and then evidently dismissed from their posts in the Arizona Department of Health Services during the past three weeks amid investigations into allegations regarding patient mistreatment, safety violations and sexual abuse at Arizona State Hospital by others during their management.

Donna Noriega, Cory Nelson, Jeff Goldbloom.
All three of whom were fired from
their executive positions at
ASH/ADHS in 2015.

Nelson left South Dakota in 2011 after a dispute over pay for his job as head of the state Human Services Center at Yankton, South Dakota. Nelson originally became acting director at Yankton during the Janklow administration and then received the job on a full basis despite criticism that he didn’t have the proper academic credentials and executive experience. He continued at Yankton through the Rounds administration and left in 2011 as Gov. Dennis Daugaard required pay cuts throughout much of state government’s top levels. He then became the chief executive officer for the Arizona State Hospital.

Bloomberg was state secretary of corrections in South Dakota during the Janklow administration when allegations arose over mistreatment of youth in state custody and the death of a girl at the Plankinton boot camp that was created and later shut down by Janklow. Bloomberg then worked as an attorney in state government for much of the past decade, before leaving for Arizona to work with Nelson. Bloomberg most recently was a top attorney for the Arizona state health department, where he served as manager for the office of administrative counsel and rules.”

"You, Dr. Cara Christ , are 100% responsible for doing the right thing today. So do it, already."

Dr. Cara Christ. Director, Arizona Dept. of Health Services 2015-the present.

Since her appointment to the highest ranking position in Arizona’s public health care system in 2015, Arizona Department of Health Director Dr. Cara Christ has repeatedly stated that there have been “great improvements” in the state’s sole long term public mental health care facility, Arizona State Hospital (ASH). To date however, January 2018, Dr. Christ has never provided any evidence or information about just what these “improvements” at ASH are, in fact. This is of very real concern to the staff of this publication, given that Dr. Christ’s immediate predecessor (Will Humble ADHS Director 2009-2015) willfully relied upon producing a pattern of overt and untruthful propaganda that served to delay a subsequent process of critically needed oversight and accountability at ASH. Propaganda that defied the realities specific to the ASH operation, including but not limited to preventable patient deaths, the tragic murder of a young Phoenix woman, and a wide range of patient generated concerns expressed in grievance submissions; and as such, granted the former administrators of ASH further opportunity to continue operatinASH in a manner deeply harmful to the welfare of the Hospital’s patient community. These issues have been exemplified by the information provided in this blog since 2012, as well as in a number of scathing investigative findings of the staff of ABC Ch15 circa 2013-2015; (As reported previously in this publication, at least three preventable deaths occurred due to this fact). 

The following article was originally published sometime in the first twelve months of the life of this blog, PJ Reed The Arizona State Hospital Patient Abuse. We are republishing this information as one means to remind our readers of how dismally substandard the operation at ASH was circa 2010-2012, and in order to raise consideration as to whether in fact any legitimate improvements have in fact come about since Dr. Christ was granted directorship over Arizona’s public health care system. 

The Status of Mentally Ill Persons In the United States Today.

(Originally published April 10, 2012)

Marginalization and underrepresentation.

Prior to May, 2010, and my first admission to a psychiatric ward of any kind, I had no formal experience in spending time around persons affected by mental illness. I was forty nine years old, had been treated for physical injury and illness more then once in general hospital settings, and had no reason to believe that even today, state managed psychiatric hospitals operate in defiance of established medical standards. I had also worked for a number of years in the 1980s as a EMT, and was married to very competent and ethical nurse for over seven years 1993-2000. But as stated, no aspect of my personal life history had ever included opportunity for me to get a feel for the conditions on psychiatric treatment units, or what persons affected by mental illness might go through in such settings. I was, in no uncertain terms, absolutely unprepared for what I would come to learn over the next 21 full months of hospitalization in Arizona’s public mental health care system.

But central to what I am going to discuss in this article, one very striking feature to the realities on that first psychiatric ward that I all but immediately observed has to do with the fact that many, if not most, persons affected by serious mental illness are grossly underrepresented in terms of acquiring a range of matters specific to their needs.

While I may have thought about this (to some extent) prior to May, 2010, it was there, on the second floor of Kino Hospital in Tucson, AZ (now known as University of Arizona Medical Center, South Campus Psychiatric Hospital), that I saw first hand how difficult it is for some of us, the mentally ill, to represent ourselves in relation to our overall flow of treatment in such facilities.

Serious mental illness, as most anyone might imagine, can be very debilitating; and can, in some cases, make it very difficult for individuals so affected to speak up for themselves, whether that be in relation to their actual health care needs, or in direct relation to their given rights as disabled persons. While I may have thought about this to some extent prior to May, 2010, it was there, on the second floor of Kino Hospital in Tucson, AZ (now known as University of Arizona Medical Center, South Campus Psychiatric Hospital), that I saw first hand how difficult it is for some of us, the mentally ill, to represent ourselves in relation to our overall flow of treatment in such facilities.

Before going much further along, I need to clarify, very happily, that no aspect of the care practices or conditions at Kino Hospital so disturbed me that I ever felt the need to take action in defense of my needs. Indeed, I can report in context that university and other like operated public mental hospitals bear little resemblance with respect to the care practices and conditions in state managed mental hospitals. But that is for another conversation, beyond me needing to clarify that the folks at Kino Hospital impressed as very competent and very ethically inclined medical professionals. 

With reference to my first awarenesses as described above, and with further  regard for my thirteen months in Arizona’s sole long term public mental heath care facility, Arizona State Hospital, I sincerely believe by now (April, 2012) that seriously mentally ill (SMI) persons represent one the most marginalized populations in contemporary American society. I can, in fact, attest that, despite numerous reform movements to the contrary, such persons are still extremely vulnerable to negligence, exploitation, and outright abuse.

Hospitals are not prisons.

In this context, another critical feature to my experience based awarenesses today, relates to the simple fact that mentally ill persons are not inherently criminal by nature; this, at least, in terms of their struggles with mental illness, as may apply. No more inherently criminal by nature then any other human being, as I see it, and no more likely to be identified as persons guilty of crime then anybody else. Unless, that is, you are talking about places like ASH.

Joe Saucedo Gallegos.
At the time of his arrest, 2010,
prior to his admission to ASH.

During the near entirety of my time at ASH, where at least some of trained medical staff far too often treat each and every patient like dirt (and I feel it is safe to presume, as it may be in most all such state managed mental hospitals), as though we the patients are inherently immoral, defective to a point being undesirable, and therein undeserving of the compassionate care that all such public health care facilities are required to provide as per established law and policy. I was, from my first day at ASH, struck by the feeling that I entered some or another third world nation, where it might be taken for granted that deceit and ineptitude are all but the norm. I say this without even needing to go into the theft of some of my personal property as soon as I arrived to ASH, which did occur, and which I will discuss at length in the future. For now, I will continue to focus on the lack of respect directed to persons affected by serious mental illness, and related underrepresentation that has been imposed on state mental hospital patients by just those people who you would expect to know better. Staff psychiatrists, that is.

Case in point #1 (only one of many such examples of my experiences at ASH): In my first formal doctor-patient conversation with Dr. Pervaiz Ahkter, this Pakistani trained medical doctor incredulously stated: 

"Is it really true that you are not a felon? I can’t believe that.”

Akhter posed this question in May, 2011, at which point I had been hospitalized at ASH for over 12 weeks, in spite of the fact that my entire personal records were provided to ASH staff upon my application for admission, as per the civil court order that dictated my right to be provided services at ASH the previous winter. At that point in time, I was yet again floored by the twisted behavioral characteristics of ASH’s psychiatric staff, and it’s worth noting that my first attending psychiatrist at ASH, Dr. Laxman Patel, had already impressed upon me the need to pay serious attention to just how these entrusted medical professionals treated me, in fact (and not solely in a context of actual medical care). But this was a bizarre as hell question in itself, which seemingly came out of nowhere. I well recall sitting there looking at Akhter after I’d quickly responded, “Well, I’m not, and I never will be”, and then taking a moment to more carefully digest the tone of his question; and then, deducing almost as quickly the likelihood that this native of Pakistan was ignorant to a point of ridiculousness. Which I also recognized as a circumstance posing likely threat to my right and need to be treated at ASH with reasonably optimum health care. 

        

I attest to the fact that seriously mentally ill and disabled adults have little to no voice in terms of speaking for themselves, in graphic defiance of the mission of numerous efforts in society today to create avenues of empowerment for mentally ill persons, and that the staff at the Arizona State Hospital capitalize on the their disproportionate power over the patients as a means to preserve egregiously substandard care and practices at ASH. In  public hospitals such as ASH, the stigmatization factor that underlies deeply endemic discrimination against persons affected by serious mental illness and disability is still acutely present; and as per my experiences, behind the fences and doors of the Arizona State Hospital, I further attest to the fact that the most insidious elements of this societal disfunction and related history are still rampantly at work, to the direct and undeniable detriment of all ASH patients, all of it as a matter of standard practice. Many of the most fundamental communications between patients and staff technicians and nurses at ASH are are highlighted by overt prejudices of staff towards the patients, and I literally  encountered staff members at ASH who were willing to treat me like like as something less than human on my first day there. 

In this context, what I also learned during my 13 long months at the Arizona State Hospital is that most of the patients' interests there are managed by guardians (often the state itself) due to the severity of their given mental illness, which means that they have next to no independent voice or immediate recourse if they are in fact abused or otherwise mistreated by ASH staff. As stated, on top of that fact, many of these guardians are state appointed, and as the situation at Arizona Child Protective Services has proven in recent years, the state guardianship program is a disaster, particularly in terms of the at-risk citizens that these agencies are responsible for. 

At ASH, this issue is a double bladed reality, due to the nature of the facility with its high level security status, etc., where no sort of objective oversight is possible, in patent defiance of applicable state and federal laws. The patient advocate at ASH, Sonia Serda, once made it very clear to me that anytime a patient is struck or otherwise abused by ASH staff (this, after I reported having seen two burly male technicians face slam a nonviolent patient, Andy B., into a solid steel door), there is nothing that can be done to address the matter if the patient's guardian doesn't report the incident on that patient's behalf. But these guardians, even in the best of circumstances (if and when the patient has loving family representing them in the context, for example), are not immediately available, this as per very limited phone use restrictions and the willingness of most ASH staff to defer the factual presence of patient abuse to clinical and administrative supervisors who refuse to respond.

All staff members at ASH know these things well, and the majority of them take full advantage it. The fact is, seriously mentally ill adults are extremely vulnerable to abuse, exploitation, and negligence; and in this sense, I was shocked to learn that in a public health setting such as ASH, where one would reasonably expect for the rights and well being of seriously mentally ill persons to be most assuredly preserved, the conditions are in fact in 100% contradiction to any such expectations. Such protections and safety, as per established medical ethics, and rights and liberties provided for via the provisions of the Americans With Disabilities Act [ADA] and the Eighth Amendment of the Constitution, etc., are central to the required obligations of any/all public health care facilities, consistent as well with the actual licensure of such facilities, and that of medically certified caregivers, from the ASH psychiatrists, to senior nursing staff, and so on. It was one of the most frightening aspects of my overall experiences as a patient at ASH to realize that many of the staff there simply suspend the reality that this is the United States, and that the year is 2012, and that they are openly willing to look patients in the eye and say "You don't matter, you can't do anything to protect yourself from me, you are not human.

     Case in point #2: In early April, 2011, my first assigned ASH psychiatrist Laxman Patel, responded to my earliest concerns about patient abuse and staff misconduct at ASH with these exact words:

"What do you expect? This is the state hospital."

Only a few weeks later, out of immature frustration over my continued efforts to get him off his ass and to meet his obligation to address my reports of staff misconduct, Patel went a step further in exhibiting his resentment about my conduct in this context, by stating he would not continue treating me, as follows:

  “Only if you stop with this nitpicking!”

This, from a man who was raised and educated in India, where democratic principles are outside of that nation’s societal and cultural history, and not to mention being devoid of concern for human rights (as illustrated by India’s still in effect caste system); a man who is now (2013-14) filling the crucially important position of ASH's Chief Medical Officer. Patel’s appointment arose after his predecessor, Dr. Steven Dingle, was unreasonably promoted into a executive position in the Arizona Department of Behavioral Health Services, in graphic defiance of his role in the death of April Mott, and a wide range of other like issues that are today subjecting the ASH patient community to substandard care practices and conditions. Indeed, any hospital’s chief executive officer bears the responsibility to ensure that all aspects of clinical operations, which most necessarily requires a degree of character specific to equal ensuring that all patients are provided with optimal quality of care. More specifically, the American Medical Association defines (in part) the job description of chief medical officer as follows (@ ama.org):

“Rather than directly care for patients at the bedside, CMOs act as liaisons between doctors and healthcare executives. It’s the Chief Medical Officer’s duty to ensure patients receive the highest quality treatment possible by hiring, evaluating, and training new physicians. CMOs work to implement cost-effective, efficient medical interventions in nearly all healthcare facilities. Sometimes, CMOs are also hired by government agencies to lead a medical expert team for meeting public health needs on the legislative front. Chief Medical Officers create and enforce the clinical guidelines that make healthcare delivery run more smoothly, and must possess the willingness to adhere to all in-house and legal regulations.

  

2018 NOTE: Who are the criminals at ASH, again? As we all know by now, in the late mid 1990s, Dr. Steven Dingle was identified and disciplined for having engaged in sexual harassment of female residents working under his authority, to a degree that I’m of the opinion that not only does this man lack the character to ensure optimal quality of patient care, but more so, qualifies as one form of sexual predator, wherein via his abuse of authority/power, he willfully took unlawful advantage of women relying on him to advance their medical careers. And as illustrated by the dictate of the AMA, and his role in covering up the escape of Jesus Rincon Murietta in late May, 2011, and consequent death of April Mott, Dingle is quite obviously lacking in a willingness to adhere to all in-house and legal regulations.

As I have already said in this article, this is only one small detail of my overall experiences as a former ASH patient. I attest to the fact that similar exhibitions of grossly substandard practices and related clinical ineptitude arose on a near daily basis throughout the entirety of my 13 long months at ASH, shockingly illegitimate misconduct that intensifies the higher up the ranks of ASH staff you go, extending as such into the executive offices of ADHS/Behavioral Health Services. And no aspect of my efforts to get any member of ASH’s psychiatric staff to step forward on behalf of their patient clientele was responded to in reasonable terms, an abject pattern of negligence that was also exhibited by ASH administrators during my time there, or their given superiors in the department of health.

     

It need be understood that all ASH patients are disabled by virtue of serious mental illness. The willingness of ASH staff to carry on with their systemic abuse of patients day after day is a blatant violation of myriad state and federal laws, and occurs in complicity with various state agencies who are required as per the public trust to protect the rights of all AZ citizens. This misconduct is condoned on the basis of the fact that ASH patients are hindered by disability- which is patently discriminative in all senses- and only occurs due to the fact that, in facilities such as ASH (or places like ASH), all patients are affected by a gravely disabling illness often limiting intellectual function, which effectively rules out the possibility of any patient successfully reporting these issues as they arise.

Only in places like ASH does this sort of abuse so rampantly occur, with the involved staff basically saying in no uncertain terms "You are mentally ill and do not deserve to the same treatment as other people." This is putting it mildly, in terms of how many of the ASH staff act, and in my observations, this was consistently the attitude of the majority of senior ASH nurses, as well as the psychiatric doctors; and once I turned to the administrative staff at ASH, I only learned that much more soundly that abuse(s) of authority and related dereliction of duty is standard practice anytime the needs of seriously mentally ill and disabled citizens are at stake in Arizona's public health care system. 

It's that bad.

IN CLOSING: What will it take to bring about the reform that I contend needs to be implemented if these matters are to be addressed, at the Arizona State Hospital, and beyond in the public state health care system? At a minimum, all concerned persons must openly voice such concern to each and every elected state official in the book, as it may apply. I invite and encourage anybody of like mind to contact me, this in the hope that open and unfettered dialogue can occur on behalf of the seriously mentally ill and disabled patients at The Arizona State Hospital. Well before any such patient was committed to ASH, there were and are still human beings, not inherently criminal or immoral, and deserving of nothing short of all persons' rights in the context of public health care. 

DATELINE 2018: I mention above that I was married to a nurse in 1990s. I only recalled after writing the above 2012 article that she had done a three week rotation in an Albuquerque area, state managed psychiatric facility (Turquoise House) while acquiring her bachelor of science degree; and her informing me that she could not take seriously the idea of ever working in such a setting because of way staff there routinely mistreated their patient-clientele. Likewise, in my first year of law school (2001-2002), during a phase of focus on medical malpractice in Torts One, a visiting attorney stated "You don't even want to get me started on Arizona State Hospital!"; but given that I did not know the actual status of ASH as a public mental hospital, this too I forgot until after my discharge from ASH in 2012. As such, I did have some inking, possibly latent in form, of what to expect my experiences at ASH would be like; in fact, had I known, I most certainly would have resisted the very idea of being committed to ASH, regardless of my attitude about the need to extended treatment in context. 

"I really hope they have something for you up there." Dr. Van Rhodes, who treated me immediately prior to my 2010 commitment to ASH. Since that time, I have spoken with Dr. Van Rhodes about my experiences at ASH, and he has wholeheartedly supported my efforts to advocate on behalf of ASH patients since day one of this blog. 

As discussed in this 2012 article, the role/point of Arizona State Hospital and other like facilities throughout the United States today, is to optimally treat individuals disabled by mental illness. Emphasis here, on illness that is directly associated to the mind (vs. body), which of course underlies why these hospitals exist in the first place; and why any American is, in fact, involuntarily committed to such facilities, on the basis of identified medical need and deserved health care. 

While it may seem silly to even make this point a topic of discussion, it is imperative to consider the fact that such hospitals routinely appoint chief executive officers (and other like administrative staff) who have little if any professional history outside of the corrections industry. State hospitals are hospitals first and foremost, and should not be interpreted as anything else. Having such unqualified persons at the helm of state managed mental hospitals can and does most certainly contribute to the ineptitude of medical staff employed under their authority, including with regard for the willingness of psychiatric physicians to treat their clientele as anything other then and/or less then who those clients are, in fact: Medical patients. 

The underlying fact for why state managed mental hospitals have such horrific histories in terms of patient abuse has everything to do with patient underrepresentation, as that arises specific to the debilitating affects of serious mental illness. It was only after I witnessed (and reported) technician staff on Palo Verde east physically assault my then roommate and friend Andy H., that I learned from then patient advocate, Sonya Serda, about the inability for her to advocate on his behalf until she was granted opportunity to do so by Andy’s guardians (his parents, who resided in Minnesota).    

While it is true that some number of patients in these type of hospitals do have criminal histories, often rather serious- as in felonious- records of outright shocking “criminal” acts that would typically require extended terms in the corrections industry. But no such state hospital patient winds up in these medical facilities without first being processed through the given legal system’s criminal court, be it at the level of state or federal authority, anywhere in the U.S. today. 

There are variations from one state to the next in terms of the findings of prosecutors and judicial authorities in relation to mental illness, this, with regard for persons found “guilty but insane”, or “not guilty by reason of insanity”, and so on. But regardless of these variations, the bottom line in such findings directly relates to the fact individuals experiencing acute or persistent psychiatric disease at the time of the actual criminal act in question are not responsible for those acts. It should be noted that some states, including Arizona, have guidelines by which some criminal defendants found guilty but insane at the time of the act in question shall be treated in state managed psychiatric facilities until such a time that the individual has been “restored to competency”; wherein the individual shall be referred back to the involved criminal court, and again be indicted for the criminal act in question at the original trial proceeding wherein the defense of guilty but insane granted such individuals the right to receive medical care in state managed medical facilities. 

Joe Saucedo Gallegos
March 2012. After that
point in time that he was deemed
"restored to competency," discharged
from ASH, and retried for having
killed two young boys
in 2010.

In my time at ASH, I came to know (not always pleasantly) a patient named Joe Saucedo Gallegos. I did not know at the time that Gallegos had bludgeoned two little boys to death with a baseball bat in 2010, or that he was a candidate for future indictment and prosecution on the basis of (possibly) being restored to competency. It was only after I left ASH in February, 2012, that I became aware of Gallegos history in this context; and it was only a few months after then that Gallegos was, in fact, deemed restored to competency by the medical staff at ASH, and thus, retried- and convicted- for the original crime in question. Subsequently, Gallegos was sentenced to two separate life sentences in prison with no opportunity of early release. 

As always, and despite my at times negative interactions with Joe Gallegos, I wish him and his family well; and while it is doubtful, I also sincerely hope that he is being reasonably treated for his known psychiatric care needs in Arizona’s state prison system. 

This concern also applies to the fact that Jesus Rincon Murietta is also an inmate in Arizona’s prison system today, a man also affected by serious mental illness, who in all senses should have been returned to ASH prior to the brutal murder of April Mott. This would not be the case, if only Dr. Steven Dingle and virtually all other members of ASH’s medical staff had met their obligations to the public trust in association with Duty to Warn, and openly reported Jesus Rincon Murietta’s escape and presence in Phoenix’s public community. 

Herein again, the fact some state mental hospital patients have very disturbing histories in terms of criminal conduct. But this does not justify any physician or other like medical staff in state mental hospitals to put aside their obligations as per the Hippocratic Oath, etc., in favor of focussing attention on any patients personal history unrelated to identified health care needs. As such, regardless of the whether such individuals have criminal records, it is responsibility of state managed mental hospitals to prioritize the health care needs of each and every patient committed to these facilities, and again, with no emphasis or attention upon issues specific to the legal system. 

As illustrated at the beginning of today’s article, former-since fired ASH CEO Cory Nelson, and his compatriot Jeff Bloomberg, a former-since fired attorney who worked as a “rules expert” for the Arizona Department of Health Services during Nelson’s tenure at ASH, both came to Arizona with far more experience in corrections then anywhere else (Nelson, in fact, left South Dakota under a cloud of fiscal scandal). 

I graphically came to understand how and why the presence of such individuals in executive positions in health care poses threat to the welfare of Hospital patients at that point in time when I had to deal with Nelson on a personal basis, in direct relation to his willingness to overtly retaliate against me on the basis of my openly reporting unlawful staff misconduct to the state’s Office of Human Rights; retaliation that long time ASH chief medical officer Dr. Steven Dingle was 100% complicit in allowing for (he and Nelson both and oh-so foolishly signed the document whereby this retaliation occurred.)

Specifically speaking, no aspect of Hospital protocol was followed when, with no formal notice at all and one business day following the submission of a grievance that had been prepared on my behalf by staff of the Office of Human Rights, I was summarily relocated from ASH’s most peaceful treatment unit, Palo Verde east, to one of the most violent, Desert Sage east (which is where, not so coincidentally, I encountered Joe Saucedo Gallegos). Likewise, with direct reference to Nelson’s role in the death of April Mott in late August, and the related cover-up of Jesus Rincon Murietta’s escape three months earlier, I came to the conclusion that the one person most entrusted to oversee the ASH operation was arguably devoid of understudying the rights and care needs of his patient-clientele at ASH.  

Not that I agree with it, retaliation is an issue well known to the operation of state prisons, and one does not have to be corrections official of inmate to recognize this. “Snitches”, staff associated coercion and intimidation, punitive actions on the basis of inmate complaints, and other such issues are common place in virtually all corrections institutions today, as they long have been. 

But the presence of retaliation and other such staff based misconduct  is perhaps not so commonly known when it comes to the operation of state managed mental hospitals. As the attorney who very recently spoke at a meeting of the ASH Human Rights Committee made clear, administrative abuses of authority arise in places like ASH far more regularly then she would have ever imagined prior to her becoming familiar with issues arising there even today. And out of overt resentment towards any threats to the status quo,  these abuses of authority do include, at times, the role of CEO’s such as Aaron Bowen, who may well take action against employed individuals willing to conscientiously speak out of the patient community,  and/or bodies of patient advocacy- e.g. ASH’s Human Rights Committee.

This is precisely why persons trained and most experienced in the prison industry should not be granted the responsibility of overseeing the operation of state managed mental health care  facilities. The risk of furthering known violations of law and policy when such individuals are appointed to such positions is far too great, and I contend that persons such as Dr. Cara Christ (who appointed Bowen as ASH’s current CEO) should know this. As should have her predecessor, Will Humble, who hired and appointed former-since fired Cory Nelson and Jeff Goldbloom in 2011.

Until these highly entrusted health care officials get up to speed with the overall realities specific to mental health, and the needs and rights of persons affected by mental illness who just so happen to wind up in ASH, I can all but guarantee that we will yet again see the need for the federal government to directly intervene; and can guarantee, in fact, that PJ Reed The Arizona State Hospital and Patient Abuse will continue to expose any/all known violations of patient rights and related shortfalls in patient care there. 

paoloreed@gmail.com