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Orlando Sentinel

Thursday, July 10, 2003

Reprinted with permission of the author. All rights reserved.

OPED
As tragedies mount, proven solution is ignored

By Donald Eslinger

Five years ago this week, a bad law killed Deputy Eugene Gregory and Alan Singletary.

Florida's Baker Act keeps families from getting help for loved ones with untreated severe mental illnesses until they become dangerous, and then limits that help to inpatient treatment. Florida is one of only nine states that doesn't allow court-ordered outpatient treatment, a proven way to help people stay on their medication while remaining in the community.

People with severe mental illnesses are four times more likely to be killed in a confrontation with law enforcement than the general public. Like Singletary, 43, who killed Gregory during a 13-hour standoff in which he also wounded two other law-enforcement officers before being killed himself. Singletary's family had tried for years to get him help for his paranoid schizophrenia, but the Baker Act stood in their way.

This April, the Florida House wisely approved a Baker Act reform bill by an overwhelming 113 to 2. The momentum for passage was strong, but a short session and a procedural maneuver kept the bill from a full vote in the Senate.

So instead of reform, Floridians face continued tragedies. So far in 2003, states such as New York have been using assisted outpatient treatment to reduce hospitalization, homelessness, arrests, incarceration, harmful behavior and victimization. We are still waiting.

People in New York's program, Kendra's Law, experienced a 77 percent reduction in hospitalizations. That could have helped Alan Houseman, hospitalized under the Baker Act 13 times. His disproportionate use of emergency psychiatric services ended when he was killed in March in an altercation with a Tampa police officer after once again stopping medication.

In New York, homelessness was reduced 85 percent for Kendra's Law participants. That could make a big difference in Florida, where an estimated 15,000 Floridians with untreated mental illness are homeless. Like Thomas Albert Wallace, 52, who was fatally shot by police in May in St. Petersburg. Wallace reportedly threatened someone with a knife, then attacked responding officers, who killed him. Wallace was a marine biologist with a master's degree -- and untreated schizophrenia.

New York's law also resulted in an 83 percent reduction in arrests. A similar reduction in arrests in Florida might have diverted J.C. Conyers, 40, from the terrible path he was on when he was shot and killed in May after attacking two Orange County deputies. His brother explained that Conyers had his biggest problems when he didn't take medication for schizophrenia. He had a history of 21 arrests -- a ridiculous expenditure of resources.

Fewer arrests would also mean fewer incarcerations. Between 7,511 and 10,798 inmates with severe mental illnesses are in Florida's jails -- three to four times more people than are in remaining state psychiatric hospitals. The 83 percent reduction in arrests noted in New York could reduce this population, and might have saved Ryan Thomas Green, 19, who has been in Escambia County Jail since February on charges of first-degree murder and attempted first-degree murder. It also could have saved his alleged victims, a 59-year-old retired Pensacola police officer and a 26-year-old house painter, who were killed and critically injured, respectively, in the shooting spree. Green had quit taking medications for schizoid tendencies and bipolar disorder in December.

People with severe mental illnesses who are taking medication are no more violent than the general population. But when they stop medication, the risk of violence increases. New Yorkers in the Kendra's Law program saw the risk of harm to others reduced by 44 percent, and a study by Duke University showed a reduction in violence of 50 percent. A 2002 North Carolina study also showed that individuals with severe psychiatric disorders who were on outpatient commitment, and thus were taking their medication regularly, were victimized half as often as those who were not on outpatient commitment. Victimization is one of the consequences of lack of treatment that often fails to make headlines. Yet multiple studies have shown that individuals with severe psychiatric disorders are especially vulnerable to being victimized. Like Colleen Francis Wells, who was allegedly beaten to death by her son in April, a sad example of how reducing violence and victimization would have saved two people in one family. Both Colleen and her son, David Bruce Wells, had schizophrenia and were known to stop taking medication. David Wells had been previously involuntarily committed and had an extensive criminal history that ended up erupting in violence.

When Gene and Alan died, we hoped that a new law would prevent similar tragedies.

We are still waiting.

Donald F. Eslinger is Sheriff of Seminole County and Legislative Chair of the Florida Sheriffs Association.

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