Connecticut lawmakers admit more work needed on Whiting Forensic, CVH

\State lawmakers on Wednesday admitted they have a long way to go in trying to turn around the decadeslong deterioration of conditions and culture at Middletown’s Connecticut Valley and Whiting Forensic psychiatric hospitals.

But after an hourlong discussion in the legislative Public Health Committee, the panel unanimously agreed that until a new psychiatric complex is created within the next few years, staff has to be held accountable and those patients who have been assigned there after committing violent crimes should be better supervised. The bill heads next to the Senate, but committee leaders suggested it may next be reviewed by the Judiciary Committee.

State Rep. Jonathan Steinberg, D-Westport, co-chairman of the panel, warned that a balancing act is needed between the security of patients and the ability of clinicians to allow them access to neighboring areas of the community, including parks, from a facility that in recent years has been exposed for “abominable practices” and patient abuse.

“We are really only at the early stages of this path,” Steinberg said, stressing the underlying need to design and build a new complex. “One of the things that was so obvious is that the existing facility is not suitable in any sense of the word. To suggest that it doesn’t provide quality of life is an understatement. It is perhaps not even humane, and that’s one of the things we have to work on.”

He said while in recent years conditions have improved somewhat,

“It’s very difficult to change a culture very quickly.”

He warned that civil rights of those patients assigned there by the criminal justice system could be at risk.

“This is a struggle for us. It’s not the end of the story. At least we are seriously addressing a problem that had to be addressed.”

Lawmakers cited the July 1989 stabbing murder of 9-year-old Jessica Short, killed by an escapee from the maximum-security Whiting Forensic Hospital, where defendants acquitted from crimes by reason of mental illness are housed and treated.

Rep. Liz Linehan, D-Cheshire, said she is concerned that the rules on day passes for patients in the legislation are inadequate.

“We are here because of the staff shortfalls in Whiting Forensic, but what this legislation is doing is placing far too much trust in the head of an institution, which in the same legislation also determines the need for oversight,” Linehan said, stressing that there is no reference in the bill to clinical violence-and-risk guides.

“I recognize that day passes, it is well-documented, can be beneficial to the treatment of people in the reintegration into society, however, we need to institute guardrails,” Linehan said. Steinberg admitted that the bill will be the subject of further review as the General Assembly heads toward its midnight May 4 adjournment.

“We want to be careful about exposing the public to people who we know have been violent in the past and we don’t want to put them in a circumstance where we could have bad outcomes,” Steinberg said, stressing that dozen of employees have been fired from the facility amid investigations of patient abuse.

“Many of the excesses have been revealed,” Steinberg said. “I think oftentimes we all wonder how could they not know. How could they not have seen what was going on? I think some of it could be attributed to a culture that simply got used to treating people there in a certain fashion and when there were no dissenting voices it became acceptable.”

Last year, a task force studying the long-troubled complex, which also includes patients who voluntarily admit themselves, suggested abolishing the Psychiatric Security Review Board, which supervises people who are found not guilty by reason of insanity, because it favored public safety over patient treatment.

“In no way does this committee or the intent of this legislation, mean to allow someone who is a high-risk or vulnerable in their actions to be released from this facility,” said state Sen. Heather Somers, R-Groton, who has been looking into the psychiatric complex for years. “I know that there has been some talk of that and I want to assure the victims and family members of victims.”

Somers said that a pass for a patient to leave could include a twohour supervised walk in a park. “Temporarily leave does not mean you are released into society with no safeguards,” Somers said. “We are open to making stronger or more specific requirements as this bill moves forward.”

She noted the difference between those brought to the hospitals through civil commitment and patients brought after committing crimes. “It is a facility that when you visit, if you had an animal shelter in your town, I would consider it a nicer facility than what this is,” Somers said.

“There are issues for those who work there, with themselves getting depressed, themselves feeling like this is not a positive work environment,” Somer said. “You can see that when you visit this facility. This is something that you imagine like a third-world penal center to like. We can do better than that in the state of Connecticut. It is important that we change the culture, the atmosphere, the facility that those who work with these patients that are oftentimes very difficult and time-consuming and exhausting have a decent and acceptable place to go to work.”