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Patient killed at Atascadero State Hospital

May 29, 2014

ash2An Atascadero State Hospital patient died Wednesday after another patient allegedly attacked the victim. [KSBY]

California Department of State Hospital officials are investigating a homicide that occurred Wednesday afternoon at ASH. The attack allegedly took place around 2:15 p.m. inside a patient dorm room.

Hospital officials then transported the injured patient to the ASH urgent care center. A doctor pronounced him dead, though, just after 3 p.m.

An ASH employee also suffered an injury and went to a local hospital for treatment.

State officials say there are two suspects in the homicide, both of whom are currently in isolation at ASH under the supervision of hospital police officers.


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for isoslo


The third PATIENT (not inmate) was my brother. I’m sure he would have liked a steak dinner before he was murdered, unfortunately your offer is a little too late. Do you know the circumstances that put him in that place? I do. It’s not because he was a criminal, he was a decent man who had a very bad thing happen to him in his childhood that caused permanent, irreversible brain damage. Because of this he lived on the streets as a drifter and did some bad things to survive, but he was not violent and only committed some minor crimes to stay alive. Do you know what happened to the person that caused this damage to him? No you don’t but I do…he lived his life as if nothing had ever happened and died of old age and never gave one thought to the son whos life he destroyed. By the way, that person lived his whole life on the taxpayers dime as well but for vastly different reasons…he did it by choice so he wouldn’t have to do an honest days work. Do you see where I’m going with this? Probably not because you are too self absorbed in your ability to solve all of the worlds problems with a simple steak dinner reward system. Believe me, I am totally fed up with the ‘entitlement nation’ we have become, but I also realize that many of these programs were put into place for people who genuinely need them…my brother fell into that category. As a working person, I paid for his treatment just as much as anybody. I loved my brother very much, his death is not a joke to me. It’s devastated me because, although he may have been just a nameless, faceless ‘criminal’ to you, he was a living, breathing, caring human being to me. He was my brother.


1

The SEIU is taking the taxpayers for a ride.


The SEIU is more evil than the inmates.


0

The SEIU has done some things for which taxpayers are paying a huge bill. However, in the case of ASH, I think they are at least trying to do the right thing in looking out for the safety of the employees. Wages there are good but not extravagant given the difficulties and dangers of the work. Treating/warehousing mentally ill criminals is a case where there aren’t many good options and we don’t have the financial resources to do a good job when we have a good option. It is usually just a case of the least bad option.


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And then put them where? In our prison system? Oh yea, that’ll do! Just transfer the spending from one entity to another, why not, right? One isn’t anymore successful at rehabilitating then the other and one really can’t be discerned from the other, right? Just a bunch of sick fu**’s anyway, right? We don’t have enough prison beds right now, so we’ll build the new one to house these f*cked up criminals right next door to you, right? Oh, again! Not in my f***in’ back yard you won’t! Jeeeeeeeeez!


0

I know it’s easy to demonize the mentally ill, and some of the people housed in Atascadero are indeed very bad people. But many are just sick people who did bad things while in an untreated and uncontrolled state. For all we know, the man killed was in there because he hit someone while convinced they were the devil. For all we know, he had since responded to treatment and was a totally upstanding person.


And in response to the calls to shut the place down, that’s easy to say, but the people don’t disappear with the place. Do we move them to prisons where they would get less treatment, get involved in more violence, and ultimately cost the taxpayers more money? Do we release them to the streets where they would get in more trouble and then just end up in jails and prisons anyway?


It’s easy to criticize anything, but much harder to propose a realistic and workable solution.


0

How do we thank the two criminals for getting rid of the third criminal?. Maybe we should provide them with a fabulous steak dinner for two. Perhaps with the proper reward it will occur again and again and we can then start to use all of the wasted billions “treating” criminals to start helping good citizens who need a little assistance for things like education or health.


-1

isoslo,


Great idea! I’ll get the steaks, you fire up the grill, we’ll invite the rest of your neighbors over and they can bring the sides and drinks… What’s your address? Oh, that’s right! Not in your backyard…. Jeeez!!!


0

You’re on Sunday at one my place 1585 Kansas Ave., SLO


0

LOL!!! You got me on that one! You have more guts than most, isoslo! But please! Let you neighbors know what you’ve just volunteered them for….


0

You missed the joke. It is the County Jail.


0

Whooops! Got me again, and now I’m LMFAO! Guess the neighbors really wouldn’t mind then, right? I’ll bring a big plate of humility…


1

Shut the place down. The lunatics have run the asylum long enough.


0

And then we’ll release them into? Your neighborhood? Yea, that’s the ticket, your neighborhood, right! Oh, of course not! Anywhere but there… Jeeeeez!


0

No….you have it ALL wrong. DON”T release ANY of them. Put them in prison where THEY belong…behind bars, not in dorms,


0

There are many, many, many, many and many more dorm beds in California State Prison then cells. To have it any other way? We’d have to build many, many, many, many and many more prisons as a dorm setting can house many, many, many, many and many more people in the same space. So, can we start right next door to you? I understand the overall aesthetics of the modern prison is a lot less visibly intrusive as compared to the old ones. And your property value? Through the roof! Or was that through the floor?


0

How about general population in prison, where they should have been in the first place? Oh wow what a novel idea.


0

And do what? Set them free to the streets? Let them rampage the prisons with no trained staff to deal with them? Other inmates, non- mentally ill will die. And these guys will go without therapy, meds or proper guidance. Bad Bad idea Pelican.


0

No…you assume too much. Lock them up in prison where they belong. We have enough nuts roaming the streets as it is.

These guys are CRIMINALLY insane and No amount of meds, therapy, or guidance provided by the state will help them in any way.


0

I assume too much? And your assumption of “No amount of meds, therapy, or guidance provided by the state will help them in any way.” is what? A professional opinion based on first hand clinical knowledge on each and every person locked up in these type of facilities across the nation? Wow. You’re a busy person, huh?


0

Why don’t you talk to some people. I have been on a field trip to CMC (Cuesta Class) and to CYA Paso (someone in Ad.min I know) and asked about the recidivism rate. Near 80%. Yea sounds like it’s working great.


Also have read articles over the years talking about child molesters. Most are NOT curable but hey like you say, we can house them over at your place huh, because as long as a TRAINED professional says they are safe for release no problem??


0

80%? Never, not even close. 2012, the last year of CDCR’s current report on the 3 year recidivism rate (they only do reports of this type on a three years basis, next one due out next year), shows less than 65%, and current available numbers in 2014 show that figure has dropped to about 61%. The highest figure recorded is right around 70%, depending on who you get that number from, but never 80%.


And guess what group of offenders show the lowest, by far the lowest, rate of recidivism, sexual offenders! Less than 9% come back for any reason.


A Convicted child molester? Lock ’em up! And don’t give ’em a chance to do it again! Lock ’em up for good! Hospitalize them? Sure. But for the predominant purpose of finding out what makes them “tick” so maybe to better prevent that kind of BS.


0

OK GBG, there are two practical approaches to dealing with these criminally insane felons…lock them up (behind bars) or lobotomize. It’s not rocket science.


0

I guess like BeenThereDoneThat you’ve been on a field trip too? It’s only from such a short trip can someone come up with such a “practical” approach as lobotomizing! You are kidding though, right? Wow, I hope so….


0

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=de00c3ggHLw


0

Here is the problem with this. When did we get to the point of all this touchy feely BULLS*IT?


Terms, like Hospital and dorm room. Hell makes it sound like college. It is PRISON for the mentally F*CKED UP criminals!!!


We have tried this for years and it ISN’T WORKING!!! Lets put them back in lock down and get rid of the open areas. Let’s start calling it what it is so the DON’T FORGET WHY THEY ARE THERE!!!!


0

Oh, I don’t know, BeenThereDoneThat, we probably got to the “…of all this touchy feely BULLS*IT?” when we became better educated? Or was it when we stopped torching witches? Or maybe when they did away with lobotomies? I don’t know, but wherever it started, trying to get back to any point before that would only result in, well, I don’t know, maybe people like you doin’ the things I just mentioned? Me? I’ll stay in the here-and-now and then try goin’ forward tomorrow.


0

Yea GBG I guess your right. I’m not for rapists, child molesters and murders like it sounds like you are. Yea if that is progress you can have it.


0

Wow! I’m sorry, did I miss something? How does anything I said translate to being “for” anyone? Let alone the types you just implied I’m “for”? Again, Wow!


0

Well your last command implying staying the same, (as is) implies to me that you are o.k. with the system of how it is with open dorms and touchy feely with the type of criminals mentioned (that is what ASH houses) so what else would one assume?? And then to suggest that by putting them back behind bars would be draconian, again implies to me that you are all for, let’s not make it to hard on the criminals. Maybe you should convey your thought process better??


0

They are behind bars, and a wall, and a fence and electronic measures that make sure they stay behind all of the fore mentioned. Atascadero is after all a maximum security facility (California’s designation, not mine. A designation you should look into so you get a better sense of what you’re purporting to know).


Here’s what Atascadero ACTUALLY houses:


41% – Mentally disordered offenders (outside of sexual offenders)


17% – Inmates from the Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation who require psychiatric treatment unavailable in the state’s prisons.


30% – Sexual Offenders


12% – Other commitment types, including individuals found incompetent to stand trial and those found not guilty by reason of insanity.


The Atascadero population is more than just murderers, more than just sexual offenders and more that just violent individuals, as you have implied it only houses. But it’s easier to bunch ’em all together, huh? That way your point is valid, whether it’s based on any facts, or not!


But, what do you care what these “rapists, child molesters and murders'” do to one another anyway? Kill each other at Atascadero or Wasco, or San Quentin, or Folsom, or Pelican Bay, what should it matter to you. Oh, I know! Not in my back yard, you won’t!


0

Boy your last paragraph is total hogwash. What do I care if they kill each other? In my original post did I not say…………


” Lets put them back in lock down and get rid of the open areas.”


It has been noted many a times in the 34+ years I have lived here that the open area’s at ASH promotes a hazard for both staff and inmates.


They can easily attack others day or night as it is all open. So it is YOU that sounds like you have utter disregard for their safety, as well as staff that is trying to do their job.


0

One last you must be one of those that strongly defend the criminals and the hell with the victims? I don’t know if this is the case but boy you sure put a lot of time into worrying about criminals. I hope you do the same for victims?


0

I put time in considering the rights of everyone, because if you ignore the rights of one group? Inevitably the rights of all suffer. Proven fact. Just look at the current situation with the likes of the NSA and other entities under Homeland Security; they have ignored the rights of the “criminal” and in turn used that to justify ignoring everybody rights, and we’ve bought into it!


Look, the predominate amount of inmates within CDCR live in open dorm settings in lower security prisons, and when you consider that more inmate caused staff injuries occur in the higher security prisons where most are in cells, your argument to “cell ’em all up” just doesn’t fly. It feels good to say it though, right? “Put ’em a f**in’ cell! Crazy f**in’ lunatics!”


0

GBG I agree about rights but when you commit crimes against others and humanity you leave your rights at the door. Do prisoners vote? No. Why? Because they lost that………….right.


Yes one does have to be careful about the NSA etc as you mentioned but your argument is apples and oranges.


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