Medicated Woman With Schizophrenia Beaten Up By Police

Not a story you will see on the Treatment Advocacy Center’s blog because it doesn’t suit their agenda of associating bad outcomes for people with mental illness with not taking medication.  This is the story of a Virginia woman who had been to her psychiatrist the same day and been given an increase in her medication whose family called the police on the (bad) advice of her psychiatrist’s office instead of taking her to the Emergency Room themselves for help.  The police charged her with domestic violence over a lamp that hurt no one and then beat her up when they had her down on the ground. Nice.  If she had been off medication she and Virginia’s commitment laws would be blamed by the Treatment Advocacy Center, NAMI-Virginia and a number of legislators but since she was treatment compliant, I guess we won’t hear about her case at all from these so called advocates for the mentally ill. 

The real problem is that hatred, fear and ignorance of people with mental illness is at an all time high in this state and so called advocates who push for forced treatment are to blame for much of this rise in hatred, fear and ignorance.

http://content.hamptonroads.com/story.cfm?story=132881&ran=116518
Suit: Beach deputies battered mentally ill woman
By SUSAN E. WHITE AND DUANE BOURNE,
© September 20, 2007
Last updated: 12:14 AM

VIRGINIA BEACH
A 60-year-old woman who is mentally ill has filed a $2 million lawsuit against the city of Virginia Beach, the state and Sheriff Paul Lanteigne.
The lawsuit, filed in Virginia Beach Circuit Court on Tuesday, says Janace Johnson, who has schizoaffective disorder, was wrongfully arrested and prosecuted. It also says Johnson did not receive necessary medical care and that law enforcement officers used excessive force against her while she was in the Virginia Beach jail.
The retired nurses’ aide supervisor was released from jail May 18 with a broken nose, a busted lip, a black eye, broken dentures and other bruises. Sheriff’s officials have said that Johnson, who was 59 at the time, sustained the injuries when she was “taken to the ground” after she “attacked a female deputy.”
The incident occurred after Johnson’s arrest on May 17, on a domestic violence charge. Throughout that day, Johnson’s family said, she was agitated, hallucinating and hearing voices. By nightfall, they said her mental health had deteriorated. She was drinking and chain smoking. Her family called Johnson’s psychiatrist’s office, where she had been earlier in the day and received an increase in her medication. The office advised the family to call police for help.
Virginia Beach attorney Timothy Anderson, who is representing Johnson, said the family thought police would assist in getting an emergency mental health screening for her as had been done several years earlier during a similar episode that led to Johnson’s psychiatric diagnosis and treatment. Instead, Johnson was charged with domestic violence after she kicked a lamp shade down the stairs. Johnson was then taken to jail.
“While she was restrained, she had the living daylights beaten out of her,” Anderson said. “You had untrained deputies who reacted to her behavior as combative when she was extremely mentally ill. She looked like she was in a fight with Mike Tyson.”
The sheriff’s department charged Johnson with felony assault. Video recordings of the jail incident exist, but sheriff’s officials have said they are being withheld because they are “evidence in a criminal prosecution… and they are part of an administrative investigation.”
Sheriff’s Office spokeswoman Paula Miller said Wednesday that the video recordings will remain withheld because of the pending litigation. The administrative portion of the internal investigation is over, Miller said. Details of the findings or any disciplinary action taken were not released, she said, because they are considered a personnel matter.
Anderson said Edwin Johnson, Janace Johnson’s husband, received an anonymous letter in June in which the sender informed him that there was a videotape of the “assault” on his wife.
Later that month, Johnson pleaded guilty to a reduced misdemeanor disorderly conduct charge. She received a suspended sentence of six months, provided she maintained her medication and remained on good behavior for two years.
The domestic violence charge was also dismissed in Juvenile and Domestic Relations Court.
Anderson said the city was included in the lawsuit because there is no safety net in place to ensure that mentally ill patients who arrive at the jail at night are taken to psychiatric hospitals rather than being placed in lock-up.
Mark Stiles, a Virginia Beach deputy city attorney, acknowledged that the city received notice of the complaint but declined to comment on the allegations, because the city had not yet been served.
Susan E. White, (757) 222-5114, susan.white@pilotonline.com
Duane Bourne, (757) 222-5150,
duane.bourne@pilotonline.com

© 2007 HamptonRoads.com/PilotOnline.com