Red Alert Politics
written by Melissa Quinn
Thursday September 12, 2013
The city of San Francisco is officially firing back against the state of Nevada after a Las Vegas hospital bused psychiatric patients to the city, allegedly “dumping” them at the expense of the city and taxpayers.
San Francisco City Attorney Dennis Herrera filed a class action lawsuit against the Silver State earlier this week, alleging the state-run Rawson-Neal Psychiatric Hospital in Las Vegas sent psychiatric patients to various cities throughout California with a one-way ticket. The litigation seeks an injunction prohibiting Nevada from engaging in such practices and reimbursement for the cost of providing patients care once they arrived.
“Homeless psychiatric patients are especially vulnerable to the kind of practices Nevada engaged in, and the lawsuit I’ve filed today is about more than just compensation — it’s about accountability,” Herrera said in a statement. “What the defendants have been doing for years is horribly wrong on two levels: It cruelly victimizes a defenseless population, and punishes jurisdictions for providing health and human services that others won’t provide. It’s my hope that the class action we’re pursuing against Nevada will be a wake-up call to facilities nationwide that they, too, risk being held to account if they engage in similarly unlawful conduct.”
According to the suit, officials at Rawson-Neal transported more than 24 patients to San Francisco via Greyhound bus between 2008 and 2013. Upon their arrival, the patients were instructed to call 9-11 and seek medical care. 20 0f the patients required medical help mere hours after arriving in the Bay Area, costing the city — and taxpayers — approximately $500,000 in medical care, shelter and basic necessities.
The wrongdoings were originally brought to light after the Sacramento Bee reported the story of a 48-year-old patient at Rawson-Neal in March. James Flavy Coy Brown embarked on a 15-hour bus ride to Sacramento after the hospital sent him to a Greyhound bus station with a one-way ticket to California. He was given snacks and a three-day supply of medicine. Brown suffers from schizophrenia, depression and anxiety, and hospital staff instructed the former patient to call the authorities when he arrived. According to the Sacramento Bee, a doctor from the Las Vegas hospital told Brown California has “excellent health care and more benefits than you could ever get in Nevada.”
News reports following the Sacramento Bee’s findings allege the Nevada hospital sent more than 1,500 psychiatric patients to cities nationwide. According to the lawsuit, 500 alone landed in California.
“Nevada knew many of these patients were not California residents at the time it discharged them to buses bound for California,” the lawsuit states. “…Nevada intentionally and wrongfully appropriated the resources that the destination California cities and counties had established to provide medical care and basic necessities to the indigent, and avoided expending its own public resources to care for these patients.”
Prior to the lawsuit’s filing, Herrera fired a warning shot to Nevada Attorney General Catherine Cortez Masto informing her of his intention to enter into litigation.
“Apart from the public costs borne by California taxpayers for Nevada’s unlawful patient discharge and busing practices, the manner in which these patients were transported was inhumane and unacceptable,” Herrera’s letter to Masto, sent in August, states.
Herrera previously requested a meeting with Masto and Nevada state officials to discuss the Sacramento Bee’s findings, but one was not granted.
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