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Article that mentions BPD and Anna Nicole Smith….
Doctor: Anna Nicole Smith medication ‘overkill’
By LINDA DEUTSCH (AP) – 3 days ago
LOS ANGELES — A hospital psychiatrist testified Friday that medication given to Anna Nicole Smith by a doctor now on trial was “overkill” for the kind of pain she was describing.
Dr. Nathalie Maullin said she believed Smith had “a borderline personality disorder” and was addicted to prescription medications.
Maullin said she was on staff at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center in April 2006 when Smith was brought in pregnant and in withdrawal from anti-anxiety drug Xanax and the pain killer Methadone. The celebrity model told her she had gone “cold turkey,” discontinuing her medications all at once because she was concerned for the welfare of her expected baby.
By doing that, Maullin said, she had actually endangered the baby and herself. The doctor said she quickly resumed her medication with Methadone and began weaning her off Xanax, both of which had been prescribed by Dr. Sandeep Kapoor, a defendant in the drug conspiracy case.
“My thoughts were these were very hard core medications to be giving for the kind of pain she was demonstrating,” said Maullin. “She was on medication that seemed like overkill for the type of pain she was in.”
She said it was difficult to get a medical history from Smith because she was “putting on a show” and was deferring questions to her lawyer-boyfriend, Howard K. Stern, who was with her at all times.
Kapoor, Stern and Dr. Khristine Eroshevich have pleaded not guilty to conspiring to provide excessive opiates and sedatives to Smith. They are also charged with prescribing drugs to an addict, but are not charged with causing her 2007 overdose death.
Maullin said Stern told her Smith had been suffering from back pain for five years. She said the former Playboy model also complained of pain in her upper back and arm.
Another doctor who testified earlier this week said Smith suffered from chronic pain syndrome all over her body.
Maullin said she conferred with Kapoor by phone, gave him her plan for weaning Smith off Xanax and any drugs known as benzodiazopines which can be addictive. She said he agreed and told her he would leave the prescribing of Methadone to her.
“Did you see any pain that needed treatment with opiates?” asked the prosecutor.
“No,” Maullin said.
The problem was that Smith showed no enthusiasm for the plan, the doctor said.
“It was like pulling teeth to get some response from her,” she said. “She was compliant but not really interested. She was not wholehearted.”
Five days after Smith checked in to the hospital, Maullin said she received a page at midnight from a nurse that said Smith’s eyes had rolled back in her head.
That sounded like a drug reaction and a one-time dose of Benadryl was prescribed, Maullin said. However, the next day, she received another call saying Smith was having hallucinations.
“The nurse said that she was flossing her teeth with no floss and was out of it,” Maullin said. “This was a radical change.”
Under questioning by Deputy District Attorney David Barkhurst, Maullin said she did not consider this an emergency and she tended to other patients before going to see Smith five hours later.
“In psychiatry, we are used to seeing patients do strange things,” she said.
Upon her arrival, Stern told Maullin that Smith “was generally acting goofy.” Smith was angry and made no eye contact but seemed lucid, Maullin said.
The psychiatrist said she suggested that Smith go into an inpatient facility that deals with addicts. But Smith wasn’t interested and told Stern she wanted to leave the hospital.
Maullin said she informed Kapoor and he said he would go to her house.
“I thought that was unusual,” she said. “Physicians generally see patients in the office or the hospital. There was no reason she could not leave her home to come to see him. Just in terms of proper boundaries with patients, you see them in your office.
“She needed to participate in her care,” Maullin said. “It’s not a home delivery service.”
 Lindsay Lohan Breaks Down in Court Well, it’s been some time since I have written anything about celebrities with possible borderline personality disorder. Personally, I wish some celeb would just come out and admit that they have the disorder and help others by showing that there’s effective evidence-based treatments for BPD. I guess the stigma is too great and they feel that it would hurt their careers. Of course, for some, their behavior is what is hurting their careers. Today, I am turning again to Lindsay Lohan (click here to see all posts about LiLo). Lately I have been receiving a ton of alerts with news stories that contain LiLo’s name and reference BPD. These are usually in the user comments. I can’t find a single legit magazine or news article that has speculated on BPD and LiLo. Recently, her behavior has accelerated, even as she is facing jail. Here are some recent articles that could indicate that (in combo) LiLo has BPD (remember, this is just speculation at this point):
Lindsay Lohan goes Doctor Shopping
http://entertainment.oneindia.in/hollywood/top-stories/scoop/2010/lilodoes-doctor-shopping-for-prescriptionmeds.html
Washington, July 12 (ANI): Lindsay Lohan apparently obtains her dangerous combination of prescription drugs through “doctor shopping” across the country.
According to a source, Lohan goes to six different doctors for prescriptions.
“When one doctor says no to refilling a prescription, she will go to the next. It’s a whole process to get what she needed, ” TMZ quoted the source as saying.
Lindsay who has prescriptions for- Zoloft (antidepressant), Trazodone (antidepressant), Adderall (stimulant to control ADHD), Nexium (acid reflux) and the extremely powerful painkiller Dilaudid, have doctors both in Los Angeles and New York.
In fact, one of her past rehab facilities still prescribes her meds.
The source even added that, Lohan “would get a large supply every time” she visited a doctor.
Lindsay Lohan and Suicidal Ideation
http://www.hollywoodlife.com/2010/07/14/lindsay-lohan-suicide-watch-kill-herself-jail-90-days/
Lindsay Lohan would rather kill herself than be locked away in jail. The 24-year-old actress is reportedly so upset over the 90 day jail sentence looming over her since July 6, that she’s threatening to take her own life.
“She just kept repeating, ‘I can’t go to jail,’ and, ‘I’ll kill myself first,’” a source tells Star magazine. “She’s mentally unstable and getting worse.”
After Lindsay’s discovered she’d be serving time at the Century Regional Detention Facility in Lynwood, Calif., Star reports she went home and broke everything in sight.
“She ran around breaking mirrors, cutting herself and rambling like a lunatic. She tore her house apart before she finally just broke down,” reveals a source. “Lindsay’s on a 24/7 suicide watch, it’s so bad. She isn’t doing well with this.”
Not only is Lindsay going around saying she wants to kill herself but she’s taking a lethal dose of prescription drugs.
“She has been doctor shopping across the country,” she says. “She is utterly unable to control her use of any mind-altering substance.”
Lindsay Lohan and Self-Injury
http://www.radaronline.com/exclusives/2009/11/exclusive-self-harm-sign-%E2%80%9Cseverely-disturbed-behavior%E2%80%9D
In shocking phone conversations exclusively obtained by RadarOnline.com Lindsay Lohan’s mom, Dina, is heard expressing her concern over her daughter’s self mutilation. And with good reason, as experts in the field tell RadarOnline.com that self harm is often just one factor of greater, underlying emotional issues.
Renown psychotherapist, and author of Cutting: Understanding and Overcoming Self-Mutilation, Dr. Steven Levenkron tells RadarOnline.com that Lindsay’s behavior is a sign of disturbed psychiatric behavior and that it will take time and energy to help her heal. “Whether (a given patient’s) condition is termed being ‘out of touch with reality,’ ‘psychotic,’ or ‘in a diagnosed state,’ the scene constitutes severely disturbed psychiatric behavior,” Levenkron says. “ This is the element that must be present in order to meet the criteria for self-injury. ‘Severely disturbed behavior’ does not mean hopeless, but it does mean that it will take a long time, lots of focused attention, and an intense emotional bond between helper and sufferer in order to repair the damage.”
And Dr. Wendy Lader, PHD, President and Clinical Director of the S.A.F.E ALTERNATIVES program, a nationally recognized treatment approach, professional network and resource base, and an international speaker on self-injury elaborates, telling RadarOnline.com, “The main reason for self injury is to deal with emotional regulation. For whatever reason it helps them to calm down.
“People who self harm have the inability to communicate the depth of their feelings.
Continue reading Lindsay Lohan and possible BPD (more detail this time) →
Here’s a NY Times Article about a man charged with assisted (or encouraging) suicide. He allegedly did so over the Internet. It is one to watch to see if free speech on the Internet will be regulated. I NEVER advocate suicide (obviously). I wonder however how this case (or if) will impact the back-and-forth dialog in chat rooms and online groups, such as ATSTP.
May 13, 2010
Online Talk, Suicides and a Thorny Court Case
The seemingly empathetic nurse struck up conversations over the Internet with people who were pondering suicide. She told them what methods worked best. She told some that it was all right to let go, that they would be better in heaven, and entered into suicide pacts with others.
But the police say the nurse, who sometimes called herself Cami and described herself as a young woman, was actually William F. Melchert-Dinkel, a 47-year-old husband and father from Faribault, Minn., who now stands charged with two counts of aiding suicide.
Mr. Melchert-Dinkel, whose lawyer declined an interview request on his behalf, told investigators that his interest in “death and suicide could be considered an obsession,” court documents say, and that he sought the “thrill of the chase.” While the charges stem from two deaths — one in Britain in 2005 and one in Canada in 2008 — Mr. Melchert-Dinkel, who was indeed a licensed practical nurse, told investigators that he had most likely encouraged dozens of people to kill themselves, court documents said. He said he could not be sure how many had succeeded.
The case, chilling and ghoulish, raises thorny issues in the Internet age, both legal and otherwise. For instance, many states have laws barring assisting suicide, but rarely have cases involved people not in the same room (much less the same country) or the sharing of only words (not guns or pills).
The case also brings up questions about the limits of speech on the Internet: How does one assign levels of culpability to someone who shares thoughts with people who say they are already considering suicide? And for some who counsel against suicide, it points to a growing area for worry, an online world where the most isolated and vulnerable might be touched in a way that they would not have in the past.
Groups that work to prevent suicide compare suicide chat rooms to “pro-ana” sites, Internet sites that portray anorexia as a lifestyle as opposed to a disease. Anti-suicide advocates say that there has been more than one instance recently where a person killed himself on a Webcam as others watched. Papyrus, a charity in Britain that works to stop young people from killing themselves, says it has tracked 39 cases in that country alone where young people committed suicide after visits to “pro-suicide” chat rooms.
It was the untrained, unpaid Internet sleuthing by Celia Blay, a 65-year-old from a tiny community in Britain, that helped lead to charges in April against Mr. Melchert-Dinkel. “He was practically invisible,” she said. “I tried to talk to any police I could, and most of them would have nothing to do with it. The first one I talked to told me, ‘If it bothers you, look the other way.’ And that really bothered me, because by then I was pretty sure people had died.”
About four years ago, Ms. Blay, who describes herself as a “computer illiterate,” became friends online with a young, depressed woman who had entered into a suicide pact. Ms. Blay persuaded her not to proceed, but the incident sent Ms. Blay searching for the other member of the pact. It was someone who called herself Li Dao, another screen name that the police later said Mr. Melchert-Dinkel used.
Making inquiries on a Web site aimed at people talking about suicide, Ms. Blay said she found at least half a dozen people who had similar pacts with Li Dao, a name that popped up on all sorts of suicide Web sites. She and a friend uncovered Mr. Melchert-Dinkel’s name and e-mail address after setting up a sting in which her friend posed as someone preparing for suicide and was, she said, approached by Mr. Melchert-Dinkel.
By then, the police in Minnesota say, Mr. Melchert-Dinkel had already aided the suicide of Mark Drybrough, 32, of Coventry, England. A coroner’s report found that Mr. Drybrough, who was suffering from a psychiatric illness, hanged himself from a ladder in his home in July 2005. His computer showed that he had posted a question in a suicide chat room about how to hang oneself without access to something high to tie a rope to, and that Li Dao — Mr. Melchert-Dinkel, the police say — had offered details on how to use a door.
In March 2008, Nadia Kajouji, 18, disappeared from her college in Ottawa. The Canadian authorities investigating her disappearance searched her laptop and discovered that she had been talking online with a person who used the screen name Cami. In e-mail messages, the authorities say, the pair agreed to a pact in which Ms. Kajouji would jump from a bridge into a river (to avoid, at Cami’s suggestion, the police say, creating a mess) and Cami would hang herself a day later. In April 2008, Ms. Kajouji’s body was found in the Rideau River.
Around the same time, Ms. Blay contacted the St. Paul Police Department through an acquaintance in Minnesota. By then, she said, she had grown frustrated with what she described as the authorities’ unwillingness to study the huge file she had amassed with the stories of 20 to 30 people who had been approached online. Over time, she said, she had tried to tell the story to a police department near her home, a member of parliament and even law enforcement in the United States.
Since at least the 1970s, many states have barred assisted suicide, though criminal charges are rarely filed. Physician-assisted suicide is allowed under certain conditions in Oregon and Washington.
In Minnesota, 12 charges of aiding suicide have been brought since 1994, when the state began keeping track, and about half of those have resulted in convictions. That state’s law, a felony, applies to “whoever intentionally advises, encourages or assists” another in taking his or her own life; convictions carry sentences of up to 15 years in prison.
Barbara Coombs Lee, the president of Compassion and Choices, who has advocated for laws like the one in Oregon, said she found it “perfectly appropriate” that Mr. Melchert-Dinkel faces such charges. “This is so egregious, so clearly wrong, that I’ll be very disappointed if assisted-suicide statutes do not reach this,” she said. “There is a bright line between aid in dying and assisting in suicide like this.”
Still, legal experts suggested that there may be room for challenges. The Minnesota law itself, some suggested, could be seen as too ambiguous or too broad to include protected speech that falls short of actually leading someone to suicide. The deaths occurred in other jurisdictions, posing potential issues, other lawyers said.
Terry A. Watkins, a lawyer for Mr. Melchert-Dinkel, said it was premature to describe what defense he intends to present but made it clear that he had questions about the law itself, as well as the dissection of causes that lead to any suicide. “As a society, we need to be careful when we start putting together laws that prohibit things like ‘encouragement’ without a really clear definition of what in God’s name you’re talking about,” he said.
Mr. Melchert-Dinkel, who is scheduled to be arraigned on May 25 in Rice County District Court, has had his nursing license revoked. He had held it since 1991, despite a record that included repeated discipline for complaints of leaving a nursing home patient unattended, being too rough, sleeping on duty, failing to take vital signs and failing to track a patient’s medications.
But Mr. Watkins said his client was basically a good person. “This is not a monster,” he said.
Shortly after the police interviewed Mr. Melchert-Dinkel last year, he checked into a local emergency room, state records show, saying that he was dealing with an addiction to suicide Internet sites and feeling guilty over advice he had given to people to end their lives.
Apparently not…
 Marriage and BPD http://newsinfo.inquirer.net/breakingnews/metro/view/20100401-261988/Are-personality-disorders-enough-bases-to-nullify-marriage
Are personality disorders enough bases to nullify marriage?
By Tetch Torres
INQUIRER.net
Posted date: April 01, 2010
MANILA, Philippines—Being a “mama’s boy,” immature, or self indulgent, are not grave enough causes to allow the annulment of marriage, the Supreme Court said.
Jordan and Jeanice Paz met on November 1996, became a couple on May 10, 1997 and got married two months later. She gave birth to a son in 1998 but left Jordan a year later after a big fight.
She filed a petition for declaration of nullity of marriage against Jordan in 1999 accusing her husband of being psychologically incapable of assuming the essential obligations of marriage.
Jeanice said her husband had a tendency to lie about his whereabouts, had the habit of hanging a great deal of time with his friends. Since Jordan worked in their family business, he opted to stay home and tinker with his playstation. She said Jordan even asked her to lie to his brother about his whereabouts. She added that after giving birth to their son, her husband demanded from his mother a steady supply of milk and diapers. She added that he subjected her to verbal lashing and even threatened to hit her with a golf club.
Psychologist Cristina Gates testified that Jordan has a “borderline personality disorder” due to his impulsive behavior, delinquency and instability and with no indication of reformation, his disorder was grave and incorrigible.
Jordan argued that even his wife was also immature, childish and was emotionally unable to cope with the struggles of maintaining a married life. He also questioned Gates’ findings saying she did not interview him.
The Pasig City Regional Trial Court Branch 69 in 2003 nullified the marriage of Jordan and Jeanice based on the findings of Gates which was also affirmed by the Court of Appeals in 2004.
But the high court reversed the findings of both courts as it pointed out that for a marriage to be annulled, the psychological disorder must be “confined to the most serious cases of personality disorders clearly demonstrative of an utter insensitivity or inability to give meaning and significance to the marriage.”
“Moreover, contrary to the ruling of the trial court, Jordan’s alleged psychological incapacity was not shown to be so grave and so permanent as to deprive him of the awareness of the duties and responsibilities of the matrimonial bond. At best, Jeanice’s allegations showed that Jordan was irresponsible, insensitive, or emotionally immature. The incidents cited by Jeanice do not show that Jordan suffered from grave psychological maladies that paralyzed Jordan from complying with the essential obligations of marriage.”
“What the law requires to render a marriage void on the ground of psychological incapacity is downright incapacity, not refusal or neglect or difficulty, much less ill will,” the high court said.
The high court added that all people may have certain quirks that can be attributed to isolated characteristics associated with certain personality disorders but that is not enough to invalidate a marriage.
©Copyright 2001-2010 INQUIRER.net, An Inquirer Company
I was disturbed to read this column in which Caroline Hutchinson of (apparently) “Mix FM” (some sort of radio station) said this about a story in which a boy was bullyed at a disco in Sydney. What I find troubling about her post about the incident is this… She says:
There is a diagnosable condition known as a personality disorder. According to the American Psychiatric Association personality disorder typically rears its ugly head in late adolescence but, in rarer instances, childhood. It’s subjective, but a person with borderline personality disorder, should exhibit three or more of the following:
1. Failure to conform to lawful social norms – repeatedly performing acts that are grounds for arrest;
2. Deceitfulness – repeated lying, use of aliases, or conning others for personal profit or pleasure;
3. Impulsivity or failure to plan ahead;
4. Irritability and aggressiveness – repeated physical fights or assaults;
5. Reckless disregard for safety of self or others;
6. Consistent irresponsibility – repeated failure to sustain consistent work behaviour or honour financial obligations;
7. Lack of remorse – being indifferent to or rationalising having hurt, mistreated, or stolen from another.
I’m no psychologist but if you ticked too many of those boxes for yourself or a loved one, with a GP’s referral you can see a qualified psychologist for free in Australia. One referral entitles any Medicare cardholder to 12 free consultations and 12 group sessions.
No, you’re not psychologist all right. The criteria to which she is referring is the criteria for Anti-social Personality disorder, not Borderline Personality Disorder. I think before you post something about which you know next to nothing about, at least get it fact-checked.There’s already enough stigma around BPD without having people attribute ASPD criteria to it as well.
An article “clarifying” the latest Courtney Love custody decision…
Courtney Love in wake of losing custody of Frances Bean: ‘terrible influences, pure evil’
By Vicki Hyman/The Star-Ledger
December 15, 2009, 10:29AM
 Courtney and Frances Bean Courtney Love has left a string of only occasionally coherent messages on her Facebook page in the wake of a Los Angeles court decision to give temporary custody of Frances Bean Cobain to the girl’s paternal grandmother: “cruelty to children and people too young to understand that under that rock isnt gold its only,.,,,,, utah on steroids” and “terrible influences, pure evil. and a poor baby caught inside a trap”.
That clears things up.
Love’s lawyer tells People that Frances Bean, Love’s daughter with dead rock icon Kurt Cobain, wanted to live with her grandmother, and the judge’s decision should not be taken as confirmation that Love has had a drug relapse.
“Courtney’s been clean for years and is perfectly fine,” Keith A. Fink says. “Frances is 17 and a strong-willed child, and this is a decision she made on her own. No matter what, Courtney loves her daughter more than anything in the world.”
Frances Bean has reportedly always been close with her grandmother, who had custody during a particularly messy period (and that’s saying something) of Love’s life in 2003 and 2004.
From Bloomberg…
Mental Health Coverage Expanded by Rescue Package (Update2)
By Aliza Marcus
Oct. 3 (Bloomberg) — Health insurers that provide mental- health benefits will be barred from providing less coverage than they do for other medical services under the $700 billion financial-markets rescue package approved by Congress.
The plan was backed by a 263-171 vote in the House of Representatives today and signed by President George W. Bush. The package incorporates a measure requiring so-called mental health parity for health plans enrolling more than 50 employees.
“Aren’t we all pleased across America that this legislation includes the mental health parity act?” House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, a California Democrat, said in a speech before the vote.
The mental-health measure was among provisions added to the financial rescue package to win support after the House initially rejected the bailout legislation. The Senate, which supported the expansion of mental health coverage benefits in tax legislation passed last month, approved the revised financial rescue plan on Oct. 1.
“It seemed like it was getting lost after the bailout issue arose, but now with this bill it’s just happened,” said Steve Vetzner, spokesman for the Mental Health America advocacy group in Alexandria, Virginia. “This has been a long struggle and long fight.”
The act is intended to eliminate what supporters call unequal access to care from insurers that set higher co-payments and other limitations on services such as mental health counseling compared with physical ailments.
$3.4 Billion
The House and Senate previously disagreed about how to cover the cost to the federal government of the expanded benefit, estimated at $3.4 billion over five years by the Congressional Budget Office in 2007.
The estimate is related to tax revenue that would be lost because employers would pay more for health insurance premiums, to cover the expanded benefits, instead of turning over some of this money as taxable wages to employees.
Health insurers and businesses worked with Congress on the measure, which built up wide support from stakeholders in the health-care field, said Aetna Inc. Chief Executive Officer Ronald Williams in a statement on Business Wire.
“They had a deal for a long time,” said Kim Monk, an analyst at Capital Alpha Partners, in Washington, in a telephone interview. “The challenge was how to off-set the cost,”
Employers will now be looking for well-managed mental health networks to help them reduce costs associated with implementing the legislation, Monk said. “Not all insurers have this, so they may have to beef it up.”
To contact the reporter on this story: Aliza Marcus in Washington at amarcus8@bloomberg.net
Last Updated: October 3, 2008 15:26 EDT
This is an editorial from the NY Times…
October 1, 2008
Editorial
Oh So Close to Mental Health Parity
Congress is within a whisker of passing a sound and fair-minded bill to require that group health insurance coverage for mental illness and substance abuse be provided on the same terms as coverage for physical illnesses. It would be a shame if the legislation, which caps more than a decade of struggle to achieve mental health parity in insurance coverage, were allowed to die while Congressional energies are focused on the all-consuming economic crisis.
The bill would not require employers or health plans to cover mental illness or drug or alcohol abuse. But if they do, the treatment limits and financial requirements could be no more restrictive than those that apply to medical or surgical benefits. A 1996 law had required parity in setting annual and lifetime spending limits, but insurers found ways to circumvent it. The new bill closes loopholes by requiring parity in deductibles, co-payments and out-of-pocket expenses — and in setting treatment limitations, such as the maximum number of doctor visits and days of coverage allowed.
The bill is endorsed by President Bush, business groups, insurance companies, the medical community and mental health advocates. Both the House, in a stand-alone bill, and the Senate, as part of a broader tax relief bill, have approved it by large margins. But it requires a final shove because the measure is snarled in a broader legislative struggle over how to pay for tax revenues that would be reduced by this measure and others. Is there a statesman who can push this worthy parity legislation through to final passage before adjournment?
 Well, I haven’t written anything EVER about Andy Dick… but I read an article today that puts him high on the celebrity BPD meter… I also watch the YouTube clip of him being thrown off of Jimmy Kimmel’s show. Here is the article and the clip:
Comedian Andy Dick arrested in drug, sexual battery case in Murrieta
From the Associated Press
Andy Dick, 42, was arrested today on suspicion of drug use and sexual battery in Murrieta.
The former ‘NewsRadio’ star allegedly fondled a teen and pulled down her tank top outside a restaurant. Police say they found marijuana and Xanax in his possession.
By David Kelly, Los Angeles Times Staff Writer
July 17, 2008
Actor and comedian Andy Dick, who has a history of run-ins with the law, was arrested early Wednesday outside a Murrieta restaurant on suspicion of sexual battery and drug possession.
Police said Dick, who was heavily intoxicated, grabbed and fondled the breast of a 17-year-old girl before pulling her top down in the parking lot of the Buffalo Wild Wings Grill & Bar about 1:15 in the morning.
“The victim was traumatized by this,” said Lt. Dennis Vrooman, spokesman for the Murrieta Police Department.
Police later found one gram of marijuana and one Xanax anti-anxiety pill in Dick’s pocket. He was arrested and later released on $5,000 bail.
It was the latest in a string of encounters that Dick, 42, has had with authorities. The former star of the comedy series “NewsRadio” was cited last year in Columbus, Ohio, for urinating in public. He was kicked off the set of “Jimmy Kimmel Live” for repeatedly touching fellow guest Ivanka Trump. In 1999 he drove his car into a telephone pole and was charged with possession of cocaine and marijuana.
Calls to his manager were not returned.
Vrooman said police had already warned Dick about his intoxication before he went to the restaurant. Officers had encountered the comedian while responding to an altercation at the Corner Pocket Sports Cafe in Murrieta about 9 p.m. Tuesday. They told him to leave or face possible arrest on public intoxication charges. He left with five or six friends.
Dick, who listed his address as Woodland Hills, told officers he was in town to attend the funeral of a friend’s father.
Later that night, Dick and his entourage arrived at the Buffalo Wild Wings and began drinking, police said. He was recognized by several patrons, including the alleged victim, who approached him.
Vrooman said the girl, who is from Murrieta, tried to talk to Dick but backed off when she realized how intoxicated he was.
Sara Lidman, one of the restaurant managers, would say only that Dick was in the bar with friends.
Police said that when Dick left he spotted the girl and her friend in the parking lot and shouted, “There are the girls!”
“He groped her breast with his right hand, then pulled down her top,” Vrooman said.
The teen’s friend called police.
When they arrived, they found Dick in the front seat of a Honda pickup truck heading toward a nearby Sam’s Club parking lot.
Officers stopped the truck and forced all the men inside to line up so the girl could identify the man who allegedly groped her. She pointed to Dick.
A search of his pockets turned up the Xanax and marijuana. He did not have a prescription for the Xanax, police said.
Vrooman said Dick was belligerent at first and then answered officers’ questions.
On Saturday, Dick was spotted at Pepe’s Mexican Restaurant and Cantina in Canyon Lake in Riverside County.
“My understanding was that he was drinking soda water and was not drunk,” said Pepe’s owner Marty Gibson. “There was no altercation that I heard of.”
Dick was arrested on suspicion of sexual battery, possession of a controlled substance and possession of marijuana, and he may yet be charged with public intoxication, Vrooman said.
He is scheduled to be arraigned Aug. 12 in Murrieta.
david.kelly@latimes.com
Times staff writer Harriet Ryan contributed to this report.
The video.
Ignored Psych patient dies in NY hospital….
Ignored Psych Patient Dies on Hospital Floor
Video Shows Death in NYC Hospital Already Faces a Lawsuit for ‘Squalid’ Psych Care
By DAVID SCHOETZ
July 1, 2008—
Even pared down to a few minutes, the hour-long surveillance video is disturbing.
At 5:32 a.m. June 19, a woman in a hospital gown in the waiting area of the psychiatric emergency room of a New York City hospital topples first to her knees before collapsing on her face.
A full hour passes. Other people stream in and out of the waiting room, including hospital security guards. The woman writes something on the ground before going completely still. Finally, someone takes notice and alerts the staff. But by then, at 6:36 a.m., the woman is already dead.
The woman, 49-year-old Esmin Green, died on the floor of the waiting room at the Kings County Hospital Center Psychiatric Emergency Department. Her exact cause of death has not been released.
The native of Jamaica, who had been waiting for a bed when she collapsed, had been involuntarily admitted the previous day for “agitation and psychosis,” according to the City Health and Hospital Corp., which acknowledged June 20 that Green had been left unattended on the ground for an hour.
Alan Aviles, the president of the Health and Hospital Corp., had already announced that six hospital employees, including staff members who oversee patient care and security, face disciplinary action for their lack of response. Two of the employees were fired, while four unionized staff members must go through termination proceedings.
The hospital, in the Brooklyn borough of New York City, may have a much bigger problem on its hands. In May, Kings County Hospital was targeted in a federal lawsuit by three organizations that described hospital conditions as “inhumane.” Attorneys for the plaintiff released the footage of Green’s death Monday night to illustrate in brutal detail some of the allegations made in the suit.
The Mental Hygiene Legal Service, New York Civil Liberties Union and Kirland & Ellis LLP filed the lawsuit after an investigation at the hospital “showed that Kings County psychiatric facilities are overcrowded and often dangerously unsanitary and that patients — including children and the physically disabled — are routinely ignored and abused,” according to the groups’ May 3 release announcing the suit.
The groups claim that alleged mistreatment of patients at the hospital is a violation of the federal Americans With Disabilities Act as well as several New York State provisions that guarantee the delivery of mental health services in a safe and sanitary manner.
Aviles is named as one of the lead defendants in the 36-page suit, which specifically cites five patients, all with some type of disability, who allege “abusive and neglectful” treatment at Kings County.
One patient, L.D., claimed that she was laughed at when she asked to call her family and was placed in a bed with soiled sheets. Another patient, identified as J.P., said that she had to sleep sitting up in a wheelchair after she got up in the night to use the bathroom and returned to find another patient in her bed.
The New York Daily News reported that in addition to the neglect in Green’s case, staff members entered false information into her medical chart during the hour in which she lay on the ground to cover up the lack of treatment.
At 6 a.m. on the morning of her death, according to the Daily News, Green’s medical chart reportedly listed the patient as “awake, up and about, went to the bathroom.” Green had been in the same spot on the ground for more than a half-hour. At 6:08 a.m., she stopped moving, according to the footage. But her chart described her at 6:20 a.m. as “sitting quietly in the waiting room.” In reality, she may have already been dead.
Ana Marengo, a spokeswoman for the Health and Hospital Corp., would not address the exact entries in Green’s medical chart, but did say, “There appears to be some discrepancies” that have been forwarded, along with the entire case, to various New York City investigative departments.
“It is clear that some of our employees failed to act based on our compassionate standards of care,” administrators wrote in a statement last night that followed the video’s release.
Hospital administrators outlined a series of improvements already made to the Kings County psychiatric program, including the addition of staff and expanding space to cope with overcrowding. They pledged a series of improvements, including the appointment of an “interim administrator” who will report directly to Aviles, and a guarantee that patients in the psychiatric emergency unit will be checked on every 15 minutes.
In June, USA Today reported that nearly 80 percent of hospitals said that mentally ill patients sometimes wait up to four hours or more for emergency care, citing a study by the American College of Emergency Physicians that surveyed 328 emergency medical directors.
Physicians blamed the delayed care on shrinking budgets that have prompted many hospitals to either consolidate mental health services or shut them down completely. Since 2000, the number of psychiatric beds has dropped 12 percent, according to the medical organization’s statistics.
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