Psychiatric Abuses:

NEW YORK STATE

Between 1990 and 2004, 42 psychiatrists, psychologists and psychiatric personnel were convicted of crimes including sexual assault, health insurance fraud, murder, perjury and drug-related offenses. The combined incarceration time was 97 years, plus one life sentence for murder. Fines and restitution totaled more than $3.5 million. 1  In the state of New York an estimated 7,000 people receive Electroshock treatment annually, frequently against their will. Court-ordered electroshock treatment increased 73 percent in New York state psychiatric hospitals between 1999 and 2001. Damage from electroshock treatment includes permanent memory loss, brain damage, depression and death. 2  There are 135,000 psychiatric emergency visits per year in New York State alone. An average of 8.5% of these emergency patients will be put in mechanical restraints placing them at risk of injury and/or death. In one 1-year-period (approximately 1984 to 1994) there were 111 fatalities in New York facilities due to restraints. 3  Abuses and fatalities from psychiatric restraints has continued in the state of New York despite 1999 federal regulations against coercive and abusive restraining of patients in mental facilities. According to a May 2003 report by the New York State Commission on Quality of Care—their agency is called upon to investigate restraint related patient deaths every four months. The Commission had just completed an investigation in to the restraint death of a 42-year-old Neil Larkin who was asphyxiated after being placed face-down during a restraint episode in a mental health residential center. 4  In fiscal year 2000-2001, the New York State Commission on Quality of Care received 8,794 reports of psychiatric abuse and neglect of patients. 212 of these were episodes of abuse involving seclusion and restraints and 2,578 complaints were for physical abuse and neglect. 5  People in group homes for the mentally ill also have been subjected to abuses and fatal conditions. Between 1995 and 2001, 960 people died in NEw York group homes for the mentally ill according to an April 2002 New York Times investigation. Some residents died roasting in their rooms during heat waves. Others threw themselves from rooftops, making up some of at least 14 suicides in that seven-year period. Still more, lacking the most basic care, succumbed to routinely treatable ailments, from burst appendixes to seizures. 6  More than 8.5 million American children are prescribed powerful stimulants, antidepressants and other psychotropic drugs for so-called educational and behavioral problems that have no medical or scientific evidence to substantiate them. 7  New York State is no exception to this trend. Patricia Weathers, a mother in New York State, formed a parents group and filed a lawsuit after school psychologists and psychiatrists coerced her to drug her then 8-year-old son Michael. On the psychiatric drugs, Michael became withdrawn, could not eat or sleep and ran away from home. Recognizing that these problems started with the ADHD medications, Mrs. Weathers gradually withdrew her son from the drugs. Medical tests showed that he suffered from allergies and anemia, and when treated, his behavior problems disappeared. He is now drug-free and doing well. 8  Following an August 2002 New York Post front page article on Patricia Weathers' story, over 65 parents came forward to describe their own personal stories of coercion and intimidation used by school districts to strong arm them into drugging their children. 9  70 parents form New York State have signed an online petition on the website of the group, "Parents for a Label and Drug Free Education" (www.ablechild.org) attesting to the fact they were pressured and/or coerced to place their children on psychotropic drugs in New York State schools. Parents were coerced in towns ranging from upstate New York such as Buffalo to New York City. 10  On June 3, 2004, New York Attorney General Eliot Spitzer filed suit against a pharmaceutical manufacturer alleging the company had suppressed negative clinical study data that the companies antidepressant was harmful to children. On August 26, 2004, the manufacturer paid $2.5 million to the state of New York, agreeing to post all clinical trial data on its drugs by the end of 2005. 11  On October 15, 2004, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration ordered pharmaceutical companies to add a "black box" warning to antidepressants, saying the drugs could cause suicidal thoughts and actions in some children and teenagers. 12 1 PsychCrime website http://www.psychcrime.org 2 Erika Rosenberg, "Group reacts to shock-bill veto," Observer-Dispatch (Utica, NY), Sept 25, 2003; Douglas Montero, "Dad's Rights Zapped By Shock Docs," New York Post, June 17, 2001. 3 Dan L. Zimbroff, MD, "Clinical Management of Agitation," Clinical Update Medscape article, April 8, 2003. 4 "In the Matter of Neil Larkin*: A Case Study on Restraint, Traumatic Asphyxia and Investigations," New York State Commission on Quality of Care, 13 May 2003. 5 "Adult Abuse/Neglect Reports By Type FY 2000-2001," New York State Commission on Quality of Care website report at http://www.cqc.state.ny.us/aboutcqc/abusli.htm 6 Clifford J. Levy, "Broken Homes 3 Part Series: For Mentally Ill, Death and Misery," The New York Times, April 28, 2002. 7 John Breeding, "Does ADHD Even Exist? The Ritalin Sham," Mothering Magazine, Issue 101, July/Aug 2000. 8 House Government Reform Committee, U.S. Rep. Dan Burton, transcript of hearing, Sept 26, 2002. 9 "Overmedication of Hyperactive Children," Government Hearing Transcript, Testimony of Patricia Weathers, Sept 26, 2002. 10 "Parents are losing their right to choose," online petition with New York State signatures, www.ablechild.org, accessed Feb 1, 2005. 11 "Paxil maker will post its unfavorable test results," Washington Post, August 27, 2004 and "Spitzer turns his guns on Glaxo over Paxil child suicide studies," The Independent (London), June 3, 2004. 12 Labeling Change Request Letter for Antidepressant Medications - FDA Letter, Oct 15, 2004; FDA orders strong "black box" warnings on antidepressants used by children - Associated Press Worldstream, Oct 15, 2004.