Watchdog highlights reports of patients sexually and physically assaulted, drugged, restrained, or killed, all in a single month, citing nationwide and global concerns.

By CCHR International
The Mental Health Industry Watchdog
May 24, 2024

As Mental Health Awareness Month draws to a close this May, Citizens Commission on Human Rights (CCHR) International, a mental health industry watchdog, examined a month’s worth of distressing reports detailing patient abuse. These accounts included incidents of children subjected to assault under care, investigations into both state and for-profit psychiatric hospitals, and the pursuit of criminal charges against the most egregious offenders. Yet, despite the gravity of these events, such instances of abuse and patient deaths resulting from negligence remain largely overlooked during Mental Health Awareness Month. It has only been through the diligent scrutiny of media investigations, lawsuits, and pressure from advocacy groups, including CCHR, that the pervasive issue of psychiatric abuse is brought to light, revealing its status as a silent epidemic.

This month, the American Psychiatric Association’s (APA) annual meeting, held in New York, discussed sexual violence in psychiatric inpatient units. One speaker remarked, “The hallmark of sexual violence is betrayal of trust.” However, as a seminar attendee pointed out, only patient-on-patient violence was addressed, and not the betrayal of a treating psychiatrist, therapist, or hospital staff member sexually abusing patients in their care. Patients are also betrayed when they are violently restrained and told this is to “protect” them.

During the APA convention, news broke of a therapist charged with multiple offenses relating to the sexual assault of a 14-year-old-boy, while being treated at Somerset County Youth Aid Home in Pennsylvania, according to state police.[1]

Shortly before the APA meetings began, a $50 million lawsuit was filed alleging staff at the Walter Reuther Psychiatric Hospital in Michigan encouraged a 15-year-old girl to attack a 10-year-old boy, while both were patients there. Surveillance video also showed hospital staff members stomping on the 10-year-old boy’s fingers as he stuck them under a locked door.[2]

Two days later, a New Hampshire jury awarded $38 million to a man who exposed a pattern of mistreatment, including physical violence, sexual assault, and prolonged isolation at the Youth Development Center in Manchester. The lawsuit sparked over 1,100 similar claims spanning six decades, with survivors alleging they were abused by state employees.[3]

Media also reported allegations of abuse, falsification of records, lack of care and “overmedication” at Brynn Marr psychiatric hospital in North Carolina, owned by Universal Health Services. A doctor and 13 former staff members, interviewed by NC Health News, indicated that staff relied on drugs rather than treatment. From January 2019 to September 2023, police responded to assault calls 116 times and sexual assault and rape allegations 129 times.[4]

The Salt Lake Tribune detailed how Utah brought “one of the strictest sanctions possible” from Utah authorities against Highland Ridge Hospital, operated by Acadia Healthcare, due to a litany of issues, including failure to report sexual abuse allegations and improper medication practices. The sanction—short of closure—mandates the facility hire an independent monitor for 40 hours a week for a year.[5] Federal regulators also threatened to terminate Medicare funding to the facility.[6]

CCHR says the meager penalties imposed for patient abuse in mental health facilities serve only to perpetuate further misconduct. Such leniency sends a dangerous message, suggesting that staff can act with impunity under the guise of mental health care. According to CCHR, there is an urgent need for tougher repercussions to deter coercive practices.

Psychiatric Services reports that the use of seclusion and mechanical restraints in U.S. psychiatric hospitals is rife, despite the traumatizing effects and risk for lethality associated with these practices.[7] However, CCHR says the problem is global.

In May, media in Switzerland reported that “the line between help and deprivation of liberty is in danger of becoming blurred,” as the use of restraints in psychiatric hospitals was exposed—some patients were strapped to their beds for six days, another “locked in an isolation room or tied naked to the mattress.” As reported, “What sounds like a horror film actually happened in two psychiatric clinics in Switzerland.” Over 18,300 people were forcibly admitted to a psychiatric facility in Switzerland in 2022—one in four against their will. Of 36,119 coercive measures, one in 10 involved restraints.[8]

In May, the Royal Australian & New Zealand College of Psychiatrists (RANZCP) held its 60th Annual Congress, themed “Excellence and Empathy, Knowledge and Kindness.”[9] Yet, in 2021-2022, there were 16,966 restraint incidents in acute mental health services in public hospitals alone, and a 36% increase in the rate of physical restraint applied to children and adolescents since 2017/18.[10] According to a British Journal of Psychiatry Open study, of 166,102 public mental health hospital admissions over 5 years in New South Wales, Australia, 54% included at least one day of involuntary care.[11]

A recent UK report found that over 2,000 mental health inpatients were subjected to restrictive interventions in one month alone.[12] Reported this month, more than 15,000 people are estimated to have died between March 2022 and March 2023, while being cared for by community mental health teams.[13]

Laws allow mental health practices to be forced on individuals, which is hostile to the intentions of the World Health Organization (WHO) and United Nations Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) Guideline on Mental Health, Human Rights and Legislation. The guideline condemns coercive practices, which include involuntary hospitalization, forced drugging and electroconvulsive therapy (ECT), the use of seclusion, and physical, chemical and mechanical restraint, as these “violate the right to be protected from torture or cruel, inhumane and degrading treatment….”[14]

CCHR says that psychiatric abuse and coercion are consistently overlooked during Mental Health Month. They advocate for the implementation of an annual report, akin to the one published in the UK on restraints and seclusion, called “Out-of-sight—who cares?” which transparently discloses instances of abuse. Such a requirement would serve to shed light on these critical issues and ensure accountability within the mental health care system.

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[1] Judy D.J. Ellich, “Child therapist charged with rape of a boy while working at Somerset County Youth Aid Home,” The Daily American, 8 May 2024, https://www.dailyamerican.com/story/news/local/2024/05/08/child-therapist-at-aid-home-charged-with-rape-of-youth-in-somerset-county/73613517007/

[2] Ross Jones, “Lawsuit claims psych hospital staff encouraged young patient to attack another,” WXYZ ABC News Detroit, 1 May 2024, https://www.wxyz.com/news/lawsuit-claims-psych-hospital-staff-encouraged-young-patient-to-attack-another; “Second lawsuit filed against state agency over October fight at juvenile center,” The Detroit News, 2 May 2024, https://www.detroitnews.com/story/news/local/michigan/2024/05/02/second-lawsuit-october-fight-at-juvenile-center-hawthorn-center-walter-reuther-psychiatric-hospital/73543117007/

[3] “New Hampshire jury finds state liable for abuse at youth detention center and awards victim $38M,” AP, 3 May 2024, https://apnews.com/article/youth-detention-center-trial-new-hampshire-1cacb2f57f4eccaeb776e712d016cd8e; “YDC Victims and Supporters Rally at State House Seeking Federal Investigation,” IndepthNH.org, 25 Aug. 2023, https://indepthnh.org/2023/08/25/ydc-victims-and-supporters-rally-at-state-house-seeking-federal-investigation/

[4]“Former employees say short-staffed NC psych hospital rife with violence, abuse,” NC Health News, 6 May 2024, https://www.northcarolinahealthnews.org/2024/05/06/former-employees-say-short-staffed-nc-psych-hospital-rife-with-violence-abuse/

[5] “Why Utah brought ‘one of the strictest sanctions’ possible against this hospital,” Salt Lake Tribune, 20 Mar. 2024, https://www.sltrib.com/news/health/2024/03/20/why-utah-brought-one-strictest/

[6] Taylor Knopf, “NC psych hospital failed to provide ‘safe and therapeutic’ environment, feds say,” Carolina Public Press, 12 May 2024, https://carolinapublicpress.org/60141/nc-psych-hospital-failed-to-provide-safe-and-therapeutic-environment-feds-say/

[7] S. Atdjian, M.D., et al., “Toward the Cessation of Seclusion and Mechanical Restraint Use in Psychiatric Hospitals: A Call for Regulatory Action,” Psychiatric Services, 18 July 2023, https://ps.psychiatryonline.org/doi/10.1176/appi.ps.202100538

[8] “Nus, attachés pendant des jours… Ils racontent leur enfer en hôpital psychiatrique,” [Naked, tied up for days… They tell of their hell in a psychiatric hospital], blue News (Switzerland), 3 May 2024, https://www.bluewin.ch/fr/infos/faits-divers/ils-racontent-leur-enfer-en-hopital-psychiatrique-2188714.html

[9] https://www.ranzcp.org/events-learning/ranzcp-2024-congress

[10] “Restraint is Criminal,” CCHR Australia, https://cchr.org.au/restraint-is-criminal

[11] Corderoy A, Large MM, Ryan C, Sara G., “Factors associated with involuntary mental healthcare in New South Wales, Australia,” BJPsych Open, 2024;10(2):e59. doi:10.1192/bjo.2023.628,  https://www.abc.net.au/news/2024-05-11/psychiatric-care-patients-against-their-will/103829936

[12] Restraint, segregation and seclusion review: Progress report (December 2021), Care Quality Commission (UK), https://www.cqc.org.uk/publications/themes-care/restraint-segregation-seclusion-review-progress-report-december-2021

[13] Rebecca Thomas, “Leaked NHS figures reveal 15,000 died in care of mental health trusts in one year,” The Independent, 22 Apr. 2024, https://www.independent.co.uk/news/health/nhs-mental-health-deaths-leak-b2526944.html

[14] World Health Organization, OHCHR, “Guidance on Mental Health, Human Rights and Legislation,” 9 Oct. 2023, pp. 13 & 15, https://www.ohchr.org/sites/default/files/documents/publications/WHO-OHCHR-Mental-health-human-rights-and-legislation_web.pdf