PHOENIX — After years of repeated issues and critical incidents, state lawmakers are advancing a proposed law that will remove the Arizona State Hospital from the control of the health department and create a new governing board to run the facility.
Senate Bill 1710, introduced by Sen. David Gowan, R-Sierra Vista, overwhelmingly passed through the Senate and now moves to the House of Representatives.
Proponents of the bill said it eliminates a fundamental flaw: The Arizona Department of Health Services (ADHS) should not be in charge of the same hospital it is also required to inspect and regulate.
“It doesn’t take a rocket scientist to know that you shouldn’t be regulating the same place that you’re running,” said Will Humble, a former ADHS director who now runs the Arizona Public Health Association, during testimony given at a Senate hearing in February. “It’s the easiest thing in the world for someone in that position to decide to go easy because they don’t want things to look bad. They don’t want to have a bad inspection report.”
A health department spokesperson said the agency “cannot comment on specific actions being considered by policymakers.”
ADHS’s full statement is included at the bottom of this report.
The state hospital is Arizona’s only publicly run psychiatric facility. It’s located at 24th Street and Van Buren in Phoenix and has about 300 civil and forensic patients.
In recent years, ABC15 has obtained records, videos, and photos from multiple critical incidents, including a homicide, suicides, and an escape. But those incidents have not shown up in public inspection reports or resulted in deficiencies and enforcement actions.
“I think that’s exactly what we’re getting at,” said Josh Mozell, an attorney who has represented dozens of patients at the state hospital. “These things continue to happen and we have the fox guarding the henhouse.”
Mozell and fellow mental health attorney Holly Gieszl said there are several incidents that clearly highlight the issue.
One of them was a homicide in April 2019.
A patient repeatedly beat another in the hallway of the hospital’s Community Protection and Treatment Center.
According to Mozell and Gieszl, another incident that highlights a lack of accountability was a suicide in October 2021.
ABC15 obtained incident records and photos, which show that a patient was provided sharp scissors and then let into a bathroom.
The two incidents above are not isolated, Gieszl said.
“Since 2021, there have been more deaths, more suicides, and more attempted escapes,” she said.
An ADHS spokesperson said the department could not comment directly on specific cases due to health privacy laws.
But generally stated, “There appears to be an inaccurate assumption that every event should automatically result in a citation or a noted deficiency for a health care institution. Regulatory authorities such as the Bureau of Medical Facilities Licensing will investigate a hospital’s compliance with rules and regulations and the hospital’s own policies. Similarly, hospital license, certification, and accreditation decisions are based on a hospital’s compliance with regulatory requirements, not based on a specific event.”
A previous version of SB1710 was introduced during last year’s legislative session but was killed by then-Governor Doug Ducey’s office, according to Humble, Mozell, and Gieszl.
Contact ABC15 Chief Investigator Dave Biscobing at Dave@ABC15.com.
