State Hospital escapee's capture reignites detention debate
By Johnny Brannon
Advertiser Staff Writer
Yesterday's capture of a suspected car thief who escaped twice from Hawai'i State Hospital casts a spotlight on a problem officials have wrestled with for years: how to detain mentally ill people accused of criminal acts.
Richard Ambo • The Honolulu Advertiser
After a month-long hunt, police caught 35-year-old Leonard Moore in Kahala, where it is believed he had been hiding, prowling the neighborhood at night. Fear gripped the Kahala neighborhood as the search for Moore intensified just before his capture.
Police place Leonard Moore, who escaped twice from Hawai'i State Hospital, into an HPD cruiser before transportation.
When Moore escaped last month, he was being evaluated at the hospital to determine whether he was mentally competent to stand trial on auto-theft charges. Not only did Moore escape from the hospital twice, the second time was just a day after another patient fled.
The hospital has improved security and Moore and others who pose a flight risk can be held there safely, state health director Bruce Anderson said yesterday.
But the hospital balked when police brought Moore back there after his capture. Moore will now be psychologically evaluated in a cell block instead, Anderson said.
Just hours after police apprehended Moore, U.S. District Judge David Ezra agreed to delay proceeding with a class-action lawsuit charging that dozens of people who should have been sent to a mental health facility were instead illegally kept in prison.
The delay was granted because state lawyers had failed to immediately turn over evidence that shows health and public safety officials knew it was wrong to incarcerate the mentally ill but allowed it to continue.
"Such individuals are illegally placed in a correctional facility and our liability is extreme," former O'ahu Community Correctional Center medical director Dr. Kim Thorburn wrote in a 1994 memo to other prison officials. Now in the hands of attorneys for plaintiffs in the lawsuit, the memo is one of several that point to a serious rift between health and prison officials.
Thorburn wrote of a "lack of cooperation from Hawai'i State Hospital" and her concern that "we will continue to have extreme resistance" from health officials. She pointed out one inmate who was still in prison three weeks after he was found mentally unfit to stand trial.
Deputy Attorney General David Webber said he had meant to provide the documents earlier but had accidentally placed them in the wrong file. Ezra agreed to delay the case for 30 days so the plaintiffs would have time to review the material and subpoena additional witnesses if necessary.
Ezra ruled in October that those found not guilty of a crime by reason of insanity could not be held in Hawai'i jails or prisons for more than 48 hours. That preliminary injunction, which may soon become permanent, also applies to the mentally ill who are accused of violating the terms of conditional release programs.
State health director Bruce Anderson said he was confident that the mentally ill are no longer being inappropriately imprisoned.
"Historically that may have been a problem, but not today," he said. "We certainly wouldn't want anyone in prison if they don't belong in prison. They should be in a treatment program."
The hospital is under pressure to reduce crowding and to improve plans for treating and discharging patients as a result of a second court case, filed in 1991 by the U.S. Justice Department.
At a hearing today, Ezra will hear from a special monitor assigned to watch over the hospital's efforts to comply with a consent decree the state entered to settle the suit.
Bruce Sherman, the plaintiffs' attorney in the case heard yesterday, said he believed the hospital had resisted attempts to transfer prisoners there to meet the crowding limitations of the consent decree.
"What they did was rob Peter to pay Paul," he said.
Anderson said the hospital is now able to safely accommodate all patients referred by the criminal courts and that he is confident that management of the facility has improved.
Moore may have been able to escape from the hospital because the staff underestimated him, however, Anderson said.
"I think they misjudged his propensity to run, and of course we've learned from that," he said.
Moore first escaped from the hospital on March 28 by heaving a table through a window about three weeks after he was arrested on auto theft charges and sent there for an evaluation. He was returned to the facility but escaped again on April 7 when he tossed a large television through another window.
Police caught him yesterday after he was spotted moving through a yard on 'Ama'u Street just before 3:30 a.m., said Honolulu Police Lt. Carlton Nishimura.
Moore, who was not armed, ran through several yards before police caught him. There was a brief struggle when he was captured, Nishimura said.
"We're happy for the community," Nishimura said. "The fear factor was kind of gripping the Kahala community."
Police believe Moore hid inside a vacant Pu'ulani Place house to elude the SWAT team, teams of officers and a helicopter during a search yesterday afternoon. Police found a stolen camera in the house as well as evidence that a person was living inside.
"This guy's a runner and he's fast," Nishimura said. "This guy is smart. He eluded us. Just because he's an escapee from the State Hospital doesn't mean he can't think and comprehend. He's a very calculating person."
Moore was scratched during his capture and refused medical treatment at Queen's Medical Center, Nishimura said.
Police said an officer fired two shots at Moore on Saturday after he crashed a stolen car in Kahala and emerged from the darkness carrying what later was determined to be a hammer. The bullets missed and hit a wall. No one was hurt.
Police said they are investigating whether Moore was involved in thefts in the Kahala area.
He was arrested earlier on suspicion of car theft and committed to the hospital March 20 to determine whether he was fit for trial.
Moore has 18 convictions in Hawai'i dating back to 1988, all non-felony offenses ranging from court violations, trespassing, and traffic-related violations such as driving without a license, driving without a seat belt, and driving through a prohibited safety zone, according to the Hawai'i Criminal Justice Data Center.
Advertiser Staff Writer Brandon Masuoka contributed to this report.
