Lawsuit Over a Woman’s Suicide at an Elite Private Psychiatric Hospital

Via the New York Times. The hospital, of course, is investigating and blaming one of the heirs to the woman for contributing to the suicide, even tho she was under the hospital care and custody. A long story, so here are some snippets:

Depressed and addicted to painkillers, Ms. Farrell had checked herself into the acute-care ward at Silver Hill the previous week. Records show she told the staff she was feeling better the day she died and even asked the dietitian for less garlic in her orzo, showing that she was looking ahead.

But by nightfall, Ms. Farrell had made other plans. The orderly who had been checking on her every 15 minutes found her suspended from a bathroom door, eight feet from the nurses’ station. Black Spandex pants were tied around her neck. A suicide note was in the trash.

Now Silver Hill — a 76-year-old nonprofit hospital specializing in psychiatric disorders and substance abuse — is being sued by the executor of Ms. Farrell’s estate, himself a former patient with whom she maintained a close relationship despite warnings by her doctor that she should stay away from him. The suit accuses the hospital and a psychiatrist there, Dr. Ellyn Shander, of wrongful death by failing to protect a troubled woman from herself.

The complaint, and other episodes recounted in lawsuits and police reports over the last decade, are peeling back the veil on life inside one of the country’s more prominent psychiatric institutions and raising questions about how far a psychiatric hospital has to go to ensure its patients’ safety.

[...]

Victoria de Toledo, a Stamford lawyer who has twice sued the hospital, saw the situation differently. Speaking generally, she said, “It’s heartbreaking when someone goes in because they need help at a place like Silver Hill, and they come out worse than when they went in.”

In one case, Ms. de Toledo represented a patient who settled a civil case after accusing a hospital employee with a long criminal record of sexually assaulting her while she slept. And in a case settled for an undisclosed amount in August, she was the lawyer for a man who had his ear partly bitten off by another patient in 2003.

[...]

In the months before the trial, lawyers for the hospital and for Dr. Shander fought to obtain Mr. Kervick’s psychiatric records in an effort to shed light on his relationship with Ms. Farrell.

Judge Thomas L. Nadeau acknowledged that some records might be relevant, although he displayed concern that the information might be used to smear Mr. Kervick. “What jury would want to give money to the beneficiary of an estate who is then portrayed as a bad guy, even if his bad-guyness didn’t impact her conduct?” he asked.

Neal P. Rogan, a Westport lawyer who once defended a man charged with abetting his wife’s suicide, though not involved in this case, said the judge’s concern was legitimate. “If the jury actually followed the law,” he said, Mr. Kervick would win his case because “even if you might not like the fact that he’s the one in the will, they’re the ones charged with her care.”