Reports of death, rape allegation censored

The state's mental hospitals block information that was once public, belying promises of greater transparency

RALEIGH -- As reports of patient beatings and deaths in state mental hospitals have mounted, the man charged with fixing the system has repeatedly pledged to increase transparency.

But as Dempsey Benton nears the end of his time as secretary of the Department of Health and Human Services, his department is becoming less transparent, not more.

His subordinates are increasingly relying on broad interpretations of patient privacy restrictions to block public access to information about hospital deaths and reported abuse.

In recent weeks, the department has released some public records with nearly every word blacked out.

Benton declined requests for an interview. His spokesman, Tom Lawrence, said Tuesday the documents were redacted at the direction of the state Attorney General's Office.

"The secretary remains committed to transparency, but also to the law," Lawrence said.

Attorney General Roy Cooper also declined an interview request. His spokesman, Noelle Talley, wouldn't say directly whether Cooper approved of the legal justification the DHHS is using.

"Attorneys with our office gave legal advice to the client agency which performed the redactions," Talley wrote in an e-mail.

As required by federal rules, the names of patients, their addresses and Social Security numbers have long been redacted from mental hospital documents released under the state's public records law.

The department is now citing a sweeping state privacy law to remove information that had previously been released routinely. The DHHS now contends the three police departments at its mental hospitals are exempt from aspects of public records law.

After a female patient at Cherry Hospital in Goldsboro said she was raped by another patient Oct. 31, an officer from the hospital's internal police department investigated. When a reporter asked for all public documents related to the case, the department released a copy of a four-page report with all information about the incident blacked out with grease pencil.

The information was redacted because it was "too graphic," Lawrence said.

He said hospital administrators determined the sexual encounter was consensual, though he wouldn't discuss the evidence.

The department also is now blocking access to nearly all information about those who die in state mental hospitals.

Some information about the dead patients had been provided under an agreement forged after top editors from The News & Observer met with Benton in September 2007, shortly after Gov. Mike Easley made him DHHS secretary.

Under the agreement, patients' names and case numbers were blacked out to ensure privacy, but all other information -- including the age, cause of death and date of death -- would remain.

Nearly 600 such reports were released in the past year with only the patient's name redacted. The N&O cross-referenced the reports with other state records where the names of the dead are public, such as death certificates and autopsy reports.

In March, the newspaper told the stories of 82 patients who died under questionable circumstances in state mental hospitals and homes for the developmentally disabled, including people who were beaten to death or were suffocated by staff members who improperly restrained them.

After the series, state legislators voted unanimously to require the DHHS to report all state hospital deaths to the Office of the Chief Medical Examiner in Chapel Hill, which must review the cases and produce a report on each case. Medical examiners' reports are public records. Easley signed the bill into law July 28.