House panel defers action on bill to track mental health patients, passes measure to amend law on defaced firearms

A House committee on Tuesday deferred action on a bill that would require outpatient facilities across the state to alert victims of crimes committed by mental health patients after they have been released from jail or into society.

Rep. Brandt Smith, R-Jonesboro, told the House Judiciary Committee that he filed House Bill (HB) 1045 because he was concerned about the growing number of criminal acts by persons with mental illness that could have been prevented.

“The primary reason I am presenting this bill to you today is simply this: the incidents are on the rise basically at our mental health facilities as patients often act out on their impulses and attack their caregivers,” Smith testified. “We felt there needed to be some system where — without going into medical records and digging deeply into that person’s history — once they are through some therapy or released from the State Hospital or a county jail …, the victims will be notified that their attacker has been released.”

In support of Smith’s bill, Jonesboro native Lauren Hannah provided a graphic and harrowing personal account of an attack by an erratic-acting mental health patient at an unnamed Northwest Arkansas outpatient facility where she worked.

Hannah said she received several serious injuries from the attack, and did not want other mental health professionals or victims of such crimes to experience what she has gone through over the past several years.

“We have no idea how many attacks happen in our state every year because once someone is (released), there is no notification system,” said Hannah, a licensed social worker. “A victim may run into them on the street and never know that they’ve been released.”

Hannah said it would be quite terrifying for her to meet her attacker after the State Hospital authorizes a release. Before her incident, she said the person she was providing therapy to at the mental health facility had attacked two other victims after being acquitted and released.

“So, I began advocating for a change in those laws, and I believe this is the first step we need for a change in Arkansas,” Hannah told the House panel. “We’ve seen a rise nationwide of attacks attributed to mental illness, and I believe (Arkansas) health care laws need to reflect … that this is a growing problem.”

In debate on how the state of Arkansas would pay for implementing the new legislation, Smith said a preliminary financial impact study shows that it would costs about $4,500 to install the necessary software on the state’s Victim Information and Notification (VINE) system to set up an alert process for the 108 mental health outpatient facilities across the state.

Brad Cazort, repository administrator for the Arkansas Crime Information Center, told the judiciary panel that the State Hospital system is already a part of the VINE system and is currently notified when a mental health patient is released to an outpatient facility or into the general population.

Besides the one-time $486,000 cost to install software at 108 locations across the state, Cazort said it would cost an additional expense of nearly $650,000 to maintain the alert system each year. “That is double what we are paying for the VINE system now,” he said.

After about 20 minutes of back-and-forth discussion about the costs of a new mental health alert system and other details on how it would be administered by the state, Rep. Charles Blake, D-Little Rock, asked Smith if he would pull down his bill for further study on how much it would cost the state.

House Judiciary Chair Matthew Sheppard, R-El Dorado, agreed to run HB 1045 at a later date in the session. Smith said once he receives a complete financial impact study from ACIC, he would seek a vote by the committee to move the bill to the House floor.

In other business for the House Judiciary’s first full hearing in the 91st General Assembly, Rep. Andy Davis, R-Little Rock, had the distinction of having the first bill to obtain a unanimous “do pass” voice vote by the House panel.

Davis sponsored HB 1039, which would amend current state law making it a Class D felony to knowingly possess a firearm with a manufacturer’s serial number that has been defaced. Davis’ bill would add language to current legislation to include firearms manufactured prior to Jan. 1, 1968, consistent with federal law.

Sen. Jeremy Hutchinson, R-Little Rock, is the Senate sponsor of the measure.