Insane killer escapes on field trip to county fair


Recommended Posts

The Associated Press

SPOKANE, Wash. ?

Authorities have put out a statewide alert for a mentally ill killer who escaped during a hospital field trip to a county fair, leading to fears that he'll become more unstable and potentially dangerous the longer he is on the loose with no medication.

Sgt. Dave Reagan of the Spokane County sheriff's office says Phillip Arnold Paul remained at large Friday and officials believe he's headed to Sunnyside, the town where his parents live. Anyone spotting him should call 911 and not try to confront him.

Paul was committed after he was acquitted by reason of insanity in the 1987 slaying of an elderly woman in Sunnyside. He soaked the woman's body in gasoline to throw off search dogs and buried the remains in her flower garden. He reportedly said voices in his head told him she was a witch.

He was caught trying to escape four years later, only to knock a deputy unconscious in the booking area following his arrest.

The 57-year-old Paul escaped Thursday during a supervised outing to the Spokane County Interstate Fair for patients from Eastern State Hospital. Thirty-one patients from the mental hospital were on the trip with 11 staff members.

Local officials and fairgoers said they were stunned that mental patients, including at least one with a criminal past, would be taken to the fair.

"I think it's wrong, it's totally wrong," said Jennifer Craig, who was visiting the fair with her husband and grandchildren. "You're putting too many kids and old disabled people like me at risk."

Patients must be cleared by a treatment team of six to 12 clinicians according to an extensive checklist before they can go on field trips to stores, parks, ball games, fairs and other sites, said hospital spokesman Jim Stevenson said. They wear street clothing and need not all stay together, but staff members are required to keep each patient within eyesight at all times.

"They have gone to the county fair in past years," said hospital spokesman Jim Stevenson.

Hospital CEO Harold E. Wilson told The Spokesman-Review Paul had been "a fairly model patient."

The escape led state Department of Social and Health Services Secretary Susan Dreyfus to order an indefinite halt to all outings involving criminally committed patients at the state's three mental institutions.

Dreyfus also instructed Eastern State to review the policy on patient outings and a plan to prevent similar problems.

"It's outrageous that security was so inept that a guy who's officially regarded as criminally insane was able to just slip away from the group," state Rep. Matt Shea of Spokane Valley told The Spokesman-Review.

It was the second escape for Paul. In 1991, he walked away from custody during a day trip in Medical Lake and was captured at Fishtrap on the western Spokane County line. He attacked a sheriff's deputy in the jail booking area, knocking him unconscious and separating his shoulder, and was convicted of first-degree escape and second-degree assault.

Paul, who was diagnosed with schizophrenia, was acquitted by reason of insanity after the 1987 killing and committed to Eastern State Hospital indefinitely.

Hospital officials told authorities that Paul hadn't exhibited violent behavior in years. They argued in the past that he should be released, but his petition for release was rejected in 2003.

He was described as 5-foot-8 and 207 pounds with brown hair and a goatee, was wearing blue jeans and a red windbreaker over a blue T-shirt.

Source: http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/loca...dwritethru.html

They let an insane mental patient who has killed in the past..... go on a field trip to a county fair?!?!

Umm..... HELLO???? Does anyone other than ME see a problem here?! :p

+100000000

Authorities have said they believe Phillip Arnold Paul is heading to the Sunnyside area of Yakima County, where his parents and many siblings live.

...

His brother said Paul was a high-school and junior-college wrestler and a martial artist who should not be approached.

...

The Sheriff's Office said Paul's medication should keep him stable for 14 days, not 48 hours as previously reported.

Source: http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/loca...2_escape19.html

They let an insane mental patient who has killed in the past..... go on a field trip to a county fair?!?!

Umm..... HELLO???? Does anyone other than ME see a problem here?! :p

Yes. Whoever allowed that guy to go on a field trip was clearly insane as well :yes:

They let an insane mental patient who has killed in the past..... go on a field trip to a county fair?!?!

Umm..... HELLO???? Does anyone other than ME see a problem here?! :p

You're not the only one :p

This really is an epic fail for the hospital.

if "insane" doesnt ring the alarm for the asylum director, "killer" should... if neither means anything to him, maybe the director should join them in the asylum as patients

Perhaps the director was ill that day, and one of the patients doubled for him? :laugh:

This topic is now closed to further replies.
  • Recently Browsing   0 members

    • No registered users viewing this page.
  • Posts

    • For a guy who claims to hate Farage and the ignorant, gullible, rightwing racist skinheads sponsored by Putin that his lies represent, you sure are quoting them time and time and time again, mate. I guess you're conveniently ignoring the fact that your country and commonwealth just happened to work much better when it was still part of the E.U.? Denial isn't just a river in Egypt.
    • Do you live in the U.K? Do any of the people here that are against the UK leaving the E.U, live in the U.K? If not then why are you bothered? If you do live here then it is a different thing . Brexit was a good idea, should have done it years before, it was done badly, but the idea was good. You are saying the same thing as remainers do, oh we did what Putin wanted, we listened to the lies and Farage. I hate Farage and never believed most of what he said, certainly did not believe the £350m a week for the NHS. But we did pay a lot of money to the E.U and yes some of it came back, but what is the point of paying it out for only some of it to come back? Get out of the E.U, no money to them and in theory we can use the money to do things in the country. I said in theory, but our governments are a total and complete waste of space. No matter what colour rosette they wear. You and others say it was a mistake and yet the two main parties in the U.K are not looking at rejoining the EU, I wonder why that is? I was not tricked by anyone. Makes no odds now, we are out and have been for 10 years, what we need is a decent government to run the country. All they do is shout at each other like a load of kids and seems to do nothing and make this country more into a police and nanny state. Getting more like China all the time.
    • 4TB TEAMGROUP MP44Q, 2TB T-Force G50, and 2TB WD My Passport SSDs drop to great prices by Fiza Ali Prime Day may be over, but there are still worthwhile storage deals available, including discounts on SSDs for shoppers who missed the event or are looking to upgrade their storage solution. Particularly, 2TB Western Digital My Passport, 2TB TEAMGROUP T-Force G50, and 4TB TEAMGROUP MP44Q SSD are selling at great prices with up to 23% off. The 2TB TEAMGROUP T-Force G50 is an M.2 2280 PCIe 4.0 x4 NVMe SSD with sequential read speeds of up to 5,000MB/s and sequential write speeds of up to 4,500MB/s. The drive has an endurance rating of 1,300 TBW (terabytes written) and features a DRAM-less design. The company specifies a mean time between failures (MTBF) of 3 million hours. The drive includes an "ultra-thin" graphene heat spreader that helps dissipate heat without significantly increasing the drive's thickness. It also supports S.M.A.R.T. monitoring, allowing compatible software to monitor drive health and operating status. The SSD is rated for operating temperatures from 0°C to 70°C, with a storage temperature range of -40°C to 85°C. The drive is backed by a five-year limited warranty as well. 2TB TEAMGROUP T-Force G50 SSD: $269.99 (Amazon US) The TEAMGROUP MP44Q is an M.2 2280 PCIe 4.0 x4 NVMe SSD that delivers sequential read speeds of up to 7,000MB/s and sequential write speeds of up to 5,900MB/s. It uses 3D QLC NAND flash memory to provide 4TB of storage capacity for games, applications, media files, and other data. The drive has an endurance rating of 2,000 TBW and an MTBF of 1.6 million hours. The SSD features a DRAM-less design and supports TEAMGROUP's S.M.A.R.T. monitoring software, allowing users to monitor drive health, temperature, and remaining lifespan. For thermal management, the MP44Q also includes an "ultra-thin" graphene heat spreader. It is designed to operate at temperatures between 0°C and 70°C and can be stored at temperatures ranging from -40°C to 85°C. The SSD is also backed by a five-year limited warranty. 4TB TEAMGROUP MP44Q SSD: $478.99 (Amazon US) The 2TB WD My Passport SSD connects via a USB-C port using the USB 3.2 Gen 2 interface. It delivers sequential read speeds of up to 1,050MB/s and sequential write speeds of up to 1,000MB/s through NVMe technology. In terms of security features, the drive includes password protection with 256-bit AES hardware encryption. The SSD is also designed to resist shock and vibration and is rated to withstand drops from heights of up to 6.5 feet. The recommended operating temperature range is 5°C to 35°C, while the non-operating temperature range is -20°C to 65°C. This drive is also backed by a five-year limited warranty. 2TB Western Digital My Passport SSD: $279.99 (Amazon US) Good to know This Amazon deal is U.S. specific, and not available in other regions unless specified. We only use first-party seller links (at the time of article publishing); ensure that you purchase from a first-party seller link only. Check out Today's Deals on Amazon | or our recent tech deals. Become a Prime member (for Students or SNAP) via Neowin Get Prime Access - Prime for half price (for qualifying Medicaid, EBT, SNAP) Subscribe to Prime Video, Audible Plus, Music Unlimited or Kindle Unlimited via Neowin As an Amazon Associate, we earn from qualifying purchases.
    • Yeah... The root of my comment, ostensibly, is how to spin the story via the actual technical merits of the solution! * Decentralized (aka federated) solution with built-in encrypted ephemeral message transport, * Transport via Relays (intermediary servers) with no message archival, * Second configurable pathway are actual email servers (if DNS records are programmed accordingly) via IMAP protocols carriage, * "Chat-over-Email" is the design pattern adopted; it can either leverage full-blown Email Server (must use the INBOX folder) to exchange all received messages/edits/reactions (so be weary of notifications overloads) [best practice is creating a separate email acct used explicitly for federated chat purposes!] or leverage its built-in Relay Server mechanism which actually resides on-device (by default but can be configured otherwise), * By virtue of be a decentralized/federated model, all other intermediary servers who may pass-along messages (while the recipient's final relay/device is inaccessible) cannot snoop on the messages due to the encrypted nature of contents. The intermediaries may, however, analyze the metadata due to the simple fact that routing mechanisms require hints for relay destinations. Unfortunately, whomever is posting about DeltaChat across socials are misleading with "zero metadata" claims -- especially when the Relays (according to their own technical documents) mandate the addition of chat-version metadata and other decorations in order to actually transport any message. -- Based on this summary, I'd prefer if they'd better dual-path message transport (email server add-in, federated relay engine) rather than patch-on email protocols to existing federated social media frameworks. They're frankensteining something rather than extending widely-deployed technology stacks.
    • Decentralized search result anonymization...
  • Recent Achievements

    • Week One Done
      flexorcist earned a badge
      Week One Done
    • One Month Later
      Woland13 earned a badge
      One Month Later
    • Week One Done
      Woland13 earned a badge
      Week One Done
    • One Year In
      bernmeister earned a badge
      One Year In
    • Week One Done
      Scoobystu earned a badge
      Week One Done
  • Popular Contributors

    1. 1
      +primortal
      493
    2. 2
      +Edouard
      225
    3. 3
      PsYcHoKiLLa
      148
    4. 4
      Steven P.
      75
    5. 5
      FloatingFatMan
      71
  • Tell a friend

    Love Neowin? Tell a friend!