BURLINGTON — A man accused of setting a fire in City Hall earlier this week has been ordered into the custody of the Department of Mental Health after a contentious hearing, sparking debate about the interactions of the state’s criminal justice and mental health systems.
Both Chittenden County State’s Attorney Sarah George and public defender Sara Puls have raised questions about the DMH’s decisions in recent cases involving inpatient hospitalization.
Dennis Phillips, 62, is accused of setting a fire in City Hall Monday morning and locking himself in a break room with a hammer, destroying property. George and Puls agreed that he should be hospitalized in department custody. They say DMH, however, did not agree that Phillips required hospitalization.
Judge Gregory Rainville ruled that Phillips should be hospitalized.
Sarah Squirrel, the commissioner of DMH, contested the attorneys’ notion that the DMH had objected to Phillips’ hospitalization, saying it was not a party in the case.
“We simply wanted to ensure that there was current expert clinical testimony or evidence that indicated hospitalization,” she said. “Because the reality is for us, even if someone is ordered to the hospital by the court, and they don’t actually meet the clinical hospital level of care, that puts the overall certification of the hospital at risk.”
Phillips called the Burlington Police Department at 9:46 a.m Monday, telling them he was at Burlington City Hall and planned on setting the building on fire, according to an affidavit.
Phillips said that he wanted to burn City Hall down “because the fucking hospital lets me go every time to go up there they won’t help me.” Phillips had been transported to the University of Vermont Medical Center for evaluations twice in the day leading up to the incident at City Hall, and was evaluated and released both times.
When officers and street outreach personnel responded, they found a fire in a second floor hallway. Phillips had barricaded himself in a small break room, where, with a hammer, he damaged two antique windows. The damage was valued between $1,500 and $2,000.
Thursday’s hospitalization hearing had been scheduled before the alleged arson at City Hall as the result of earlier charges against Phillips for driving his car in the direction of pedestrians in June 2019. Dr. Paul Cotton evaluated Phillips last fall and determined he suffered from a major mental disease and was insane at the time of the offense, Puls said.
However, the Department of Mental Health contended that Phillips did not meet the criteria for hospitalization and expressed concern that Puls did not have a doctor or expert to testify on Phillips’ need for hospitalization, Puls said.
George and Puls argued that Phillips clearly demonstrated the need for hospitalization based on Cotton’s finding and his escalating behavior that led to the June 2019 charges, a charge for leaving the scene of an accident on Jan. 7 and the charges connected to the City Hall arson.
“He has a lot of pending cases, all clearly due to a major mental illness,” George said. “He seems to have been decompensating over time, things have gotten worse. He’s literally been asking for help and not receiving it.”
Phillips had also voluntarily checked himself into the Brattleboro Retreat just after Jan. 7, where he stayed until shortly before the incident Monday at City Hall, Puls said.
“I think it was clear that an attempt was made for less restrictive, community-based treatment, and Mr. Phillips almost immediately ended up arrested after he had been released from the Retreat,” Puls said. “I think the affidavit in the most recent case made it clear that he had made several attempts to get back into the hospital unsuccessfully.”
George said that Chittenden County Deputy Sheriff Tom Thibault testified that Phillips had been barking like a dog, roaring like a dinosaur, refused to get clothed and was smearing his feces against the wall while in jail.
“He indicated that he felt like if he had tried to transport him against his will, it would have taken force that could have been dangerous for all parties, and so they didn’t transport him,” George said.
Puls said that this is not the first case in which clients seeking mental health treatment had not met the Department of Mental Health’s criteria for an in-patient mental health treatment order. Puls said in at least two other recent cases, she believed there was clear evidence the patients had met the criteria.
In two recent cases, the jail has initiated hospitalization hearings for individuals who screeners had determined did not meet the criteria for in-patient treatment.
“The jail has actually initiated, on their own volition, hospitalization proceedings in family court, because those individuals either were already decompensated to a state that it clear they needed to be in a hospital, not a jail, or that they had decompensated further upon being incarcerated,” she said.
Squirrel said DMH was committed to ensuring that individuals with mental health issues involved in the criminal justice system receive the appropriate care. She said DMH had federal and state statutory requirements to serve individuals in the least restrictive settings possible.
“It is always our duty and responsibility to ensure that anyone who has been put in our care and custody who may need hospital level of care has an appropriate, current clinical assessment,” she said.
Puls said that while she understands why the state has a high bar for hospitalization, especially when it is involuntary, it is concerning when clients voluntarily seeking help are turned away. She said she had concerns about the results DMH reaches in its evaluations.
“It does seem that the answers that we are getting from DMH seem to be different than when I look at the law and the evidence,” she said.
George said the state relies far too heavily on the criminal justice system for people with major mental illnesses who commit crimes. Those individuals need to be in hospitals, not jails, George said.
“It is my position that the Department of Mental Health is not doing enough to take on that responsibility of not just treating these people, but also [ensuring] public safety,” she said. “It just gets put on us far too often, we don’t have the mechanism to treat these individuals in the way that they need, and they reoffend.”
George said she believed earlier intervention from DMH could prevent the escalation of mental health issues that leads to public safety risk.
“We’re constantly battling with the Department of Mental Health to take custody of some of these individuals that are clearly struggling and shouldn’t be in jail,” she said. “They really should be in the Department of Mental Health custody, getting the care that they need, and they’re often pushing back on us.”
Squirrel said that DMH does not have party status in criminal court proceedings, and is not usually at the table in those discussions. She said DMH is asking lawmakers to consider changing the policy to give the department party status, which would allow the department the right to information and evidence to be able to make a recommendation.
Squirrel said that the criminal justice and mental health systems in the state should be “working together,” not pointing fingers.
“I really hope that our criminal justice partners will commit to having productive and professional dialogue with the Department of Mental Health, that we continue to work in partnership to move forward meaningful social and systemic change to ensure that our systems work well together to meet the needs of vulnerable Vermonters,” she said.
