Michael Hyde is so detail-oriented that he admits to consulting notes as he sits through interviews about his new book. “Like a maniac,” he laughs. “For my benefit and for yours.”

There’s a serious side to that, though. Hyde, a communication professor at Wake Forest University, has obsessive-compulsive disorder. His disorder drove his interest in the subject of perfection.

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An influx of mental patients and elderly people from South Carolina is straining the county’s budget and causing problems for other adult-care-home residents, an advisory committee told the Buncombe County commissioners during their Feb. 16 meeting.

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Mental health issues of mother, son integral to case.

Editor’s note: Child-custody cases fall under a peculiar category of the law, with special restrictions meant to protect both the child and those charged with ensuring his/her welfare.

In January, we reported on an unusual custody case involving a now 17-year-old Buncombe County boy diagnosed with chronic fatigue and immune dysfunction syndrome (see “Home for the Holidays,” Jan. 6 Xpress). At that time, we promised further coverage pending an upcoming court hearing, which was held Jan. 14.

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Patricia Murray has a calming aura about her.

It is a good quality for someone who often finds herself in the middle of the passionate debate about the quality of mental-health care in Forsyth County.

Murray, a captain with the Winston-Salem Police Department, with 23 years on the force, is a liaison to the community on mental-health issues, serving on several local advisory committees.

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Death occurred as three officers tried to serve commitment papers.

MORGANTON – The woman accused of shooting a law enforcement officer in 2007 has pleaded not guilty by temporary insanity. Her trial started Tuesday with a slew of Burke County sheriff’s deputies and the Sheriff taking the witness stand.

Joyce Smith Nelson, 62, is on trial for attempted first degree murder, assault with a deadly weapon with intent to kill inflicting serious injury, assault of a law enforcement officer with a firearm and two counts of discharging a weapon into occupied property.

The state called the three sheriff’s deputies who attempted to serve Nelson involuntary commitment papers that day on to the witness stand.

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ASHEVILLE — Taking care of former South Carolina residents who come to live in homes for the elderly or mentally ill is costing Buncombe County and state taxpayers thousands of dollars, county officials say.

In some cases, residents are recruited from South Carolina hospitals by what are called adult care homes, county officials told Buncombe County commissioners.

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Area counties’ debts from the financial implosion of Albemarle Mental Health Center will be forgiven if the counties join East Carolina Behavioral Health, Pasquotank County Manager Randy Keaton said last week.
Keaton estimated late last year that Pasquotank’s share of AMHC’s debt could be as much as $350,000.

But he told the Pasquotank Finance Committee last week that state officials have said the debts stemming from disallowed expenses would be waived if the counties affiliate with ECBH. The New Bern-based agency has been managing mental health services in the 10-county Albemarle region for the state Division of Mental Health since July 1.

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FAYETTEVILLE, N.C. — The man charged in a 2004 hit-and-run spree was suffering from “untreated schizophrenia” at the time of the crimes, defense attorneys said on Monday.

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CARY (WTVD) — Police and firefighters spent hours Sunday dealing with a very unusual suicide.

It happened on Cary Reserve Drive around 11 a.m. Police found a car with signs all over it warning of a dangerous chemical inside.

A hazardous materials team from Raleigh was called in to help, and the car was carefully opened.

Inside, emergency workers found the body of a 31-year-old Cary man who apparently mixed some household chemicals together in order to take his own life.

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RALEIGH, N.C. — North Carolina’s effort to help thousands of mental patients and prisoners sterilized against their will decades ago moved forward Tuesday as state officials announced its first hire to lead a program to determine how to compensate victims.

Charmaine Fuller Cooper, named the first executive director of the North Carolina Justice for Victims of Sterilization Foundation, will help develop criteria to determine whether patients or their descendants qualify for financial restitution or other assistance, according to the Department of Administration.

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Former employees of Albemarle Mental Health Center who lost their jobs in the agency’s financial implosion last year are now losing their health benefits as well.

Joy Futrell, chief financial officer for East Carolina Behavioral Health, explained last week that the ECBH group insurance plan through Blue Cross-Blue Shield is up for renewal March 1. When Blue Cross first indicated it wouldn’t renew the group plan for AMHC, Futrell said she and the insurance agent who works with ECBH “pushed and begged” for a renewal of the AMHC plan.

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Lindsay Hayes, a jail suicide expert and project director for the National Center on Institutions and Alternatives, a private organization that has conducted prison suicide studies for the U.S. Justice Department, said 46 days is too long to be on any level of suicide watch without daily mental health treatment.

The suicide of a Buncombe County Jail inmate who hanged himself over the weekend raises multiple questions, including the most obvious: Why did a prisoner who had threatened suicide have access to a bed sheet?

The latest suicide in a mountain jail illustrates the difficulty in monitoring suicidal inmates and preventing suicides.

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There’s more than enough tragedy to go around in the fatal shooting of 17-year-old Christian Rook by a sheriff’s deputy.

A young man’s life snuffed short before he was old enough to vote or legally drink a beer.

A grieving family.

An officer who must live with the outcome of one split-second decision for the rest of his life.

The deputy in this case, Barry Glosson, a nine-year veteran of the Guilford County Sheriff’s Office, was himself treated for what were described as “stress-related” chest pains following the Feb. 2 incident.

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Last year North Carolina lawmakers made $38 million in cuts over two years to group homes for children with mental illness and behavior disorders. Many group homes are closing and now the state is looking to place more than 1,000 of these children with foster families by next June. To take in the children, therapeutic foster parents must participate in specialized clinical training. In Charlotte, Alexander Youth Network says it’s in a good position to place the kids because its therapeutic program already has a stepped up level of clinical training. WFAE’s Simone Orendain has this report on the agency’s recruitment efforts.

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KANNAPOLIS — Piedmont Behavioral Healthcare broke ground Wednesday for a $10.3 million corporate center on Kannapolis Parkway.

The new facility will put all Piedmont Behavioral Healthcare employees, now spread between five locations in Concord, under one roof.

Construction should begin March 1 and take about a year.

Piedmont Behavioral offers mental health, development disability and substance abuse services in Cabarrus, Davidson, Rowan, Stanly and Union counties through a network of providers.

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RALEIGH — The state of North Carolina will partner with the Council of State Government’s Justice Center to take a broad look at the state’s corrections system to see if money can be reinvested in strategies that reduce crime.

“Our prison population is growing at a faster rate than the rest of our state,” said Rep. Alice Bordsen, D-Alamance, who sees the study as an opportunity to reduce prison recidivism rates.

“There’s no magic bullet,” Bordsen said. “There won’t be overnight changes and it won’t be easy.”

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It’s not unusual to see people on the side of the roads in Hickory holding signs and asking for money, food or work.

It’s obvious there’s a homeless population in the Hickory area. What’s less obvious is exactly how many homeless people are here.

That’s why Housing Visions Continuum of Care of Catawba County conducted a homeless count on Jan. 27.

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GREENSBORO — When Christian Rook, 17, felt a manic episode blow in like a storm front, family members say, he looked for shelter.

Either he would get himself arrested, as he did in December, spending 12 days in jail, or committed for treatment as he did in November, at Moses Cone Behavioral Health.

But on Feb. 2, his plan backfired, with tragic results. 

“Let’s see if we can make the news,” family members heard the teenager say, as he grabbed a 12-inch knife from the kitchen drawer.

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WILMINGTON, N.C. The Defense Department’s investigation into allegations of poor mental health care at Camp Lejeune will be independent of a Navy probe that accused the whistleblower of poor performance, a North Carolina congressman said Thursday.

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RALEIGH – Last fiscal year, the state of North Carolina spent nearly $230.9 million on health care costs for prison inmates.

Inmates, however, don’t get their doctor bills totally paid by taxpayers. They’re charged co-payments of $5 or $7 when they see a doctor.

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Victoria Whitt is the new chief executive officer of Sandhills Center.

Whitt, who has been with the center 30 years, has served as interim CEO since last fall, when Michael Watson resigned to accept a position as assistant secretary of the N.C. Department of Health and Human Services in Raleigh.

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Thousands of mentally ill patients in North Carolina are losing their services. During last year’s state budget crisis, North Carolina’s mental health system took huge cuts. That’s even as the state enters into the tenth year of a problematic mental health reform effort. Advocates say these cuts are shortsighted; patients lives are at risk, and eventually the state will pay – one way or another.

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We commend Forsyth Medical Center and the law-enforcement officials leading a pilot program to streamline treatment of the mentally ill in emergency rooms, freeing up the police officers who guard those patients to spend more time patrolling the streets. Such cooperative efforts are crucial to correcting the problems created by the state’s failed overhaul of its mental-health-care system.

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Part of the county’s consideration is that it is still about $800,000 in debt to Diamond Healthcare for mental-health services never paid for by Baptist, Moxley said.

YADKINVILLE – Yadkin County residents learned a few more details of the only offer to buy Hoots Memorial Hospital during a public hearing on Monday.

HMC/CAH wants to buy Hoots for $1.6 million — but that’s not for the hospital building. The county would still own that, and as part of its offer, HMC would build a replacement hospital in the county within five years. The company would lease the current building from the county until the new hospital is finished.

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GREENVILLE — A state medical examiner clarified Wednesday that it was investigators reviewing an inmate’s death, not prison officials, who denied access to key evidence needed to conduct the autopsy.

Johnny Lee Lewis, 55, was determined to have committed suicide in his cell May 5 by placing a plastic bag over his head and securing it with a belt around his neck. The inmate had a history of mental illness.

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