U.S. v. Georgia

A coalition of stakeholders asked the U.S. District Court in Atlanta to withhold approval of a settlement that would end a U.S. Department of Justice lawsuit challenging abuse and neglect of patients in Georgia state hospitals. The Bazelon Center and the Georgia Advocacy Office represent the group, which includes the Carter Center. On September 30, 2009, the federal court dismissed the State and DOJ’s motion for final approval of the settlement agreement.

The case began after a series of articles in the Atlanta Journal Constitution in 2007described the disastrous and deteriorating situation of the state’s public mental health system. The Civil Rights Division of the Department of Justice (DOJ) opened an investigation into horrific conditions in Georgia’s hospitals under the Civil Rights of Institutionalized Persons Act (CRIPA). In 2008, the DOJ issued scathing findings of serious constitutional and statutory violations in the psychiatric hospitals, including failure to protect patients from harm, failure to provide adequate mental health care, abusive seclusion and restrain practices, substandard medical and nursing care and inadequate discharge planning.

The Department entered into settlement negotiations with the State. Although mental health advocates and stakeholders had assisted DOJ investigators, they were excluded from the settlement process. Then, in January 2009–literally in the final hours of the Bush administration—the Department and the State filed a settlement agreement in federal court. It was little more than a promise by Georgia to improve. Mental health advocates and stakeholders were shocked and asked the Bazelon Center to help organize, and ultimately represent them, in attempts to improve the agreement.

The coalition filed a letter of “objections” in March 2009 laying out areas of concern about the settlement agreement: that it did not require the State to develop an actual implementation plan to make required improvements, failed to address the need to expand community-based services to serve people who were unnecessarily institutionalized, and had weak monitoring provisions (including none by the court). The court ordered the DOJ and the State to meet with the coalition’s attorneys.

After contentious negotiations, agreement was reached to address some of the issues, and the Justice Department agreed to pursue investigations. In June the Department and the State filed a joint status report.  

On September 30, 2009, the coalition and the DOJ jointly filed another status report, expressing grave concerns about the State’s implementation efforts, its failure to develop a meaningful plan of implementation, the continued horrendous conditions in the hospital, and its failure to commit to the needed expansion of community-based services. The coalition continues to oppose approval of the settlement agreement until these issues are addressed—and it would appear that, by dismissing the motion, the judge concurs. 

See the Bazelon Center’s March 2, 2009 press release on filing of the stakeholders’ request to the court.