More mentally ill sex offenders freed on parole

Lawmakers seek audit of mental health agency

The system that decides whether mentally ill sex offenders are too dangerous to be freed when their prison terms end has seen a tenfold increase in cases since the passage of Jessica’s Law in California three years ago.

But the number of inmates who get committed to an institution has barely budged, according to an analysis of state data by The San Diego Union-Tribune.

One reason is the volume of prison referrals rejected by the California Department of Mental Health. In 2005, the agency approved 45 percent of cases on initial review. That number has fallen steadily, to 17 percent last year.

That trend is one of the reasons a state lawmaker on Tuesday asked for an audit of the government agency responsible for screening offenders.

Assemblyman Nathan Fletcher, R-San Diego, said he wants the state Department of Mental Health to explain why so few inmates are ordered into hospitals instead of being released on parole.

“I’ve got serious concerns that (the department) is not fully executing its duty to protect the public from sex offenders,” Fletcher said in a letter sent yesterday to Stephen Mayberg, state mental health director.

Fletcher’s inquiry follows a report in the Union-Tribune on Sunday detailing allegations from child-safety advocate Marc Klaas about the department’s handling of John Albert Gardner III, the convicted sex offender charged with raping and killing Poway teenager Chelsea King.

Klaas, citing department employees who saw Gardner’s psychological evaluations, said prison officials twice recommended Gardner not be released, and twice Department of Mental Health evaluators disagreed.

Placing Gardner in a state hospital rather than releasing him on parole after serving five years for a 2000 conviction for molesting and beating a 13-year-old girl in Rancho Bernardo might have saved Chelsea’s life, Klaas said.

California, like 19 other states, has a civil-commitment procedure that allows officials to keep violent sex offenders in custody past the end of their prison sentences if they have a mental illness that makes them dangerous and requires hospitalization.

When Jessica’s Law passed in November 2006, it changed the criteria for designation as a sexually violent predator from two offenses to one, and lengthened the list of qualifying crimes. The Department of Mental Health caseload exploded.

It went from 636 referrals in 2006 to 6,705 last year, according to the Union-Tribune data analysis.

The referrals originate with prison officials, who evaluate the offenders as they are nearing the end of their terms.

Department of Mental Health psychologists and psychiatrists then look at the cases and decide which ones should get additional screening. That round of screening determines which of those candidates will be sent to local district attorneys for civil-commitment trials.

The number finally placed in hospitals statewide after that process was 23 in 2006, and grew only to 27 last year despite the high number of referrals, the data review found.

A San Francisco attorney who represents a group of current and former Department of Mental Health sex-offender evaluators in a possible whistle-blower suit against the state said the trends are largely due to the state shifting more to “paper screenings” — reviews of written records instead of face-to-face interviews by two separate evaluators.

That has allowed the department to manage the flood of cases and cut costs amid a severe state budget crisis, said the attorney, Chris Johnson. But he believes it’s against the law, which requires a “full evaluation.” To most mental health professionals, doing a full evaluation involves a personal interview, he said.

“Everybody understands the state is having financial difficulties, but if they want to change the law, they should ask Californians to agree, and not do it on the backs of crime victims,” Johnson said. “We already voted on it, with Jessica’s Law.”

A Mental Health department spokeswoman did not respond to phone and e-mail requests for comment yesterday. In response to an earlier story addressing similar concerns, the spokeswoman said the department’s screening process “exceeds all statutory requirements” and the evaluators “always err on the side of caution.”

In his letter yesterday to Mayberg, Fletcher asked how often the department does “paper screenings” and under what statutory authority.

“I am asking you to help me in this process and to be part of the solution to ensure the safety of our children from sexual predators,” Fletcher wrote.

The assemblyman, who last week announced plans for a Chelsea’s Law to crack down on sex offenders, also wants the Bureau of State Audits to examine the Mental Health Department’s practices.

Trula LaCalle, executive director of the California office of the National Alliance on Mental Illness, said she could not speak to Fletcher’s concerns because she has no firsthand knowledge of interactions between prison and mental-health officials.

But “the Department of Mental Health is overwhelmed in all areas,” LaCalle said. “Mental Health has been underfunded in this state for decades. The laws themselves may not be the problem. The problem is implementation.”