Assemblyman Responds to Latest Death at Napa State Hospital

A patient died Monday, according to a report in the .

The newspaper reports that the patient died as staff subdued him during an assault on another patient in the hospital’s secure wing, that an autopsy was scheduled to be performed Wednesday and that his death is under investigation.

(D-Santa Rosa) issued a statement Tuesday afternoon addressing the assault and death:

"I cannot speak to the specifics of this incident, because we don't yet know what happened beyond the barest of details. We don't yet know, for example, what the level of security was for the area where the incident took place, or whether additional security precautions could have prevented the initial action or the changed the nature of the response.

What do we know this is: for far too long, the conditions at Napa State Hospital have posed an ongoing threat to the health, safety and lives of workers and patients alike, a situation which must be changed now.”

Allen chairs the Assembly Select Committee on State Hospital Safety.

Napa State Hospital workers and their unions have become increasingly vocal about what they say are unsafe conditions at the hospital, staging several since hospital employee Donna Gross was strangled to death in a patient assault last October. Her accused killer, Jess Massey, is awaiting trial in the Napa County Department of Corrections.

In December, a hospital therapist was beaten unconscious with multiple skull fractures by patient , who was found incompetent to stand trial and returned to the hospital.

Another patient, , was found incompetent to stand trial last month for sexually assaulting a female hospital worker.