As a father to five special needs children, I’m all too aware of how quickly a behavioral or mental health crisis can escalate into a physical situation.
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For Staff Writer Mica Kanner-Mascolo’s story “Every 36 minutes” in the June 2 edition, WBJ tied an online poll to the effort by healthcare providers to have Massachusetts classify assault against a healthcare worker as a felony. The poll received more votes than any other WBJ poll this year, and 95% of respondents said yes to the question, “Do you support the effort to raise the charges to the felony level for anyone found guilty of assaulting a healthcare worker?” The reader comments on the poll provided a bit more nuance, but one anonymous commenter said, “I am curious who would vote ‘no’ on this.”
Well, I voted no.
I’m well aware of the increasing levels of danger facing hospital workers in Central Massachusetts, which has a serious shortage of professionals wanting to stay and enter into the profession, so I sympathize with the effort to upgrade the penalty against those who assault them. However, I sympathize with the patients as well. As a father to five special needs children, I’m all too aware of how quickly a behavioral or mental health crisis can escalate into a physical situation.
While I’m guessing the 95% of people who voted yes to WBJ’s poll are thinking of emergency room patients who act like jerks after being told they must wait longer, my concern is for the 12-year-old boy who doesn’t understand why he is being restrained, the brain-damaged car accident victim who doesn’t fully comprehend where she is, or the countless others in extremely stressful situations experiencing some of the worst days of their lives. None of these patients are thinking about the level of criminal offense assigned to their actions. While the effort to upgrade healthcare worker assault to a felony level is trying to incorporate some nuance to account for these situations, all you need is one overly aggressive prosecutor or a police officer behind on quotas to follow the letter of the law and turn these patients into criminals set to serve five-year prison sentences.
Everyone has a right to feel safe at their places of employment, and businesses and regulators need to take steps to ensure that safety. However, we must weigh the effectiveness of those steps against the potential harm. If someone goes to a hospital looking for help and comes out with a five-year prison sentence, that’s not good for society.
Brad Kane is editor of the Worcester Business Journal.
