‘The Reverend’s’ arrest sparks mental illness debate

http://www.santacruzsentinel.com/archive/2003/April/13/local/stories/06local.htm

By CATHY REDFERN
Sentinel STAFF WRITER
April 13, 2003

A troubled homeless man has found himself in the middle of some thorny downtown issues, as has his mother, a former Clinton appointee to the federal Department of Education.
And while Jan Paschal’s federal ties may be unusual, the problems surrounding her son who has been diagnosed as bipolar and who she says uses marijuana to quell epileptic seizures are not.
Jason Paschal, 30, is known as “The Reverend” to those who travel the downtown Pacific Avenue and Church Street area. Here, he would stand all day most days for the past year or so, pulling tarot cards for those who agreed to get some insight and hopefully had a little money to pay for it.
“If he could only channel that dedication ... “ one shop owner mused.
But Paschal was arrested seven times by Santa Cruz police since last summer. All the charges were misdemeanors, for things such as using milk cartons as a fortune-telling table, disturbing the peace and narcotics charges.
His mom said while most Santa Cruz residents treated her son with compassion, she believes one officer repeatedly mistreated him, a charge police deny.
“He is a son of America,” Paschal said. “He’s not a throwaway person. But someone like Jason faces more than a normal person would face, and when they arrest somebody for having a milk carton, you have to wonder what the issues really are.
“Santa Cruz seems to me to be the kind of place that could lead this country (in better responses to some of these issues) instead of letting things like this happen.”
Jason is headed to prison this month after his April 1 arrest, his mother said. That arrest came when police realized he had a felony drug warrant out of New Hampshire and officials are willing to retrieve him.
He has eight months left on his original prison sentence in New Hampshire, but he was diverted to a drug rehab program, which he left with three weeks unfinished.
“He broke his parole, there is no question,” said Paschal, whose father was a police officer in Detroit. “But with all his needs, there has to be a better way.”
Jason left the drug program and “disappeared” after the death of his father, a contractor, she said.
She says her son does not belong in prison; that his mental health problems are exacerbated there.
At least 25 percent of those in County Jail suffer from psychiatric illnesses, said David Polak, supervisor of the jail’s Crisis Intervention Team.
“We do treat them, but resources in jail are limited due to budget constraints,” he said.
Now retired from her Department of Education position heading programs in six New England states, Jan Paschal speaks eloquently about “begging” for help for her son for most of his life, most recently from Santa Cruz jailers and city leaders.
Jason earned a high school equivalency degree and attended college in Vermont for one semester, she said. That was before he got arrested in 1998 on a marijuana charge in New Hampshire.
“Jason’s story is kind of a major tragedy,” she said. “It’s the last thing I ever thought, that one of my children would have this life. We’ve done everything we knew to do, maybe too much.
“I think one thing Jason has taught me is how helpless you feel as a parent of a child with special needs of any kind.”
Since childhood, Jason has suffered from diabetes as well as epilepsy and mental health issues, she said. His first prescription drug for those problems came at age 5, she said. Most had nasty side effects.
Police perspectives
Eric Seiley, a homeless resource officer with the Santa Cruz police, understands well how police get caught in the middle between a person with untreated mental problems and those offended by the subsequent behavior.
“There are several issues,” he said. “Are they diagnosed? Are they taking stable meds? We have a stressed system and often people don’t always (fit the criteria for involuntary detainment).”
The Santa Cruz Police Department is one of five police agencies nationwide that has started training and programs to deal with what Seiley calls the gray issues surrounding people on the streets with untreated mental health issues.
“For a lot of police officers, it’s a straight 5150 (a person with psychiatric issues deemed a danger) or a criminal offense,” he said. “We are a criminal agency and there is only so much at our disposal, but the gray area is where I work.”
Police say they got complaints about Paschal. The officer who Jan believes mistreated her son was not available to comment, but police say officers do not act on a vendetta.
“I don’t know of any officer in the county who would do that,” Seiley said.
Seiley is not familiar with Paschal’s case, but downtown beat Sgt. Jack McPhillips is.
“He was a little mouthy and a little offensive to women, but he’s an all-right guy,” he said. “He’d go behind O’Neill’s into Abbott Square and smoke pot, and he’d get caught.
“But if he wasn’t on meds, he could get real aggravated.”
The District Attorney’s Office said no local charges are pending against Paschal. He pleaded guilty to giving false information to a peace officer last year and was sentenced to 10 days in jail and one year probation.
Helping parents
Seiley understands parents’ frustrations as well.
“The system doesn’t meet their proper needs at times,” he said.
There is little a parent can do if their child does not want treatment, given the law and people’s rights, said Polak, the County Jail team supervisor.
What they can do is call police and ask for a welfare check. They can ask those who work on the front lines with homeless people to get a message to their child.
They can attend support programs such as those at the local chapter of the National Alliance for the Mentally Ill.
Polak and Seiley hope to start a program that teams psychiatric workers with police.
“It’s a hot topic now, and given the percentage of mentally ill people in this community, we feel it would be a very valuable service, despite the wonderful days of budget cuts,” Polak said.
As far as involuntary treatment, for police to hold a person and request a so-called 5150 evaluation either at jail or at a Dominican Hospital unit, they must be deemed to be a danger to themselves or others or suffer from a grave disability, Seiley said.
The criteria for forced treatment is stricter, he said.
“Jason is a very visible example of untreated medical illness in our city,” Seiley said. “There is a way we can navigate that system, but it takes time and focus on the issues.”
Tough love
Treatment programs can be ordered by a judge after a run-in with law enforcement.
Sometimes, that is the best thing for those who wouldn’t seek help otherwise, though it is “not a friendly option,” said Paul Bellina, a counselor who runs the county’s acute and forensic psychiatric services.
“I get calls from parents all the time,” he said. “And while it’s not a situation without hope, I sometimes can give only the most Draconian advice, depending on the denial of the child and other details.”
Bellina says he often ends up advocating for tough love.
“Parents will rescue and rescue and rescue their children from horrible circumstances because it’s the thing to do, that a parent helps their child,” he said.
He added that such rescuing keeps children from facing the consequences of “behavior that comes to the attention of law enforcement.”
Another issue arises when those ordered for evaluation, even those who really need help, are able to be “crazy like a fox” and pull it together in the face of mental health evaluators, he said.
Mom stays in touch
Jan Paschal says her son was doing better in Santa Cruz, despite being homeless. She says she has tried every treatment program she could find and has tried to get him to come home to Arkansas.
“He’s my child, and he may not be perfect, but he’s mine and we adore him,” she said.
“I used to have a cookie-cutter approach for what I wanted for him ... and the part that sort of amazes me as someone who doesn’t believe in the legalization of drugs, I’ve had to re-evaluate (use of medical marijuana and other issues).”
She lost touch with her son for about a year until he called the 800 number she has set up for him, saying he was in Santa Cruz.
Paul Brindel of the Community Action Board says shelter operators often pass along word to homeless people that their parents called looking for them, but have stopped confirming whether a person is there, as “people are not always who they say they are.”
And, of course, because some people don’t want to be found.
In jail, even when mom gets through to officials past a nationwide, expensive jail phone system, and gives them her son’s prescriptions, Jason is still often not able to do what jailers require, Jan Paschal said.
County jail officials say Paschal has been on an “on and off” hunger strike.
Jan Paschal said she just wants her son to find whatever peace he can, a daunting task in prison.
“If we have a national shame, it is that we give federal money to programs with mission statements about correcting behavior, but use punitive measures, pure and simple, to extract their pound of flesh. If that’s what it is, let’s call it that.”
She stressed that her son’s abuse has come largely from East Coast jailers and from a minority.
“I know the vast majority of people in Santa Cruz were kind to Jason, and we are most grateful,” she said. “But I ask others to stop and think what they would feel if that was their son or daughter in that situation.”

For information on mental health resources in Santa Cruz County, call the National Alliance for the Mentally Ill at 458-1923. To seek treatment for an inmate, call the County Jail at 454-2444 and ask for the Crisis Intervention Team.
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Contact Cathy Redfern at credfern@santa-cruz.com