NORTHVILLE TWP., Mich. (WXYZ) — The state’s only psychiatric hospital for children lost a 13-year-old boy in April after he walked out of an emergency room in Detroit in the middle of the night.
The boy, at least the 17th patient of the Hawthorn Center to escape since 2020, was located hours later by a security guard nearly two miles away.
The escape is at least the third to happen since February, when 7 Action News first revealed that the hospital had experienced a rash of missing or escaped patients, with some children gone for hours.
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After police canvassed the area, the boy was ultimately located hours later by a security guard who found him wandering downtown. He was returned to Hawthorn Center 7 hours after he first went missing.
The escape happens following promises by the Michigan Department of Health and Human Services to implement new safety measures designed to stop patients from escaping.
But since February, at least three more Hawthorn patients have escaped from the secure facility.
In March, a patient with an “assaultive past” escaped from Hawthorn staff while being transferred to the University of Michigan medical facility down the road. He was missing for 4 hours.
The next month, another patient escaped from Hawthorn and this time, the state says, was recovered “within 20 minutes.”
The third escape occurred on April 20, when a 13-year-old Hawthorn patient was taken to the Michigan Children’s Hospital emergency room in Detroit after swallowing an object at Hawthorn.
But while under the supervision of a Hawthorn employee, the boy was able to walk out of Children’s hospital just after 3 a.m. He left by himself.
A Children’s Hospital employee called 911 at 3:30 am.
“It’s dark out,” the man told the 911 dispatcher, noting that the patient had been missing for about 20 minutes. “He’s pretty much gone.”
Detroit police records show that Hawthorn staff was preparing to issue a media release, hoping that wider attention could help locate the missing boy.
“They said he does have homicidal ideology,” the employee told the 911 dispatcher. “So there’s a chance he could do something stupid while he’s out there.”
Hours later, just before 7:30 am, a private security officer would see the young boy wandering around Campus Martius Park.
Police responded, confirming his identity, and the young patient was returned to Hawthorn Center 7 hours after he first went missing.
“It’s not like this is a school field trip to the zoo,” said Michelle Massey Barnes, an advocate for better mental health treatment for children in Michigan
“This was a high-risk medical placement, and someone or many people dropped the ball,” she said.
Massey Barnes is a co-founder of Advocates for Mental Health of Michigan Youth, a parent-led organization fighting for better access to hospitals like Hawthorn, and better patient safety for children who find a bed there.
“I can’t imagine getting a phone call saying I’m sorry, but your son is somewhere in the City of Detroit—lost,” she said.
But patient escapes are hardly the only black eye at Hawthorn Center.
Hawthorn staff is now the subject of a lawsuit stemming from an active shooter drill that took place at the hospital in December.
Staff and patients say they were not told the drill was happening in advance, and believed the hospital was under attack from two men carrying AR-15 rifles.
Police from four different agencies descended on the hospital with guns drawn.
“If it’s a drill...that needs to be relayed to us before we have 300 police here, putting everyone in danger to here,” said an officer on the scene, according to police bodycam video obtained by 7 Action News.
“I cannot apologize enough,” said hospital manager Victorai Petti.
Through a spokesperson, Petti would not agree to an interview with 7 Action News about the recent rash of safety problems at her facility.
The lawsuit, filed by six staff members and the parents of two children, alleges that unannounced drill traumatized those inside Hawthorn that day.
“We need more accountability. We need more oversight,” said Massey Barnes.
“I don’t understand how people haven’t lost their jobs.”
Contact 7 Investigator Ross Jones at ross.jones@wxyz.com or at (248) 827-9466.
