Patient Hangs Herself at State Hospital in Norwalk

A 20-year-old patient died after using a bedsheet to hang herself at Metropolitan State Hospital in Norwalk last week, according to the Los Angeles County coroner.

The woman, whose name was being withheld pending notification of relatives, was found in her room Sept. 7. She was taken to nearby Los Angeles Community Hospital and died from her injuries Sunday, said Lt. David Smith, of the coroner’s office.

It was the fifth unusual death at Metropolitan since Feb. 2004, when the U.S. Department of Justice released the second of two scathing reports on care at the facility. The last suicide occurred in May, when an 18-year-old woman hanged herself.

“Each of these is an isolated incident,” said Kirsten Macintyre, a spokeswoman for the state Department of Mental Health, which oversees Metropolitan. “They’re not linked together in any way.

“At this time there is no indication that staff did anything wrong,” she added, “but that doesn’t change the fact that it’s a tragedy.”

Macintyre said the state is looking into the incident.

Since its reports on Metropolitan, the Justice Department has announced that it intends to investigate the state’s three other large mental hospitals.

But the Mental Health Department has not allowed federal investigators to enter those facilities, saying it wants to first negotiate an inspection plan that doesn’t interfere with patient services.

Nonetheless, the Justice Department issued a report critical of Napa State Hospital in July, based on information from health inspectors.

Last week at Patton State Hospital, a mental facility near San Bernardino, two patients were arrested on suspicion of choking and stabbing their roommate to death.