Kevin G. Johns Jr. was in prison for murdering his uncle when he killed a fellow inmate and then, a year later, strangled another.
Now he's been judged insane, prompting questions about whether he can be safely housed in a state hospital where patients sleep in unlocked rooms and are encouraged to mingle. Fears for patient and staff safety are complicating Johns' commitment to the state-run Clifton T. Perkins Hospital Center in Jessup, just south of Baltimore.
"I can't imagine a more dangerous person in the state of Maryland," prosecutor S. Ann Brobst said after a judge on Monday found Johns guilty but not criminally responsible for the 2005 murder of Philip E. Parker Jr. aboard a prison bus.
Johns was already serving a life sentence without parole for the 2004 murder of his cellmate at a medium-security prison, where he had been sentenced to 35 years for his uncle's murder in 2002.
He remains in solitary confinement at the Supermax prison in Baltimore while public health and prison officials discuss moving him to Perkins.
A judge postponed Johns' commitment until at least June 23 to give state officials time to work out security details.
Killers aren't unusual at Perkins, where 89 of 218 patients have been convicted of first-degree murder or attempted first-degree murder, Chief Executive Officer Sheilah Davenport said.
She acknowledged that Johns' history of killing in custody "is unlike anything we have previously experienced." But she said the relative freedom Perkins patients enjoy _ and the prospect of fewer restrictions in return for good behavior _ are part of the therapeutic environment.
Nothing at Perkins resembles the dungeon where cannibalistic serial killer Hannibal Lecter was housed in the fictitious Baltimore State Forensic Hospital in the movie "The Silence of the Lambs."
"The reality is, most of the time, when patients are out of their bedrooms, generally speaking they are not restrained," she said. "They are walking around, interacting with each other, interacting with staff."
Brobst and the union that represents hospital staff have suggested that Johns, 25, remain in prison and be treated by visiting psychiatrists for the hallucinations, demonic voices and aggression that specialists have attributed to bipolar disorder, schizo-affective disorder and other problems.
Johns' attorney, Harry J. Trainor Jr., contends Johns killed Parker because he spiraled out of control after the Division of Correction stopped his anti-psychotic medication amid conflicting expert opinions about whether he was faking. Trainor said the sooner Johns gets to Perkins, the less dangerous he'll be.
Escapes from Perkins are rare _ the last was in 1999 _ but patients are discharged once they are deemed no longer in need of care or treatment, not dangerous, and able to care for themselves or be cared for by others.
Johns, however, would be released to the Division of Correction to serve the remainder of his terms for murdering his uncle and cellmate.
Yale University professor Howard Zonana, medical director of the American Academy of Psychiatry and the Law, said he has never heard of a person who has been judged criminally insane being kept in prison for treatment. He also couldn't recall an inmate successfully pleading insanity after killing another prisoner.
Zonana said maximum-security psychiatric hospitals like Perkins generally are equipped to handle potentially violent patients, and the law makes it easier for hospitals than prisons to forcibly medicate someone.
But Washington County Deputy State's Attorney Joseph S. Michael, who prosecuted Johns for murdering his cellmate, said that from what he's seen, "the only way to handle someone like Mr. Johns is to isolate him from any human contact. And if that takes locking him in a room, that's what has to be done with him."
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On the Net:
http://www.dhmh.state.md.us/perkins/index.html
http://www.aapl.org
