Letter to DBH

January 12, 2016                  

3801 Connecticut Avenue, NW

Apartment 136

Washington, DC  20008

Tanya A. Royster, M.D.

Director

D.C. Department of Behavioral Health

64 New York Avenue, NE

Third Floor

Washington, DC  20002

Dear Dr. Royster:

I am a consumer of mental health services provided by the D.C. Department of Behavioral Health (DBH).  I receive supportive psychotherapy and medical management provided by Alice E. Stone, M.D., a third year psychiatry resident at 35 K Street.  Dr. Stone works under the supervision of Earle Baughman, M.D. (St. Elisabeths Hospital).

I am deeply concerned about the failure of DBH to provide appropriate psychotherapy for me, which would be psychodynamic, insight oriented therapy.  Supportive psychotherapy is inadequate for my needs.

I need to remind the DBH that the D.C. Office of Attorney General and others have grave concerns about my case and my potential for violence, including the potential for armed mass homicide.

1. The D.C. Office of Attorney General affirmed as genuine and credible a psychiatric opinion offered to my former employer, Akin Gump Strauss Hauer & Feld (Dennis M. Race, Esq.) (1991) that concluded that I suffered from severe mental illness that rendered me unsuitable for employment and a direct threat in the workplace.  The employer in a sworn statement stated that it feared, based on said psychiatric opinion, that allowing me to remain on the firm’s premises posed a negligence risk to the firm.  (The psychiatrist in question, Gertrude R. Ticho, M.D. (deceased) denied ever having offered said opinion to the employer.  See letter to William J. Earl, Esq. dated March 19, 1996 (enclosed)).

2.  The D.C. Court of Appeals did not find that my former supervisor’s published fear (1991) that I might commit a mass homicidal assault on the firm’s premises and her act of securing her office against such an assault was motivated by discriminatory animus.  See Record at 41, Freedman v. D.C. Dept. Human Rights, D.C.C.A. no. 96-CV-961 (Sept. 1, 1998).

3.  The D.C. Office of Attorney General found that my coworkers’ fears that I might become armed and extremely dangerous in August 1989 (two years before my job termination) were genuine and credible.  The AG concluded that my coworkers had genuine and credible fears that I might “buy a gun, bring it in, and shoot everybody.”  See Brief of D.C. Office of Corporation Counsel at 8 citing Record at 276, Freedman v. D.C. Dept. Human Rights, D.C.C.A. no. 96-CV-961 (Sept. 1, 1998).

4.  On October 12, 2004 the MPDC dispatched 10 police officers and four FBI agents to my residence to escort me to D.C. General Hospital for an emergency forensic psychiatric examination.  The MPDC feared that I might become armed and extremely dangerous.

I urge the DBH to heed the concerns of the D.C. Attorney General and the MPDC and provide the psychodynamic psychotherapy that I require.

Thank you.

Sincerely,

 Gary Freedman

 cc: DC AG (Karl A. Racine); USDOJ (Leslie R. Caldwell)